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(c) 2025 Race Results Weekly, all rights reserved. Published with permission. OTTAWA (25-May) -- After several days of rainy and unseasonably cold weather, the sun finally came out here in the Canadian capital and it shone brightest on Albert Korir and Mercy Chelangat.  The two Kenyans won the 51st edition of the Tartan Ottawa International Marathon by comfortable margins.  For Korir, who clocked 2:08:22, this was his second victory here (he also won in 2019).  For Chelangat, who was timed in 2:23:33, today's race was her first-ever marathon.  Both winners earned CAD 20,000 in prize money (=USD 14,560). KORIR GOES IT ALONE The men's race began with a tightly-bunched pack following two pacemakers through 5K in 15:06 and 10K in 30:08, on pace to run in the 2:06's.  Korir was right in front of the pack along with Canadian Rory Linkletter, American C.J. Albertson, and Ethiopians Demeke Tesfaye and Belay Tilahun.  Everybody looked comfortable. But Korir --who had originally planned to run the Boston Marathon last month, but had to withdraw due to an ankle injury-- was itching to run faster. "I was feeling good so I was seeing the pacer was, like, slow," Korir told Race Results Weekly.  "I had to push and I had it on my mind that I had to win this one." The pack held together on the climb up Alexandra Bridge where the runners move from Ontario to Quebec, but soon after Korir decided to make his move.  He ran 2:56 for the 20th kilometer, dropped his pacer, and opened up a gap on the rest of the field.  By the time he hit halfway (1:03:12) he had an 18-second lead on Linkletter and Albertson.  The two Ethiopians had fallen even further behind. From there, Korir ran alone.  Wearing bright red adidas kit, he clicked off the kilometers and repeatedly looked at his watch and shot glances behind him to see if anyone was catching up. "I was trying to keep the distance, and I was also trying to track them not to close the gap," Korir explained. Korir's lead inched-up to 22 seconds by 30K, and 28 seconds by 35K.  He seemed to have the win in his pocket, but Linkletter felt he had enough energy left to try to close the gap.  The Canadian Olympian picked up his pace. "Honestly, I didn't feel that good the first 30K," Linkletter told reporters.  "Like, it was fine, but I wasn't full of confidence that I was going to make the distance."  He continued: "Like, at some point I've got to see if I can close this gap a little.  With 5-K to go I was like, let's run 1-K hard and see how much I can close it down.  I was closing it, but not enough, not fast enough." Linkletter's move brought him within nine seconds of Korir by the finish, and his time of 2:08:31 was the fastest ever recorded by a Canadian on Canadian soil.  It also put him 24 seconds ahead of Albertson who clocked 2:08:55, the second fastest time of his career.  The American was surprised that he survived in the second half after running 1:03:20 in the first.  Both he and Linkletter had run the Boston Marathon five weeks ago. "I ran pretty fast," Albertson told Race Results Weekly.  "I think Brooks is making some good shoes because I don't know how I ran that fast with my training, but it was nice." CHELANGAT RUNS HER OWN RACE Chelangat, and her HOKA Northern Arizona Elite coach Jack Mullaney, had a plan for today's race.  She was supposed to follow the male pacers in the first half and not think about much else.  But that plan fell apart when the pacers were moving too quickly, about 10 seconds per mile too fast, and she decided to drop back.  Watching the race broadcast it was easy to think that she had been dropped, but she had made a decision. "I was just like, I'm going to run my own race," Chelangat told Race Results Weekly.  "We were kind of going so fast, like faster than the (planned) pace at the beginning.  It was like 5:20's, low, like every time, every mile.  So, they were kind of going fast, so I was not sure how I'm going to feel at the end because that's not how you want to start your first marathon." Chelangat ran 1:10:59 for her first half, and split 1:51:36 at 30K.  That put her 14 seconds behind Ethiopians Meseret Gebre and Fantu Shugi.  Chelangat was feeling good, but she was dealing with another challenge.  She was having trouble opening the drinking tips of her bottles.  She ended up unscrewing the tops and drinking from the wide opening, instead. "I had to open the water thing and like chug it," she said, pointing to the dried sheen of energy drink that had spilled on her legs. In the 34th kilometer she caught up to Gebre who had previously dropped Shugi (she would later drop out).  The pair briefly ran together before Chelangat began to pull away escorted by male pacers Andrew Alexander and Sammy Kirongo.  From there she expanded her lead with every kilometer, eventually finishing almost five minutes ahead of her nearest rival, Visiline Jepkesho of Kenya, who ran 2:28:09.  Gebre had a very tough second half and finished third in 2:30:46 (she ran halves of 1:10:57 and 1:19:49). After hugging his star athlete, Coach Mullaney spoke to Race Results Weekly.  "I don't know if I have the words right now," said Mullaney, who was clearly emotional.  "I'm just so happy for her because she made a conscious decision two months ago that she was going to embrace everything that it meant to be a marathoner, and just own the 24/7 process."  He added: "She was smart.  She worked hard, she showed some true grit, and I'm just so proud of her." Chelangat's time was the fastest-ever by a HOKA Northern Arizona Elite woman, eclipsing the 2:24:28 Kellyn Taylor ran at Grandma's Marathon in 2018.  Chelangat already had the club record for the half-marathon of 1:08:57. Paige Wood, Chelangat's teammate, also ran in today's marathon as a pacemaker.  She ran with the lead group for about 26 kilometers before dropping out.  She plans to run Grandma's Marathon in Duluth in June. PHOTO: Albert Korir of Kenya celebrates after winning the 2025 Tartan Ottawa International Marathon (photo by Jane Monti for Race Results Weekly)

(c) 2025 Race Results Weekly, all rights reserved. Published with permission. OTTAWA (23-May) -- Mercy Chelangat, the 2022 NCAA 10,000m champion for the University of Alabama, is finally ready to step up to the marathon.  The 27 year-old Kenyan, part of the Hoka Northern Arizona Elite team in Flagstaff, Ariz., will run the 42.195-kilometer distance for the first time here on Sunday at the 51st Tartan Ottawa International Marathon, and she's excited that she chose the Canadian capital to make her marathon debut. "We had like a couple of options, and we liked this one because it's closer; I didn't have to travel really far," she told Race Results Weekly in an interview this morning.  She continued: "I don't really like a lot of pressure, so I really didn't want to put myself in a (World Marathon) Major and have that kind of pressure put on me.  So, we just decided to do this one." Still, Chelangat will be running with some fast women, including Kenyans Visiline Jepkesho (2:21:37 personal best) and Philes Ongori (2:23:32), and Ethiopians Meseret Gebre (2:23:11) and Bontu Bekele Gada (2:23:39).  She said that she has a simple race plan. "Just try to hang if my legs will allow me," Chelangat said with a laugh.  "I will try to hang as much as possible because we have some pacers who are going to help us, so I'm just hoping to hang with them as much as I can." To get ready for Sunday's race, Chelangat returned to her native Kenya in February and March and began to lay down her base.  Before this training block, she had never run 100 miles a week.  But, after informally joining-up with some training groups in Kenya that kind of mileage became the norm, according to her coach Jack Mullaney. "Right after the Houston Half in January she went back home to Kenya," Mullaney said in an interview.  "For about six weeks she started hopping in with a few marathon groups over there.  I think she really understood what it meant to be a marathoner when she did that.  She was over there training and I happened to text her and I said, 'Mercy, that was a hundred-mile week this week.'  She goes, 'Oh, it was?'" Mullaney explained that except for her long run and rest days, she was basically doubling 10K every day. "Seeing the level of what it takes to be an elite marathoner was really pivotal for her to take that next step in training," Mullaney said.  She's now put in eight 100-mile weeks in the lead-up to this before she started tapering." After returning from Kenya, Chelangat did one race as a fitness test.  Still deep into her marathon miles, she ran a solo 1:10:32 at the OneAmerica Mini-Marathon, a half-marathon in Indianapolis on May 3.  She ran the first eight miles conservatively, then cut down to a 5:10 per mile pace by the finish.  She clocked 1:10:32 and felt very comfortable. But, all of the accumulated miles had left her fatigued and needing a lot more food. "Really tired," she said when asked how her body had responded to marathon training.  She continued: "I'm really hungry in the mornings now; I eat a really good breakfast. I make sure I'm eating through the day, for sure." Chelangat and Mullaney are clearly on the same page as far as the goal pace for Sunday.  Both said that 5 minutes and 30 seconds per mile (or a little faster) through 30-K would be great.  That should give her enough remaining energy to drop down a little for the last 12 kilometers and shoot for a 2:23 finish.  The women's course record here is 2:22:17 by Gelete Burka of Ethiopia in 2018. "She can really turn her brain off for the first half to 30-K of this thing and just tuck in behind the pacers," Mullaney said.  He continued: "We feel like 5:25 to 5:30 (pace) is a pretty good range for her on Sunday." But like every first-time marathoner, Chelangat sees getting to the finish line as her primary goal. "Finishing is going to be a success for me, because this is a new distance for sure," said Chelangat.  "So, I don't know how my body and my legs will respond.  Now I've done my part of training, I've done everything I could, but we don't know.  Getting to the finish line will be success for me, for sure." PHOTO: Mercy Chelangat of Hoka NAZ Elite at the pre-race press conference for the Tartan Ottawa International Marathon (photo by Jane Monti for Race Results Weekly)  

(c) 2025 Race Results Weekly, all rights reserved. Published with permission. (16-May) -- A woman running a 2:38:49 marathon.  A man running a 14:06 5K.  A woman running a 34:34 10K.  A man running a 1:04:14 half-marathon. What did all of those 2024 road running performances have in common?  They all generated a $1000 prize money payment, just four of a total of 235 one thousand dollar (or one thousand euro) payments recorded by Race Results Weekly (RRW) last year.  RRW sifted through the results of thousands of road races to determine what it took to make $1000 in prize money. Not surprisingly, the range of those performances was very broad, from truly world-class marks to times more typically associated with recreational runners. For instance, in the marathon --where RRW flagged 90 one thousand dollar payments (45 to men and 45 to women)-- the average time to earn $1000 was 2:39:10 for women and 2:16:37 for men.  The average finish place for $1000 payments was 5.4 for women and 5.5 for men.  The range of times to earn $1000 was huge, from 2:23:52 to 3:10:24 for women, and 2:07:09 to 2:30:50 for men. At the top end of the performance scale, Kenya's Linet Masai finished seventh at the Mainova Frankfurt Marathon last October in 2:23:52 and earned €1000 (equaling $1080 at the time).  On the men's side, Italy's Eyob Faniel finished seventh at the Zürich Maratón de Sevilla in 2:07:09, also earning €1000.  For comparison, running the same times at the TCS New York City Marathon a week later, both Masai and Faniel would have earned $100,000 and been the race winners (theoretically, at least). At the other end of the scale, American Meredith Steely ran 3:10:24 (2nd place) at the high-altitude Boulderthon Presented by Puma in Colorado and earned $1000, the slowest marathon mark in the RRW list.  At the same race Esteban Trujillo finished second on the men's side and clocked 2:30:50.  His performance was also good for $1000. Looking across the most popular distances, these were the fastest and slowest performances to earn $1000 (or €1000): Fastest marks to earn $1000:                     Men        Women Mile             3:51.9     4:20.4 5K                13:44      15:25 10K               27:29      30:38 Half-Marathon   59:21    1:07:08 Marathon      2:07:09    2:23:52   Slowest marks to earn $1000:                     Men        Women Mile             4:09.1     4:44.5 5K                14:10      16:47 10K               30:23      36:38 Half-Marathon 1:08:21    1:18:35 Marathon      2:30:50    3:10:24 Comparing results over a range of distances and events highlighted the diversity of the global road running scene.  Some races use pacemakers and are speed-oriented, while others are held championship-style with no pacers.  Some events have flat courses at sea level, while others are contested on hilly courses at altitude.  Some events pay larger appearance fees in relation to their prize money, while others pay no appearance fees and only offer prize money.  Some races have travel budgets which allow top athletes to participate no matter where they live, while others have no travel budget and can only support athletes who live near the race. In addition many organizers offer special prize money for home-country athletes, and this is especially true in the United States.  For instance, Race Results Weekly only credited Henry Wynne for the $1000 he earned for eighth place at the Asics Falmouth Road Race last August.  However, he also earned an additional $2000 for being the second American. A complete list of all of the payments is here (file sorted chronologically, from January to December): https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1TVlun8M7xh4ysw3GLstGNTRsTAPOGoK7sYy-uRGkiuw/edit?usp=sharing PHOTO: Erika Kemp finishing fifth in 15:25 at the 2024 Boston 5-K presented Point32Health where she earned $1000 in prize money (photo by Jane Monti for Race Results Weekly)

(c) 2025 Race Results Weekly, all rights reserved. Published with permission. BOSTON (21-Apr) -- Cool temperatures, brilliant sunshine and only light winds helped Kenyans John Korir and Sharon Lokedi win their first Boston Marathon titles here today in fast times.  Korir, 28, broke the race open with a powerful surge in the 20th mile and scampered to the finish line on Boylston Street alone in a quick 2:04:45.  Lokedi, 31, won a two-way battle with compatriot and two-time defending champion Hellen Obiri in the 26th mile and smashed the course record by more than two and a half minutes, clocking 2:17:22.  Both athletes won $150,000 in prize money, and Lokedi earned an additional $50,000 bonus for breaking the course record. KORIR GOES FROM THE PAVEMENT TO THE PODIUM Korir's race got off to an awful start.  About 100 meters into the competition he was tripped from behind and fell, ripping off his bib number. "I fell at the start," Korir told reporters after the race.  "I said, 'should I stay down or get up?'" He regained his feet quickly, tucked his crumpled bib into his shorts, and was running in 12th place by the 5-kilometer checkpoint, just two seconds behind the leaders Conner Mantz and Clayton Young of the United States, Patrick Tiernan of Australia, Yemane Haileselassie of Eritrea, and Wesley Kiptoo of Kenya.  In all, about 21 men were running together. Korir, following the plan set forth by his coaches, Ron Mann and Haron Lagat, and his brother, Wesley Korir (the 2012 Boston Marathon champion) Korir stayed "quiet," just grinding out the miles within the pack.  The pace was more than honest.  Through 20 kilometers the men surpassed all of the checkpoint times recorded by Kenya's Geoffrey Mutai when he set the course record of 2:03:02 in 2011. "I was surprised at how many people were in that pack (going so fast)," Mantz said at the post-race press conference.  "The pack was quite large through halfway, and it was quite large at the 18-mile mark, and I was a little concerned." Indeed, there were 16 men within two seconds of the halfway leader, Canada's Rory Linkletter, including last year's champion Sisay Lemma.  Like earlier in the race, Korir remained in the pack, waiting. In the famously downhill 16th mile, the pack ran a blistering 4:32 split.  That was too much for Lemma who dropped out.  Korir stayed tucked-in, then surged hard past the 20-mile mark just as Heart Break Hill begins. "For me, that was the plan," said Korir.  "We planned that with my coach and my brother." Korir, last October's Bank of America Chicago Marathon champion, stunned the field with a 4:39, uphill split.  In one mile, he built an 18-second lead which grew to 39 seconds by 35 km.  Beginning with mile-20, he ran mile splits of 4:41, 4:39, 4:24, 4:38, and 4:41.  By the 24-mile mark he was up by 55 seconds and everybody else was running for second. "It worked very well," said Korir matter of factly about his move.  "And I'm happy." Korir spread his arms as he crossed the finish line, and was immediately embraced by his brother.  The Korirs became the first brothers to win the Boston Marathon, and John Korir became the first man since Robert Kipkoech Cheruiyot to win the Chicago Marathon in the fall then Boston the following spring (Cheruiyot did it in 2006 and 2007). Korir said that he did the same training for Boston as he did for Chicago, despite the fact that the Chicago course is completely flat. "We did the same like Chicago," Korir said, adding, "We repeated it for Boston." Behind Korir, a terrific battle was playing out for second place.  Mantz, Tanzania's Alphonce Simbu and Kenya's Cybrian Kotut were running together.  Mantz tried to make a move to break up the pack, but his legs just didn't have the snap that he had hoped. "Over the last 1000 (meters) there were three of us," said Mantz.  "I made a hard move and they responded as if I wasn't making any moves.  It was a little bit humbling." Simbu and Kotut pulled away from Mantz, who would finish fourth in a personal best 2:05:08, the second-fastest time by an American at Boston.  The two Africans ran side-by-side until just a few meters from the finish where, sprinting in earnest, Simbu got a step on Kotut.  Both men were timed in 2:05:04, but Simbu got second and Kotut --a younger brother of former New York City Marathon champion Martin Lel-- took third.  Debutante Muktar Edris of Ethiopia was fifth in 2:05:59, and Canada's Linkletter --the race leader at halfway-- took sixth in 2:07:02, the fastest Boston Marathon ever by a Canadian. LOKEDI AND OBIRI DO BATTLE AGAIN IN THE WOMEN'S RACE After a gentle opening mile of 5:46, the elite women made the collective decision to ramp-up the pace.  With Ethiopia's Rahma Tusa on the front, they hit 5K in 16:49, then dropped way down to 16:02 for the next 5K (32:51 at 10-K).  Remarkably, 15 women were willing to stay with that pace, just 13 seconds slower than the course record pace set by Ethiopia's Buzunesh Deba in 2014. "The pace was hot from the start and I think that played out well for me," said Lokedi.  "It was like go, go, go, go go." The lead women were just about level with course record pace by 15-K (49:10), but were well under that pace after Ethiopia's Yalemzerf Yehualaw split the next five kilometers in 15:54.  Only Lokedi, Obiri, Ethiopia's Amane Beriso and Kenya's Irine Cheptai could hold that pace.  That group of five hit halfway in 1:08:46, and 25K in 1:21:22.  That put them about one minute under course record pace.  Lokedi loved the fast pace. "I was really grateful for them pushing from the start," said Lokedi.  "Because I think that's what made the outcome what it was." Cheptai was the first to fall off (she was 12 seconds behind by 30-K), then Beriso faded back by 35K.  Lokedi, Obiri and Yehualaw stayed together through 24 miles (which went into the books at a blistering 4:53).  Lokedi was doing all of the leading, and she motioned to Obiri to come up and help her (she did not). Early in the 26th mile, Obiri tried to surge away.  Lokedi immediately covered that move, then put in a surge of her own.  That was the decisive blow.  Lokedi ran the final mile in 5:04 (25.2 to 26.2), and that gave her a gap of 19 seconds over Obiri (2:17:41).  Yehualaw held on for third (2:18:06), and all three women broke Deba's course record. "I just tried to say, 'stay strong and keep fighting,'" Lokedi said.  "Fight, fight, fight, fight." Cheptai took fourth in 2:21:32, and fifth went to Beriso in 2:21:58.  Jess McClain was the top American in seventh.  Moving up from 16th place at halfway, she clocked 2:22:43, tying Joan Benoit's fourth-fastest time by a USA woman at this race set in 1983.  McClain, who finished fourth at the 2024 USA Olympic Team Trials Marathon, was delighted with her finish. "First American is amazing, for sure," said McClain, who did much of her training in the pre-dawn hours in Phoenix where she lives.  She added: "Today it felt like a win for me." HUG GETS NUMBER 8 Switzerland's Marcel Hug won his 8th wheelchair title by over five minutes over American Daniel Romanchuk, clocking 1:21:34.  The win was particularly special for Hug because Bob Hall, the race's first wheelchair champion 50 years ago, was in attendance. "It's a really special moment," Hug told reporters.  He continued: "He opened the door for us to be able to participate here." American Susannah Scaroni won her second Boston title, defeating Switzerland's Catherine Debrunner with a fearless descent in the 16th mile. "My years of experience gave me a lot of confidence not to brake on that hill," Scaroni said.  She added: "I think I was just a little bit less cautious there.  Then we went into my favorite part, the uphills." Scaroni won by more than two minutes.  Like Hug, she won $50,000 in prize money. By 3:15 p.m., 21,727 runners had crossed the finish line (of about 28,928 starters).  The official number of finishers will not be known until tomorrow. PHOTO: John Korir of Kenya winning the 2025 Boston Marathon in 2:04:45 (Photo by Jane Monti for Race Results Weekly)  

(c) 2025 Race Results Weekly, all rights reserved. Published with permission. BOSTON (19-Apr) -- With well-timed long kicks, American Casey Comber (Under Armour) and Kenyan Dorcus Ewoi (Puma Elite Running) took the wins at the 15th B.A.A. Invitational Mile on the streets of Back Bay.  The 28 year-old Comber, who competed collegiately for Villanova, successfully defended his title from last year, running 4:06.2.  Ewoi, 28, who ran for Campbell University during her NCAA career, won in her debut at the race, clocking 4:42.6.  Both athletes won $3,000 in prize money. Comber's experience on the course played to his favor today.  When he first ran the race in 2023, Olympian Hobbs Kessler got the best of him in the final two turns of the three-loop course.  Last year Comber did a better job positioning himself on those turns, and it paid off with a win.  He basically did the same thing this year, getting the inside line turning from Newbury to Exeter Streets, then punching the gas for the final left-hand turn onto Boylston Street for the finish.  Canada's Aaron Ahl was close behind, but just didn't have Comber's finishing speed. "I've been here three years in a row," Comber told reporters.  "Hobbs got the best of me that first year... kind of got a better angle on me on one of those turns.  And now every year I come down I look at where the cones are laid out, and it always kind of comes into play on that last lap.  Everyone is trying make a move on the corners." Ahl was timed in 4:06.4, and Australia's Mick Stanovsek (Puma) took third in 4:06.6.  Nick Willis's 2013 course record of 4:03.3 stood up for the 11th straight year. Ewoi made a similar move to Comber.  On the third and final lap, she made sure she was near the front on Newbury Street (essentially the backstretch) then surged hard before those final two turns.  She emerged onto Boylston Street with a comfortable lead, and was able to relax her stride through the finish line where she smiled and raised her right hand as she broke the tape. "I was just going to stay with the people and run with them," Ewoi told reporters.  "Whatever move they make, I'm just going to cover every move.  Then, how I feel the last lap, do whatever I want." Laurie Barton (Atlanta Track Club Elite) won a tight sprint for second over Kate Mitchell (New Balance Boston), 4:44.0 to 4:44.4.  Nicole Sifuentes's 2017 record of 4:33.7 was never under threat. In the invitational high school miles, which featured athletes who live in the eight towns and cities which the Boston Marathon transverses, the winners were Ciara Evans of Newton (5:12.1) and Altamo Aschkenasy of Brookline (4:25.7).  Evans is the daughter of two-time Irish Olympian Sinead Evans (née Delahunty) who had a mile personal best of 4:27.38.  Evans ran shoulder to shoulder with defending champion Sasha Lamakina of Framingham for most of the race, but pulled away from her rival in the final quarter mile to win easily by more than seven seconds. "Having both my parents, especially my mom who ran professionally, is very inspiring, always looking out for me," said Evans.  "I'm very lucky to have two parents who understand the sport, how disappointing it can be but also how rewarding it can be." Aschkenasy overwhelmed the competition in the final quarter, running away from Bilal Elhaji of Boston, to win by nearly six seconds.  Aschkenasy, who ran the race for the first time, came very close to Sam Burgess's 2022 high school course record of 4:25.4. "The last corner I just turned up the heat," said Aschkenasy with his sunglasses perched on his head.  "I know I have a really good kick." PHOTO: Dorcus Ewoi winning the B.A.A. Invitational Mile (photo by Jane Monti for Race Results Weekly)