|
|
Cheruiyot cruises to fourth title in Boston
Cheruiyot cruises to fourth title in Boston,
Tune hangs on to win closest-ever women's race
http://web.wcsn.com/article/news.jsp?ymd=20080421&content_id=61977&vkey=wcsn_news&dpre=
Tuesday, 22 April, 2008 4:31:00
By Jim Hage / WCSN.com
BOSTON -- Robert Cheruiyot joined Bill Rodgers and Clarence DeMar in the ranks of Boston Marathon immortals with his third-straight win and fourth overall in two hours, seven minutes, 46 seconds on Monday.
Cheruiyot ran with the leaders before breaking away from a four-man pack on the Newton Hills 20 miles into the race with a 4:37 mile.
Cheruiyot was on pace to break his course record of 2:07:14 set in 2006, before slowing over the final few miles. But Cheruiyot was clearly pleased to win again: "Boston, I like. Boston, I love."
"This was the hardest [win]," Cheruiyot said. "I tried to push because I wanted a course record ... but it is very difficult to run alone. You need company."
Only DeMar, who won seven titles between 1911 and 1930, has more Boston wins than Cheruiyot. American Rodgers and Canadian Gerald Cote both won four times here. Kenyan men have now won 16 of the past 18 Boston Marathons.
Abderrahime Bouramdane of Morocco took second in 2:09:04, and his countryman, Khalid El Boumlili, was third in 2:10:35. Both men were burnishing their credentials in the hope of being named to their country's Olympic team. Boumlili ran here three years ago and did not finish.
In the women's race, Dire Tune and Alvetina Biktimirova left a group of four at 16 miles, then ran together until the final 400 meters on Boylston Street, where Tune used a punishing kick to win in 2:25:25. Russia's Biktimirova took second, just three seconds back, in the closest women's finish in Boston Marathon history.
For much of the way up and down the hills, Tune drafted directly behind Biktimirova. At 24 miles, Tune pulled even and briefly took the lead before it became clear that the Russian would not be intimidated into relinquishing the win. In the last mile, the two traded the lead twice more before Biktimirova succumbed.
Tune said through a translator that she wasn't sure she would win until she had safely crossed the finish line. Tune, 22, is the first Ethiopian women's champion at Boston since Olympic gold medalist Fatuma Roba won the last of her three consecutive titles here in 1999.
Last week, Biktimirova visited the Circle of Champions near the finish line, where past marathon winners are honored. She had hoped to have her name carved into that circle and appeared disappointed with her runner-up status.
"I wanted to win very badly," Biktimirova said through an interpreter. "I was trying to keep the race under control [by leading], but I didn't have enough speed at the end."
Rita Jeptoo, the 2006 Boston champion, finished third in 2:28:34, a creditable performance but not the dispositive effort she sought in her quest to make the Kenyan Olympic team. Jelena Prokopcuka, from Latvia, pushed the pace through the first half of the race and finished fourth in 2:28:12.
Defending champion Lydia Grigoryeva ran with the leaders through 25 kilometers but faded and finished ninth in 2:35:37.
Both Cheruiyot and Tune won $150,000; the runners-up earned $75,000.
Nicholas Arciniaga was the first American, 10th in 2:16:13.
"I was shooting for the top 15," said Arciniaga, who runs for Hansons Distance Project in Rochester Hills, Mich. "It worked out well for me."
Ashley Anklam was the top American woman, 15th overall in 2:48:43.
Seven-time Tour de France cycling champion Lance Armstrong finished in 2:50:58 "on a much harder course," he said, than his two much-publicized marathons in New York.
Running, he said, "is a hobby, it's what I do to keep fit. At the same time, that makes it hard because I don't train as hard as I did on the bike, I don't do this for a living. Every time, I say I'm going to train harder, but I never do."
Ernst Van Dyk of South Africa won his seventh title in the push rim wheelchair division in 1:26:49. Van Dyk won six straight from 2001 to 2006.
Wakako Tsuchida, from Japan, won her second-straight wheelchair race in 1:48:32. Two-time Boston champion Cheri Blauwet, from Menlo Park, Calif., finished third.
"It wasn't quite my day," Blauwet said. "But halfway through today's race, I was already thinking about tweaking my training in preparation for [the Paralympics in] Beijing in September."
The weather, which was so bad last year that the race was almost canceled, was not a problem Monday, with 61 degrees at the start in Hopkinton, bright skies and a slight breeze. More than 25,000 qualified, the second-largest field since the centennial race in 1996, when more than 36,000 official runners finished.
|
|
樓主
發表於 2008-4-22 00:01:41
