LONDON – London Marathon event director Hugh Brasher is predicting a more competitive women’s race on April 21 than the 2024 Paris Olympic marathon later in the summer, and believes the women-only world record may fall.
The world’s fastest female marathoner Tigst Assefa headlines an elite field that features 10 women who have run under 2hr 17min 30sec, including three of the top-four fastest women ever.
“No race in the history of our sport has ever had that,” Brasher said on April 17.
“So I have no idea who’s going to win but I think it’s going to be an incredibly competitive event. This will be a harder marathon to win than the Olympic Marathon in Paris, I’m pretty certain of that.”
Assefa clocked 2:11:53 at the Berlin Marathon in September, setting the world record for women in a race alongside men runners, and is aiming to break Mary Keitany’s mark of 2:17:01 set in a women-only race at the 2017 London Marathon.
The race has a lot to live up to after Sifan Hassan struggled in the early going in 2023, even stopping twice to massage her leg, before racing to victory in her debut at the 42.195km distance.
“It was the most spectacular race last year, I don’t think anyone had seen the eventual winner stopping mid-race and massaging their hamstring in a major race before,” Brasher added.
New York City Marathon champion Tamirat Tola, plus Alexander Mutiso Munyao, Dawit Wolde and Kinde Atanaw headline a men’s race that is wide open in the absence of 2023 winner and world-record holder Kelvin Kiptum.
There will be 30 seconds of applause before the start of the men’s race to celebrate the Kenyan, who died in a traffic accident on Feb 11, at the age of 24. He will be remembered at a race he won a year ago in a record 2:01:25. His world best is 2:00:35 at last October’s Chicago Marathon.
Brasher also said he is “99 per cent certain” the 44th running of the London race will be the biggest ever, with more than 50,000 finishers expected.
The event will make history as the first marathon to award equal prize money to able-bodied athletes and wheelchair racers, with a total prize pot of US$308,000 each (S$418,800), and the four winners in the elite races receiving US$55,000 each.
The weather forecast favours fast times, Brasher added, with temperatures expected to hover between 12 and 14 deg C, although the winds along the Thames can be a factor.
Extreme runner Russ Cook will be racing only two weeks after he became the first person to run the entire length of Africa. The 27-year-old Briton took 352 days to complete his African odyssey of more than 16,000km.
British ultra-runner Jasmin Paris, who in March became the first woman in history to complete the infamous 100-mile Barkley Marathons, will be the starter for the elite women’s race. REUTERS, AFP
