Eliud Kipchoge of Kenya, the unquestioned champion who sought to break the record for the oldest marathon, came in sixth place on Monday in Massachusetts, far behind fellow countryman Evans Chebet, who had already won the race in 2022.
Additionally, Chebet, 34, who won the famous New York marathon last year, won in Boston in 2 hours, 05 minutes, and 54 seconds, completing the double there for the first time since 2008, solidifying himself as a strong rival to Kipchoge in his pursuit of an Olympic treble in Paris in 2024.
“The conditions were very different from last year,” Chebet said at the finish, “but I felt it was still my day. And at the 20th kilometre, we said to each other with my training partner, Benson Kipruto, that it was.”
With less than a year until the Paris 2024 Olympics, Kipchoge, 38, is quite disappointed and has many questions. The steep route in Boston has a striking resemblance to what the Paris route might look like. coming year.
The double Olympic champion (2016, 2021), who holds the world record for the fastest marathon (2 hours, one minute, and nine seconds in Berlin on September 25), planned to add Massachusetts to his list of victories in the world’s most famous marathons. world.
Kipchoge got going quite soon in the light rain and light breeze, dropping the majority of the field by taking advantage of the beginning of the downhill race.
When an initial attempt from the Tanzanian Gabriel Geay failed to catch him at the 30th kilometre, he was still in the lead of a group of seven runners.
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The future podium was drawn by a second attack led by Evans Chebet just before kilometre 35, with Geay and Benson Kipruto, another favourite, managing to hang on to the Kenyan’s back for the very end.
While Chebet ultimately broke away in the final kilometres, Geay had to push himself all the way to the finish line to take second place in the sprint in 2 hours and 6 minutes and 4 seconds, barely ahead of Kipruto, who was in good shape after winning in Chicago in October. Kipruto finished third in 2 hours and six minutes.
Unlike the men, the women chose a race in groups that began slowly.
Eight runners still had a chance to win at the 35th kilometre, including the favourite from Ethiopia, Amane Beriso, who had won the Valencia marathon in December in 2 hours, 14 minutes, and 58 seconds.
However, Beriso was unable to fend off a late surge from Kenyan Hellen Obiri, a middle-distance expert who won the 5000m world championships in London in 2017 and Doha in 2019, and who ran in Boston for the first time in her career.
Obiri raced away on the last ascent before the finish at Boylston Street and eventually won in 2:21:38, beating her previous best by more than 3 minutes. She beat Israeli-born Lonah Salpeter from Kenya by 19 seconds, and Beriso by 12 seconds.
The bombing at the finish line on April 15, 2013, which left three people dead and nearly 300 injured, was carried out by two American-born brothers, and it was also 10 years ago on Monday. Dzhokhar and Tamerlan Tsarnaev are Chechen and Kyrgyz.
The majority of the commemoration activities, including a ceremony at the new finish line, happened on Saturday.
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