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|  2004 - Road: Marathon Running and Race Walking Review By A. Lennart Julin & Mirko Jalava December 27, 2004 Courtesy of IAAF
MEN - Road Marathon The general rule that Olympic years mean raised standards in world
athletics disciplines applies to all events except the Marathon! This is
not as paradoxical as it might appear at first glance. Marathon runners compete seldom (one, two or at most three times per
year) and for those that have a major championship in the summer as
their big priority, the opportunities to also chase fast times in the spring
and autumn become limited. The spring marathon might be considered
as disturbing the preparation, and then there is too little time to recover
after the championships in late August to run fast in October. But isn't there a major championship more or less every year? That
might be correct in theory but it is very obvious that for most top runners
it is only the Olympic lure that is strong enough to have a major impact
on their priorities. The effect on the statistics is conspicuous: Last year there were 81 sub-
2:10 and 25 sub-2:08 runners, this year the corresponding numbers are
59 and 12. But it must of course be remembered that 2003 was by far
the best year ever. 2004 is actually on par with 2002 (57 and 15) in the
fight for 2nd place on the all-time list for "marathon years". The correlation between the season world list and the Olympic race is
also almost non-existent: The three medallists from Athens - Stefano
Baldini, Meb Keflezighi and Vanderlei de Lima - occupy positions 21,
55 and 48 statistically! Actually Baldini is the only runner in the Olympic
top-10 that can be found in the top-40 timewise in 2004! As for the major international marathons, the victories were as always
spread between many different runners with Evans Rutto and Felix
Limo, the only ones with one triumph in the spring and one in the
autumn: Rutto won London and Chicago, while Limo was No 1 in
Rotterdam and Berlin. Both of them recorded 2:06-times on both
occasions. Although Limo and Rutto were followed by four more Kenyans in the
World list, the Kenyan statistical grip on the marathon lessened
somewhat this year. In 2003 they had 8 out of the top-10 and 14 out of
the top-20, this year they had "only" 7 in the top-10 and 12 at top-20. But the real "national sport" of Kenya seems to be the Half Marathon.
Including the slightly downhill courses, the 2004 World list had 6
runners at 59 minutes, 16 at 60 minutes and 62 at 61 minutes. Out of
these Kenya supplied 4, 13 and 43!! Thus 71% (60 out of 84) of the
fastest half marathon runners in the world in 2004 were Kenyans. Road Running - IAAF WORLD RANKINGS - as of 13 Dec 2004 Position - Name - DOB - Country - Points 1. Paul KIRUI 80 KEN 1314 Race Walking The race walkers are competing almost as sparingly as the marathon
runners but in stark contrast the top walkers tend to face each other not
just at the international championships but almost whenever competing.
This year the 20km people got together not only in the Olympics in
August but also at the World Cup in May, and many of them also met in
Tijuana in March. World 20km champion Jefferson Perez won the first two of those
encounters but had to be content with a 4th place in the Olympics where
Ivano Brugnetti - after a 3rd place in Tijuana and a 6th at the World Cup
- rose to the occasion. Robert Korzeniowski displayed great consistency
with 2nd places in Tijuana and the World Cup at 20km but then at the
Olympics he chose to contest only the 50km. But there are also similarities with the marathon as the correlation
between statistics and the Olympic outcome is weak. The Olympic 20km
medallists Brugnetti, Francisco Fernandez and Nathan Deakes are to be
found a bit down in the lists as No 11, No 8 and No 7, while top-3 times
belong to a Russian trio from a national race in February. Of this trio,
Vladimir Stankin, Vladimir Parvatkin and Roman Rasskazov, only
Parvatkin competed in Athens where he had a lowly finish. Stankin's 1:17:23 missed Perez inaugural World 20km record set at the
2003 World Championships but in the 50km event the record
(Korzeniowski's 3:36:03 also from Paris 2003) was surpassed in Russia
when Denis Nizjegorodov was half a minute faster in the national
championships, though it will not be ratified as no EPO test was carried
out. However, in Athens, Korzeniowski once more proved that he is the
foremost in this event defeating the runner-up Nizjegorodov by over four
minutes.
Korzeniowski also won the season long IAAF Race Walking Challenge,
so retaining the inaugural title he took in 2003. Overall, the discipline is ruled by a very small group of just four nations.
In the Olympics it was POL, RUS, RUS, CHN, ESP, POL, POL, ESP,
RUS and CHN for the top-10! China seems to be well on its way to
becoming a race walking superpower. But for Mexico the trend is the
opposite. This former superpower is conspicuously missing from the
"Big 4" of 50km and that reflects in the current situation. A 12th place in
the 20km lists and a 19th in the 50 km is everything that is Mexican in
the statistical top-20 this year. So it was only logical that they had to be
content with having their top Olympians finishing 18th (20km) and 15th
(50km) in Athens. Race Walking - IAAF WORLD RANKINGS - as of 13 Dec 2004 Position - Name - DOB - Country - Points 1. Robert KORZENIOWSKI 68 POL 1371 WOMEN - Road Marathon Following on from a few very high standard seasons for the women's
Marathon there was a slight drop-off at the top in 2004. This time World
record holder Paula Radcliffe (GBR) kept her first Marathon of the year
to the Olympics which she famously was unable to finish. There was
only one sub 2:20 performance, 2:19:41, achieved by Yoko Shibui (JPN)
in Berlin in September. The Olympic gold medal went to Mizuki Noguchi (JPN), who also ran
her first Marathon of the season in Athens. Noguchi won in 2:26:20, just
edging another favourite Catherine Ndereba (KEN) who finished in the
silver medal position in 2:26:32. Radcliffe went to win the New York Marathon in November to
successfully bounce back from her Olympic disappointment. Her time of
2:23:10 was enough for third place in the World lists this season.
Another top ranked Marathon runner during the past few years, Sun
Yingjie (CHN), won her third successive Beijing Marathon, but was
obviously tired following her win in the World Half Marathon
Championships two weeks earlier. Her winning time was 2:24:11 which
gives her the ninth place in the 2004 World list. There was some quality lost, this season the tenth athlete in the world
list was at 2:24:27, in 2003 this mark was 2:23:07, and 2:22:46 in 2002.
Some more depth was lost as well, as there were 68 athletes under the
2:30 limit, with 70 in 2003 and 87 in 2002. Japan is the strongest country
with 18 athletes in the world top 100. Russia is second with 16 and
Kenya third at 13. Road Running - IAAF WORLD RANKINGS - as of 13 Dec 2004 Position - Name - DOB - Country - Points 1. Mizuki NOGUCHI 78 JPN 1317 Race Walking After her disappointment in 2003, Olimpiada Ivanova (RUS) was back
fighting for the gold medal again this summer. She went to Athens
having won the Russian Championships with 1:26:54, which gave her
second place on the World list behind 20-year-old Song Hongjuan
(CHN), who entered her second successive major championship with
the fastest time prior to the competition. In Paris 2003 the young
Chinese was disqualified, but at the Olympics she did better and was in
the leading group in Athens for a long time before finally fading to a 14th
place finish. But surprises were to come, Yelena Nikolayeva (RUS) and the 18-year-
old Jiang Jing (CHN), who fought vigorously for the win in the World
Cup in Naumburg with the Russian just staying in front in the end, were
both dropped from Olympic medal contention early in the race, with
Nikolayeva finally ending in 17th place with Jiang dropping to 32nd. The surprise of the race was that two Greeks, to the delight of the home
crowd, were able to cope with the pace until the very end of the Olympic
20km Race Walk. Although Athina Papayianni finally finished in 10th
place, 22-year-old Athanasia Tsoumeleka was unbelievably strong in
the end holding off Ivanova and took the Olympic gold medal in 1:29:12
- a personal best for the Greek in this pretty slow race. The Russian was
second just four seconds behind in 1:29:16, and Jane Saville (AUS),
who was disqualified in the Sydney Olympics in 2000 just before
entering the stadium when leading the race, finally got her Olympic
medal finishing in third place at 1:29:25. Reigning Olympic champion Wang Liping was strongest of the Chinese
in eighth place although she only started her training in February after
giving birth to her first child in November 2003.
Italy's Elisa Rigaudo, fifth in the Olympics won the season long IAAF
Race Walking Challenge. In 2004 there were 30 athletes under 1:30 with 26 in 2003 and only 15
in 2002. 2001 had 24 and the Olympic season of 2000, 27. China
continued to be the strongest country in this event with 22 athletes in the
world top-100, Russia had 18 for 2nd place and Spain, 8 in third. Race Walking - IAAF WORLD RANKINGS - as of 13 Dec 2004 Position - Name - DOB - Country - Points 1. Jane SAVILLE 74 AUS 1302
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