London: Ethiopia’s Tigist Assefa smashed the women-only world record by 26 seconds at the London Marathon, running 2:15:50 to win the World Athletics Platinum Label road race on Sunday.
The Olympic silver medallist kicked away from Kenya’s Joyciline Jepkosgei to clinch her first London Marathon win after finishing second to Peres Jepchirchir last year.
Jepchirchir’s winning mark of 2:16:16 a year ago had also been a women-only world record and that is the mark Assefa improved, finishing strongly to win by almost three minutes ahead of Jepkosgei (2:18:43). Sifan Hassan of the Netherlands was third (2:18:59), the World Athletics reported.
Given the strength of the field, the women-only world record was always the target. With that in mind, the lead group of Jepkosgei, Assefa, Hassan and Megertu Alemu followed the pacemakers through 5 km in a blistering 15:34 – not only inside the targeted 2:15 pace, but on sub-2:12 rhythm.
The quartet maintained that pace through 10km, hitting that mark in 31:16. Assefa and Jepchirchir broke away by the halfway point, which they passed in 1:06:40, 10 seconds ahead of Hassan.
The leading pair continued to move away from the rest of the field and after 35 km was reached in 1:52:12, Assefa made a break. A 5:03 24th mile made the difference and by 40 km Assefa was 56 seconds ahead.
She finished hard to stride over the finish line in 2:15:50 – the second-fastest marathon of her career behind the 2:11:53 she ran to win in Berlin in 2023, a mark that at the time was a world record for a women’s marathon in a mixed race.
A short while later, the men’s race was won by Kenya’s Sabastian Sawe in 2:02:27 – the second-fastest ever London Marathon. Uganda’s Jacob Kiplimo was second on his marathon debut, clocking 2:03:37.
(IANS)
