Women’s Marathon – Kiplagat leads historical sweep for Kenya

27 August 2011 – Daegu, Korea – The bell rang for the final lap of the women’s Marathon. It was an alarm clock for Edna Kiplagat.

The fastest woman in the field bided her time through the first of two 15km laps around the centre of Daegu, lurking at the back of a pack which still numbered 19 at 30km, keeping a watchful eye out for any moves. There were none.

Now, Kiplagat and her Kenyan teammates Priscah Jeptoo and Sharon Cherop moved swiftly to the front. And 12.195km later, Kiplagat had the gold medal and Kenya had the first Marathon medal sweep in World Championships history. Needless to add, Kenya had won the World Marathon Cup as well.

But there was still drama to play out on that final lap. Coming into a water station near 37km, Kiplagat and Cherop exchanged positions as they took their drinks. Cherop clipped Kiplagat’s heels as they came away from the table and the favourite hit the road.

A horrified Cherop quickly helped Kiplagat to her feet and she resumed running as powerfully as before. There may be grazes and abrasions, but a gold medal salves all.

Amid all that drama, Kiplagat ran the fastest five kilometres of the race – 16 minutes 10 seconds – between 35 and 40km. She kept going at the same pace to the finish, reaching it in 2:28:43, thus adding a 1:11:57 second half to a fairly pedestrian 1:16:46 first half.

Jeptoo (2:29:00) and Cherop (2:29:14) followed her across the line to complete the sweep.

For Kenya, the women’s Marathon was the one women’s distance event missing in Berlin two years ago. Vivian Cheruiyot won the 5000m, Linet Masai the 10,000m, but no-one finished in the top 10 in the Marathon.

Now, they had all three medals. There had never been a sweep of Marathon medals before this, the best instances in the women’s events being the 1-3 by Junko Asari and Tomoe Abe of Japan in Stuttgart 1993 and the 2-3 by Mizuki Noguchi and Masako Chiba behind Catherine Ndereba in Paris 2003.

On the men’s side, Abel Anton and Martin Fiz went 1-2 for Spain in Seville 1999, Abel Kirui and Emmanuel Mutai did the same for Kenya in Berlin.

Kiplagat came into the race with the fastest time, and third-fastest in the world for the year, her 2:20:46 in London. And she won like the fastest runner in the race should, her tumble notwithstanding.

For Kenya’s great east African rival it was the opposite story, failing to add to a World Championships women’s Marathon history which has brought just the single bronze medal to Aselefech Mergia in Berlin 2009.

At Olympic Games level, it is better, but only because the solitary medal was Fatuma Roba’s gold in Atlanta in 1996.

Mergia was never a factor in the race, but her teammate Aberu Kebede stuck bravely to the Kenyan trio when the break was made. She paid for her courage, finishing 12th eventually. Bezunesh Bekele was best finisher for Ethiopia in fourth place.

Japan’s Yukiko Akaba was fifth, China’s Zhu Xiaolin sixth and Sweden’s Isabellah Andersson seventh. Wang Jiali of China, Portugal’s Marisa Barros and Japan’s Remi Nakazato rounded out the top 10.

 

 

Results:

 

MARATHON – Women