by Abdi Nageeye of the Netherlands and Sheila Chepkirui of Kenya won the 2024 New York Marathon, each prevailing in the final stages of the race to clinch their first world titles.
After a brutal 26.2 miles through New York’s five boroughs, from Staten Island to Central Park in the heart of Manhattan, Nageeye, 35, reached the finish in 2:07:39, just six seconds behind ahead of Evans Chebet, the 2022 Men’s Champion.
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Chepkirui, 33, finished in 2:24:35, with defending women’s champion Hellen Obiri still visible on her shoulder as she crossed the line. Vivian Cheruiyot finished third, capping an All-Kenyan podium.
“The last lap was really difficult,” Chepkirui said after the race. “I was still with Hellen, and I was like, ‘I have to push to the finish line’.”
Just 12 weeks after the Olympic marathons, the elite field was filled with athletes staging their post-Paris comebacks. “It’s like running the Olympics and then running another Olympic race,” Tamirat Tola, the 2024 Paris champion, who came to New York to defend his 2023 title in the city, told The Guardian earlier this week. . Tola, 33, finished fourth on Sunday, hot on the tail of Albert Korir, the Kenyan who won New York in 2021.
For Nageeye, this weekend presented a chance to recover and try again, after a hip injury forced him to withdraw a few kilometers before the finish in Paris. This time – at the world’s largest marathon – he prevailed.
“I was out for revenge,” Nageeye said after the race. Olympic withdrawal had been “one of my biggest disappointments ever,” he added. “Every day” during training he thought of Paris, “but every day I did my training [at] Like 110%, and it went so smoothly that I had a lot of confidence today. »
New York is a notoriously unpredictable race for those at the front of the pack. “It’s a mental race,” Obiri said, like “you never know” when it really starts. “You have to be ready,” she said. “If she moves 17 miles away, you’re set; if [she moves at] 40K, you are ready.
Obiri, a bronze medalist in Paris, was ready in the final stages of the race. But so was Chepkirui. After a hard kick, Chepkirui finished just 15 seconds ahead of Obiri.
Obiri and Tola had raised the prospect of a faster run in New York; Tola described the course record he established last year as “breakable” on Thursday. “I think it’s possible to run faster on this course,” he said, “either now, or in the future.”
Sunday was not the day. Tola’s men’s course record of Tola, and Margaret Okayo’s women’s course record of 2:22:31, set in 2003, still stands.
Hundreds of thousands of people lined the streets of Brooklyn, Queens, Manhattan and the Bronx to cheer as an estimated 50,000 runners cruised through the city on Sunday, tackling what is widely considered the world’s largest marathon. more difficult.
Three American men and women each achieved the top 10.
Training partners Conner Mantz and Clayton Young, who also made the Paris top 10, finished sixth and seventh in the men’s field, respectively; CJ Albertson, the top American finisher in Chicago, just three weeks ago, and Boston, in the spring, finished 10th.
Sarah Vaughn, forced by illness to abandon Chicago last month, bounced back to finish sixth in the women’s field, as the top American. Jessica McClain and Kellyn Taylor were close behind, in eighth and 10th, respectively.
Two Americans also finished first in wheelchair races for the first time, with Daniel Romanchuk holding off Great Britain’s David Weir in the men’s field; and Susannah Scaroni winning the women by a 10 minute lead. Marcel Hug, who had won 16 consecutive wheelchair marathons in a row, saw his streak end.
The bridges serve as the tent features of this marathon. Athletes start on the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge, crossing Brooklyn; Arrive in Queens via the Pulaski, halfway point; And ride the Queensborough, as they hit Manhattan at mile 16 and the going gets really tough. Two more follow, bisecting a mile through the Bronx.
New York’s difficult climbs invited comparison with this summer’s Olympic course. But there is “a big difference” between the two courses, Mantz noted: While the hills were steep in Paris, with many flat sections along the way, New York is more rolling. The hills keep coming until the end.
“I’m a good hill runner,” Mantz said before the race, noting New York’s two significant climbs in the second half. “If I execute correctly up to that point, then I think that will play to my strengths.”
Young had always been “intimidated” by New York. “I’m a Chicago guy,” after finishing seventh in the Windy City last year, in a personal best. “Keep it flat, let’s keep it fast.”
But this year, and the Olympics, changed his thinking. Young finished ninth in Paris, just 44 seconds off his personal best, despite the elevation. “I came away with a lot of confidence,” Young told the Guardian this week.
“I am a resilient runner. The worse, the better,” he said. “I used to be afraid of hills, but now I kind of think, like, make it hot, make it humid, make it miserable, make it rain, make it cold, make it hilly, do whatever you want – Because I know mentally that I can handle it better than anyone. »
The New York City Marathon, organized by New York Road Runners, has come a long way since its beginning in 1970. That year, 127 athletes lined up at the start line and only 55 finished.
Along with Chicago, Berlin, Boston, London and Tokyo, New York is one of the six world marathons. During Sunday’s race, however, organizers confirmed a seventh: Sydney will join next year.
Des Linden is a two-time Olympian. In 2018, she became the first American woman to win the Boston Marathon in 33 years. In 2021, she set a world record in 50 km. She has run in New York four times before.
This weekend she was back. Linden, 41, has nothing left to prove. But the thrill of competition — and the challenge of New York — lured her to another starting line. She was rewarded with 11th place, less than five minutes from the front.
“You never know how the race is going to play out,” Linden told the Guardian in September. “Anything can happen.”
