Key events
We’re with the elite men at 5km that I think is now 10 strong: Mengesha, Sawe, Kipplagat, Kipchoge, Petros, Munyao, Tola, Esa, Kiplimo, Nageeye. Meantime, Suzuki and Schipper pursue Hug; good luck with that, old mates.
Hahahahaha, Hassan has already caught back up; whether she’s playing mind-games with herself, the others, or both remains unclear.
Oh! Alemu, who was working hard, has been dropped by the leading group … AND SO HAS HASSAN! She’s 20m or so behind Jepkosgei and Assefa, who are absolutely punishing it, though you can never write off so absurd an individual.
Derbrunner and Hug both have significant leads. The former is gone; Suzuki is still pursuing the latter.
Alemu looks to be working a little harder than the other three women as we near the nine-mile mark. Hassan, we’re reminded, took four months off after the Olympics – she ran the 5, the 10 and the marathon, which is frankly ridiculous behaviour – but the others, having hammered it since, might fancy she’ll be lacking a bit of pace if they can make it a (particularly) painful one.
McColgan has dropped off from her group, who I guess were going too quickly for her comfort. It means a long, lonely time, but I guess as a distance-runner she’s well used to that.
Also going on:
The fun-runners are under way, and what a sight it is. My knees are wincing in sympathy.
In the men’s do, Kipchoge is closest to the pacemakers, but I think the group is 13-strong, all the usual lads present.
Oh, and of course Debrunner has gone too; she leads Scaroni by seven seconds and the move looks decisive; the gap to Schar in third is a couple of minutes and Rainbow-Copper is fourth.
Hassan has caught up again now; Assefa leads but notionally so.
The machine Hug leads Suzuku by 7s, Romanchuk a further 17s away.
Assefa leads the women’s race and doesn’t bother getting a bevvy as Alemu, Jepkosgei and Hassan swig away, Hasssan a little behind and wincing. We have, though, seen this before when she won in 2023 after hirting herself early doors.
The elite men are on the start line. Kiplimo is buzzing, and I can’t wait to see how he goes off – will he try and destroy the field by imposing a pace no one but him can hit? Here we go!
Stop me if you’ve heard this one before: Hug has pulled away, his lead about 20m. Meantime, we’re watching Alex Yee hanging with his runner-grandpa. How proud is he? “Unimaginable. I always tell people ‘is my superstar grandson Alex Yee.’” You can almost feel the love coming through the screen; great stuff.
After 15km, Scaroni leads the women’s wheelchair race with Debrunner just behind; Schar and Rainbow-Cooper are two minutes behind now, and Debrunner’s course record is under threat.
Goodness.
“Having this to focus on, being out there running, thinking of Elsie – it’s like therapy,’ says David, then he and Sergiuo are shown a message from Keir Starmer.
Goodness me, Lottie has, thanks to Couch to 5K, lost 12 stone. The success of that app is seriously dazzling, but now we’ve got David and Sergio, whose daughters, Alice and Elsie, were murdered in Southport last year. I don’t even know, really I don’t. Go on lads, go on.
Aha! A leaderboard!
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Jepkosgei
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Assefa
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Alemu
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Hassan
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Cheruiyot
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Desse
The last two are half a second or so back.
Assefa is also in the group of four leading the women’s race; they’ve been going just over 15 minutes and have grabbed their first drink; the pace is swift. A little further back, McColgan is a little behind the second group.
Back to the women’s wheelchair, Debrunner, who was leading, is now back in the pack, Scaroni in front; Lucy Jones, meanwhile, is celebrating her 18th by running as the race’s youngest competitor in memory of her mum. A crowd are singing her happy birthday, which is very sweet.
Blessed are the pacemakers. In the women’s race, we’ve got a leading group of four behind two: Hassan, Alemu, and, er, I can’t quite see who else. Bear with me!
Hug has put a few metres between him and Suzuki, Romanchuk now in third. When he’s involved, no one gets owt for nowt.
At 5km, the men’s wheelchair race has Romanchuk, Hug, Schipper, Suzuki, Weir and Watanabe in the leading group; in the women’s Scaroni has a three-second lead 0ver Schar … no she doesn’t, Debrunner is now at the front! Of course she is; McFadden and Rainbow-Cooper are also in touch.
Our elite women are on the line, Denise at the ready … and we’re away! She enjoyed that.
In the men’s wheelchair, a group led by Hug has broken away; with him are Romanchuk and others.
Email! “Whoever says a marathon live-streaming is not exciting has never played a sport in her/his life,” reckons Krishnamoorthy V. “There are countless summer weekends when I stood in awe after a day on my bike to realise that my average speed (on a BIKE) was less than that if Eliud Kipchoge. I only ran half-marathons in my life and I celebrated my 2hr 35 min as my personal best. Kiplimo runs it in 57 minutes (that is my PB for a 10km). This is athletes at their most supreme. Bring it on.”
Yup – the pace they hit then sustain is mind-boggling.
It can’t just me be who, every time they hear the name Sammi Kinghorn – 100m Olympic champ, marathoner as of today – thinks of this.
Oh, it is? Ah.
Away we go!
It’s not Denise, it’s Richard Whitehead starting this race, but the effect is similar.
The wheelchair races are massed on the start line, the gun to be fired by Denise Lewis. To do what she did, before lottery funding, is so badass it deserves its own category, and she announces, in her capacity as chair of UK Athletics, that London will be bidding to host the 2026 World Athletics Championships.
It’s going to be a jazzer of a London day. The mist is clearing now, burnt away by the sun, and though it might make things tougher for the fun-runners, conditions for the elite lot can’t be far off perfect.
Oh man. I can’t lie, fluids were taken on board last evening – mazal tov Yona! – but I’m already in absolute bits watching Isla Lough, Paula Radcliffe’s daughter, talk about her experience of cancer and talking about why she’s running today at just 18. And there are so many stories just like hers. People are incredible.
Our race preview:
Just when we thought we were getting telly that didn’t feature Romesh Ranganathan, here he is! He’ll be racing today, so too Kelly Brook. More news as I get it!
Preamble
Generally speaking, elite sport is something we watch. But today, for one day only, elite sport is something in which we can participate – if we choose! – London subsumed by serious sport and banging vibes.
We begin at 8.50am – let’s hope the intensifying mist remains at least until then – with our wheelchair races. In the women’s edition, the ludicrous Catherine Debrunner – winner last year and in 2022, when she set a world record, and also the Olympic champion – seeks a third title in four years. But Madison de Rozario, winner in 2023, along with Saisannah Scaroni and Manuela Schar will have plenty to say about that, perhaps Eden Rainbow-Cooper too.
The men’s edition, meanwhile, features the unreal Marcel Hug, aiming for a fifth victory in a row and a seventh overall. Seeking to stop him, as ever, are Daniel Romanchuk and David Weir.
The winner of last year’s women’s race, Peres Jepchirchir, has been forced to pull out, likewise Ruth Chepngetich, the world record-holder, and Emile Cairess, who came fourth in Paris. But fear not! The astounding Sifan Hassan, Olympic champion and multiple Olympic medallist in events from the 1500m upwards, who won this race in amazing circumstances in 2023, goes again. Challenging her are Tigst Assefa, the Olympic silver medallist, along with Joyciline Jepkosgei, Stella Chesang and Megertu Alemu, while GB’s Eilish McColgan makes her long-awaited marathon debut.
In the men’s event, we have a new challenge for the legendary Eliud Kipchoge. Jacob Kiplimo, recently the first person to run a half-marathon in under 57 minutes, attacks the longer distance for the first time – I cannot wait to see how that goes – but this is no head-to-head: Tamirat Tola, the Olympic champ, and Alex Mutiso, last year’s winner, will also be at it, likewise Timothy Kiplagat and Milkesa Mengesha. Oh, and if that weren’t enough, Alex Yee, Great Britain’s world and Olympic triathlon gold-medallist, attempts the distance for the first time.
And in among all of that, we have all the people and all the stories that get our eyeballs sweating, that help make this one of the great days of the sporting year. Bring it on!
