Running News Daily

Athletics coach explains the headache he faced selecting Kenya’s marathon team for Paris Olympics

The veteran coach has explained the challenges he had to overcome to settle on the provisional marathon squad that will represent Kenya at the Paris 2024 Olympics

Veteran athletics coach Julius Kirwa has revealed how he faced a difficult time narrowing down to 20 athletes who will represent Kenya at the Paris 2024 Olympics.

Athletics Kenya (AK) named a provisional squad of 20 (10 men and as many women) with marathon great Eliud Kipchoge, world record holder Kelvin Kiptum, Boston and New York Marathon champion Hellen Obiri as well as three-time world half marathon champion Peres Jepchirchir among the big names included.

While the selection was based heavily on world ranking and athletes’ performances in major marathons, Kirwa admits it was a herculean task given the many good runners in the country.

“We are selecting them based on their time and world ranking. We are allowed to field three athletes only and in Kenya, we have about 120 athletes who are capable of representing the country,” said Kirwa.

“Other countries have a few to pick from but here, it has not been easy. I have taken a lot of time monitoring and some are still coming up like Alexander Mutiso ran very well in Valencia [finished second in 2:03:11 on Sunday] but it was too late to put in someone.

“We followed the world ranking and in Kenya we have Kiptum leading then Eliud so there was no need of jumping. We follow that way unless someone withdraws and you go to the next best ranked runner.”

Besides Kipchoge and Kiptum, Vincent Ngetich, second at the Berlin Marathon this year, Rotterdam Marathon runners-up Timothy Kiplagat, former Chicago and Boston Marathon champion Benson Kipruto, Bernard Koech, two-time New York Marathon champion Geoffrey Kamworor, Cyprian Kotut, 2022 London Marathon champion Amos Kipruto and Titus Kipruto also made the list.

The women’s team has Obiri and Jepchirchir as well as former world record holder Brigid Kosgei, Tokyo Marathon champion Rosemary Wanjiru, former world champion Marathon Ruth Chepng’etich, former world half marathon record holder Joycilline Jepkosgei, Sheila Chepkirui, Judith Jeptum Korir, Selly Chepyego and Sharon Lokedi.

However, world ranking was not the only consideration given Joshua Belet and Ronald Korir, who who are ahead of Kamworor on the rankings, missed out same as Dorcas Chepchirchir and Jackline Chelal.

AK explained that they also looked at consistency, championship mentality and the attitude of the athletes before setting on the squad.

Athletics Kenya has selected its Provisional Marathon team for the Paris Olympics

Athletics Kenya has named it’s Provisional Marathon Team towards Paris 2024 Olympic Games next year through Competitions Director Mr. Mutwii.

Although AK has released a list of 10 men and 10 Women, the team will be scaled down to 5 in January, 3 to compete and 2 Reserves.

Marathon Men

Eliud Kipchoge

Kelvin Kiptum

Vincent Ngetich

Timothy Kiplagat

Benson Kipruto

Bernard Koech

Geoffrey Kamworor

Cyprian Kotut

Amos Kipruto

Titus Kipruto

Marathon Women

Ruth Chepngetich 

Rosemary Wanjiru 

Joycilline Jepkosgei 

Sheila Chepkirui 

Peres Jepchirchir 

Judith Jeptum Korir 

Selly Chepyego 

Hellen Obiri 

Sharon Lokedi

 Brigid Kosgei

Lots of exciting racing on the streets of New York City and a new course record

Hellen Obiri timed her kick to perfection to win a thrilling women’s race and Tamirat Tola broke the course record for a dominant men’s title triumph at the TCS New York City Marathon, a World Athletics Platinum Label event, on Sunday (5).

Claiming their crowns in contrasting styles, Obiri sprinted away from Letesenbet Gidey and Sharon Lokedi in Central Park and crossed the finish line in 2:27:23, winning by six seconds, while Tola left his rivals far behind with 10km remaining in a long run for home. Clocking 2:04:58, he took eight seconds off the course record set by Geoffrey Mutai in 2011 to claim his first win in the event after fourth-place finishes in 2018 and 2019.

While super fast times have dominated recent major marathon headlines, the focus in New York was always more likely to be the battles thanks to the undulating course and competitive fields, although the men's race ended up being the quickest in event history.

The women’s race was particularly loaded. Kenya’s Lokedi returned to defend her title against a strong field that featured Boston Marathon winner Obiri, 10,000m and half marathon world record-holder Gidey, and former marathon world record-holder Brigid Kosgei, while Olympic champion Peres Jepchirchir was a late withdrawal following the leg injury she sustained a week before the race.

There was no clear pre-race favourite and that remained the case right up to the closing stages, with many of the leading contenders locked in a fierce fight after a tactical 26 miles.

The pace was conservative in the first half, with a series of surges but no big moves. Eleven of the 14 members of the field remained together at half way, reached in 1:14:21. It set the scene for a final flurry, with the pace having gradually slowed after 5km was passed by the leaders in 17:23, 10km in 34:35 and 15km in 52:29.

Obiri, Lokedi and Kosgei were all firmly part of that group, along with their Kenyan compatriots Edna Kiplagat, Mary Ngugi-Cooper and Viola Cheptoo. Ethiopia’s Gidey was happy to sit at the back of the pack, with USA’s Kellyn Taylor and Molly Huddle taking it in turns to push the pace.

The tempo dropped again as the lead group hit the quiet of Queensboro Bridge, with the 25km mark reached in 1:28:39. But the group forged on, hitting 30km in 1:47:06 and 35km in 2:04:45.

Then Cheptoo made a move. The 2021 New York runner-up managed to create a gap but Obiri was the first to react and covered it gradually. Gidey followed and as Cheptoo surged again, Obiri and Gidey ran side-by-side behind her. It wasn’t decisive, though, and soon Lokedi and Kosgei were able to rejoin them.

As the group hit 24 miles in Central Park, Lokedi was running alongside Obiri and Cheptoo, with Gidey and Kosgei just behind. The pace picked up again but each time Kosgei was dropped, she managed to claw her way back – Lokedi leading from Gidey, Obiri and Kosgei with one mile to go.

Looking determined, two-time world 5000m champion Obiri saw her chance and began to stride for the finish. Being chased by Gidey and with Lokedi four seconds back, she kicked again at the 26-mile mark and couldn’t be caught, using her superb finishing speed to extend her winning margin to six seconds.

It was a brilliant return for Obiri, who finished sixth when making her marathon debut in New York last year and who went on to win the Boston Marathon in April. She becomes the first women since Ingrid Kristiansen in 1989 to complete the Boston and New York marathon title double in the same year.

Gidey followed Obiri over the finish line in 2:27:29, while Lokedi was third in 2:27:33, Kosgei fourth in 2:27:45 and Ngugi-Cooper fifth in 2:27:53.

"It's my honour to be here for the second time. My debut here was terrible for me. Sometimes you learn from your mistakes, so I did a lot of mistakes last year and I said I want to try to do my best (this year)," said Obiri.

"It was exciting for me to see Gidey was there. I said, this is like track again, like the World Championships in 2022 (when Gidey won the 10,000m ahead of Obiri)."

Tola finishes fast

The men’s race also started off at a conservative pace but by 20km a lead group of Tola, Yemal Yimer, Albert Korir, Zouhair Talbi and Abdi Nageeye had put the course record of 2:05:06 set 12 years ago back within reach.

Most of the field had been together at 5km, reached by the leaders in 15:28, and 10km was passed in 30:36. Then a serious surge in pace led to a six-strong breakaway pack, with Ethiopia’s Tola, Yimer and Shura Kitata joined by Kenya’s Korir, Dutch record-holder Nageeye and Morocco’s Talbi.

Kitata managed to hang on to the back of the pack for a spell but was dropped by 20km, reached by the leaders in 59:34.

The half way mark was passed by that five-strong lead group in 1:02:45, putting them on a projected pace just 24 seconds off of Mutai’s course record.

Tola – the 2022 world marathon champion – surged again along with Yimer, who was fourth in the half marathon at last month’s World Road Running Championships in Riga, and Korir, the 2021 champion in New York. They covered the 5km split from 20km to 25km in 14:41, a pace that Nageeye and Talbi couldn’t contend. It also turned out to be a pace that Korir couldn’t maintain and he was the next to drop, leaving Tola and Yimer to power away.

After an even quicker 5km split of 14:07, that leading pair had a 25-second advantage over Korir by 30km and Tola and Yimer were well on course record pace as they clocked 1:28:22 for that checkpoint. Tola was a couple of strides ahead as they passed the 19-mile mark, but Yimer was fixed on his heels.

The next mile made the difference. By the 20-mile marker Tola had a six-second advantage and looked comfortable, with Korir a further 45 seconds back at that point and Kitata having passed Nageeye and Talbi.

Then Yimer began to struggle. He was 33 seconds back at 35km, reached by Tola in 1:42:51, and he had slipped to fourth – passed by Korir and Kitata – by 40km.

Tola reached that point in 1:58:08, almost two minutes ahead of Korir, and more than four minutes ahead of Yimer, and he maintained that winning advantage all the way to the finish line.

With his time of 2:04:58, Tola becomes the first athlete to dip under 2:05 in the New York City Marathon. Korir was second in a PB of 2:06:57, while Kitata was third in 2:07:11. Olympic silver medallist Nageeye finished fourth in 2:10:21 and Belgium’s Koen Naert came through for fifth in 2:10:25.

"I am happy to win the New York City Marathon for the first time," said Tola. "It's the third time for me to participate, after two times finishing fourth. Now, I'm happy."

How Hellen Obiri plans to conquer Sunday's New York City Marathon

Hellen Obiri will be banking on the lessons learned from her past two marathons to make a statement in the streets of New York City.

Reigning Boston Marathon champion Hellen Obiri made her long-awaited marathon debut in the streets of New York City last year and there are a lot of lessons she learned from that race.

Obiri plans to use the lessons to her advantage as she takes on a very strong field that has been assembled for this year’s edition of the race.

She finished sixth in her debut, clocking a Personal Best time of 2:25:49 which she improved when running at the Boston Marathon. 

“Last year was my debut and, in that case, I was prepared for anything to happen. I learned to be patient and wait for the right time to kick," she said. 

"I also realized that taking a lot of drinks helps a lot during the race. Last year, I thought running a marathon was the same as running on the track but now I have a lot of experience from Boston too. This gives me a lot of motivation to do well."

The two-time World 5000m champion also expressed her happiness to be back in the streets of New York to accomplish her mission.

She explained that she missed out on what she was supposed to do last year and she has returned to show the world that anything is capable. 

“I’m so happy to be back because last year I missed out on what I was supposed to do. I am back to show that I can also do these things,” Obiri said.

She will be battling for top honors against defending champion Sharon Lokedi who is the form of her life. Former world marathon record holder Brigid Kosgei will also be in the mix with the hope of bouncing back.

Olympic champion, Peres Jepchirchir suffered a calf injury during her last session of training and she is yet to confirm whether she will be running.

Ethiopia’s Letesenbet Gidey will also be in the mix after a challenging time at the World Championships in Budapest, Hungary where she failed to defend her 10,000m world title.

Peres Jepchirchir pulls out of New York City Marathon

Peres Jepchirchir has pulled out of the 52ndd edition of the New York City Marathon, a Platinum Label marathon and the last of six World Marathon Majors slated for this Sunday (5).

Jeochirchir who is the women-only world record holder was injured on Saturday during the workouts making it impossible for her to race on Sunday in New York.

The 30 year-old won this race two years ago in a time of 2:22.39 beating her compatriot Viola Cheptoo to second place in 2:22.44 with former world half marathon record holder Yashaneh Ababel from Ethiopia wrapping up the podium three finishes in 2:22.52.

The three time world half marathon champion was to face-off with her compatriots led by defending champion Sharon Lokedi, reigning Boston Marathon champion, Hellen Obiri, former world marathon record holder Brigid Kosgei.

Jepchirchir who was the first athlete to win the Olympic gold medal and the New York City Marathon in the same year was also to face the oldest-ever winner of a World Marathon Major (male or female) Edna Kiplagat, who be making her sixth TCS New York City Marathon appearance aged 43yrs old and the 2014 World Half Marathon silver medalist, Mary Wacera Ngugi who comes to this race with a life time best of 2:20.22 that she got last year at the London Marathon where she finished in seventh place.

Jepchirchr who won the Great North Run beating Lokedi to second and defending her World half marathon title in Riga with a course record time of 1:07.25, has been battling with a hip injury since last year that even prevented her from the 2022 World Athletics Championships in Oregon.

Americans Kellyn Taylor and Molly Huddle Are Ready to Race the New York City Marathon

The women's professional lineup for the 2023 New York City Marathon on November 5 packs a wallop. Barring any late withdrawals, we can look forward to a showdown among a defending champion, an Olympic champion, a former marathon world record holder, the current half marathon world record holder, and the 2023 Boston Marathon champion.

While fast times aren't usually the main objective in New York, a race that traditionally favors tactics and competition over pace on an undulating 26.2-miles through the city's five boroughs, we just may see the course record--2:22:31, set all the way back in 2003--go down. 

Last year's surprise winner Sharon Lokedi of Kenya is returning to defend her title. The 2022 race was her debut at the distance and she aced her first test in 2:23:23, though since then, she's coped with a foot injury that kept her out of the Boston Marathon in April. Hellen Obiri, also of Kenya, is back, too--her first attempt at the marathon was also last year in New York, finishing sixth (2:25:49). Obiri went on to win the 2023 Boston Marathon in April, lowering her personal best to 2:21:38.

Kenyan Brigid Kosgei, who broke the marathon world record in 2019, finishing Chicago in 2:14:04 (since bettered in September at the Berlin Marathon by Ethiopian Tigst Assefa in 2:11:53) is also returning from injury after dropping out of the 2023 London Marathon in the first mile.

Joining these top contenders are 2021 Olympic marathon champion Peres Jepchirchir, also of Kenya, who won the 2021 New York City and 2022 Boston marathons and owns a 2:17:16 personal best, and Ethiopia's Letesenbet Gidey, the 2022 world champion in the 10,000 meters, ran the fastest marathon debut in history at the 2022 Valencia Marathon with a 2:16:49 effort.

The American women's field this year is small, because most athletes opted for earlier fall races, like the Chicago Marathon, to allow for more recovery time before training begins for the U.S. Olympic Trials, scheduled for February 3, 2024, in Orlando, Florida. But Molly Huddle and Kellyn Taylor are each making their return to the distance on Sunday after giving birth to their daughters in 2022--Huddle welcomed Josephine in April and Taylor welcomed Keagan in December (in addition to their eldest daughter, who is 13 years old, the Taylor family adopted a five-year-old son and almost-two-year-old daughter, growing the family to four children in the past 13 months).

Huddle, 39, and Taylor, 37, both said it was important to them to get in a healthy marathon training cycle and race experience prior to the U.S. Olympic Trials, to get back in the routine and fitness they'll utilize in preparation for 2024.

"Obviously you want to be able to finish 26.2 miles and have that fresh in your mind, but also the buildup, the marathon work--I've gotten pretty far away from that just with the pregnancy and postpartum," said Huddle, a two-time Olympian in the 5,000 and 10,000 meters, who placed third at the 2016 New York City Marathon (2:28:13) in her debut at the distance. "This is supposed to be a building block toward the workload that you need for the Trials--I'm going to have to try and inch my way back a little closer to what I'd ideally do for a marathon buildup."

Huddle hasn't started a marathon since the 2020 Trials in Atlanta, which she dropped out of at the 21-mile mark. She hasn't finished a marathon since April 2019, when she lowered her personal best to 2:26:33 with a 12th-place finish at the London Marathon. However, she did run two relatively fast half marathons this year, including a fifth-place, 1:10:01 effort at the Houston Half Marathon in January.

Taylor's last marathon was two years ago in New York, where she placed sixth in 2:26:10. In September, she finished seventh in the U.S. 20K Championships in New Haven, Connecticut, in 1:08:04.

Going into the 2023 New York City Marathon, here's what the two top Americans had to say as they reflected on their postpartum experiences and goals for their first 26.2-mile race back:

They would have preferred to race the Chicago Marathon because of the timing.

Huddle, who is the former American record holder in the half marathon, 5,000 meters, and 10,000 meters, was hoping to make her postpartum comeback on a flatter, faster course like the October 8 Chicago Marathon, which would have also afforded an additional three weeks of time until the U.S. Olympic Trials. Taylor, who placed eighth at the 2020 Trials in Atlanta and owns three top-10 finishes in New York, agreed that Chicago's timing would've been more ideal. Neither of them were accepted into the professional field, however.

"We birthed humans. We were still running--it's not like we've been sitting on the couch eating Cheetos for a year," Taylor said. "It didn't work out and that's fine. I'll go where I'm wanted, so it doesn't really bother me that much--we'll still have 11 weeks until the Trials, and New York's my favorite marathon, hands down. I love the course. I love the people."

Huddle is also looking forward to racing in New York.

"They've always been happy to have me and that was important. I love racing through the city," she said. "My only concern was it's a very challenging course and there probably won't be any PRs happening, so I'll have to chase that later in the next year and a half."

A spokesperson for the Chicago Marathon said in an email message, in part, that the race officials "weigh many factors including performance standards, athlete interest, event resources, and operational considerations," when choosing athletes to accept into the professional race each year. "While our goal is to host as many athletes as possible, there are years where demand to participate exceeds the resources available and operational needs to host a professional race," the spokesperson wrote.

Huddle attributes her injury in the spring (mostly) to breastfeeding.

In March, Huddle experienced her first major bone injury of her career--a femoral stress fracture--which took her out of training for three months. After talking with her medical team, she's fairly convinced that her dietary needs weren't being met while breastfeeding. Since then, she's learned to adjust her fueling to account for what she loses not only to training, but also feeding her daughter.

"I refer to it as my body's new rules, because old me always knew how to fuel and I knew what I could handle workload-wise," Huddle said. "Now there is just more taxing the system and there's less time to mindfully refuel."

Taylor is finding much more camaraderie this time around.

When Taylor had her first daughter 13 years ago, not many fellow competitors had children. This time, however, she is finding a plethora of support from elite distance running moms.

In 2010, pro athletes also couldn't find much, if any, information about how to safely train through pregnancy and postpartum. And although solid research still lags, plenty of athletes are ready and willing to share their experiences with each other, which Taylor didn't have the first time around.

"It's become really helpful to be able to text each other and just directly ask how they handled one thing or another," Taylor says. "There isn't necessarily a lot of information, but with the network of athletes that have kids, I feel like there's more coming out now."

Huddle and Taylor each took a bit more conservative approach to training for New York this time. In the past, Taylor's peak weekly mileage could go as high as 130, but this time around she topped out around 112 miles. Similarly, Huddle's mileage prior to pregnancy would hit around 115 and this time she kept it to about 80 miles per week and substituted an Elliptigo session for a second run some days.

Their goals for Sunday run the gamut.

Despite a severe lack of sleep, Taylor's recovery from pregnancy and childbirth has gone exceedingly smoothly, she said, emphasizing that everybody's return is different and she believes she just lucked out with her genetics.

Knowing that she'll face a stellar international field on Sunday, Taylor is ready to run an aggressive race, targeting a 2:23 finish. (Her personal best is 2:24:29 from 2018 at Grandma's Marathon in Duluth Minnesota, but that was before the adventure of super shoes.)

"I think I'm in a really good position. I think I have the potential to run really well," said Taylor, who will wear Hoka Rocket X 2 shoes. "I think I can run 2:23 on a good day and that could put me in the hunt to do something, depending on how the race plays out."

Huddle has more of a wait-and-see approach, though, she notes, it is the first marathon in which she'll race in super shoes. She'll race in the Saucony Endorphin Elite shoes.

"I just don't think I'm going to be hanging with the world record holders, so I'm going to let them go do their thing," Huddle said. "I'm just focusing more on myself and just seeing what I can do."

It'll be a learning experience for the U.S. Olympic Trials.

The duo will each have a bigger fanbase than ever with their families coming to New York to support them. It's also an opportunity to see how they can organize the logistics of racing, childcare, and race prep ahead of the Trials in February.

Huddle, who is also raising money for &Mother, a nonprofit organization that supports athletes who pursue their career goals while parenting, as part of her marathon experience on Sunday, is hoping she will be done breastfeeding by February, but New York will serve as a test run in case she is not.

"I think it'll be interesting just seeing what the routine is like with my family, how we're going to shuffle everyone around with childcare and sleeping arrangements," Huddle said.

For Taylor, an additional hotel room was necessary to accommodate the whole family--and she couldn't be happier to have everybody there.

"It's going to be complete chaos," she said, laughing. "My parents are coming, so they're going to be the saving graces."

Lokedi keen to defend New York title as she faces off with Jepchichir, Obiri

Lokedi keen to defend New York title as she faces off with Jepchichir, Obiri.

The 2022 New York City Marathon winner Sharon Lokedi will be seeking to defend her title against a formidable women's field during the 52nd edition of the marathon slated for Sunday.

Lokedi won the race in what was her marathon debut last year, pulling away in the final two miles to finish the race in 2:23:23.

She became the eighth athlete to win the race on debut. She has, however, been dealing with an injury for the better part of the year, which forced her to withdraw from the Boston Marathon in April.

Lokedi will be up against the 2020 Tokyo Olympic gold medalist Peres Jepchirchir who will be eyeing the top prize. The 30-year-old is the only athlete to win the Olympics, the New York City Marathon and Boston Marathon.

The two-time World Half Marathon gold medalist had been unbeaten since winning Boston last year until Dutch runner Sifan Hassan defeated her in London last April.

Joining the duo will be two-time Olympic silver medalist Hellen Obiri who is fresh from a triumphant display in the Boston Marathon.

Also in the fold will be the former world record holder Brigid Kosgei and veteran Edna Kiplagat who is a two-time world champion, Boston, London, and New York City winner.

The Kenyan squad will face stiff competition from Ethiopia’s Letesenbet Gidey who is a 10,000m and half-marathon world record holder.

She will be making her New York City Marathon debut after her 2022 victory in Valencia in 2:16:49, which is the fastest women’s marathon debut in history.

Yalemzerf Yehualaw from Ethiopia and USA’s double Olympian Molly Huddle will also be in contention for the title.

Leading the men’s elite race will be 2021 winner Albert Korir who will be seeking to duplicate his heroics during the 2021 edition.

He will be joined by Edwin Cheserek who is a 17-time NCAA (National Collegiate Athletics Association) cross country champion.

2023 World Athletics Championship silver medalist Maru Teferi of Israel will be seeking to upset the Kenyan contingent as well as Ethiopia’s Mosinet Geremew.

Netherlands’s Olympic silver winner Abdi Nageeye and 2021 New York Marathon champion and Morocco's Zouahir Talbi will also be eyeing the top spot.

Three elite athletes have, however,  pulled out of the race including the defending champion Evans Chebet, his Kenyan compatriot Geoffrey Kamworor and Ethiopian Gotytom Gebreslase.

Reigning Olympic marathon champion Peres Jepchirchir will be eyeing her second win in the streets of New York and she will be banking on her super shoes to propel her to victory

Peres Jepchirchir is banking on her Ksh 75,275 super shoes to propel her to victory at the New York City Marathon.

Reigning Olympic marathon champion Peres Jepchirchir is one of the key headliners at Sunday’s New York City Marathon.

Jepchirchir will be eyeing her second win in the streets of New York and she will be banking on her super shoes to propel her to victory.

The 2022 Boston Marathon champion clinched her first victory in the streets of New York in 2021 and intended to defend her title last year but an injury setback saw her postpone her title defense to this year.

She hopes her super shoes will work wonders for her like they did for Tigst Assefa who broke the women’s world record at the Berlin Marathon. The super shoes also worked for Kelvin Kiptum on his way to victory at the Chicago Marathon where he also broke the world record.

Because she’s sponsored by Adidas, she had preliminary access to the recently-released Adizero Adios Pro Evo 1—the ultralight but expensive, Ksh 75,275, the latest player in the super shoe game. She used the shoes while winning at the World Road Running Championships in Riga, Latvia.

“I was one of the early testers for the shoe when Adidas was first developing it. I was impressed by how much technology was in the shoe, despite it being so light.

I expect (the shoe) to continue to help me achieve my peak performance I am confident these shoes give me the best possible chance of winning in New York,” she told Runner’s World.

Jepchirchir also explained that the streets of New York are one of her favorite places to run and she will be keen to record her second win.

She opened her season with a third-place finish at the London Marathon before winning the Half Marathon in Riga.

More imminently, Jepchirchir has her sights set on earning her second New York City Marathon title. She says she’s excited to do some people-watching and take in the views of the city, but above all, she’ll look to capitalize on her fitness.

Coming out of an injury setback, she wants to test her prowess one more time against a strong field.

“I am finally feeling like my strongest self again. I am eager to show what I can achieve in one of my favorite races in the world,” she said.

24 Hours with One of the World’s Best Marathoners

As the 2023 Boston Marathon winner and Olympian Hellen Obiri puts final touches on her build for the NYC Marathon, she’s aiming to become the seventh woman ever to win two majors in one year

Four weeks out from competing in the 2023 New York City Marathon, one of the world’s most prestigious road races, an alarm clock gently buzzes, signaling the start of the day for 33-year-old Hellen Obiri.

Despite having rested for nearly nine hours, Obiri, a two-time world champion from Kenya, says the alarm is necessary, otherwise she can oversleep. This morning’s training session of 12 miles at an easy pace is the first of two workouts on her schedule for the day as she prepares for the New York City Marathon on November 5.

The race will be her third attempt in the distance since she graduated from a successful track career and transitioned into road racing in 2022. Obiri placed sixth at her marathon debut in New York last November, finishing in 2:25:49.

“I was not going there to win. I was there to participate and to learn,” she says, adding that the experience taught her to be patient with the distance. This time around in New York, she wants to claim the title.

Obiri drinks two glasses of water, but she hasn’t eaten anything by the time she steps outside of her two-bedroom apartment in the Gunbarrel neighborhood of Boulder, Colorado.

In September 2022, the three-time Olympian moved nearly 9,000 miles from her home in the Ngong Hills, on the outskirts of Nairobi, Kenya, to Colorado. She wanted to pursue her marathon ambitions under the guidance of coach and three-time Olympian Dathan Ritzenhein, who is the fourth-fastest U.S. marathoner in history. Ritzenhein retired from professional running in 2020 and now oversees the Boulder-based On Athletics Club (OAC), a group of elite professional distance runners supported by Swiss sportswear company On.

Obiri, who was previously sponsored by Nike for 12 years before she signed a deal with On in 2022, said that moving across the world wasn’t a difficult decision. “It’s a great opportunity. Since I came here, I’ve been improving so well in road races.”

In April, Obiri won the Boston Marathon. It was only her second effort in the distance, and the victory has continued to fuel her momentum for other major goals that include aiming for gold at the 2024 Paris Olympics and also running the six most competitive and prestigious marathons in the world, known as the World Marathon Majors.

Obiri says goodbye to her eight-year-old daughter Tania and gets into a car to drive six miles to Lefthand trailhead, where she runs on dirt five days a week. She will train on an empty stomach, which she prefers for runs that are less than 15 miles. Once, she ate two slices of bread 40 minutes before a 21-mile run and was bothered by side stitches throughout the workout. Now, she is exceptionally careful about her fueling habits.

Three runners stretch next to their cars as Obiri clicks a watch on her right wrist and begins to shuffle her feet. Her warmup is purposely slow. In this part of Colorado, at 5,400 feet, the 48-degree air feels frostier and deserving of gloves, but Obiri runs without her hands covered. She is dressed in a thin olive-colored jacket, long black tights, and a black pair of unreleased On shoes.

Obiri’s feet clap against a long dirt road flanked by farmland that is dotted with horses and a few donkeys. Her breath is hardly audible as she escalates her rhythm to an average pace of six minutes and 14 seconds per mile. This run adds to her weekly program of 124 miles—some days, she runs twice. The cadence this morning is hardly tough on her lungs as she runs with her mouth closed, eyes intently staring ahead at the cotton-candy pink sunrise.

“Beautiful,” Obiri says.

Her body navigates each turn as though on autopilot. Obiri runs alone on easy days like today, but for harder sessions, up to four pacers will join her.

“They help me to get the rhythm of speed,” Obiri says. For longer runs exceeding 15 miles, Ritzenhein will bike alongside Obiri to manage her hydration needs, handing her bottles of Maurten at three-mile increments.

After an hour, Obiri wipes minimal sweat glistening on her forehead. Her breathing is steady, and her face appears as fresh as when she began the run. She does not stretch before getting into the car to return home.

The remainder of the morning is routine: a shower followed by a breakfast of bread, Weetabix cereal biscuits, a banana, and Kenyan chai—a mix of milk, black tea, and sugar. She likes to drink up to four cups of chai throughout the day, making the concoction with tea leaves gifted from fellow Kenyan athletes she sees at races.

Then, she will nap, sometimes just for 30 minutes, and other times upwards of two hours. “The most important thing is sleeping,” Obiri says. “When I go to my second run [of the day], I feel my body is fresh to do the workout. If I don’t sleep, I feel a lot of fatigue from the morning run.”

Obiri prepares lunch. Normally she eats at noon, but today her schedule is busier than usual. She cooks rice, broccoli, beets, carrots, and cabbage mixed with peanuts. Sometimes she makes chapati, a type of Indian flatbread commonly eaten in Kenya, or else she eats beans with rice.

The diet is typical among elite Kenyan athletes, and she hasn’t changed her eating habits since moving to the U.S. Obiri discovered a grocery store in Denver that offers African products, so she stocks up on ingredients like ground corn flour, which she uses to make ugali, a dense porridge and staple dish in many East African countries. She is still working through 20 pounds of flour she bought in June.

Obiri receives an hour massage, part of her routine in the early afternoon, three times a week. Usually the session is at the hands of a local physiotherapist, but sometimes Austin-based physiotherapist Kiplimo Chemirmir will fly in for a few days. Chemirmir, a former elite runner from Kenya, practices what he refers to as “Kenthaichi massage,” an aggressive technique that involves stretching muscles in short intervals.

Ritzenhein modifies Obiri’s training schedule, omitting her afternoon six-mile run so she can rest for the remainder of the day and reset for a speed workout tomorrow morning. Last fall, he took over training Obiri, who was previously coached by her agent Ricky Simms, who represented Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt, an eight-time gold medalist and world record holder, and British long distance runner Mo Farah, a four-time Olympic gold medalist.

Ritzenhein has programmed Obiri’s progression into the marathon with more volume and strength training. The meticulous preparation is essential to avoid the aftermath of her marathon debut in New York City last fall, when she was escorted off the course in a wheelchair after lacking a calculated fueling and hydration strategy. Obiri had averaged running 5:33-minute miles on a hilly route that is considered to be one of the most difficult of all the world marathon major races.

“It’s a real racing race. You have to make the right moves; you have to understand the course,” Ritzenhein says of the New York City Marathon. “We’ve changed some things in training to be a little more prepared. We’ve been going to Magnolia Road, which is a very famous place from running lore—high altitude, very hilly. We’ve been doing some long runs up there. In general, she’s got many more 35 and 40K [21 and 24 miles] runs than she had before New York last year.”

In New York, Obiri is aiming to keep pace alongside a decorated elite field that will include Olympic gold medalist Peres Jepchirchir, former women’s marathon world record holder Brigid Kosgei, and defending New York Marathon champion Sharon Lokedi, all of whom are from Kenya. In fact, Kenyan women have historically dominated at the New York City Marathon, winning nine titles since 2010 and 14 total to date, the most of any country since women were permitted to race in 1972.

“They are all friendly ladies,” Obiri says. “But you know, in sports we are enemies. It’s like a war. Everybody wants to win.”

While Obiri is finishing her massage, her daughter returns from school. Though Obiri arrived in Colorado last fall, her husband Tom Nyaundi and their daughter didn’t officially move to the U.S. until this past March. The adjustment, Obiri says, was a hard moment for the family.

“We didn’t have a car. In the U.S. you can’t move [around] if you don’t have a car. We had a very good team that helped us a lot,” Obiri says of the OAC, whom she refers to as her friends. “The athletes made everything easier for us. They were dropping my daughter to school. Coach would pick me up in the morning, take me to massage, to the store. I was lucky they were very supportive.” Now, Obiri says she and her family have fully adjusted to living in the U.S.

Obiri returns home and makes a tomato and egg sandwich before taking another nap. Usually she naps for up to two hours after lunch. Today, her nap is later and will last for two and a half hours.

Obiri doesn’t eat out or order takeaway. “We are not used to American food,” she says, smiling. “I enjoy making food at home.” Dinner is a rotation of Kenyan dishes like sukuma wiki—sautéed collard greens that accompany ugali—or pilau, a rice-based dish made with chicken, goat, or beef. This evening, she prepares ugali with sukuma wiki and fried eggs.

Before bed, Obiri says she can’t resist a nightcap of Kenyan chai. She will pray before falling asleep. And when she wakes up at 6:00 A.M. the next day, she will prepare for a track session, the intervals of which add up to nearly 13 miles: a 5K warmup, followed by 1 set of 4×200 meters at 32 seconds (200 meter jog between each rep); 3 sets of 4×200 meters at 33 seconds  (200 meter jog between each rep); 5×1600 meters at 5:12 (200 meter jog between each rep) and finishing with a 5K cool down.

The workout is another one in the books that will bring her a step closer to the starting line of the race she envisions winning. “I feel like I’m so strong,” Obiri says. She knows New York will be tough. But “when I go to a race I say, ‘you have to fight.’ And if you try and give your best, you will do something good.”

How Peres Jepchirchir accidentally made her debut over the marathon

Olympic champion Peres Jepchirchir has narrated how she 'accidentally' made her marathon debut at the Kisumu Safaricom Marathon.

Reigning Olympic marathon champion Peres Jepchirchir never intended to make her debut in the marathon back in 2013 since she had just begun her professional career.

She had started off her professional career with 10km road races in South Africa and had performed pretty well for a newbie.

Jepchirchir, 20 at the time, jetted back to the country for her last race, a 10km road race in Kisumu, the Kisumu Safaricom Marathon but she was shocked on arrival.

Speaking to World Athletics, Jepchirchir explained that when she got there, she was told the 10km road race was only for the residents of Kisumu and she had to run the marathon.

The former New York City Marathon champion did not disappoint despite being a newbie since she dominated and won the race in fashion. She clocked 2:47:33 to win the race.

“I was going there for the 10k and then I arrived and the 10k was only for people from that area. I remember it a lot because I ran that first marathon without any long runs,” she recalled.

After her triumph at the marathon back in 2013, Jepchirchir did not immediately start running the 42km distance since there was a lot she had to learn.

She became serious about the marathon in 2019 when she ran her second marathon, the Saitama International Marathon, where she won the race dominantly too.

Jepchirchir then went ahead and dominated the Valencia Marathon in 2020 before bagging the Olympic marathon and New York City marathon titles in 2021.

In 2022, she won the Boston Marathon in style and became the first woman to have won the Olympic, New York City, and Boston Marathon titles. After her Boston Marathon triumph, the now 30-year-old suffered an injury setback that saw her pull out of the New York City Marathon.

She opened her season this year with a third-place finish but has since insisted that she is injury-free and will be looking to dominate at the New York City Marathon.

“I was happy because I was able to train for only two months when I was preparing for London, so for me, I was happy because I was coming back," she said. 

Kenyan Margaret Chelimo to battle Melat Kejeta at Valencia Half Marathon

World Road Running Half Marathon silver medalist, Margaret Chelimo will lead a strong deep field at the 17th edition of the Valencia Half Marathon slated for Sunday in Valencia, Spain.

The 30 year-old who is also the 2019 World 5000m silver medalist will partner with her compatriot Janeth Chepngetich as they try to dethrone the seven Ethiopia’s who will be led by the former world marathon champion, Gotytom Gebreslase, who comes to this race with the third fastest time on paper of 1:05.36 that she got two years ago at Bahrain Night Half Marathon where she took the honors.

Chelimo who is also the 2022 World 10,000m bronze medalist, will have to get past the current European record holder over the half marathon distance, Melat Kejeta from Germany who holds the fastest in this field of 1:05.26 that she got at the 2020 World Half Marathon Championships, where she finished in second behind Peres Jepchirchir.

The World Cross Country silver medalist, Tsigie Gebreselama and World Indoor 3000m champion Lemlem Hailu both from Ethiopia will also be fighting for the top podium finish.

The race director Marc Roig expresses his anticipation for the event, saying, “Valencia proves once again to be the race of choice for the world’s elite athletes looking to break records. “The return of last year’s winner in the women category is a testament to the race’s popularity. We expect to witness remarkable records, national records, and potentially the fastest world records of the year”.

Peres Jepchirchir shares why it will take time to break the women's world record again

Peres Jepchirchir has shared her insights on why it will take longer for the women's marathon world record to be broken.

The streets of Berlin witnessed a historic moment on September 27 when Ethiopia’s Tigst Assefa shattered the women-only world record.

Assefa clocked 2:11:53 to completely obliterate Brigid Kosgei’s world record time of 2:14:04. Having clocked that time, the Ethiopian became the first woman in history to have run under 2:12:00.

Kosgei had set the world record in 2019 and in less than five years, it has already been shattered. However, Olympic champion Peres Jepchirchir has admitted that lowering Assefa’s world record time will definitely take more time.

“For now, it’s difficult, 2:11:00 is a very difficult barrier to break. Maybe it will take some years to break that barrier.

It took time to break Kosgei’s record and it was 2:14…but for this world record, it will take more time. I know we are strong ladies and we will break it one day.

If it will not be me, then my colleagues will definitely break it and make history,” Jepchirchir explained.

The 2022 Boston Marathon champion will be heading to the streets of New York for the New York City Marathon on November 2.

She noted that she does not intend to go for a world record on the course since it is not suitable for a world record. However, she is bullish about reclaiming her title that she won during the 2021 New York City Marathon.

She missed out on last year’s edition of the event due to an injury setback but she has since announced her comeback. She opened her season at the London Marathon where she finished third.

She then bagged a win at the Great North Run before defending her World Half Marathon title at the World Road Running Championships.

Molly Seidel Stunned the World (and Herself) with Olympic Bronze in Tokyo. Then Life Went Sideways.

She stunned the world (and herself) with Olympic bronze in Tokyo. Then life went sideways. How America’s unexpected marathon phenom is getting her body—and brain—back on track. 

On a clear December night in 2019, Molly Seidel was at a rooftop holiday party in Boston, wearing a black velvet dress, doing what a lot of 25-year-olds do: passing a joint between friends, wondering what she was doing with her life.

“You should run the Olympic Trials,” her sister, Izzy, said, as smoke swirled in the chilly air atop The Trackhouse, a retail shop and community hub on Newbury Street operated by the running brand Tracksmith. “That would be hilarious if you did that as your first marathon.” 

Molly, an elite 10K racer who’d spent much of 2019 injured, looked out at the city lights, and laughed. Why the hell not? She’d just qualified for the trials, winning the San Antonio Half with a time of 1:10:27. (“The shock of the century,” as she’d put it.) True, 13.1 miles wasn’t 26.2—but running a marathon was something to do. If only because she never had before. 

A four-time NCAA track and cross-country champion at The University of Notre Dame in Indiana, Molly had moved to Boston in 2017, where she’d worked three jobs to supplement her fourth: running for Saucony’s Freedom Track Club. The $34,000 a year that Saucony paid her (pre-tax, sans medical) didn’t go far in one of America’s most expensive cities. Chasing kids around as a babysitter, driving around as an Instacart shopper, and standing around eight hours a day as a barista—when you’re running 20 miles a day—wasn’t ideal. But whatever, she had compression socks. And she was downing free coffee and paying rent, flying to Flagstaff, Arizona, every so often for altitude camps, and having a good time. Doing what she loved. The only thing she’s ever wanted to do since she was a freckly fifth-grader in small-town Wisconsin clocking a six-minute mile in gym class. 

“I was hustling, and I loved it. It was such a fun, cool time of my life,” she says, summarizing her 20s. Staring into Molly’s steely brown eyes, listening to her speak with such clarity and conviction about her struggles since, it’s easy to forget: She is still only 29. 

After Molly had hip surgery on her birthday in July 2018, her doctors gave her a 50/50 chance of running professionally again. By summer 2019, she’d parted ways with FTC, which left her sobbing on the banks of the Charles River, getting eaten alive by mosquitoes and uncertainty. Her biggest achievement lately had been being named #2 Top Instacart Shopper (in Flagstaff; Boston was big-time).

The day after that rooftop party, Molly asked her friend and former FTC teammate Jon Green, who she’d newly anointed as her coach: “Think I should run the marathon trials?” Sure, he shrugged. Nothing to lose. Maybe it’d help her train for the 10K, her best shot—they both thought—at making a U.S. Olympic team. 

“I’m going to get my ass kicked six ways to Sunday!” she told the host of the podcast Running On Om six weeks before the trials in Atlanta.

Instead, on February 29, 2020, she kicked some herself. Pushing past 448 of the fastest, most-experienced women marathoners in the country, coming in second with a 2:27:31, earning more in prize money ($60,000) than she had in two years of racing—and a spot on the U.S. trio for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, along with Kenyan-born superstars Aliphine Tuliamuk and Sally Kipyego. “I don’t know what’s happening right now!” Molly kept saying into TV cameras, wrapped in an American flag, as stunned as a lottery winner. 

Saucony who? Puma came calling. Along with something Molly hadn’t anticipated: the spotlight. An onslaught of social media followers. And two weeks later, a global pandemic and lockdown—and all the anxiety and isolation that came with it. She was drowning, and she hadn’t even landed in Tokyo yet.

The 2020 Olympics, as we all know, were postponed to 2021. An emotional burden but a physical boon for Molly, in that it allowed her to get in a second marathon. In London, she finished two minutes faster than her debut. When the Olympics finally rolled around, she was ready. 

Before the race, Molly says, “I was thinking: ‘Once I cross the starting line, I get to call myself an Olympian and that’s a win for the day.’” 

But then she crossed the finish line—with a finger-kiss to the sky and a guttural Yesss!—in third place with a 2:27:46, just 26 seconds behind first (Kenya’s Peres Jepchirchir). And realized: She gets to call herself an Olympic medalist forever. Only the third American woman to ever earn one in the marathon.

Lots of kids have fleeting hopes of making it to the Olympics. I remember thinking I could be Mary Lou Retton. Maybe FloJo, with shorter fingernails. Then I decided I’d rather be Madonna or president of the United States and promptly forgot about it. But Molly held tight to her Olympic aspirations. She still has a poster she made in 2004, with stickers and a snapshot of her smiley 10-year-old self, to prove it. “I wish I will make it into the Olympics and win a gold medal,” she wrote, and signed it: Molly Seidel, the “y” looping back to underline her name. In case there was any doubt as to who, specifically, would be winning the medal.

Molly grew up in Nashotah, Wisconsin, and is the eldest of three. Her sister and brother, younger by not quite two years, are twins. Izzy is a running influencer and corporate content creator for companies like Peloton; and Fritz favors Formula 1 racing and weightlifting and works for the family’s leather-tanning business. The family was active, sporty. Dad, Fritz Sr., was a ski racer in college; Mom, Anne, a cheerleader. You can tell. Watching clips of Molly’s mom and dad watching the Olympic race from their backyard patio, jumping up and down, tears streaming, is the kind of life-affirming moment you wish you could bottle. “I’m in shock. I’m in disbelief,” Molly says into the mic, beaming. “I just wanted to come out today and I don’t know…stick my nose where it didn’t belong and see what I could come away with. And I guess that’s a medal.” When the interviewer holds up her family on FaceTime, Molly breaks down. “We did it,” she says into the screen between sobs and smiles. “Please drink a beer for me.

Molly hasn’t always been unabashedly herself, even when everyone thought she was. A compartmentalizer to the core, she spent most of her life hiding a huge part of it: anorexia, bulimia, anxiety, obsessive-compulsive disorder, debilitating depression. 

It started around age 11, when she learned to disguise OCD tendencies, like compulsively knocking on wood, silently reciting prayers “to avoid God getting mad at me,” she says. “It was a whole thing.” She says her parents were aware of the behaviors, but saw them more as odd little habits. “They had no reason to suspect anything. I was very high-functioning,” she says. “They didn’t realize that it was literally taking over my life.” 

She wasn’t officially diagnosed with OCD until her freshman year of college, when she saw a therapist for the first time. At Notre Dame, disordered eating took hold, quietly yet visibly, as it does for up to 62 percent of female college athletes, according to the National Eating Disorders Association. As recently as the Tokyo Olympics, she was making herself throw up in the airport bathroom, mere days before taking the podium. Molly hesitates to share that detail; she fears a girl might read this and interpret it as behavior to model. “Having been in that place as a younger athlete, I know I would have,” she says. But she also understands: Most people just don’t get how unrelenting eating disorders can be. 

In February 2022, she finally received a diagnosis of the root cause for all of it: ADHD. About being diagnosed, she says, “It made me feel really good, like [I don’t have] a million different disorders. I have a disorder that manifests itself in a lot of different symptoms.”

She waited to try Adderall until after the Boston Marathon in April, only to drop out at mile 16 due to a hip impingement. Initially, the meds made her feel fantastic. Focused. Free. Until she realized Adderall hurt more than it helped. She couldn’t sleep, couldn’t eat, lost too much weight. Within weeks, she devolved. “The eating disorder came roaring back,” she says, referring to it, as she often does, as its own entity, something that exists outside of herself. That ruthlessly takes control over her very need for control. “I almost think of it as an alter ego,” she explains. “Adderall was just bubblegum in the dam,” as she puts it. She ditched the drug, and her life—professionally, physically—unraveled.

In July 2022, heading into the World Championships, she bombed the mental health screening, answering the questions with brutal honesty. She’d been texting Keira D’Amato weeks prior. “Yo girl, things are pretty bad right now. Get ready…” Sobbing on the sidewalk in Eugene, Oregon, she texted D’Amato again. And the USATF made it official: D’Amato would take her spot on the team. Then Molly did what she’d been “putting off and putting off”— checked herself into eating disorder treatment for the second time since 2016, an outpatient program in Salt Lake City, where her new boyfriend was living at the time. 

Somehow (see: expert compartmentalizer) mid-meltdown, in February 2022, she had met an amateur ultrarunner named Matt, on Hinge. A quiet, lanky photographer, he didn’t totally get what she did. “I didn’t understand the gravity of it,” he tells me. “I was like, Oh she’s a pro runner, that’s cool. I didn’t realize she was, like, the pro runner!” 

Going back to treatment “was pretty terrible,” she says. At least she could stay with Matt. Hardly a honeymoon phase, but the new relationship held promise. “I laid it all out there,” says Molly. “And he was still here for it, for all the messiness. It was really meaningful.” And a mental shift. “He doesn’t see me as just Molly the Runner.”

Almost a year later, on a freezing April evening in Flagstaff, Molly is racing around Whole Foods, palming a head of cabbage, grabbing a thing of hummus, hunting for deals even though she doesn’t need to anymore. 

“It’s all about speed, efficiency, and quality,” she says, explaining the secret to her earlier Instacart success. She checks the expiration date on a container of goat cheese and beelines for the butcher counter, scans it faster than an Epson DS3000, though not without calculation, and requests two tomato-and-mozzarella-stuffed chicken breasts. Then she darts over to the beverage aisle in her marshmallow-y Puma slip-ons that Matt custom-painted with orange poppies. She grabs a case of La Croix (tangerine), then zips to the checkout. We’re in and out in under 15 minutes and 50 bucks, nothing bruised or broken.

Other than her body. Let’s just say: If Molly were an avocado or a carton of eggs, she probably wouldn’t pass her own sniff test. The week we meet, she is just coming off a month of no running. Not a single mile. She’s used to running twice a day, 130 miles a week. No wonder she’s spraying her kitchen counter with Mrs. Meyer’s and scrubbing the stovetop within minutes of welcoming me into her new home. 

The place, which she shares with Matt and his Australian border collie, Rye, has a post-college flophouse feel: a deep L-shaped couch draped in Pendleton blankets, a bar cluttered with bottles of discount wine, a floor lamp leaning like the Tower of Pisa next to a chew toy in the shape of a ranch dressing bottle. Scattered about, though, are reminders that an elite runner sleeps here. Or at least tries to. (“Pro runner by day, mild insomniac by night” reads the bio on her rarely used account on what used to be Twitter.) There’s a stick of Chafe Safe on the coffee table. Shalane Flanagan’s cookbooks on the counter. And framed in glass, propped on the office floor: Molly’s Olympic kit—blue racing briefs with the Nike Swoosh, a USA singlet, her once-sweat-drenched American flag, folded in a triangle. “I’m not sure where to hang it,” she says. “It seems a little ostentatious to have it in the living room.” 

With long brown curls and a round, freckly face, Molly has an aw-shucks look so innocent that it’s hard, at first, to perceive her struggles. Flat-out ask her, though—How are you even functioning?—and she’ll tell you: “I’m an absolute wreck. There’s no worse feeling than being a pro runner who can’t run. You just feel fucking useless.” Tidying a stack of newspapers, she adds, “Don’t worry, I’ve had therapy today.” 

She’s watched every show. (Save Ted Lasso, “too sickly sweet.”) Listened to every podcast. (Armchair Expert is a favorite.) She’s got nothing else to do but PT and go easy on the ElliptiGo in the garage, onto which she’s rigged a wooden bookstand, currently clipped with A History of God: The 4,000 Year Quest of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. “I don’t read running books,” she says. “I need something different.”

Like most runners—even the most amateur among us—running, moving, is what keeps her sane. “What about swimming? Can you at least swim?” I ask, projecting my own desperation if I were in her size 8.5 shoes. “I fucking hate swimming,” says Molly. Walking? “Oh, yeah, I can go on walks. Another. Long. Walk.”

The only thing she has on her schedule this week is pumping up a local middle school track team before their big meet. The invitation boosted her spirits. “Should I just memorize Miracle on Ice?” she says, laughing. “No, I know, I’ll do Independence Day.”

Injuries are nothing new for Molly. Par for the course for any professional athlete. But especially for women, like her, who lack bone density—and have since high school, when, according to a study in the Orthopedic Journal of Sports Medicine, nearly half of female runners experience period loss. Osteoporosis and its precursor, osteopenia, are rampant in female runners, leading to ongoing issues that threaten not just their college and professional running careers, but their lives.

Still, Molly admits, laughing: She’s especially accident-prone. I ask her to list every scratch she’s ever had, which takes her 10 minutes, and goes all the way back to babyhood, when she banged her head against the bathtub spout. There was a cracked spine from a sledding incident in 8th grade, a broken collarbone from a ski race in high school, shredded knee cartilage in college when a driver hit her while she was riding a bike. “Ribs are constantly breaking,” she says. In 2021, two snapped, and refused to heal in time for the New York City Marathon. No biggie. She ran through the pain with a 2:24:42, besting Deena Kastor’s 2008 time by more than a minute and setting the American course record.

Molly’s latest injury? Glute tear. “Literally a gigantic pain in the ass,” she posted on Instagram in March. Inside, Molly was devastated. Pulling out of the Nagoya Marathon—the night before her 6:45 a.m. flight to Japan, no less—was not in the plan. The plan, according to Coach Green, had been simple. It always is. If the two of them even have one. “Just to have fun and be consistent.” And get a marathon or two in before the Olympic Trials in February 2024. 

She’d been finally—finally—fit on all fronts; ready to race, ready to return. She needed Nagoya. And then, nothing. “It feels like I’m back at the bottom of the well,” says Molly, driving home from Whole Foods in her Toyota 4Runner. “This last year-and-a-half has been so difficult. It’s just been a lot of doubt. How do I approach this, as someone who has now won a medal? Like, man, am I even relevant in this sport anymore?” She pops a piece of gum in her mouth. I wait for her to offer me some, because that’s what you do with gum, but she doesn’t. She’s so in her head. “It’s hard when you’re in the thick of it, you know, to figure out: Why the fuck do I keep doing this? When it just breaks my heart over and over and over again?” 

We pull into her driveway. “I was prepared for the low period after Tokyo,” she says. “But this has been much longer and lower than I expected.” 

The curse of making it to the Olympics, let alone coming back with a medal: expectations. Molly’s own were high. “I think I thought, after the Olympics, if I win a medal, then I will be fixed, it will fix everything.” Instead, in a way, it made everything worse. 

That’s the problem that has plagued Molly for most of her running career: Her triumphs and troubles intermingle, like thunder and lightning. Which, by the way, she has been struck by. (A minor backyard-grill, summer-thunderstorm incident. She was fine.)

The next morning in Flagstaff, Molly’s feeling like she can run a mile, maybe two. It’s snowing, though, and she doesn’t want to risk the slippery track, so we meet at Campbell Mesa Trails. She loops a band around the back of her truck to stretch and sends me off into the trees to run alone while she does a couple of laps on the street.

Molly leaves for an acupuncture appointment, and we reunite later at Single Speed Coffee (“the best coffee in Flagstaff,” promises the ex-barista who drinks up to three cups a day). We curl up on a couch like it’s her living room, and she talks as freely—and as loudly—as if it was. Does she realize everyone can hear her? She doesn’t care. I guess that’s what happens when you’ve grown so comfortable sharing—in therapy, on podcasts, in a three-part video series on ADHD for WebMD—you just…share. Loud and proud. 

Mental illness is so insidious, says Molly. “It’s not always this Sylvia Plath stick-my-head-in-a-fucking-oven thing, where you’re sad all the time,” she says. “High-functioning depressed people live normal successful lives. I can be having the happiest moment, and three days later I’m in a total downward spiral.” It’s something you never recover from, she says, but you learn to manage. 

“I’m this incredibly flawed person who struggles so much. I think: How could I have won this thing when I’m so flawed? I look at all the people around me, all these accomplished people who have their shit together, and I’m like, ‘one of these things is not like the other,’” she says, taking a sip of her flat white. “I was literally in the Olympic Village thinking: Everybody is probably looking at me wondering: Why the hell is she here?” 

They weren’t. They don’t. She knows that. 

And yet her mind races as fast as she does. It takes up So. Much. Space. When she’s running, though, the noise disappears. She’s not Olympic Molly or Eating Disorder Molly, she’s not even, really, Runner Molly. “When I’m running,” she says, “I’m the most authentic version of myself.” 

Talking helps, too. Molly first shared her mental health history a few years ago, “before she was famous,” as she puts it. After the Olympics, though, she kept talking and hasn’t stopped. The Tokyo Games were a turning point, she says. Suddenly the most revered athletes in the world were opening up about their mental health. Molly credits Simone Biles’s bravery for her own. If Biles, and Michael Phelps and Naomi Osaka, could come clean... then maybe a nerdy, niche-y, unlikely medaling marathoner could, too.

“Those guys got a lot more shit for it than I did,” says Molly. “I got off easy. I’m not a household name,” she laughs. She knows she can be candid and off the cuff—and chat freely in a not-empty café—in a way Biles never could. “I’m a nobody!” she laughs.

Still, a nobody with 232,000 Instagram followers whom she has touched in very IRL ways—becoming an unintentional poster woman for normalizing mental health challenges among athletes. “You are such an incredible inspiration,” @1percentpeterson posts, one comment of a zillion similar. “It’s ok to not be ok!” says another. Along with all the online love is, of course, online hate. Molly rattles off a few lowlights: “She’s an attention-seeking whore,” “Her bones are so brittle she’ll never race again,” “She’s running so badly and posting a lot she should really focus on her running more.” Molly finds it curious. “I’m like, ‘If you hate me, you don’t need to follow me, sir.’” 

It’s Molly’s nobody-ness—what Outside writer Martin Fritz Huber called her “runner-next-door” persona, and I’ll just call “genuine personality”—that has made her somebody in running’s otherwise reserved circles. 

Somebody who (gasp!) high-fives her sister in the middle of a major race, as she did at mile 18 of the 2021 New York City Marathon. “They shat on me in the broadcast for it,” she says. “They were like, ‘She’s not taking this seriously.’” (Except, uh, then she set the American course record, so…) 

Somebody who, obviously, swears like a sailor and dances awkwardly on Instagram, who dresses up like a turkey, and viral-tweets about getting mansplained on an airplane. (“He starts telling me how I need to train high mileage & pulls up an analysis he’d made of a pro runner’s training on his phone. The pro runner was me. It was my training. Didn’t have the heart to tell him.”)

Somebody who makes every middle-aged mom-runner I know swoon like a Swiftie and say: “OMG! YOU HUNG OUT WITH MOLLY SEIDEL!!?” Middle-aged dad-runners, too. “I saw her once in Golden Gate Park!” my friend Dan fanboyed when he heard. “I waved!” Did she wave back? “She smiled,” he says, “while casually laying down 5:25s.”

And somebody who was as outraged as I was that I bought a $16 tube of French toothpaste from my hip Flagstaff motel. (It was 10 p.m.! It was all they had!) “For that price it better contain top-shelf cocaine,” she texted. Lest LetsRun commenters take that tidbit out of context: It’s a joke. It’s, in part, what makes Molly America’s most relatable pro runner: She’s not afraid to make jokes. (While we’re at it… Don’t knock her for smoking a little legal weed, either. That’s so 2009. Per the World Anti-Doping Agency: Cannabis is prohibited during competition, not at a Christmas party two months before it. Per Molly: “People would be shocked to know how many pro runners smoke weed.”)

I can’t believe I never asked to see it. Molly’s medal. A real, live Olympic medal. Maybe because it was tucked into a credenza along with Matt’s menorah and her maneki-neko cat figurines from Japan. But I think it was because hanging out with Molly felt so…normal, I almost forgot she’d won one. 

People think elite distance runners have to be one-dimensional, she says. That they have to be sculpted, single-minded, running-only robots. “Because that’s what the sport has been,” she says. 

Molly falls for it, too, she says. She scrolls the feeds, sees her fellow pros living seemingly perfect lives. She wants everyone to know: She’s not. So much so that she requested we not print the photos originally commissioned for this story, which were taken when she was at the lowest of lows. (“It’s been...refreshing...to be pretty open and real with Rachel [about] the challenges of the last year,” she wrote in an email to Runner’s World editors. “But the photos [were taken at] a time when I was really struggling and actively trying to hide how bad my eating disorder had become.”)

Molly finds the NYC Marathon high-five thing comical but indicative of a more serious issue in elite running: It takes itself too seriously. It’s too…elitist. Too stilted. “Running a marathon is a pretty freaking cool experience!” If you’re not having fun, she asks rhetorically, what’s the point? Still, she admits, she isn’t always having fun. Though you wouldn’t know it from her Instagram. “Oh, I’m very good at making it seem like I am,” she says.

She used to enjoy social media when it was just her friends. Before she gained 50,000 followers in a single day after the trials, and some 70,000 on Strava. Before the pandemic, before the Olympics. Keeping up with content became a toxic chore. “You feel like you’re just feeding this beast and it’s never going to stop,” she says. She’s taken to deleting the app off her phone, reloading it only to fulfill contractual agreements and post for her sponsors, then deleting it again. 

As much as she hates having to post, she enjoys plugging products the only way that feels natural: through parody. As does Izzy, her influencer sister, who, like Molly, prefers to skewer rather than shill (à la their idea behind their joint Insta account: @sadgirltrackclub). “The classic influencer tropes make me want to throw up,” she says (perverse pun as a recovering bulimic not intended). “New Gear Drop!’ or ‘This is my Outfit of the Day!’ Cringe. “Hot Girl Instagram is not how I identify,” she says. 

Nor is TikTok. “Sponsors tell me all the time: You should TikTok! I’m like, ‘I am not doing TikTok.’ I know how my brain works. They’ll say, ‘We’ll pay you less if you don’t’—and I’m, like, I don’t care.”

And to those sponsors who ghosted her after she returned to eating disorder treatment, good riddance. “Michelob dropped me like a bad habit,” she says. “Whatever. You have watery-ass beer anyway.”

To those who have stood by her, though, she’s utterly devoted. Pissed she couldn’t wear the Puma panther head to toe in Tokyo, Molly took off her Puma Deviate Elites and tied them over her shoulder, obscuring the Nike logo on her Olympic singlet for all the world to see. Or not see. “Nike isn’t paying my fucking bills.”

The love is mutual, says Erin Longin, a general manager at Puma. After decades backing legends like Usain Bolt, Puma was relaunching road running and wanted Molly as their guinea pig. “She’s a serious athlete and competitor, but she also has fun with it,” says Longin. “Running should be fun. Molly embodies that.” At their first meeting, in January 2020, Molly made them laugh and nerded out over their new shoes. “We all left there, fingers crossed she’d sign with us,” says Longin.

Come February, they all flipped out. Longin was watching the trials, not expecting much. And then: “We were all messaging, “OMG!!” Then Molly killed in London. Medaled in Tokyo. “What she did for us in that first year…” says Longin. “We couldn’t have planned it!” 

Then came the second year, and the third, and throughout it all—injuries, eating disorder treatment, missed races, missed opportunities—Puma hasn’t flinched. “It’s easy for a company to do the right thing when everything is going great,” Molly posted in April, heartbroken from her couch instead of Heartbreak Hill. “But it’s when the sh*t hits the fan and they’re still right there with you….” She received 35,000 hearts—and a call from Longin: “You make me feel so proud.” 

Does it matter to Puma if Molly never places—never races—again? “Nope,” Longin says. 

My last afternoon in Flagstaff, it’s cloudy skies, still freezing. I find Molly on the high school track wearing neoprene gloves, black puffy coat, another pair of Pumas. Her breath is white, her cheeks red. Her legs churning in even, elegant strides. Upright, alone, at peace, backed by snow-dusted peaks. Running itself is what matters, not racing, she tells me. “I honestly don’t give a shit about winning,” she says. All she wants—really wants, she says—is to be healthy enough to run until she’s old and gray.

Molly’s favorite runner is one who didn’t get to grow old. Who made his mark decades before she was born: Steve Prefontaine. “Pre raced in such a genuine way. He made people feel something,” she says. “The sports performances you truly remember,” she adds, “are the ones where you see the struggle, the work, the realness.” 

Sounds familiar. “I hate conversations like, ‘Who’s the GOAT?’” Molly continues. “Who fucking cares? Who’s got the story that’s going to get people excited? That’s going to make some kid want to go out and do it?” 

I know one of those kids: My best friend’s daughter, Quinn, a rising track phenom in Oregon, who has dealt with anxiety and OCD tendencies. She has a picture of Molly Seidel, and her times, taped to her bedroom wall. This past May, Quinn joined Nike’s Bowerman Club. She was named Oregon Female Athlete of the Year Under 12 by USATF. She wants to run for Notre Dame. 

“Quinn loves running more than anything,” her mom tells me, texting photos of her elated 11-year-old atop the podium. “But I don’t know…” She’s unsure about setting her daughter on this path. How could she not, though? It’s all Quinn wants to do. Maybe what Quinn, too, feels born to do. 

It’ll be okay, I tell her, I hope. Quinn has something Molly never had: She has a Molly. 

Molly and I catch up via phone in June. A team of doctors in Germany has overhauled her biomechanics. She’s been running 110 miles a week, feeling healthy, hopeful. Happy. A month later, severe anemia (and accompanying iron infusions) interrupts her summer racing schedule. She cancels the couple of 10Ks she had planned and entertains herself by popping into the UTMB Speedgoat Mountain Race: a 28K trail run through Utah’s Little Cottonwood Canyon—coming in second with a 3:49:58. Molly’s focus is on the Chicago Marathon, October 8th; her first major race in almost two years. 

Does it matter how she does? Does it matter if she slays the Olympic Trials in February? If she makes it to Paris 2024? If she fulfills her childhood dream and brings home gold? 

Nah. Not if—like Matt, like Puma, like, finally, even Molly herself—you see Molly the Runner for who she really is: Molly the Mere Mortal. She’s the imperfect one who puts it perfectly: What matters isn’t her time or place, how she performs on the pavement. Or social media posts. What matters—as a professional athlete, as a person—is how she makes people feel: human. 

She’d been finally—finally—fit on all fronts; ready to race, ready to return. She needed Nagoya. And then, nothing. “It feels like I’m back at the bottom of the well,” says Molly, driving home from Whole Foods in her Toyota 4Runner. “This last year-and-a-half has been so difficult. It’s just been a lot of doubt. How do I approach this, as someone who has now won a medal? Like, man, am I even relevant in this sport anymore?” She pops a piece of gum in her mouth. I wait for her to offer me some, because that’s what you do with gum, but she doesn’t. She’s so in her head. “It’s hard when you’re in the thick of it, you know, to figure out: Why the fuck do I keep doing this? When it just breaks my heart over and over and over again?” 

Jepchirchir takes third global half marathon title in Riga

Kenya’s Peres Jepchirchir underlined her status as one of the all-time greats by claiming a third world half marathon title at the World Athletics Road Running Championships Riga 23 on Sunday (1), the 30-year-old utilising her fearsome finishing speed to take gold in 1:07:25.

She was followed home by compatriot Margaret Chelimo Kipkemboi in 1:07:26, with Catherine Reline Amanang’ole completing a 1-2-3 for Kenya in 1:07:34.

“I wanted to win three times and make history, and thank God I have made it,” said Jepchirchir. “It was my birthday this week and I told my husband I would work extra hard to get the win.”

Jepchirchir led Kenya to a decisive victory in the team title, their first since 2016, when they also swept the medal positions. Their top three had a cumulative time of 3:22:25, with Ethiopia second with 3:27:55 and Great Britain and Northern Ireland claiming bronze with 3:29:15.

“I am so happy for team Kenya,” said Jepchirchir. “I knew we would sweep this as a team because I trust my colleagues so much.”

On a cool, sunny afternoon in the Latvian capital, Jepchirchir once again played a very patient game, the Olympic marathon champion and women-only half marathon world record holder content to let the pace remain steady through much of the race, knowing she possessed a gear no one else could live with when it counted most.

The early pace was relatively pedestrian, with a group of 22 hitting the 5km mark clustered together, led by Britain’s Samantha Harrison in 16:25. But that pack began to whittle soon after, with a group of eight passing 10km in 32:19.

Jepchirchir, Chelimo Kipkemboi and Reline Amanang’ole took turns at the front soon after, with British duo Harrison and Calli Thackery also putting in a shift in the breezy conditions. But in the third quarter, Harrison and Thackery began to lose contention while the Kenyans started to apply pressure up front, Amanang’ole passing 15km in 48:33 and six athletes left in the battle for the podium positions.

That was soon down to five, with Ethiopia’s Ftaw Zeray dropping away. Jepchirchir ran at the back of the pack as they approached 20km, marking her opponents’ every move. But as they ran through the old town and back towards the finish, alongside the River Daugava, Jepchirchir began to take closer order, with just one Ethiopian, Tsigie Gebreselama, sandwiched among the four Kenyans.

The 20km mark, reached in 1:04:20, was Jepchirchir’s cue to make her first big effort, surging to the front and quickly checking the effect on her rivals, with only her compatriot Irine Jepchumba Kimais dropping away. But with Kipkemboi soon taking up the pace, the Kenyans swiftly had what they wanted – with Gebreselama dropping off the leading trio.

Leading into the wind in the final kilometre, Kipkemboi began to veer around the road, hoping for assistance from those behind, but by then it was every woman for themselves, Jepchirchir smartly sitting in her teammate’s slipstream until she drew inside the final 400 metres, at which point she unleashed that renowned change of pace, surging to gold.“When I saw the tape, I started celebrating,” said Jepchirchir, who admitted she couldn’t sleep the night before as she was worried about the race. But with another global title in the bag, she has big plans for the year ahead.

“Next month I’m going to run the New York City Marathon,” said Jepchirchir, who will then train her sights on retaining her Olympic marathon title. “That’s my prayer; I pray to God for good health to get that chance. I will try my best.”

Silver medallist Chelimo Kipkemboi said: “It was great to run with Peres today. I am always proud to run for Kenya. I was fourth at the World Championships on the track so to get a medal today is very special. It’s very nice to see that I’m progressing and next, I will race the Valencia Half Marathon.”

Amanang’ole was content with her bronze, saying: “It was a very tough race but I’m super excited because it is my first time running this event.”

Focus shifts from track as road racing season heats up

As the international outdoor track and field season draws to a close, we now look forward to the feast of top-class road racing that will be on offer throughout the final four months of the year.

In just 11 days’ time, the focus of the sport will be on the World Athletics Road Running Championships Riga 23, where the best distance runners on the planet will compete for global honours in the mile, 5km and half marathon.

The likes of world champion Faith Kipyegon, world record-holder Berihu Aregawi and Olympic champion Peres Jepchirchir are among the stars set to compete in the Latvian capital. Recreational runners from around the world, meanwhile, will run on the same courses as the greats when they take to the streets of Riga for the associated mass races.

There are also eight Platinum Label road races between September and December, the first of which was held last weekend with Betsy Saina and Othmane El Goumri winning the Blackmores Sydney Marathon. Of the seven other upcoming Platinum events, three of them form part of the Abbott World Marathon Majors (WMM) series: the BMW Berlin Marathon, the Bank of America Chicago Marathon and the TCS New York Marathon.

Platinum Label road races, Sep-Dec 2023

8 Oct – Chicago Marathon (WMM)

15 Oct – Amsterdam Marathon

5 Nov – New York Marathon (WMM)

26 Nov – Shanghai Marathon

3 Dec – Valencia Marathon

17 Dec – Bang Saen Half Marathon

The Chicago Marathon two weeks later will be highlighted by a clash between defending champion Ruth Chepngetich and London Marathon winner Sifan Hassan.

Two-time Tokyo Marathon champion Birhanu Legese, the fourth-fastest marathon runner of all time, headlines the men’s field for the Amsterdam Marathon. Defending champion Evans Chebet will take on two-time winner Geoffrey Kamworor at the New York City Marathon in November.

For the first time since the Covid-19 pandemic, the Shanghai Marathon in late November will welcome an international elite field.

Just one week later, multiple global champion and world record-holder Joshua Cheptegei will make his long-awaited marathon debut in Valencia. In recent years the event has established itself as one of the highest-quality marathons in the world, and this year’s edition will surely be no exception.

Towards the end of the year, the Thai coastal area of Bang Saen will host one of the newest additions to the Platinum Label calendar, the Bangsaen21 Half Marathon. Since the pandemic, it has been largely a domestic affair, but it will be back with a bang this year with a high-quality elite line-up.

Hundreds of road races each year are granted a World Athletics Label, ranging from ‘Platinum’, for the top tier of road events, to Gold, Elite and Label. There are still more than 100 World Athletics Label road races due to take place between now and the end of 2023.

Jepchirchir and Tola win Great North Run half marathon

Kenya’s Peres Jepchirchir won the women’s race in 1:06:45, while Ethiopia’s Tamirat Tola claimed the men’s title in 59:58 at the Great North Run half marathon on Sunday (10).

Britain’s record-breaking warm weather continued as the elite career of one of its greatest athletes ended at the 42nd edition of the half marathon that takes participants from Newcastle to South Shields.

Mohamed Farah placed a respectable and emotional fourth in 1:03:28. He would have loved to have been on the podium in his final race, but he was no match for the Olympic and world-medal winning trio ahead.

Tola made some amends for his failure to retain his world marathon title 14 days earlier. Alongside Farah, the smooth-running Ethiopian led a group of seven athletes at 5km (14:11), then pressed on as the group climbed to the highest point of the course at five miles.

Then, on the downhill dual carriageway stretch, he showed the form which deserted him in the closing stages of the Budapest marathon. His 4:27 mile to seven broke all but Bashir Abdi, then he cranked it up to 4:20 and was 10 seconds up on the Belgian, who himself was 30 seconds ahead of Muktar Edris.

Tola’s pace slowed as the course climbed, but he still pulled away to dip under one hour. No-one else got under 61 minutes. Abdi was second in 1:01:20, while Edris was third in 1:01:54.

In the women’s race, Jepchirchir went one better than her runner-up finish in 2022.

Following a snappy 5:03 opening mile, her fellow New York Marathon winner Sharon Lokedi was her only company, but just for four miles. In the 24°C heat, Jepchirchir ran quicker than she had in kinder running conditions a year earlier. This is a woman who won the Olympic marathon when it was 31°C with 78% humidity, so heat doesn’t bother her.

Behind Jepchirchir and Lokedi, who finished second in 1:07:43, was Britain’s Charlotte Purdue, who repeated her 2021 third place finish to tune up nicely for her Berlin Marathon bid.

“I decided to run by myself,” Jepchirchir told the BBC. Both she and Lokedi are also in marathon preparations as they get ready to return to the New York City Marathon on 5 November.

As with so many mass races of this kind, there were countless human interest stories and races within races amid the 43,768 starters. One unique record was established by blind British runner Jim Roberts, who completed the distance untethered in 2:08:25.

The last word goes to Farah. “All I know is running,” declared the 10-time global track gold medallist in his post-race interview that was broadcast to the sunbaked spectators on the seafront. “That’s what made me happy for so many years.”

Peres Jepchirchir using Great North Run to fine tune for New York City Marathon

Reigning Olympic champion Peres Jepchirchir will be competing at the Great North Run on Sunday September 10, as she gets ready to reclaim her New York City Marathon title on Sunday, November 5.

Jepchirchir missed out on last year’s event due to a hip injury but she has now recovered and will be ready to fight and reclaim her title.

She opened her season with a third-place finish at the London Marathon. The 2021 Boston Marathon champion also finished second behind Hellen Obiri at the Great Manchester Run.

The Great North Run will be a perfect place for Jepchirchir to test out her form ahead of the do-or-die assignment.

In a previous interview with New York City Marathon race organizers, Jepchirchir said: “I was so disappointed that I couldn’t defend my title in New York last year due to an injury, and winning again in Central Park has been my main motivation as I begin my preparations for the autumn.

"New York is an important step in defending my Olympic gold medal next summer in Paris, and I will do my best to make my family and my country proud.”

But before the New York City Marathon, she will face tough opposition at the Great North Run where she finished second last year.

She will be up against compatriot Sharon Lokedi who will also be competing at the New York City Marathon. Ethiopia’s Tirunesh Dibaba and Great Britain’s Charlie Purdue will also be in action at the event.

Sharon Lokedi gearing up to defend her New York City Marathon title

The 2022 New York City Marathon champion Sharon Lokedi is hungry to return to the streets of the Big Apple and defend her title on Sunday, November 5.

As a debutant during last year's edition of the event, Lokedi broke away from the leading pack and sprinted to the finish line to cut the tape in a time of 2:23:23.

She is plotting a grand return to the streets that gave her a breakthrough in athletics and repeat last year’s remarkable performance.

“Last year, I came into the TCS New York City Marathon with the goal of being in the thick of the race, and the result was better than I could have ever hoped for.

"This year, I’m returning with a different mindset, hungry to defend my title and race against the fastest women in the world,” she said as per the New York City Marathon race organizers.

This year, she intended to open her season at the Boston Marathon but had to pull out due to an injury.

The 29-year-old is yet to compete in any major races so far this year but she is sharpening her talons in preparation for the title defense.

She will not have an easy run since she will be up against some of the greatest marathoners the world has ever witnessed.

Boston Marathon champion Hellen Obiri will be in the race, for the second time after making her marathon debut on the same course last year where she finished sixth.

She has had a great season so far this year, losing only one race out of all the races she has competed in.

Former New York City Marathon champion Peres Jepchirchir will also be in action. She missed out on last year’s event due to an injury but she will be making a return with the hope of reclaiming her title.

Sharon Lokedi, Hellen Obiri, Peres Jepchirchir and Brigid Kosgei to Race 2023 TCS New York City Marathon

Defending TCS New York City Marathon champion Sharon Lokedi, reigning Boston Marathon and United Airlines NYC Half champion Hellen Obiri, Olympic gold medalist and 2021 TCS New York City Marathon champion Peres Jepchirchir, and marathon world-record holder Brigid Kosgei will headline the women’s professional athlete field at the 2023 TCS New York City Marathon on Sunday, November 5.

When the four Kenyans line up in New York, it will be the first time in event history the reigning TCS New York City Marathon champion, Boston Marathon champion, Olympic champion, and world-record holder line up against each other in the TCS New York City Marathon.

Lokedi won the TCS New York City Marathon in her marathon debut last year, pulling away in the final two miles to finish in 2:23:23 and became the eighth athlete to win the race in their true 26.2-mile debut. In preparation for the marathon, Lokedi had raced the United Airlines NYC Half and the Mastercard New York Mini 10K, finishing fourth and second, respectively, in those races.

“Last year, I came into the TCS New York City Marathon with the goal of being in the thick of the race, and the result was better than I could have ever hoped for,” Lokedi said. “This year, I’m returning with a different mindset, hungry to defend my title and race against the fastest women in the world.”

Obiri is a two-time Olympic medalist and seven-time world championships individual medalist who earlier this year won the Boston Marathon in her second-ever attempt at the distance, in addition to winning the United Airlines NYC Half in her event debut. Obiri holds the Kenyan record for 3,000 meters and represented Kenya at the Rio 2016 and Tokyo 2020 Olympics, earning silver medals in the 5,000 meters at both. In her marathon debut last year in New York, she finished sixth.

“With a year of marathon experience now under my belt, a win in Boston, and my move to the U.S., I’m coming to New York this year with more confidence and in search of a title,” Obiri said. “I’m excited to show the people of New York what I’m capable of and that my win at the United Airlines NYC Half in March was just the beginning.”

Jepchirchir is the only athlete to have won the Olympic marathon, TCS New York City Marathon, and Boston Marathon. She is also a two-time world championships gold medalist in the half marathon. In 2021, she won the Tokyo Olympic marathon to claim Kenya’s second consecutive gold medal in the event. Four months later, she won the TCS New York City Marathon, finishing in 2:22:39, the third-fastest time in event history and eight seconds off the event record. In April 2022, in a back-and-forth race that came down to the final mile, she fended off Ethiopian Ababel Yeshaneh to take the Boston Maraton title on Boylston Street in her debut in the race in 2:21:02. This April, she recorded another podium finish, taking third at the TCS London Marathon.

“I was so disappointed that I couldn’t defend my title in New York last year due to an injury, and winning again in Central Park has been my main motivation as I begin my preparations for the autumn,” Jepchirchir said. “New York is an important step in defending my Olympic gold medal next summer in Paris, and I will do my best to make my family and my country proud.”

Kosgei is the world-record holder in the marathon and has won an Olympic silver medal and five Abbott World Marathon Majors races; she will now make her TCS New York City Marathon debut. In 2019, Kosgei broke Paula Radcliffe’s 16-year-old world record by 81 seconds, running 2:14:04 to win the Chicago Marathon. It was her second Chicago Marathon victory, as she’d also won in 2018. Additionally, she won back-to-back London Marathons in 2019 and 2020, the Tokyo Marathon in 2022, and the silver medal at the Tokyo Olympic marathon.

“I am very excited to make my New York City debut this fall, and attempt to win my fourth different Major,” Kosgei said. “I am not worried about the course, as I have had success in hilly marathons before, but New York has always been about head-to-head competition, and I know I must be in the best possible shape to compete with the other women in the race.”

The 2023 TCS New York City Marathon women’s professional athlete field is presented by Mastercard®. The full professional athlete fields will be announced at a later date.

The 2023 TCS New York City Marathon on Sunday, November 5 will have 50,000 runners and be televised live on WABC-TV Channel 7 in the New York tristate area, throughout the rest of the nation on ESPN2, and around the world by various international broadcasters.

Sheila Chepkirui over the moon after making Team Kenya to Budapest

Kenyan marathon runner, Sheila Chepkirui, has expressed her delight at being selected for the 2023 World Championships in Budapest, Hungary.

Chepkirui, 33, comprises the stellar list of headliners unveiled by Athletics Kenya (AK) last week to hold forte for the country in the flagship global extravaganza set for August. 

The Commonwealth Games 10,000m bronze medalist said she has already begun her preparations in anticipation of a monumental conquest in the central European nation. 

"I'm overjoyed to have made the team. It is always a wonderful honour to be given the rare opportunity to represent the country on such a stage. "I'm hoping to do well," Chepkirui said. 

She said she plans to participate in the Boston 10k race on June 25 as part of her training program."Right now my focus is to prepare adequately for the World Championships. I'll be traveling to the US to battle out in the Boston 10k race to evaluate my speed," Chepkirui remarked.  "I don't intend to compete in any major marathon events until then," Chepkirui said. 

Budapest will be her third marathon attempt after she clocked 2:17:29 to wrap up sixth on her debut over the distance in Valencia last year.

She heads into the championships buoyed by her impressive show at the 2023 London Marathon on April 23, where she placed fourth behind Holland's Sifa Hassan, Ethiopian Alemu Megertu, and compatriot Peres Jepchirchir respectively.

  The Kenya Defence Forces officer said she is currently on vacation in Kericho county, where she is perfecting her act for the herculean task. I am currently on leave, so I am training alone at home in Kericho. I usually work out with the KDF team in Ngong," she stated. 

Chepkirui will be heading to Budapest strengthened by a recent heartwarming report that ranked her fourth in the 10 km road race on the world all-time list.

A natural trailblazer, Chepkirui defeated Japan's Yuriko Kobayashi over 1500m at the 2005 World Youth Championships to storm her maiden global title after posting a championship record of 4:12.29. 

After enrolling with Kenya Defence Forces around 2012, she secured a spot on the plane to the 2016 African Cross Country Championships, where she bagged the silver in a Kenyan podium sweep alongside compatriots Alice Aprot and Beatrice Mutai.

Chepkirui will, however, first have to fend off a stiff challenge from 2020 Tokyo Olympics silver medals Brigid Kosgei who won the 2018 and 2019 Chicago Marathons, the 2019 and 2020 London Marathons, and the 2021 Tokyo Marathon. 

She won the Paris Half Marathon title in France after clocking 66.00 minutes ahead of Ethiopian Betelihem Yemer (66.45) and Kenyan Marion Kibor (66.45). Unforeseen visa gremlins saw her painfully miss out on this year's Boston Marathon as well as the Oregon22 World Athletics Championships.  

She nonetheless secured a place in Team Kenya for the Birmingham Commonwealth Games last year, where she blazed to the 10,000m bronze podium behind Scot Eilish McColgan and compatriot Irene Cheptai.   

Mo Farah eighth in penultimate race of career

Four-time Olympic champion Mo Farah finished eighth at the Great Manchester Run, the penultimate race of his career.

The 40-year-old Briton completed the 10km course in 29 minutes 11 seconds - 44 seconds behind winner Eyob Faniel of Italy.

Kenya's Hellen Obiri defended the women's title in 31 minutes 14 seconds.

Farah's final competitive race will be the Great North Run in Newcastle on 10 September.

"I'm so proud of what I've achieved throughout my career," he told BBC Sport.

"I was a bit nervous at the start, but this city has some great history and the support I got was amazing."

Farah won 5,000m and 10,000m gold at the 2012 and 2016 Olympics.

He has also won six world and five European golds, and was knighted in 2017.

Faniel, who was born in Eritrea but moved to Italy as a child, beat Briton Marc Scott by four seconds, with Australia's Stewart McSweyn a further four seconds back. Britain's Jonny Mellor was 10th.

Obiri, who won the Boston Marathon last month, finished 45 seconds ahead of compatriot Peres Jepchirchir in second.

Calli Thackery was third - 1min 37secs behind Obiri - one of five Britons in the top 10.

Stephanie Twell was fourth, Rose Harvey fifth, Natasha Cockram seventh and Rachael Franklin 10th.

Britain's Commonwealth 10,000m champion Eilish McColgan was absent as she recovers from a knee injury.

Peres Jepchirchir will compete in the Great Manchester Run 10km race on Sunday

Olympic marathon champion Peres Jepchirchir and Hellen Obiri will compete in the Great Manchester Run 10km race on Sunday.

Jepchirchir will be using the race to train for the next marathon season where she is optimistic of good results.

The Kapsabet-based Jepchirchir will battle it out with defending champion Hellen Obiri, who is fresh from winning the Boston Marathon last month in the USA, among other athletes.

“Competing in the race on Sunday is just part of my training as we start another marathon season. I’m still waiting for confirmation from my management on which race I will be competing in next,” said Jepchirchir.

She said that it feels good competing once again after being out for a long period due to injuries. She has set her eyes on performing well in the forthcoming assignments.

“Competing in the London Marathon and finishing on the podium was something sweet for me. I was running to see how my body would react and I was elated by my performance. I believe I will be able to compete well in the forthcoming events,” added Jepchirchir.

Obiri has risen to stamp authority in the road races after graduating from track where she ruled in the 5,000m and 10,000m. She said that she has just resumed her training and prepared for only two weeks. 

“I will be competing on Sunday but I don’t have anything in mind despite having ran a course record last year. I will be eyeing a good race because I have just trained for two weeks,” Obiri told Nation Sport on phone from UK.

Her debut in marathon saw her emerge sixth in the 2022 New York Marathon in a time of 2:25:49 before winning her second marathon race, Boston Marathon in a personal best of 2:21:38.

Also in the mix is Ethiopia’s former world silver medalist in the 5,000m Senbere Teferi, British athletes, Mollie Williams, Steph Twell, Rose Harvey, Lily Patridge among others.

In last year’s race, Obiri ran a course record of 30:15 winning ahead of British Eilish McColgan who clocked 30:19 while Kenya’s Ruth Chepng’etich settled for third place in 30:29.

Manchester stage set for speedy 10km contests

Mo Farah set for penultimate race while Hellen Obiri returns to defend her crown on city streets.

Mo Farah will tackle what is set to be the penultimate competitive race of his storied career as the 20th edition of the AJ Bell Great Manchester Run is staged on Sunday (May 21), but it won’t just be the multiple global track champion who will be attracting attention on the city streets.

Last year’s 10km event produced a spectacular women’s race as Hellen Obiri surged to a brilliant win in 30:15, four seconds ahead of Eilish McColgan’s British record-breaking performance.

The Kenyan returns to defend her title this year, fresh from winning the Boston Marathon last month, but the former 5000m world champion and 2022 Great North Run winner won’t be joined by McColgan who is continuing her recovery from the knee problem which prevented her from making her marathon debut in London.

Instead, the strongest challenge is set to come from Peres Jepchirchir, the Kenyan Olympic marathon champion who was third in London, and Ethiopia’s 2015 5000m world championships silver medallist Senbere Teferi.

Steph Twell will lead the home charge as part of a British contingent which also features the likes of Mollie Williams, Monika Jackiewicz, Lily Partridge, Rose Harvey and Natasha Cockram.

On paper, the fastest man in the men’s field is Callum Hawkins, though how close he can come to his 10km road PB of 28:02 remains to be seen following his injury problems in recent years. The Scot, who has twice finished fourth over the marathon at the World Championships, will be looking to make more progress back towards top form.

Fellow Brit Marc Scott, the winner of this event in 2021, has a PB of 28:03 and will want to make his mark in his first outing since coming 12th in the Istanbul Half Marathon at the end of last month. Farah can expect plenty of support again, having last been seen in action when coming ninth in the London Marathon, where he confirmed his intention to retire at the end of this year. The four-time Olympic champion also clocked 30:41 for 10km in Gabon last month.

The home athletes will be up against the Australian duo of Jack Rayner – runner-up in Manchester last year and the current national 10km record holder – plus Stewart McSweyn, the national 1500m and 3000m record-holder who has an identical road PB to Scott.

Last year’s Osaka Marathon champion, Japan’s Gaku Hoshi, plus Uganda’s Commonwealth marathon champion Victor Kaplangat, add to the strength of the international field.

The men’s wheelchair race should be a tight contest, too, featuring Sean Frame, Johnboy Smith and Commonwealth marathon bronze medallist Simon Lawson.

As well as the popular 10km, the event schedule also features a half marathon plus the Mini and Junior Great Manchester Run.

London Marathon 2023: Kelvin Kiptum and Sifan Hassan win with superb runs

Kenya's Kelvin Kiptum smashed compatriot Eliud Kipchoge's course record to win the men's London Marathon in the second-fastest time ever.

The 23-year-old was just 16 seconds outside Kipchoge's world record, finishing in two hours one minute 25 seconds.

Sifan Hassan also produced a remarkable run to win the women's race.

The Dutch Olympic track champion, 30, suffered with a hip injury but battled to win on her debut at the distance.

“It was really amazing,” she says. She never thought she could win, so can’t believe that she did. The crowd are amazing, she says, and every single kilometre she was grateful to be there.

She’s so happy and it’s beautiful to see; she explains she has a pre-existing hip problem, hence the stretching, and because she was fasting she didn’t practise so didn’t know where to stop for drinks.

At 20km she felt she wasn’t tired and was thinking about getting experience for her next marathon and at every moment she was grateful. She didn’t have confidence because she didn’t practise drinking and she found it really tough; she realised she didn’t have to have as much as she should.

Living in the States, she used to set her alarm to watch this race, and now she’s won it she’ll never forget it. She’d been told she’d hurt, but felt much better after 35km than she thought, and when she saw the line she thought it that really it?!

She needs to decide what race she’ll run at the Paris Olympics next summer but she’s so grateful. What an incredible racer and lovely person.

Kiptum produced the fastest marathon debut in Valencia in December, where he finished in 2:01:53 - the third-fastest time in history.

He went faster still on the streets of London, knocking one minute and 12 seconds off Kipchoge's previous course record to beat second-placed compatriot Geoffrey Kamworor by almost three minutes.

Ethiopia's reigning world champion Tamirat Tola was third, while Britain's Mo Farah finished ninth in what he says will be his last marathon.

Emile Cairess, 25, produced a superb run to finish as the first British man home, taking sixth in 2:08:07 on his marathon debut. 

It was the third-fastest marathon time by a British man - behind Farah and Steve Jones - and the second fastest by a Briton in the London race. 

Four British runners finished in the top 10 in total, with Phil Sesemann eighth and Chris Thompson 10th.

In the women's race, Hassan, who won the 5,000m and 10,000m at the Tokyo Olympics in 2021, appeared out of the race after dropping back early on with a hip problem, but gradually fought back.

She then produced a sprint finish to win in two hours 18 minutes 33 seconds.

Ethiopia's Alemu Megertu was second and Kenya's previously unbeaten Olympic champion Peres Jepchirchir third. 

Kenyan world record holder Brigid Kosgei looked to be limping from the start and dropped out after just three minutes, while Ethiopia's defending champion Yalemzerf Yehualaw was fifth. 

Sam Harrison, 27, was the first British woman home, clocking a new personal best of 2:25:59 for the 26.2-mile distance as she claimed 11th. 

It was the fifth-fastest time by a British woman in the event. 

Switzerland's Marcel Hug knocked 50 seconds off his own course record to win a third consecutive London Marathon men's wheelchair race - and fifth in total.

Hug, 37, finished in one hour 23 minutes 48 seconds, well ahead of the Netherlands' Jetze Plat in second, with Japan's Tomoki Suzuki third and the United States' Daniel Romanchuk in fourth.

Britain's David Weir, 43, finished his 24th London Marathon in fifth place.

Australia's Madison de Rozario held off Manuela Schar, of Switzerland, in a sprint finish to win the women's wheelchair race for a second time.

The four women's favourites made it on the Mall together before De Rozario and Schar pulled away.

De Rozario won in one hour 38 minutes 52 seconds, with defending champion Catherine Debrunner, of Switzerland, in third and the United States' Susannah Scaroni fourth.

Eden Rainbow-Cooper, 21, who was third in 2022, was the first Briton home in seventh.

The event has returned to its traditional date in the calendar, in April, for the first time since 2019 after being moved during the Covid-19 pandemic.

More than 47,000 runners are taking part, with huge crowds lining the streets of London despite damp conditions.

World marathon silver medalist Judith Korir motivated for London race

World marathon silver medalist Judith Korir believes she has what takes  to secure a podium place in the 43rd London Marathon in the United Kingdom on Sunday.

But it will be a tall order for her as she faces a formidable field that has her compatriots, reigning Olympics marathon champion Peres Jepchirchir and Olympics marathon silver medallist Brigid Kosgei, who is also the world marathon record holder.

The runners will be targeting the course’s best time, which is a women’s only world record time set by Kenya’s Mary Keitany in 2017.

Last year, Korir who trains under the Italy-based Rosa Associati management, was initially entered in the London Marathon as a pacesetter but the last minute withdrawal of Brigid Kosgei saw her registered as a competitor.

She went on to finish fourth in a time of 2:18:43. This time she has been training in the full knowledge she is in the list of the elite women competitors.

“The line-up is tough but I believe in my training. I can’t compare it with last year where I prepared for one month,” Kosgei said when Nation Sport caught up with her at the Ndura Sports Complex in Kitale, last week as she put the finishing touches to her training.

“Competing with some of the best athletes in the marathon like Jepchirchir and Kosgei motivates me to work extra hard,” she said.

“London Marathon line-up is tough and my target is just to run well because we have some of the best athletes in the world participating,” added Korir, who is the 2022 Paris Marathon champion.

Nation Media Group’s NTV will broadcast the race live. There will be a watch party in Eldoret, at the Uasin Gishu County big screen along Uganda Road, starting at 8am on race day.

Natasha Wodak withdraws from 2023 London Marathon

The Canadian women’s marathon record holder, Natasha Wodak, will not be racing at the 2023 London Marathon this Sunday. The 41-year-old announced on her Instagram Tuesday that she has been trying to train through injury and sickness but has not been 100 per cent, which has forced her to withdraw. 

“I am absolutely gutted to announce I’ve pulled out of Sunday’s London Marathon,” wrote Wodak. “The last few days have been incredibly tough trying to decide what to do, but  I am so grateful to all the people in my life that have reassured me that we have made the right decision.”

Earlier in her marathon training build, Wodak was dealing with two separate injuries, which resulted in her missing training. “We put up a great fight when injuries tried to derail us,” wrote Wodak. Two weeks before the marathon, I started having stomach issues, and I’ve unfortunately been sick since. I have not been able to eat much, and we all know you can’t race a marathon under-fuelled.”

Last year at the 2022 Berlin Marathon, Wodak set a new Canadian marathon record of 2:23:12 with her 12th-place finish.

The two-time Canadian Olympian beat the previous record by a minute and 38 seconds, held by Malindi Elmore from the 2020 Houston Marathon (2:24:50).

Wodak was set to take on one of the greatest women’s marathon fields ever assembled, including Olympic champions Sifan Hassan and Peres Jepchirchir, plus the world record holder Brigid Kosgei and the marathon debut of Eilish McColgan. 

Wodak remained optimistic about a return to the marathon, “Right now, I will take the time to rest and reset,” she said. “We have more races to come.”

With Wodak’s withdrawal, there will now be no Canadian elites at the 2023 London Marathon. Rory Linkletter was supposed to start in the men’s elite field but also had to withdraw from an IT band flare-up in late March. 

Eliud Kipchoge is human afterall

Eliud Kipchoge came to Boston seeking to add the world’s most storied annual marathon to his unrivaled trophy case. He will leave with a sixth-place result and questions about whether he can achieve two outstanding, unprecedented goals.

“I live for the moments where I get to challenge the limits,” was posted on Kipchoge’s social media four hours after he finished. “It’s never guaranteed, it’s never easy. Today was a tough day for me. I pushed myself as hard as I could but sometimes, we must accept that today wasn’t the day to push the barrier to a greater height.”

Kipchoge was dropped in the 19th mile in his Boston Marathon debut in the middle of the race’s famed hills. He finished 3 minutes, 29 seconds behind fellow Kenyan Evans Chebet, who clocked 2:05:54 and became the first male runner to repeat as Boston champion since 2008.

“I did not observe Kipchoge,” Chebet said of what happened, according to the Boston Athletic Association. “Eliud was not so much of a threat because the bottom line was that we trained well.”

It marked just Kipchoge’s third defeat in 18 career marathons, a decade-long career at 26.2 miles that’s included two world record-breaking runs and two Olympic gold medals.

Kipchoge, 38, hopes next year to become the first person to win three Olympic marathons, but major doubt was thrown on that Monday, along with his goal to win all six annual World Marathon Majors. Kipchoge has won four of the six, just missing Boston and New York City, a November marathon that he has never raced.He skipped his traditional spring marathon plan of racing London to go for the win in Boston, the world’s oldest annual marathon dating to 1897.

Kipchoge has yet to speak to media, but may be asked whether a failed water bottle grab just before he lost contact with a leading pack of five contributed to his first defeat since he placed eighth at the 2020 London Marathon. Boston’s weather on Monday, rainy, was similar to London in 2020.

Kipchoge’s only other 26.2-mile loss was when he was runner-up at his second career marathon in Berlin in 2013.

He is expected to race two more marathons before the Paris Games. Kipchoge will be nearly 40 come Paris, more than one year older than the oldest Olympic champion in any running event, according to Olympedia.org. Kenya has yet to name its three-man Olympic marathon team.

“In sports you win and you lose and there is always tomorrow to set a new challenge,” was posted on Kipchoge’s social media. “Excited for what’s ahead.”

Kenyan Hellen Obiri won Monday’s women’s race in 2:21:38, pulling away from Ethiopian Amane Beriso in the last mile.

Obiri, a two-time world champion and two-time Olympic medalist in the 5000m on the track, made her marathon debut in New York City last November with a sixth-place finish. She was a late add to the Boston field three weeks ago after initially eschewing a spring marathon.

“I didn’t want to come here, because my heart was somewhere else,” said Obiri, who is coached in Colorado by three-time U.S. Olympian Dathan Ritzenhein. “But, my coach said I should try and go to Boston.”

Emma Bates was the top American in fifth in the second-fastest Boston time for an American woman ever, consolidating her status as a favorite to make the three-woman Olympic team at next February’s trials in Orlando. Emily Sisson and Keira D’Amato, who traded the American marathon record last year, didn’t enter Boston.

“I expected myself to be in the top five,” said the 30-year-old Bates, who feels she can challenge Sisson’s American record of 2:18:29, if and when she next races on a flat course.

The next major marathon is London on Sunday, headlined by women’s world record holder Brigid Kosgei of Kenya, Tokyo Olympic champion Peres Jepchirchir of Kenya and Olympic 5000m and 10,000m champion Sifan Hassan of the Netherlands in her 26.2-mile debut.

Eilish McColgan has had a spectacular year and now she has her sights set on competing at the Olympics in the marathon but she has not run a marathon yet

After three decades immersed in athletics, there are not too many times now when Eilish McColgan is stepping into the unknown.

Next Sunday, however, will be one of those unusual occasions when she stands on the start line not knowing quite what to expect as she will make her marathon debut in London.

For all the thousands upon thousands of miles she has run in training over the years, she is treading new ground.

“I’ve never run 26 miles,” she says. “I don’t actually know many athletes who do the full distance in training.

“We coach amateur runners and we advise not to do more than 22 miles in training and that’s what I’ve been doing myself. There is the mental aspect of can you actually get round 26 miles? But I’ve done 22-mile runs and I had no doubt at the end of them I could have run another four-mile loop. So it’s not so much the distance for me that will be tough, it’s going to be the pace of it.

“There’s a big difference between a long run and a hard, hard effort for that long. So for me, that’s what’s unknown and not something I’ve particularly tested in training.

“I think that’s something that only comes with the experience of racing.”

McColgan is certainly not easing herself in gently. London boasts the strongest women’s marathon field ever assembled with defending champion and world 10k record holder Yalemzerf Yehualaw, marathon world record holder Brigid Kosgei and Olympic champion Peres Jepchirchir all going to be on the start line.

However, with the 32-year-old from Dundee having had the year of her life over the past 12 months, she could not be in a better frame of mind.

McColgan has been on the international scene since 2012, when she competed in her first Olympic Games, but it was in 2022 that she really grabbed the spotlight.

Commonwealth gold in the 10,000m in Birmingham was the most memorable of her performances, but that win was accompanied by a raft of Scottish, British and European records both on the track and on the road.

McColgan has continued her sparkling form into 2023, with her opening appearance of the year a run over 10,000m of 30 minutes 0.86 seconds, breaking Paula Radcliffe’s long-standing national record and smashing her own personal best by 19 seconds.

That was followed by a win at the Berlin Half Marathon two weeks ago in yet another British record and McColgan admits that despite the trepidation that is certainly present about running her first marathon, she is in a confident mood.

“I’m really pleased with my runs. To have come away with British records and such big PBs, I was really happy,” she says. “It’s given me quite a lot of confidence knowing that the training I’m doing is really suited to me.

“I know for sure I can run a good 5k, a good 10k and a good half marathon so now the question is whether or not I can run a good marathon because it’s something I’ve never done. I’m certainly in a better place to run the marathon now than I ever have been but how I actually cope with it, we won’t know till race day.”

The one, and perhaps only, down side of McColgan’s spectacular year is that expectations from observers are now sky-high regarding what she is likely to achieve in London.

However, McColgan is far too pragmatic and too experienced to expect anything spectacular and instead, she sees next weekend’s race as the start of her marathon journey which will, she hopes, lead to the start line of the Olympic marathon in Paris next summer.

“This first marathon is about getting the experience of it,” she says. “I’m in a much stronger position than I’ve ever been and so I’ve given myself the best opportunity to run a good marathon but there’s a lot of things that come into play on the day with regard to the mental side of it, the physical side of covering that sort of distance at that fast pace and the fuelling side of things to make sure I don’t hit the wall.

“There’s a lot more elements that come into a marathon than do on the track or on the shorter road races.

“I know other people maybe expect me to go to London and be competitive but that’s not realistic.

“I’m going into the best marathon field that’s ever been assembled so I have to be realistic with what I can achieve within that. I’m certainly not going in there to win.”

McColgan may not be targeting a podium place but she is not lacking goals for the race.

With the 2024 Olympic Games already in her mind, qualification for Paris is of primary importance – and ideally sooner rather than later – but she also has her mum, Liz’s, one remaining time that is faster than her in her sights over those 26.1 miles in London.

“I have a few goals for London,” she says. “Firstly, I want to get round in one piece. That’s my No.1 goal – to get round and feel like yes, I want to do the marathon at the Paris Olympics,” she says.

“Secondly, this is the final PB that my mum still has of 2 hours 26 mins. Steph Twell took her Scottish record a couple of years ago when she ran 2:25 so I have that in my head as a time target.

“I do feel I’m capable of running faster than my mum and getting that Scottish record and it’d be a triple-whammy because it’d be a qualifying time for the Paris Olympics too.

“I’d like to be competitive against the British girls and if I can do that, I think I can knock those three goals off in the process.

“If I can achieve all my personal goals, that’d be a good day for me.”

Kenyan Celestine Chepchirchir eyes Boston Marathon title

The 127th edition of Boston Marathon which will be run on Monday has attracted 18 Kenyan athletes, among them big names who will contest for honors in the world’s oldest marathon race.

Winners in both categories will go home US$150,000 (Sh19,662,647.40) richer, and the top 10 finishers will also be awarded in the open division.

There will be a new champion in the women’s category since last year’s winner Peres Jepchirchir will not compete. Jepchirchir has opted to compete in the London Marathon.

Cellestine Chepchirchir is among the Kenyan women in contention for the title. For the last three months, she has been preparing for the race in Kapsabet, Nandi County.

She will come up against Kericho-based Sheila Chepkirui, former New York Marathon champion Joyciline Jepkosgei, the 2017 London Marathon champion Edna Kiplagat, 2021 Amsterdam Marathon Angela Tanui and Fancy Chemutai.

Other Kenyans in the women’s filed include Maurine Chepkemoi, Mary Ngugi, Viola Cheptoo, Vibian Chepkirui and Hellen Obiri.

The men’s category will have world marathon record holder Eliud Kipchoge, defending champion Evans Chebet, the 2021 Boston Marathon champion Benson Kipruto, John Korir, Mark Korir, 2021 New York Marathon champion Albert Korir, Nobert Kigen, and Michael Githae.

In an interview with Nation Sport last week, Chepchirchir who has been training in Kapsabet, Nandi County, and has so far competed in 12 marathon races worldwide said she was delighted to be making her maiden appearance in a World Marathon Majors event this year.

Chepchirchir said that being named among elite athletes for Boston Marathon comes with a big responsibility because there will be a lot of expectations on her.

 “I’m privileged to compete with some of the star athletes I have been watching on TV in major races. When I was named among the competitors, I immediately knew I was going to have to work extra hard, and to run a good race. It’s my first major marathon race and my training has gone well. I believe I will run a good race,” said Chepchirchir.

The soft-spoken athlete, who is coached by her husband Nahaman Serem, has competed in 12 marathon races. She finished fourth last year in Seoul Marathon, which gave her a reason to continue running.

Last year, she had been named among the elite athletes for Chicago Marathon but she delayed in processing her travel documents and missed the race.

“I would have competed in my first major marathon last year at the Chicago Marathon but my travel visa delayed. I was also prepared for the race. Unfortunately it didn’t happen but I thank God because I have another race to run this year. My aim will just to run a good race,” added Chepchirchir, who has a personal best time of 2 hours, 20 minutes and 10 seconds.

Other competitors in the women’s category include world champion Gotytom Gebreslase from Ethiopia, 2016 Boston Marathon champion Atsede Baysa, 2020 Tokyo Marathon champion Lonah Salpeter from Israel, 2018 Boston Marathon champion Desiree Linden from USA, among others.

Sifan Hassan to debut in stacked women’s London Marathon field

Aday after releasing the men’s start list for the 2023 London Marathon, race organizers have announced the women’s field, and it is jam-packed with stars. The race will feature marathon world record holder Brigid Kosgei, reigning Olympic champion Peres Jepchirchir and Sifan Hassan, who will be making her highly anticipated marathon debut. The race is April 23, and with so many amazing runners set to toe the line in London, it will be incredible to watch.

Who to watch for in London 

Kosgei has the fastest seed time of the women’s field–by a long shot. (Her 2:14:04 world record is a full minute and a half faster than that of Ethiopia’s Tigist Assefa, who owns the fifth-fastest marathon in history at 2:15:37.) However, Kosgei isn’t necessarily a lock for the win, as there are far too many other extremely successful athletes in the mix. Jepchirchir has had an incredible string of marathons, winning the last five she has entered, including the Tokyo 2020 Olympic marathon, Boston and New York. She’ll be a heavy favourite to make it six in a row (and grab yet another World Marathon Major) in London. 

Ethiopia’s Yalemzerf Yehualaw is another must-watch athlete; not only is she the 10K world record holder, but she also won her debut marathon in Hamburg last spring. Just a few months later, she followed up with a win at the London Marathon and is the defending champion.

Like Hassan, Great Britain’s Eilish McColgan will be running her debut marathon. She’s coming off an amazing season in 2022 that saw her win Commonwealth Games gold in the 10,000m and silver in the 5,000m and set three national records, including her 1:06:26 half-marathon best. Canadian marathon record holder Natasha Wodak is also set to race in London. 

Hassan’s debut

Hassan is one of the fastest runners in history. She is the reigning Olympic champion in the 5,000m and 10,000m (she also won bronze in the 1,500m last Olympics) and the owner of two world championship gold medals, plus she has multiple Dutch, European and world records to her name. What’s so impressive is not simply that Hassan has so many world records, but also the breadth of her success. Her shortest record is over 1,000m (her time of 2:34.68 is the Dutch record). Jumping up to the 1,500m, she has the European best of 3:51.95, and her mile PB of 4:12.33 is the world record. The European records in the 3,000m, 5,000m, 10,000m and half-marathon all belong to Hassan, and she owns the one-hour world record, too. 

With so much success over so many distances, she will likely do something amazing in the marathon. It shouldn’t be a surprise if it takes her a race or two to get into the marathon mindset (going from the half to full marathon is a big jump, even for the world’s best runners), but it also won’t be a surprise if she ends up running one of the fastest marathon debuts in history on April 23. 

Yalemzerf Yehualaw, Brigid Kosgei headline stellar women's London Marathon field

Ethiopia's Yalemzerf Yehualaw will defend her London Marathon title in April, with world record holder Brigid Kosgei and Olympic champion Peres Jepchirchir of Kenya also set to run, organisers said on Thursday.

Reigning Olympic 10,000m and 5,000m champion Sifan Hassan of the Netherlands will make her marathon debut at the age of 30, with 1,500m world record holder Genzebe Dibaba, 2016 Olympic 10,000m champion Almaz Ayana and Berlin Marathon champion Tigist Assefa also taking part.

Home hopes will be carried by Britain's Eilish McColgan, the Commonwealth Games 10,000m champion, who will also be making her marathon debut.

"My victory at last year's TCS London Marathon was a day I will never forget. I can't wait to go back to London and be part of this amazing team," world 10km record holder Yehualaw said.

Hassan said she was considering both track and marathon options ahead of next year's Olympic Games in Paris.

"I need to test myself over the marathon distance... I'm really excited to be making my marathon debut. It will be a step into the unknown in many ways for me but I'm looking forward to it," she added.

Race director Hugh Brasher is delighted with the strength of the field.

"This is quite simply the greatest women's field ever assembled for a marathon – arguably the greatest field ever assembled for a women's distance race," he said.

"We have two reigning Olympic champions, three world record holders and multiple national record holders, in addition to an incredibly strong British contingent led by Eilish McColgan."

Kenyan Edna Kiplagat eyes second title in Boston

Former champion Edna Kiplagat is the only elite Kenyan female athlete invited for the Boston Marathon due for April 17, next year.

Kiplagat returns to the Boston Marathon course for the sixth time, having won in 2017 in two hours, 21 minutes and 52 second besides finishing second twice in 2019 in 2:24:13 and 2021 in 2:25:09.

However, the organisers of the Boston Marathon have now scaled Kiplagat to winner’s position this year after the initial winner Diana Kipyokei failed a doping test in October this year.

Kiplagat, 43, settled ninth in 2018 (2:47:14) behind winner, home athlete Desiree Linden and fourth in 2:21:52 this year where Olympic marathon champion, Peres Jepchirchir, reigned supreme 2:21:02.

Kiplagat, the 2011 and 2013 world champion, will face the reigning world marathon champion Gotytom Gebreslase from Ethiopia, Linden, who is eying to recapture the crown, and 2016 champion Atsede Baysa of Ethiopia.

Injured Jepchirchir will be missing in action.

Kiplagat set a new Masters Division record on her way to finishing fourth at the 2022 Boston Marathon in 2:21:40, and shows no signs of stopping.

While this will be Gotytom Gebreslase’s first Boston Marathon, it is far from her first time racing in Boston.

The Ethiopian world champion has finished runner-up at the Boston Half Marathon twice and has placed in the top-five three times at the Boston 5km.

Beyond winning a world title in 2022, Gebreslase placed third at both the Berlin Marathon and New York City Marathons this year.

“I am very happy to compete in the Boston Marathon 2023, as Boston is one of the most famous races in the world,” Gebreslase told the Boston Marathon website.

Gebreslasem said it has long been her dream to win the race.

" I raced many times in Boston in indoor races and then on the roads. So, I am happy to bring my career full circle as the World Champion with a chance to add the Boston Marathon title,” said Gebreslase.

2022 - the year when international road racing got back to normal

There have been big city races with mass participation, high-profile clashes between the world’s elite distance runners, and numerous records broken across a range of distances.

Road running is back in a big way.

While some World Athletics Label road races in 2022 still had to be postponed or adapted in the face of the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic, road running as a whole is almost back to normal.

Nine Elite Platinum Label marathons have been held already this year, with the 10th and final one due to take place in Valencia on 4 December.

World Athletics Elite Platinum marathons in 2022

Tokyo – 6 March

Winners: Brigid Kosgei (KEN) 2:16:02 CR, Eliud Kipchoge (KEN) 2:02:40 CRWorld record-holders Brigid Kosgei and Eliud Kipchoge got their years off to a great start, winning in the Japanese capital with course records.Finishers: 18,272

Nagoya – 13 March

Winner: Ruth Chepngetich (KEN) 2:17:18 CRAfter an enthralling tussle with Israel’s Lonah Chemtai Salpeter, Ruth Chepngetich prevailed in 2:17:18, breaking the course record in the world’s largest women-only marathons.Finishers: 8698

Seoul – 17 April

Winners: Joan Chelimo Melly (KEN) 2:18:04 CR, Mosinet Geremew (ETH) 2:04:43 CREventual winners Joan Chelimo Melly and Mosinet Geremew were pushed all the way to course records in the Korean capital in two close races. Geremew won by six seconds, while Melly finished eight seconds ahead of her nearest rival.

Boston – 18 April

Winners: Peres Jepchirchir (KEN) 2:21:01, Evans Chebet (KEN) 2:06:51Olympic champion Peres Jepchirchir maintained her winning streak to win in one of the world’s most prestigious races, finishing just four seconds ahead of Ethiopia’s Ababel Yeshaneh. Evans Chebet enjoyed a more comfortable victory in the men’s race.Finishers: 24,607

Berlin – 25 September

Winners: Tigist Assefa (ETH) 2:15:37 CR, Eliud Kipchoge (KEN) 2:01:09 WROlympic champion Eliud Kipchoge returned to the site of his last world record-breaking performance and improved on the mark by 30 seconds, setting a world record of 2:01:09. Meanwhile, Tigist Assefa smashed the women’s course record – and Ethiopian record – with her 2:15:37 victory.Finishers: 34,879

London – 2 October

Winners: Yalemzerf Yehualaw (ETH) 2:17:26, Amos Kipruto (KEN) 2:04:39Yalemzerf Yehualaw got the better of defending champion Joyciline Jepkosgei in an enthralling duel, while Amos Kipruto made a similar late-race break to take the men’s title.Finishers: 40,578

Chicago – 9 October

Winners: Ruth Chepngetich (KEN) 2:14:18 WL, Benson Kipruto (KEN) 2:04:24Ruth Chepngetich came within seconds of the world record to win in 2:14:18, the second-fastest time in history. Benson Kipruto, winner in Boston last year, added another US big city marathon win to his collection.Finishers: 39,420

Amsterdam – 16 October

Winners: Almaz Ayana (ETH) 2:17:20 CR, Tsegaye Getachew (ETH) 2:04:49Ethiopia’s 2016 Olympic 10,000m champion Almaz Ayana ran the fastest marathon debut in history to win in the Dutch capital, holding off former track rival and compatriot Genzebe Dibaba. Tsegaye Getachew made it an Ethiopian double, winning by just five seconds from Titus Kipruto.Finishers: 12,669

New York City – 6 November

Winners: Sharon Lokedi (KEN) 2:23:23, Evans Chebet (KEN) 2:08:41Kenya’s Sharon Lokedi pulled off one of the biggest road-running surprises of 2022, winning the New York City Marathon on her debut at the distance and beating many established stars of the sport. Evans Chebet added to his Boston win from earlier in the year.Finishers: 47,839

Valencia – 4 December

Elite field: includes Letesenbet Gidey, Sutume Kebede, Tiki Gelana, Tigist Girma, Etagegne Woldu, Amane Shankule and Tadelech Bekele in the women’s race, and Getaneh Molla, Tamirat Tola, Dawit Wolde, Jonathan Korir, Hiskel Tewelde, Chalu Deso and Gabriel Geay in the men’s race.Places: 30,000

For the masses

It’s not just elite runners who have been able to enjoy top-quality road racing. Events in most corners of the world have been able to stage mass races of some sort in 2022.

That looks set to continue in 2023 too, not just with Label road races but also at World Athletics Series events.

Peres Jepchirchir named chief guest for Great Ethiopian Run

Reigning Olympic marathon champion Peres Jepchirchir is the guest of honor for this years’ edition of the Sofi malt Great Ethiopian Run International 10km road race set for Sunday in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

The race will see up to 500 elite athletes compete in both men and women categories with more than 40,000 participants expected to run in three waves of red, green and yellow which symbolises the Ethiopian flag.

Ethiopian athletics legend Haile Gebrselassie, who is a two-time Olympic 10,000m champion started the race 20 years ago with the first edition taking place in 2001. Local athletes have dominated all editions since then.

Jepchirchir, who is also the Boston Marathon champion, is excited to be gracing the race in what will be her first visit to Ethiopia.

“I’m glad to be invited for the Great Ethiopian Run International 10km road race as a guest of honour and I would love to meet with Haile and get some tips from him. I have not been to Ethiopia and I’m looking forward to also interact with my competitors and share one or two things concerning the sport,” said Jepchirchir.

Race General Manager Dagmawit Amare told Nation Sport the race is a symbol of unity and they are happy to host another  event.

“Every year in November, is the month that we are proud to be Ethiopians and in the past 21 years, the race has brought joy and unity in athletics. This year we expect more than 40,000 participants including 500 elite athletes from Uganda, Kenya, and Eritrea,” said Dagmawit.

According to the Runners World, the race held in Addis Ababa annually is possibly one of the best in the world where there is a mix of elite and fun runners.

The Great Ethiopian Run also organizes Hawassa Half Marathon, Women 5km race in March, Europe Day children races in May and Entoto Park Predator Run, which is held every month in Addis Ababa, IFH Relay Races and Great Bokoji Run.

Also invited for the event is two-time Boston Marathon champion Moses Tanui. He is expected to hold discussions for a partnership between Great Ethiopian Run and the Eldoret City Marathon, which is his brainchild.

Viola Lagat will be heading to the New York City Marathon for the second time hoping to improve on her second place finish in last year’s race

Viola Cheptoo Lagat, the younger sister of Kenyan-born US distance running legend Bernard Lagat had set base for the last three months in Iten, Elgeyo Marakwet County.

This Sunday’s race in the “Big Apple” will be her third over the marathon distance.

“Last year, it was a dream come true because I was debuting in the marathon and coming in second alongside such great athletes competing was just amazing. It gave me a reason to continue working hard,” said Lagat.

She did not change her training programme but wants to lower her personal best time.

Obiri makes debut

Other Kenyans lining up at Central Park on Sunday will be two-time world marathon champion Edna Kiplagat, Grace Kahura and Hellen Obiri. Obiri, a two-time world 5,000 metres champion and twice Olympic silver medallist over the distance, will be making her marathon debut.

“Competing with a great name like Edna Kiplagat is an inspiration. I’m still young in marathon because I need to know what time should I react and what time I should increase my pace compared to her who has done more races, she is sure of what she is doing,” Lagat added.

Lagat has good memories of last year’s race hailing Olympic champion Peres Jepchirchir for pushing her to the podium at Central Park.

“I started slow in the race, but the most amazing thing is that my body started reacting well and I surged forward steadily and, to my surprise, I managed to get to where Jepchirchir was. She asked me if the pace she was doing was fine with me and I told her I was comfortable. She really encouraged me,” explained Lagat.

Tips from Keitany

Lagat has also been taking notes from four-time New York Marathon champion Mary Keitany who has been giving her tips on how to overcome the tough New York course.

Lagat started her 2022 season with a sixth place in Boston Marathon in April, her preparations affected by a bout of Covid-19 which slowed her training.

“When I started my training in January, I had difficulty. I just trained for two months and that affected my performance in April,” she said.

Lagat has planned with her coach to attack the Abott Marathon Majors series which, besides New York, also features the London, Tokyo, Berlin and Chicago marathons.

“I would like to ask Kenyans and all our fans to always pray for us as we line up for the race. Personally, I’m doing this for Peres Jepchirchir who pulled out of the race due to injury. We are praying for her to heal as soon as possible,” said Lagat who is a former 1,500 meters specialist.

She ranks Obiri as the dark horse, arguing that anyone making a debut is capable of upsetting the applecart.

USA-based Grace Kahura eyes ‘home’ win in New York

Sunday’s New York City Marathon will be a largely Kenyan affair.

Even after the withdrawal of the defending champion Peres Jepchirchir, the field remains open with another Kenyan almost certain to keep the title in the country.

Two-time world marathon champion Edna Kiplagat leads her compatriots Viola Lagat, who was second last year, Grace Kahura, who finished ninth, and debutant Hellen Obiri.

Kahura will be competing in the “Big Apple” for the second time this year, seeking to improve on her personal best time of two hours, 30 minutes and 32 seconds.

She might not be as well known as the other elite athletes, but she’ll enjoy the advantage of training in Colorado, USA, in perfect pre-race conditions.

Kahura told Nation Sport from her US base recently that she has been preparing for the race in the last four months without any hitches. “The marathon is tough, but I have prepared well and my target is to compete well during the race because I don’t want to mess my body for I know my fitness levels,” said Kahura.

She also said that competing in New York Marathon for the second time is an honour and that she is still in the learning process.

“The New York Marathon course is tough… I used to watch athletes compete in the race and it used to be so windy so I entered last year prepared and I’m glad it wasn’t that bad.

“When going for such race, you have to be prepared for anything because challenges might arise and you have to face them,” she said.

Competing with one of the greatest marathoners of all time, Edna Kiplagat, has also motivated her to even work harder.

“I watched Kiplagat competing while in primary school and competing with her in the same race now has really inspired me.

“My joy is interacting with her as she is full of wisdom and always has good advice on how to be world beater,” she added.

Kahura joined Colorado’s Boulder University in 2016 and graduated last year in Business and Accounting but wants to focus on being a professional athlete.

She was born in Kanjeru in Kiambu County on April 5, 1993, and went to Ngure Primary School and later Kanjeru Girls High School where she sat her exams in 2011.

It is here that her coach, John Mwithiga, popularly known as “warm-up”, took her to a camp where she started training as she waited for a chance to join university. At the University of Colorado, her focus was on education and she only started training seriously after she graduated.

While in school, she competed in Utica Boilmaker 15-kilometre road race where she finished 10th in 2016, before coming in seventh at the Indianapolis One America Festival Mini Marathon the same year.

From then on, she has competed in various races including Grandma’s Marathon in 2018 and 2021 where she finished fourth on both occasions.

She has been training on her own, but under the guidance of Owen Anderson, her American agent whom she says has been sending her training programmes to help her prepare for elite races.

New York City Marathon: Kenyan Peres Jepchirchir out, Keira D’Amato in

Olympic champion Peres Jepchirchir withdrew from defending her New York City Marathon title on Nov. 6, citing an unspecified injury.

Keira D’Amato, the second-fastest American female marathoner in history, was also added to the field in Friday’s announcement.

Jepchirchir, 29, is the only person to win the Olympic, Boston and New York City Marathons in a career, doing so in a nine-month span in 2021 and 2022. She won New York City last November in 2:22:39, prevailing by five seconds over countrywoman Viola Cheptoo.

D’Amato, a 37-year-old mother of two, broke a 16-year-old American record in the women’s marathon on Jan. 16 by clocking 2:19:12 in Houston. Emily Sisson took the record last Sunday in Chicago in 2:18:29.

D’Amato, who went nearly a decade between competitive races after a middle-distance stint at American University, will make her New York City Marathon debut six weeks after running the Berlin Marathon in 2:21:48.

Elkanah Kibet also withdrew from the Nov. 6 race, a year after he was the top finisher among American male runners in fourth place. Kibet, a lieutenant in the U.S. Army, received orders to report overseas, according to the New York Road Runners.

Other race headliners include: 2018 Boston Marathon winner Des Linden and world champions Gotytom Gebreslase of Ethiopia and Edna Kiplagat of Kenya for the women. And two-time Olympic medalist Galen Rupp, defending champion Albert Korir of Kenya, reigning Boston Marathon champion Evans Chebet, Olympic silver medalist Abdi Nageeye of the Netherlands and 2020 London Marathon winner Shura Kitata for the men.

Hellen Obiri believes her winning the Great North Half Marathon is a huge inspiration as she prepares for her full marathon debut in New York

Olympic 5,000m silver medallist Hellen Obiri said cheers from the crowd on the streets of Newcastle and a good course propelled her to clinch the title once again.

As compared to last year’s edition, when the Covid-19 pandemic was still raging — forcing the limitations on crowds — Obiri said this year's edition was well attended and the course favourable.

“Last year, the race was a bit tough due to the pandemic. However, this year’s edition has been amazing owing to the cheerful crowd. The course was also good unlike last year,” Obiri said.

Obiri won the Great North Run in 1:07:05, bettering her 1:07:42 from last year, ahead of Olympic marathon champion Peres Jepchirchir ( 1:07:07 ). Ethiopia’s Almaz Ayana placed third in 1:07:10.

Obiri, the world 10,000m silver medallist added: “It’s a good feeling. I am happy for what I have done.” 

She added that the race was not a walk in the park with the presence of Jepchirchir and Ayana, a former Olympic and world 10,000m champion.

“I knew they were there and I knew the race was going to be a tight battle. However, I told myself I am the best and I will do my best. I had a plan to kick in the last 200m and it worked out well,” she said.

“I am so excited about my marathon debut but I'm also aware of the tough competition that awaits me. Right now, I am going to prepare well and I am hoping I’ll be healthy. I just want to run well and cross the finish line,” Obiri concluded.

Hellen Obiri wins back to back Great North Runs as the world’s most iconic half marathon

Hellen Obiri continued Kenya’s dominance of the famous race, repeating her victory of 12 months ago as the event took place in its rightful home following an altered course in 2021 while the world recovered from the coronavirus pandemic.  The race this year returned to its traditional course.  

Uganda’s Jacob Kiplimo won the men’s race following a thrilling three-way battle for much of the race distance.

The race took on a suitably subdued mood as runners paid tribute to Queen Elizabeth II, who died on Thursday, and it was perhaps fitting that in Kenya and Uganda, the winners of the women’s and men’s races were members of the Commonwealth, of which the Queen was head.

Obiri was given close attention by Britain’s Eilish McColgan in the 2021 staging of the 13.1-mile race, but while McColgan was not involved in the race today – she was on official starter duties – the Kenyan was instead given a tough test by Peres Jepchirchir and Almaz Ayana, the three crossing the line with only five seconds separating them.

Obiri crossed the line in 67.05, with Jepchirchir two seconds behind in 67.07, and Ayana in 67.10. First Brit over the line was Charlotte Purdue, who ran a largely solo race to finish in fifth with a time of 70.11.

Winner Obiri said: “I’m very happy to win again, although of course this route was different to last year. The crowds were so good, I am very pleased to win here.”

In the men’s race, Kiplimo quietly and confidently picked off his opponents, with 2013 winner Kenenisa Bekele, who finished an eventual third, dropping first, followed by second-place Selemon Barega with about four miles to go, leaving Kiplimo with clear air to finish in 59.33, Barega in 60.39 and Bekele in 61.01.

Kiplimo said: “The race was good – it was a great feeling to win. It was a strange feeling to run the last few kilometres on my own. From 10KM it was four or five of us, then three, then two, then just me.

“This is a wonderful crowd. Around 18-19KM the crowds were amazing. Everyone was cheering and smiling.

“When I heard the news (about the Queen) I thought the race was going to be cancelled – I was so happy to hear it was still going ahead. It is very sad news but it was good for us all to come together.”

2022 winner Marc Scott was first British runner home in sixth with a time of 62.28.

It was a very different kind of race due to the events of the last few days but it’s a great event as always. They know how to put an event on here in the North East. I’m just grateful to be part of it again, especially with a great field assembled.”

Jacob Kiplimo wins the Great North Run after fantastic tributes were paid to the Queen

World record holder Jacob Kiplimo became the first Ugandan man to win the Great North Run after tributes were paid to Queen Elizabeth II before Sunday' race.

Kiplimo powered to victory in his first appearance at the event in north-east England.

The 21-year-old had a 32-second lead as he hit the 12-mile mark on the 13.1-mile course from Newcastle to South Shields.

Kiplimo, the reigning world half-marathon champion, crossed the line in 59.33, 66 seconds ahead of Olympic 10,000m champion Selemon Barega, with Ethiopia's Kenenisa Bekele third in 1.01.01.

"I enjoyed the race, it was nice. I came here to win it," Kiplimo said.

In the women's race, Kenya's Hellen Obiri retained the title after holding off strong challenges from Peres Jepchirchir.

The trio broke away from the field early in the race and contested a tense finale.

Obiri made the decisive kick in sight of the finish line as she clocked 1:07.05, 37 seconds faster than last year, with her compatriot Jepchirchir, the Olympic marathon champion, two seconds behind and Ethiopia's Almaz Ayana a further three seconds adrift.

"It's a great opportunity to do a faster one than last time, so I'm so happy," Obiri said.

Hellen Obiri to defend Great North Run title, Peres Jepchirchir in the mix

Defending champion Hellen Obiri and Olympic marathon champion Peres Jepchirchir will be in the women’s lineup for the Great North Run slated for September 11 in the streets of Newcastle.

Obiri won last year’s edition in 1:07:42. She is a two-time world 5000m champion and a two-time Olympic 5000m silver medalist. Obiri has a personal best time of 1:04:22 which she ran at the Ras Al Khaimah Half Marathon in February.

Jepchirchir, who will be making her debut, has a personal best time of 1:05.06 which she ran at the 2017 Ras Al Khaimah Half Marathon. She placed first during the World Athletics Half Marathon Championships in 2016 and 2020 in respective times of 1:07:31 and 1:05:16. Jepchirchir is also a former world half marathon record holder. 

The Kenyan duo will be competing against the Ethiopian duo of Hiwot Gebrekidan and former Olympic 10,000m champion Almaz Ayana. Gebrekidan and Ayana have personal best times of 1:06:47 and 1:07:12 respectively.

Gebrekidan is the winner of the 2016 Copenhagen Half Marathon. She is also a former World Under-20 3000m silver medalist. Ayana won in the 2017 edition of the New Delhi Half Marathon. She is also a former world 10,000m record holder when she broke China’s Wang Junxia record during the 2016 Rio Olympics.

Charlotte Purdue and Jess Piasecki, both from Great Britain will also be in the race. Purdue placed third during last year’s edition of the Great North Run. She has a personal best time of 1:08:23 which she ran at the 2020 Kagawa Marugame International Half Marathon in Japan. 

Piasecki has a personal best time of 1:07:20 which she ran at this year’s Santa Pola Half Marathon in Spain. She is also the winner of the 2019 Usti Half Marathon in Czech Republic. She will also be making her Great North Run half marathon debut.

Fit-again Peres Jepchirchir to debut at Great North Run

Olympic marathon champion Peres Jepchirchir will make her return from injury when she debuts at the Great North Run Half Marathon on September 11 in England.

Jepchirchir, who resumed training three weeks ago, said the pain from the hip injury that locked her out of the World Athletics Championships in July in Oregon, United States, had eased.

“I feel much better now with the pain having subsided. My doctor advised me to return to training gradually and all is well as for now,” said Jepchirchir, ahead of the race that will start at Newcastle upon Tyne before ending at South Shields.

Jepchirchir was a late inclusion in the women’s marathon team for the World Athletics Championships, but withdrew days before the start of the event on July 15 with the advice from Team Kenya physician Victor Bargoria.

“It was disappointing, but I would rather not aggravate the injury since we still have another world event next year before my Olympic title defence at the 2024 Paris Summer Games,” said Jepchirchir, who hopes to use the Great North Run as part of her preparations for her New York City Marathon title defense on November 6 this year.

Judith Jeptum went on to claim silver for Kenya in Oregon, clocking a personal best of two hours, 18 minutes and 20 seconds, as Ethiopian Gotytom Gebreslase won the race in a Championship Record time of 2:18:11.

Another Kenyan Angela Tanui settled sixth in 2:22:15 as defending champion Ruth Chepngétich pulled out during the race with stomach problems.

Jepchirchir became the second Kenyan woman to win the Olympic title when she swept to victory in the streets of Sapporo, Japan in 2:27:20 seconds on August 7, 2021.

Kenyan women have won the last eight editions of the Great North Run with Hellen Obiri claiming victory last year in one hour, 07 minutes and 42 seconds.

Women’s world marathon record holder Brigid Kosgei holds the Great North Run course record with her victory of 1:04:28 in 2019.

The 2020 event was canceled due to Covid-19.

Kenya's Hellen Obiri to train in US for New York Marathon

World 10,000 meters silver medalist Hellen Obiri plans to travel to America ahead of time before making her debut in New York Marathon race on November 6.

In an interview with Nation Sport, the double 5,000m world champion said that she will be heading to Colorado, USA to acclimatize.

Obiri said that she will be depending on her new coach Dathan Ritzenhein, who heads On Athletics Club, for guidance.

Ritzenhein is a former athlete who has previously competed in the New York Marathon.

Obiri, who has plans to relocate to the US, said that she is not moving yet.

“There is still some paperwork that I’m working on before finalizing my move to the US. But, I will be going to Colorado for training because I want to acclimatize before the race. I look forward to a good race, but the most important thing for me is to learn,” she said.

The World Athletics Cross Country Championships title holder, who has been training in Ngong, Kajiado County, said that when she stepped up to marathon racing, it was not easy because the training is different.

“Marathon training is different from what I was used to while competing in track races. At fast it was tricky, but I persevered and I am now used to it,” she said.

The Olympic 5,000m silver medalist said that she was inspired to switch to marathon by two-time world marathon champion Edna Kiplagat.

“I was really inspired by Edna Kiplagat who has been doing well for long and is still competing. I have interacted with her, and when I learned that she was part of the elite field at New York Marathon, I felt encouraged that she will be racing with me,” said Obiri.

“Before the competition, I look forward to train with Edna in the US.”

The Istanbul Half Marathon champion said that she took a leap of faith to compete in full marathon after performing well in half marathon races.

Obiri clocked 64:38 to win this year’s Istanbul Half Marathon after having triumphed in the same race last year in 64:51.

The former 5,000m African champion has had a good season which climaxed in her winning a 10,000m silver medal at the World Athletics Championships in Oregon, USA on July 16.

In New York, Obiri will be up against defending champion and Olympic marathon champion Peres Jepchirchir, Edna, debutante Sharon Lokedi, Caroline Rotich and US-based Viola Lagat, who was second last year.

Other top names in the race are newly crowned world champion Ethiopian Gotytom Gebreslase and her compatriot Senbere Teferi, world bronze medalist Israel’s Lorna Chemtai Salpeter, USA’s Sara Hall and Aliphine Tuliamuk.

World Championships Medalists Gotytom Gebreslase, Lonah Chemtai Salpeter, and Hellen Obiri to Join Women’s Field at 2022 TCS New York

Sara Hall, Emma Bates, Aliphine Tuliamuk, Des Linden, Nell Rojas, and Stephanie Bruce to anchor star-studded contingent of American women.

World Championships medalists Gotytom Gebreslase of Ethiopia, Lonah Chemtai Salpeter of Israel, and Hellen Obiri of Kenya will join previously announced New York City and Olympic champion Peres Jepchirchir in the women’s professional athlete division at this year’s TCS New York City Marathon on Sunday November 6. All three will make their TCS New York City Marathon debuts, with Obiri making her 26.2-mile debut across any course, and will line up against a star-studded contingent of American women that includes Sara Hall, Emma Bates, Aliphine Tuliamuk, Des Linden, Nell Rojas, and Stephanie Bruce. The 2022 TCS New York City Marathon women’s professional athlete field is presented by Mastercard®.

Women’s Open Division

Fresh off her victory at the world championships marathon, where she finished the course in a championship-record time of 2:18:11, Gebreslase will make New York City her next stop. She will look to add a five-borough title to her resume, having previously won the 2021 Berlin Marathon and finished third at the 2022 Tokyo Marathon.

“Winning the World Championships was like a dream, and I am honored to run my next marathon in New York City,” Gebreslase said. “It’s home to the biggest marathon in the world, and many of the top athletes have run there. I understand it’s a challenging course, and I’m looking forward to seeing further success there.”

Two-time Olympian Salpeter, a Kenyan-born Israeli who won the bronze medal at the world championships marathon and was the 2020 Tokyo Marathon winner, will challenge Gebreslase once again. Obiri, a two-time Olympic medalist and seven-time individual world championships medalist, will make her highly anticipated marathon debut shortly after winning a world championships silver over 10,000 meters.

“I’m very excited to make my marathon debut at the TCS New York City Marathon,” Obiri said. “I have watched the race many times on TV and have seen my Kenyan colleagues compete there. I know New York is a tough course, but I hope my experience on track, road, and cross-country will help me navigate the ups and downs. I also plan to get advice and tips from coach Dathan Ritzenhein, who competed in the race several times in the past.”

In addition to Jepchirchir, the group will be racing against Ethiopia’s Senbere Teferi, who will look to become the first athlete to win the United Airlines NYC Half, Mastercard New York Mini 10K, and TCS New York City Marathon in one year. Three other Kenyans will also be strong contenders for podium places, including the 2010 New York City, 2014 London and 2017 Boston Marathon champion Edna Kiplagat, last year’s runner-up Viola Cheptoo, and newcomer Sharon Lokedi.

The American effort will be led by 10-time national champion Hall, who was the top world championships marathon finisher from the U.S. last month in Oregon, where she placed fifth. She is also the former half marathon national record holder, the runner-up from the 2020 London Marathon, and a two-time winner of the Mastercard New York Mini 10K. She will be joined at the Staten Island start line by Bates, who clocked a personal best to finish seventh at the world championships and was the runner-up at last year’s Chicago Marathon.

“From winning the Millrose mile to back-to-back Mini 10K wins, most of my favorite career moments have happened in NYC,” Hall said. “I’m all-in to add to that by having my best marathon yet at the TCS New York City Marathon. I can’t wait to be back racing my heart out in the five boroughs of my favorite city.”

Tokyo 2020 Olympian Aliphine Tuliamuk, and two-time Olympian and 2018 Boston Marathon champion Des Linden, will also return to New York, as will national champion Stephanie Bruce, who will race the five boroughs for the final time before retiring. The deep U.S. women’s group will additionally include Nell Rojas, the top American finisher from the last two Boston Marathons, Lindsay Flanagan, the top American finisher from the 2022 United Airlines NYC Half, Annie Frisbie, last year’s seventh-place finisher, and her training partner Dakotah Lindwurm, who won Grandma’s Marathon in June. Emily Durgin, the sixth-fastest U.S. half marathoner of all-time, will make her marathon debut.

Chinese Su Bingtian will have season's debut at World Athletics Champs

A total of 53 Chinese athletes, including veterans Su Bingtian, Xie Zhenye and Gong Lijiao, will compete for more glory at the upcoming World Athletics Championships set to start on Friday in Eugene, Oregon in the U.S.

The first-ever Asian sprinter to break the 10-second barrier in the 100-meter track and field event, 33-year-old Su is the fastest Asian man with a personal best of 9.83 seconds. He will have his season's debut as the only Chinese to participate in the red hot men's 100m event at the World Championships, where he will face a line of superstar rivals.

China's Xie Zhenye will compete in the men's 200m. Meanwhile, Xie, Su, Wu Zhiqiang, Tang Xingqiang, Chen Guanfeng and Deng Zhijian are down to compete in the men's 4X100m. The Chinese relay team was upgraded to a historic bronze medal at last year's Tokyo Olympics after Team Great Britain were stripped of the silver over a doping violation.

Other highlights for Team China will include Gong Lijiao's attempt to win her third consecutive world championship title in women's shot put and women's race walks attended by defending champion Liu Hong and teammates Qieyang Shenjie, Ma Zhenxia and Wu Quanming.

Olympic champions in women's javelin Liu Shiying and Lyu Huihui are also sure to attract attention.

However, event host the U.S. are almost sure to dominate, having won 170 gold medals since the first championship in 1983 – 110 more than next-best Kenya. 

Team USA's 151-strong roster features nine defending champions and 20 medalists from last year's Tokyo Olympics and, for a 10th and final time, superstar Allyson Felix, aged 36.

Missing the event this year is Olympic and world 400 meters champion Bahamian Steven Gardiner, who will not defend his World Championship title due to UTE tendon inflammation.

In the United States for the first time, the 18th edition of the World Championships has seen a handful of late withdrawals, including Olympic women's marathon champion Kenyan Peres Jepchirchir, who will miss out with a right hip injury.

Olympic gold medalist Lamont Marcell Jacobs returns to the 100m big stage after muscle injuries ruled him out of several Diamond League meets.

Team USA have high hopes of making it three in a row after the disappointment at the Tokyo Olympics, where the Italian team took a shock gold. 

Tokyo silver medalist Fred Kerley has been in fabulous form this season and could well be part of a home podium sweep alongside defending champion Christian Coleman and Trayvon Bromell.

Peres Jepchirchir, world’s top marathoner, withdraws from world championships

Kenyan Peres Jepchirchir, who in the last year won the Olympics, New York City and Boston marathons, withdrew from next Monday’s world championships marathon due to a right hip injury, her agent confirmed.

Jepchirchir, a 28-year-old mom, began feeling discomfort last week, according to the Daily Nation.

Last year, Jepchirchir became the first person to win the Olympic and New York City Marathons in a career, doing so in a span of three months. She then added a title in Boston on April 18, cementing her status as the world’s top marathoner.

In Jepchirchir’s absence, the marathon field at worlds in Eugene, Oregon, is led by defending champion Ruth Chepngetich of Kenya and Ethiopians Ababel Yeshaneh (second to Jepchirchir in Boston) and Gotytom Gebreslase (Berlin Marathon champion), plus American record holder Keira D’Amato.

D’Amato replaces Olympic bronze medalist Molly Seidel, who withdrew two weeks ago, citing a hip injury, an ongoing process seeking a therapeutic use exemption for ADHD medication and a focus on her mental health.

All five reigning world champions named on Kenya's team for Oregon

All five of Kenya’s champions from Doha in 2019 will defend their titles at the World Athletics Championships Oregon22 on 15-24 July.

Beatrice Chepkoech, Ruth Chepngetich, Timothy Cheruiyot, Conseslus Kipruto and Hellen Obiri have been named on the Kenyan team for the event at Hayward Field, where they will be joined by athletes including Olympic champions Peres Jepchirchir, Faith Kipyegon and Emmanuel Korir.

Obiri won her second consecutive world 5000m title in Doha and has been selected for that event as well as the 10,000m, joined by Margaret Chelimo in both.

Chepkoech and Kipruto defend their 3000m steeplechase titles, while Cheruiyot will look to return to the top in the 1500m after securing silver behind Norway’s Jakob Ingebrigtsen in Tokyo.

Chepngetich will be joined by Angela Tanui and Judith Jeptum in the women’s marathon, as well as Olympic champion Jepchirchir. After Tokyo, two-time world half marathon champion Jepchirchir went on to win the New York and Boston marathons and has been added to the team for Oregon.

Kenya finished second in the medal table behind USA in Doha three years ago with five gold, two silver and four bronze medals.

Kenyan team for Oregon

Women400m: Mary Moraa800m: Naomi Korir, Jarinter Mawia, Mary Moraa1500m: Winnie Chebet, Edinah Jebitok, Faith Kipyegon, Judy Kiyeng5000m: Beatrice Chebet, Margaret Chelimo, Gloria Kite, Hellen Obiri10,000m: Margaret Chelimo, Sheila Chepkurui, Hellen Obiri3000m steeplechase: Beatrice Chepkoech, Jackline Chepkoech, Celliphine Chespol, Purity Kirui20km race walk: Emily NgiiMarathon: Ruth Chepngetich, Peres Jepchirchir, Judith Jeptum, Angela Tanui

Men100m: Ferdinand Omanyala400m: Emmanuel Korir800m: Wycliffe Kinyamal, Emmanuel Korir, Cornelius Tuwei, Emmanuel Wanyonyi1500m: Timothy Cheruiyot, Abel Kipsang, Charles Simotwo, Kumari Taki5000m: Nicholas Kimeli, Jacob Krop, Daniel Simiu10,000m: Rodgers Kwemoi, Daniel Mateiko, Stanley Waithaka3000m steeplechase: Leonard Bett, Abraham Kibiwott, Benjamin Kigen, Conseslus Kipruto400m hurdles: Moitalel Mpoke20km race walk: Samuel GathimbaMarathon: Lawrence Cherono, Geoffrey Kamworor, Barnaba Kiptum

Olympic marathon champion Peres Jepchirchir said she could target the London, Berlin or Chicago marathons for a world record attempt next year

The 28-year-old Kenyan set the sport ablaze when she won the New York City Marathon just 13 weeks after claiming gold in Tokyo, the first athlete to win the Olympic marathon and the five-borough race in the same year.

She picked up her second major title five months later in Boston in a thrilling sprint finish, confirming her among the most dominant marathon runners of all time.

Jepchirchir, who wants to be the first woman to successfully defend her Olympic title in 2024, said she has even loftier goals in mind.

“I still have a mission to go – I still need to run to attempt records in marathon,” she told Reuters on Friday, a day ahead of competing in the 50th running of the New York Mini 10K.

“London is a faster course, even Berlin, Chicago is a faster course… Those are the races that maybe I can attempt.”

Jepchirchir produced the fifth all-time fastest marathon by a woman in December 2020, winning the Valencia Marathon in 2:17:16, and believes she’s “not far” from breaking compatriot Brigid Kosgei’s record 2:14.04 set in 2019.

“I’m feeling good – I’m so glad, I’m so happy for my improvement in my career,” she said.

Twelve Olympians will lead star-studded lineup at 50th anniversary of Mastercard New York Mini 10K

Twelve Olympians and five Paralympians will line up in Central Park for the 50th anniversary of the Mastercard® New York Mini 10K, the world’s original women-only road race, on Saturday, June 11, New York Road Runners (NYRR) announced today.

U.S. Olympians Emily Sisson, Molly Seidel, Aliphine Tuliamuk, and Rachel (Schneider) Smith will lead a strong American contingent that will go up against previously announced Olympic, TCS New York City Marathon, and Boston Marathon champion Peres Jepchirchir, United Airlines NYC Half champion and 5K world-record holder Senbere Teferi, and two-time Mini 10K champion Sara Hall.

Sisson will come into the race after claiming her sixth national title last month in an American record 1:07:11 at the USATF Half Marathon Championships. She made her Olympic debut in Tokyo last summer after winning the 10,000 meters at the U.S. Olympic Track and Field Trials, where she broke the 17-year-old Trials record set by Deena Kastor in 2004. She has been very successful in her last three trips to New York, finishing as the runner-up at the United Airlines NYC Half twice and winning the USATF 5K Championships.

“After breaking the American record in the half-marathon, I’m excited to step down in distance and compete in the Mastercard® New York Mini 10K for the first time,” Sisson said. “It will be a privilege to take part in such a powerful event that has paved the way for so many women over the last 50 years.”

Seidel owns a bronze medal from the Tokyo Olympic marathon last year and in her last trip to New York set an American course record and recorded a fourth-place finish at the TCS New York City Marathon. Tuliamuk won the 2020 U.S. Olympic Marathon Trials and then gave birth to her daughter before running in the Olympic marathon in Tokyo. She will be making her first trip to New York since 2019 and is coming off winning the 25km national title, bringing her national title count to 11. Smith represented the U.S. at the Tokyo Olympics in the 5,000 meters after finishing third in the distance at the U.S. Olympic Track and Field Trials.

The deep U.S. women’s contingent also includes American marathon record-holder Keira D’Amato, the top American finisher at the last two Boston Marathons Nell Rojas, 2019 New York Mini 10K runner-up Stephanie Bruce, U.S. national champion Erika Kemp, and the top American finisher at the 2022 United Airlines NYC Half Lindsay Flanagan.

Returning to the event 10 years after her victory will be Kenya’s Edna Kiplagat, a two-time world champion in the marathon who won the 2010 New York City, 2014 London, and 2017 Boston marathons, and was the runner-up in Boston in 2019 and 2021.

“Winning the New York City Marathon 12 years ago changed my life, and now, 10 years after also winning the Mini 10K, I still enjoy my racing and am happy to still be competing at a high level,” Kiplagat said. “NYRR always invites the highest quality fields, so I always like lining up in New York with the best in the world. There are so many inspiring women who have participated in this race over the years who set a positive example for everyone – both runners and non-runners – and I’m lucky to be part of such a prestigious group.”

Last year’s TCS New York City Marathon runner-up and Mastercard® New York Mini 10K runner-up Viola Cheptoo of Kenya and former NCAA 10,000-meter champion Sharon Lokedi of Kenya will contend for the title as well.

The professional wheelchair division will be headlined by two-time Paralympic medalist and three-time Mastercard® Mini 10K defending champion Susannah Scaroni. Since the addition of the professional wheelchair division in 2018, Scaroni is the only athlete to have won the race.

“The Mastercard New York Mini 10K is a special one to me for so many reasons, and I’m excited at the chance to race on what will be a milestone day for women’s running in Central Park,” Scaroni said. “Not only is the Mini 10K the world’s original women-only road race, but it is also one of the only women-only wheelchair races at the present time, which will hopefully pave the way for future generations of women’s wheelchair racers in the next 50 years.”

Lining up against Scaroni will be U.S. Paralympians Jenna Fesemyer, Yen Hoang, Hannah Dederick, and Eva Houston.

The Mini 10K, which began in 1972 as the Crazylegs Mini Marathon, was the first women-only road race and has gone on to garner more than 200,000 total finishers to date. Former NYRR President Fred Lebow named the race after the miniskirt, which back then was in vogue. A total of 72 women finished the first race, and three weeks later, Title IX was signed into law, guaranteeing girls and women the right to participate in school sports and creating new opportunities for generations of female athletes.

The Mastercard® New York Mini 10K will offer $45,000 in total prize money, including $10,000 to the winner of the open division and $2,500 to the winner of the wheelchair division. The professional athlete races will be streamed live on USATF.TV beginning at 7:40 a.m. ET. Mastercard® will serve as title sponsor of the event for the second time, and as part of its on-going partnership with NYRR will also serve as the presenting sponsor of professional women’s athlete field.

Celebrating 50 Years of the Mini

The Mastercard New York Mini 10K began in 1972 as the first women-only road race, known as the Crazylegs Mini Marathon. Since then, the Mini has had more than 200,000 finishers, and this year's event will be the 50th running.  

You can register for the Mastercard New York Mini 10K, set for Saturday, June 11 in Central Park, and be part of the historic anniversary celebration. Youth ages 8-18 can register for the free Kids Run at the Mastercard New York Mini 10K Stage 2 or Stage 3.We share five "Mini Moments” that define the history of the Mini.

The First Mini and First 10K 

On June 3, 1972, the first women-only road race, the six-mile Crazylegs Mini Marathon, made its debut. There were 72 finishers—a huge number at the time. Three weeks later, Title IX was signed into law, guaranteeing women the right to participate in school sports and creating new opportunities for generations of female athletes.

In 1975, the Mini distance shifted from 6 miles to 10K (6.2 miles) to align with a standard racing distance for roads and track. 

Extraordinary 5-Time Champions

Two women, Grete Waitz of Norway and Tegla Loroupe of Kenya, each won the Mini an amazing five times. Waitz—also a nine-time winner of the New York City Marathon—scored her fifth victory in 1984 and Loroupe got her fifth Mini win in 2000.This year’s pro field will feature Olympians and other world-class athletes including defending champion Sara Hall and Boston and TCS New York City Marathon champion Peres Jepchirchir.

The Mini Grows and Grows

In 1998, the 100,000th Mini finisher crossed the line, and 20 years later, in 2018, the race saw its 200,000th finisher. This year’s Mastercard New York Mini 10K will have an estimated 10,000 finishers.

Youth at the Mini

In 2016, the first Girls Run at the NYRR New York Mini took place with hundreds of finishers on an age-appropriate course. A wheelchair division was added in 20xx. This year youth of all genders will take part in the Kids Run at the Mastercard New York Mini 10K.

Record-Setting Wheelchair Races

In 2018, Susannah Scaroni (above, center) won the first wheelchair division at the Mini, setting a world-best of 22:48 for the distance; she broke that record in 2019. 

The history of the Mini, and its return at full capacity with youth events this year, point to a bright future for women and girls in running.