Kenya’s champion marathoner Eliud Kipchoge has won the Exceptional Achievement Award at the Laureus Sports Awards for his world record marathon run in Germany last year.
Eliud won the Laureus Academy Exceptional Achievement Award for winning the fastest time ever in a marathon in Berlin with a time of 2 hours 1 min 39 seconds. He broke the previous record by a massive 1 min 18 seconds.
This is what Eliud Kipchoge had to say when he was accepting the award in Monaco “I want to thank all my fans across all social media platforms, I thank everyone especially those who love the sport. A running world or a sporting world is a peaceful world; a sporting world is a healthy world, a sporting world is a wealthy world, a sporting world is an enjoyable world,”
Kipchoge had been nominated for the Sportsman of the Year Award alongside French World Cup winner Kylian Mbappe, Croatian captain and FIFA best player Luka Modric, basketball star LeBron James and five-time Formula One world champion Lewis Hamilton. The category was won by Serbian Tennis player Novak Djokovic.
Other winners on the night include USA Gymnast Simone Billes, who won the Sportswoman of the year Award and Golfer Tiger Woods won the Comeback of the Year award. FIFA World Cup winners France became the first national football team to win a second World Team of the Year Award and legendary football manager Arsène Wenger received the Laureus Lifetime Achievement Award for his contribution to football during his 22 years as manager of Arsenal.