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Gebrselassie to Defend Dubai Marathon Title
Posted October 2nd, 2008 at 1:11 PM by David Monti
Section: News & Results, Marathons
Organizers of the Standard Chartered Dubai Marathon, set for January 16, in the United Arab Emirates, announced today that world marathon record holder Haile Gebrselassie would defend his 2008 title. Gebrselassie’s Dutch management firm, Global Sports Communications, confirmed his participation in a separate e-mail message to Race Results Weekly.
Gebrselassie, 35, owns the three fastest times in world history for the marathon, including last Sunday’s 2:03:59 in Berlin, the first-ever sub-2:04 marathon. He’ll certainly be looking to lower that mark in Dubai where organizers have put a USD 1 million bonus on the line in addition to the USD 250,000 first prize which is already the highest winner’s check in marathon running.
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Gebrselassie Oh So
Close in Dubai
Posted January 18th, 2008 at 12:58 AM by David Monti
Section: News & Results, Marathons
As ING New York City Marathon director Mary Wittenberg once said: “You can’t script sport.”
Haile Gebrselassie’s world record attempt Friday at the Standard Chartered Dubai Marathon veered off plan when the great Ethiopian scorched the first half in 1:01:27, at least half a minute faster than he had intended. He had hoped to run the second half of the race faster than the first, but fading in the later kilometers he only managed 1:03:26 for the last 21.1 km. Nonetheless, his final time of 2:04:53 was still the second-fastest marathon of all-time, two seconds faster than Paul Tergat’s 2003 world record set in Berlin.
Although Gebrselassie missed out on the $1 million world record bonus, he still won $250,000 in prize money, the largest first prize in marathon running.
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Training for Dubai, Gebrselassie & Kiplagat Face Different Challenges
Posted January 7th, 2008 at 3:34 PM by David Monti
Section: News & Results, Marathons
With the Standard Chartered Dubai Marathon looming in just 11 days, Haile Gebrselassie and Lornah Kiplagat are making their final preprations, each facing their own special challenges.
Gebrselassie, the world record holder and #2-ranked marathoner in the world last year in Race Results Weekly’s rankings, is dreaming of the $1 million bonus on the line for toppling his own world best of 2:04:26 set in Berlin last September. Well, at least his Dutch manager Jos Hermens is.
“I and he are certain he can do under 2:04,” Hermens is quoted by race organizers as saying last week.
But Gebrselassie himself is more circumspect. “Yes, I did 2:04 in Berlin,” Gebrselassie told race organizers via telephone over the weekend. “But everything was perfect, the weather, the course, the pacemaking. Sure, it’s possible to do under 2:04, but everything has to be perfect again.”
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World Record Holder Kiplagat To Run Dubai Marathon
Posted November 9th, 2007 at 12:42 PM by David Monti
Section: News & Results, Marathons
The fastest woman ever over the half-marathon distance has decided to run twice as far at next January’s Standard Chartered Dubai Marathon, organizers announced yesterday.
Lornah Kiplagat, the reigning IAAF world cross country and road running champion, has been lured to the desert by the chance to win a $1,000,000 bonus for the world record and also a $250,000 first prize, the largest in marathon running.
“When we announced the Standard Chartered Dubai Marathon was being taken to the next level thanks to the support of Dubai Holding, our aim was to attract the very cream of long distance running,” said event director Peter Connerton through a media release.
Kiplagat, 33, was born in Kenya but became a Dutch citizen in 2003. At last October’s IAAF World Road Running Championships in Udine, Italy, she scorched a pending world record for the half-marathon of 1:06:25, passing through 20-K in 1:02:57, also a pending world record.
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New WR Setter Gebrselassie Eyes Dubai Marathon
Posted October 1st, 2007 at 4:30 PM by Adam Jacobs
Section: News & Results, Marathons
Twenty four world records, and counting. The Haile Gebrselassie road show moves on from the latest addition to that list, a world record 2.04.26 in the real,_Berlin Marathon on Sunday. His next dates with destiny?
The Dubai Marathon on January 18, 2008, then the Olympic marathon in Beijing in August. But hasn´t someone (Kenyan Sammy Wanjiru) recently ´stolen´ the half-marathon world record from him?
“I have plans for that, but this will be a secret,” said Gebrselassie, who can be as entertaining in press conferences as he can be in breaking world records. “I´m discussing it with my manager. It´s one of my aims (to retrieve the record)”.
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