Evans Chebet and Hellen Obiri on Monday stormed to victory in the men’s and women’s races at the Boston Marathon to complete a third straight Kenyan double in the 127th edition of the long-distance showpiece.
In rainy, cool conditions, defending men’s champion Chebet upstaged world record holder Eliud Kipchoge to become the first man to defend the Boston title since Robert Kipkoech Cheruiyot’s 2006-2008 hat-trick.
Chebet finished in a time of 2 hours, 5 muinutes, 54 seconds, with Tanzania’s Gabriel Geay second in 2:06.04, and Chebet’s training partner and fellow Kenyan Benson Kipruto third in 2:06.04.
Photo: Eric Canha-USA Today
There was disappointment for two-time Olympic champion Kipchoge, widely regarded as the greatest marathon runner of all time. He had been bidding to add the Boston crown to previous marathon victories in Berlin, Tokyo, London and Chicago.
Kenyan icon Kipchoge trailed home sixth in 2:09.23, about three-and-half minutes adrift of Chebet.
The 38-year-old had looked perfectly poised through the opening and mid-stages of the race, but was broken after a bold attack by Geay at about the 30.5km mark.
As the pack gave chase to Geay, Kipchoge was rapidly left behind and was soon nearly 100m off the pace.
Geay remained in the lead through 38.6km in a leading trio alongside Chebet and Kipruto, but Chebet and Kipruto kicked on in the final 3km and Chebet led with 1.6km to go before pulling away to retain his crown.
“I’m happy because I know this course very well,” Chebet told ESPN following his win. “I won last year, and now I’ve won this year — so maybe next year I’ll come back again.”
While Chebet was able to draw on his experience from last year to master Monday’s course, Obiri pulled off a stunning victory in the women’s event in what was only her second-ever marathon.
The 33-year-old has spent most of her career racing over shorter distances, winning two world championship gold medals in 2017 and 2019 over 5,000m, as well as silvers over the same distance at the 2016 and 2020 Olympics.
Obiri, who only raced a marathon for the first time in New York in November last year, where she placed sixth, kept her composure in a hard-fought race to win in 2:21.38.
Ethiopia’s Amane Beriso was second in 2:21.50, while Israel’s Lonah Salpeter took third in 2:21.57.
It was a remarkable performance by Obiri, who only confirmed her participation in Boston last month following urging by her coach.
“First of all I didn’t want to come, because my heart was somewhere else, but the coach told me: ‘My heart says you should go for Boston,’” Obiri said. “I said no, because it’s a strong field, but he said: ‘You’ve trained well, something tells me go to Boston.’”
I’m very happy because it’s a surprise to me, but I was feeling like my body was ready, and everything was ready,” she said.
Obiri bided her time before hitting the front with about 0.8km to go, pumping her arms and driving her legs through the rain to drop the chasing pack.
“The coach told me that marathons are about patience, patience, patience until the last minute,” Obiri said. “So I just tried to be patient.”
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