Preview of the 25th Flora London Marathon and the BAA Boston Marathon on Monday
On Sunday one of the biggest and best marathon races will get under way. A record number of more than 100,000 runners applied for a bib number. Last year London was the third biggest Marathon in the world behind New York and Chicago. Exactly 45,263 athletes got a bib number from the organization for the jubilee race on Sunday.
Although Haile Gebrselassie (Ethiopia) cancelled his start for the London Marathon the race will have the best marathon field of the year. There will be some of the best marathon runners in the world in this race, like Olympic Champion Stefano Baldini (Italy), world record holder Paul Tergat (Kenya), who ran 2:04:55 hours in Berlin in 2003, and the defending champion Evans Rutto (Kenya). The Kenyan has won all of his three marathons: two times Chicago and once London.
Paula Radcliffe will be the favorite in the women’s race. The Englishwomen came back with a victory, after her Olympic disaster in Athens. She won the New York Marathon last November. Two years ago she had set the world record in London with 2:15:25. “I can run faster than that—but then there must be everything perfect on the day of the race, the course, the weather and my fitness,” Paula Radcliffe said. If she would win on Sunday it would be her fifth victory out of six marathons: “Winning is the important thing, but I still feel I can run a fast time.”
On Monday the 109th edition of the BAA Boston Marathon will be started. Both the defending champions, the Kenyans Timothy Cherigat and Catherine Ndereba, will be in the race. The women’s marathon will be started by three time winner Uta Pippig.
