Monday, September 30, 2013

New Marathon World Record 2:03:23 Hours


Once again, the Berlin marathon has lived up to its name as the fastest marathon in the world. This is the 9th world record ran in Berlin so far, with eight coming in the last 15 years.

The man who beat the world record this year is Wilson Kipsang, from Kenya of course. Kipsang won the bronze medal at the London Olympics last year after winning the 2012 London marathon. His previous claim to fame was missing the world record by 4 seconds when he won Frankfurt marathon in 2:03:42 hours. This was less than a month after Patrick Makau set Berlin's seventh world record after running 2:03:38 hours in 2011.

Kipsang ran Berlin in 2:03:23 hours to best Makau's time by 15 seconds. He is 31 years old, in only his fourth year of racing marathons. Berlin was his 7th race.

It was a well controlled race overall. The pace makers did a good job running the first 30 km well. Kipsang's 10 km splits were 29:16, 29:03, 29:42 and 29:11. He ran an amazing 2:49 min / km for the final 2 km.

Will we see a sub 2 hour marathon soon? Exercise physiologists say it's not possible yet. We await and see what the Kenyans can do.

*Picture from Iaaf.com

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