Baringo's Tallam dark horse in New York Marathon

IN NEW YORK CITY

With popular home basketball team, the New York Knicks, having been gored 107-101 on a horror Halloween night by the Indiana Pacers at the Madison Square Garden on Wednesday, runners competing in Sunday’s TCS Now York Marathon could be in for nightmares of sorts too with difficult weather conditions expected to prevail here.

Rains are forecast for Friday and Saturday in the “Big Apple” with Sunday’s race day expected to be rain free but nonetheless with a possibility of a shower or two and cold conditions.

The Knicks were on the receiving end of Pacers’ brilliant Victor Oladipo, who arrived at the Madison Square Garden for the match wearing a full Black Panther Halloween costume.

The shooting guard on Nigerian descent scored 24 points, including 11 in the final seven minutes.

Action shifts from the Madison Square Garden’s basketball court to Central Park for Sunday’s marathon which, apart from the inclement weather, will offer the added excitement of not having pacemakers.

The Kenyan elites here, led by defending champion Geoffrey Kamworor and two-time winner Mary Keitany are used to adverse conditions and once again start as favourites alongside London Marathon winners Daniel Wanjiru and Vivian Cheruiyot.

With no pacemakers at this marathon title-sponsored by Tata Consultancy Services, an Indian IT services and consulting firm, it will be down to how mentally strong the athletes are.

Among the athletes expected to challenge Kamworor in the mind games for the top prize is fellow Kenyan Festus Tallam.

Not quite an unknown quantity, but Tallam, who hails from Mochongoi in Baringo County, has been nipping at the heels of the marathon and hopes to take a huge career bite on Sunday.

The 24-year-old “Grasshopper of Baringo” has twice won the Eindhoven Marathon and was unfortunate at this year’s Rotterdam Marathon after a stampede at the start of the race left him worse for wear with a bruising knee injury.

Interestingly, Tallam won his first marathon in Eindhoven, the Netherlands, running as a pacemaker, in two hours, six minutes and 26 seconds.

He completed back-to-back victories in the Dutch city also winning last year’s race in a personal best 2:06:13 and looks forward to making an impact on Sunday when he runs his first race of the World Marathon Majors series.

His personal best time is just one second slower that Kamworor’s which, on paper, makes for a great contest on Sunday.

Sunday’s race will start at 4.20pm, Kenyan time, with organisers (the New York Road Runners) having extended their broadcast partnership with WABC-TV and ESPN through to 2022.

“We are so excited to extend our partnership with WABC and ESPN, which has helped transform the TCS New York City Marathon broadcast into the most compelling running event in the world,” Michael Capiraso, president and CEO, of the New York Road Runners told journalists at a press briefing here.

“As we move on to the next chapter in the partnership, our goal is to take the world’s greatest storytelling event to an even wider audience, particularly the young people who are so important to our mission.”

The race will be made available to over 650 million homes in 176 countries around the world. “We have the world’s best athletes leading the way for 50,000 amazing stories, together on the streets of the world’s greatest city with over a million cheering spectators. It’s New York City’s biggest block party and the broadcast will cover it all,” race director Peter Ciaccia said.

Besides the elites, a group of Kenyan recreational runners drawn from various running clubs in Nairobi, will be at the starting line on Sunday.