Turkish runner flies to 15th place at Seville Marathon after surviving earthquake

Just weeks after a devastating earthquake hit her homeland, Yayla Kiliç Gönen ran the third-fastest marathon in Turkish history.

On Feb. 6, a massive earthquake hit Turkey and part of Syria, killing more than 46,000 people. When the earthquake hit, Turkish runner Yayla Kiliç Gönen was in Diyarbakir, a city in the southeast of the country.

Less than two weeks later, Kiliç Gönen traveled to Spain to race the Seville Marathon on Sunday, marking her debut at the distance. Despite the horrible tragedy that has struck Kiliç Gönen, her friends and family, and her country as a whole, she managed to run to an incredible result, placing 15th in 2:29:10, the third-fastest marathon in Turkish history.

Kiliç Gönen, who will turn 26 in March, has had plenty of success in her young career, including three Turkish national titles. Her first Turkish crown came in 2019, when she won the national 10,000m championship.

In 2020, just before the pandemic put all racing on hold, Kiliç Gönen won her second national title, this time in the indoor 3,000m. She followed that up with her third national championship win in as many years, once again claiming the 10,000m title in 2021. She has since made the jump to road racing, and as of Sunday, she’s one of her country’s fastest marathoners ever. 

As Kiliç Gönen said on Instagram after her race, the result means so much more to her considering what so many of her compatriots are going through at the moment. “I would be happy if I could make the country smile even for a moment after the catastrophe we are experiencing,” she wrote. 

Now two weeks on from the earthquake, the death toll in Turkey and Syria is still rising, and aftershocks continue to impact the region.

posted Tuesday February 21st
by Ben Snider-McGrath