Yesterday's marathon in Milan was little noted, despite Duncan Kibet's CR of 2:07:53. However, Kibet's time plus Elias Chelimo's 2nd place in 2:08:39 have established 2008 as the deepest ever, measured by total # of sub-2:10 performances. Looking at the yearly lists on IAAF and ARRS, and adding in these two from Milan, there are now 100 sub-2:10 performances for 2008. With Fukuoka still to run, this will likely turn out to be the first year in which an athlete could run sub-2:10 and not make the list of top 100 performances for the year.

2003 is the previous year w the most sub-2:10, with either 99 (ARRS list) or 98 (IAAF list: 97+1 on their various "downhill" sublists).

And, as always, I trust the real statisticians/historians to correct this.