Kebede beats Kenyans to win London marathon

LONDON

Steady rain on Sunday replaced clouds of volcanic ash as the chief hazard to elite athletes entered in the 30th London marathon. Temperatures of 21 degrees Celsius and clear skies had been predicted for Sunday but, after a week of fine spring weather, rain fell during both races and the sky remained overcast.

Ethiopian Tsegaye Kebede complained of leg problems on the slippery surfaces after overcoming a combined Kenyan challenge to win the men’s race in two hours five minutes 19 seconds. The win earned him a $55,000 (Sh4.2 million) top prize and a time bonus of $75,000 (Sh5.7 million, for running under 2:06).

Course record

But the Ethiopian was an agonising nine seconds outside Kenya’s defending champion Samuel Wanjiru’s course record of 2:05.10 and missed out on a further $25,000 (Sh1.9 million) incentive for the record. Organisers had also offered a huge bonus of $125,000 (Sh9.6 million) for a world record.

In all, Kebede will be well over Sh15 million richer, factoring in his undisclosed appearance fees and bonuses from kit sponsor, Nike. Not bad for two hours five minutes and 19 seconds’ work! “The rain wasn’t very nice, it made my pace a little slow and because of that I had a few problems in my legs,” he told reporters.

Wanjiru’s 36-hour trip

Kebede was one of the African runners whose participation in London was threatened when scheduled flights throughout the world were cancelled last week following an eruption of ash from an Iceland volcano. The Ethiopian was forced to fly from Addis Ababa to Israel and then Spain before finally arriving in Britain.

A trip lasting a total 36 hours from Nairobi to Spain and then to London appears to have contributed to Olympic gold medallist and defending champion Wanjiru’s decision to drop out at 25km with a right knee injury.

Only two days to recover

“I started to feel pain about 20km and it became very serious,” Wanjiru said. “Travelling here was very hard and maybe that affected my knee. I wasn’t comfortable sitting on the plane all that time.” Second-placed Kenyan Emmanuel Mutai added: “We only had two days to recover, it affected my performance.”

Briton Mara Yamauchi, second last year, finished 10th in the women’s race after an epic six-day journey from New Mexico to London via Portugal, Spain and France. “Maybe I wasn’t as prepared as I was last year,” she said. “The journey to get here tired me out a bit more than I thought.”

The women’s race was won by former track specialist and current Chicago champion Liliya Shobukhova of Russia in two hours 22 minutes. Russian Shobukhova, the European 5,000 metres record holder, pushed hard in the second half and never looked extended once defending champion Irina Mikitenko was forced to withdraw after 18 kms.

“The rain was no problem,” she said. “The pace was easy but I decided to push in the second half to break up the pack.” Mikitenko, who had to train on an indoor track this year because of the brutal European winter, said she had been forced to stop because of pain in her shins. “It seems to be a muscle problem, maybe it’s because I couldn’t train for five weeks on the pavements,” she said. “The pain is in my shins but it is worse in my head.”

Despite all the problems the race still fully justified its status as the world’s premier big city marathon with organisers performing heroics to ensure all elite athletes were present. A record 37,527 runners registered for the race with 36,000 expected to finish.