Jepchirchir broke away from the pack after seven kilometres and ran solo to the finishing line, beating the previous record of 1:06:11 by Ethiopia’s Netsanet Gudeta in 2018.

“I was thinking to run maybe 1:04:50, but I’m so happy,” said Jepchirchir, who claimed the world half marathon title in 2016.

“It’s difficult to run alone. If I had a pacemaker I would run 64 (minutes),” she said.

Jepchirchir’s time was more than a minute off the women’s world half marathon record of 1:04:31, set by Ethiopia’s Ababel Yeshaneh in February in a mixed men and women race.

Her compatriot Kibiwott Kandie then set a world-leading half marathon time of 58:37 in the men’s race.

Kandie also spent most of the race on his own on the 1.3km circuit in a park in Prague’s broader centre.

Saturday’s event was for elite athletes only. Prague scrapped its half-marathon and marathon weekends in the spring because of the coronavirus pandemic.