2020 London Marathon (Bekele out)

[tandfman]

I have the impression that T&FN does try to follow what the athlete prefers. That's not always easy info to obtain.

[Atticus]

I'm sticking with T&FN in thinking that he should be referred to as Tola Shura, but so what? It's pretty clear to me that something is broken.and I don't know how it can best be fixed.

Shouldn't we all follow what the athlete refers to him/herself as? When it's in a different alphabet (Cyrillic, Arabian, Japanese, Chinese, etc.), the national federation provides the transliteration.

[rsb3]

He also suffered some discomfort with a "blocked ear" apparently.

Wrong shoes !!! Hate when that happens ...

[tandfman]

Kitata outlasts Kipchumba on the sprint.

A perfect example of one of the things that's really f'ed up about our sport. All of the headlines around the world had the winner's name as Shura Kitata, and that's how he's shown in the World Athletics rankings and athlete listings. Wiki tells us that his name is Shura Kitata Tola. And Track & Field News refers to him as Tola Shura. The front page story includes a photo caption that says
"Though the victor’s bib told a different story, T&FN, matching other statistical sources, knows him as Tola Shura.". Kitata, of course, was the name on his bib.

I'm sticking with T&FN in thinking that he should be referred to as Tola Shura, but so what? It's pretty clear to me that something is broken.and I don't know how it can best be fixed.

[26mi235]

Kipchoge failed to grab his drink bottle midway through the race. So he must have run out of fuel, according to Deena Kastor.
Or his training had been sub-par, because of all the "extra-curricular" activities, according to Amy Cragg.

Unlikely; the loops are small (2,215m) and you can grab one every lap. Thus they are available twice as often (every 5000 in a standard race?) and it was not a particularly warm day, with drizzle (although the Relative Humidity was high).

[Trickstat]

Kipchoge failed to grab his drink bottle midway through the race. So he must have run out of fuel, according to Deena Kastor.
Or his training had been sub-par, because of all the "extra-curricular" activities, according to Amy Cragg.

He also suffered some discomfort with a "blocked ear" apparently.

[TN1965]

Tremendous and smart race for Sara Hall (Bei). She gained over a minute on Chepngetich between 35 and 40K, and another 44 seconds in the last 2195, which she ran at 2:21:56 pace.
God, I had to listen to Rob Barker for 5 1/2 hours!
Cheers,
Alan Shank
Woodland, CA, USA

A higher finish than Ryan's career high at WWM. (3rd at 2009 Boston.)

[TN1965]

Ummm What happened?

Kipchoge failed to grab his drink bottle midway through the race. So he must have run out of fuel, according to Deena Kastor.
Or his training had been sub-par, because of all the "extra-curricular" activities, according to Amy Cragg.

[26mi235]

There was a leading group of 8 once the pacemakers dropped out. They didn't really start racing until the last 4 miles or so, but it was already noticeable that Kipchoge was not looking that comfortable and was drifting a little back through the pack. On the penultimate lap, I think it was mainly Kitata and Lemma pushing hard from the front and Kipchoge and 3 others were dropped, with Kipchoge eventually falling back to 8th. He admitted in an interview on the BBC that he didn't feel good for the last 15K.

A bit earlier there were miles of 4:40/4:42/4:47, but then a 5:00 and then it got quicker again and EK could not keep up.

Coverage at that point sucked as they cut to the British competition and you did not know if EK was gone or just had a bad patch. You also did not know what what happening to the lead group. And, they stopped providing much information on times and over the last 2.2km I do not think that they provided info on where they were, even at the finish you did not know how much of the race was left until it was essentially over about 100m from the end (or less, who knows?).

[SoCal45]

Tremendous and smart race for Sara Hall (Bei). She gained over a minute on Chepngetich between 35 and 40K, and another 44 seconds in the last 2195, which she ran at 2:21:56 pace.
God, I had to listen to Rob Barker for 5 1/2 hours!
Cheers,
Alan Shank
Woodland, CA, USA

Alan, you didn't have to...you chose to!

[Alan Shank]

Tremendous and smart race for Sara Hall (Bei). She gained over a minute on Chepngetich between 35 and 40K, and another 44 seconds in the last 2195, which she ran at 2:21:56 pace.
God, I had to listen to Rob Barker for 5 1/2 hours!
Cheers,
Alan Shank
Woodland, CA, USA

[NotDutra5]

Some perspective in recalling that Mr. Kipchoge was the World Championship winner of the 5000m in 2003!

[Conor Dary]

2:06 is pretty sad..

[Atticus]

I take gargantuan exception to Letsrun's characterization of Eliud's run:

2,562 days after he last lost a marathon, on a cold (low 50s) and rainy day in London, Kipchoge was dropped by the leaders during the 24th mile of the 2020 Virgin Money London Marathon and
finished a mediocre 8th in 2:06:49.

[Atticus]

I think you mean Ward

Indeed, thanks, too early on a Sunday morning!