Mumbai: New champions emerged in the 20th edition of the Mumbai Marathon, a World Athletics Gold Label Road Race, as Eritrean Berhane Tesfay and Kenyan Joyce Chepkemoi Tele won the men’s and women’s categories, respectively. The top three winners each took home prize money of USD 50,000, USD 25,000 and USD 15,000 respectively.
The winners were happy to celebrate their victories here for two reasons — Tesfay for his first-ever marathon triumph and Tele for her second successive win in three months in a marathon.
Six men, including defending champion Lemi Berhanu, ran together in a bunch in most parts of the race. At the same time, pacer Timoty Kibet from Kenya pulled them to 27 km before withdrawing at that stage. After the 30K, Kenyan Philemon Rono and Lemi exchanged the lead briefly among themselves. After 35K, the runners realised that the event record was slipping away. Hence, only the top-place finish mattered in their mind.
Ethiopian Tesfaye Demeke, who finished ninth in the 2020 edition here, snatched the lead when there was only 3 km left to finish. The other runners started chasing him. Both Rono and Lemi started showing fatigue as two Eritreans, Berhane and Merhawi Kesete, increased their tempo and ran ahead of Demeke in the waning stages of the race.
Berhane Tesfay crossed the finish line first in 2:11:44, with teammate Kesete taking the runner-up position six seconds later. Demeke completes the podium in 2:11:56.
Lemi, who logged back-to-back wins here in 2023-2024, finished sixth in a nondescript 2:14:54 and could not accomplish a hat trick of victories similar to Kenyan John Kelai, who won in 2007-2008 and landed third place in 2009. IANS
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