Zaragosa -- Bekele 12:49.53

[gh]

Bekele, by the way, says this was his last race pre-Worlds

[gh]

Rono's margin of victory in his first WR was 57.6, FWIW

[Master Po]

Pela2 pointed this out on the Heusden 5000 thread:

btw,

K Bekele run a 12:49.53 yesterday in Zaragoza.

I figured even an inconsistent runner such as KB, running a fast but ho-hum time in a low-key meet, deserved his own thread! :wink:

Actually, what caught my eye was the margin of victory:

2 Edwin Kipkorir 13:27.63

ie, KB won by 38.1 sec

This prompted me to revisit pela2's lists (which I read with the interest others reserve for Harry Potter) to put KB's race in some historical context. The race is perhaps significant in a couple of ways.

While this is "only" the #17 performance, we now have 20 sub-12:50. KB has 5 of these, thus establishing in yet another way his dominance of this event, as Geb and Komen have 4 each in this range (Bekele's all winners, of course, as are Geb's'; Komen's are 3 winners, 1 2nd.)

The margin of victory stats (lists borrowedfrom pela2; thanks! margin of victory math is my own, which I hope is correct) look like this:

1 12:37.35 Kenenisa Bekele (+28.93, M Wondimu)
2 12:39.36 Haile Gebrselassie (+27.7, L Kipkoskei)
3 12:39.74 Daniel Komen (+29.04, TNyariki)
4 12:40.18 Kenenisa Bekele (+15.4, A Negere)
5 12:41.86 Haile Gebrselassie (+3.04 D Komen, +8.01 P Tergat)
6 12:44.39 Haile Gebrselassie (+17.33 D Baumann)
7 12:44.90 Daniel Komen (2nd to HG)
8 12:45.09 Daniel Komen (+7.61, HGebrselassie)
9 12:46.53 Eliud Kipchoge (+.51, SSihine)
10 12:47.04 Sileshi Sihine (2nd to EK)
11 12:48.09 Kenenisa Bekele (+13.79, EKipchoge)
12 12:48.25 Kenenisa Bekele (+.41, ISongok)
13 12:48.66 Issac Songok (2nd to KB)
14 12:48.81 Stephen Cherono (+1.43, ElG)
15 12:48.98 Daniel Komen (+3.41, SHissou)
16 12:49.28 Brahim Lahlafi (+.43, MMourhit)
17 12:49.53 Kenenisa Bekele (+38.1, EKipkorir)
18 12:49.64 Haile Gebrselassie (+3.81, SHissou)
19 12:49.71 Mohammed Mourhit (2nd to BL)
20 12:49.87 Paul Tergat (3rd to HG, DK)

So, of the 15 sub-12:50 winners, margins of victory are

8 less than 1 sec to 7 sec
3 13-17 sec
3 27-29 sec (#s 1-3 all-time)
1 38 sec

While the 3 fastest ever have been won by very large margins, most of these winners seem to have had company through the latter kms, sometimes very near to the finish, which I would take as facilitating fast times for them. For KB to knock off a 12:49 while winning by 38 sec suggests that he is fully recovered from some of his difficulties earlier in the year.