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Press Release - Frankfurt Marathon - 10/28/23

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

         40th edition of the Mainova Frankfurt Marathon on Sunday:

         Matea Parlov Kostro: How she became a Croatian Sports Star

The German roads are much to Matea Parlov Kostro's liking. Within little 
more than six months she has celebrated both the biggest success of her 
career to date and her greatest win. In August 2022 she won the silver 
medal at the European Championships in Munich which turned her at a stroke 
into a Croatian Sports Star. This was the first medal won by a Croatan 
woman in a running event in almost a century of the European Championships. 
Then in May this year she enjoyed her biggest victory so far. The athlete 
from Zagreb won the Hanover Marathon, breaking both the course record and 
her personal best with 2:25:45. This performance placed the 31-year-old 
firmly among the very best of the European marathon running elite. Now she 
will run Sunday's Mainova Frankfurt Marathon. 

"I decided to run the Mainova Frankfurt Marathon because it's a fast race 
with a high-quality field. I always feel good when I run in Germany, that 
was another factor in Frankfurt's favour. Another reason was that I am so 
looking forward to the spectacular run to the finish line in the 
Festhalle," explained Matea Parlov Kostro before Sunday's Mainova Frankfurt 
Marathon. "My form is better than ever, the performances in training are 
better than before the European Championships. I have had a slight cold but 
feel good now."

"I'm happy that I no longer have to worry about making the Olympic 
qualifying time, I've made sure of my ticket to Paris. But I want to run a 
personal best so, of course, there's always some form of pressure to 
perform."

Her first sport wasn't running but handball. "Then one day a sports teacher 
asked if I wanted to run a 600m race on the track for the school. It meant 
I didn't have to go to school that day, so I did it, not that I was bad at 
my studies, on the contrary." She finished third off no specific training 
and her talent was immediately evident. The Croatian's career was off and 
running.

At first she ran middle distance but did not have enough speed over 800 and 
1500m to make an impression internationally. Her performances over the 
longer distances were better, however. She ran 9:08.49 for a Croatian 
record over 3,000m. Road racing offered still more potential and she has 
concentrated on this more since 2018, making her marathon debut in Berlin 
in that year with 2:38:05. She had made great strides since then, 
literally. At the Valencia Marathon in 2020 she emerged from the lockdown 
of the Corona pandemic to break 2:30 for the first time, running 2:28:52. 
This ensured Olympic qualification. Competing in the 2021 Olympic, held in 
Sapporo, she achieved a highly creditable 21st place in extreme heat. She 
made big improvement on her shorter distance speed as well in 2022, running 
a personal best for 10km of 31:54 in Berlin, which stood her in good stead 
for her eventual silver medal in the marathon at the European Championships 
later that year. 

This race transformed her life. "Without a medal, you're a nobody in 
Croatia, but when you win one, you're a star overnight," explained Matea 
Parlov Kostro. "I don't earn much more money but am regularly invited to 
appear on TV programmes and people speak to me on the street and want to 
take a photo of me, especially after a training run when they've seen me." 
What does she think of the stupendous women's world record by the Ethiopian 
Tigst Assefa, running 2:11:53 in Berlin? "When I saw the time, I was 
shocked. I wouldn't have thought it possible that a woman could run so 
fast. And she didn't show any weakness during the race after 30 kilometres, 
it was astonishing." The best Europeans have in the past consistently 
achieved high finishing places and even won medals at the Olympic Games. 
Asked if she dreamed of winning an Olympic medal in Paris, Matea Parlov 
Kostro replied: "Of course, an Olympic medal is the dream. But that's not 
realistic, the African women are simply too strong."

Further information can be found at: www.frankfurt-marathon.com 

                                     ###

 

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