Time to beat Kipchoge

🔴 Sunday 01.00am
➡ Marathon (M) FINAL

📌  🇺🇬 Uganda marathon team
*⃣ Fred Musobo
*⃣ Stephen Kiprotich
*⃣ Felix Chemonges

Tokyo, Japan | THE INDEPENDENT  |  Time runs fast. Just two years ago, six Ugandans including two current Olympians, were on the list of pace setters as Kenyan marathon legend Eliud Kipchoge made history by becoming the first man to run the marathon under 2 hours.

🔴 PACE-SETTERS IN 2019

Jacob Kiplimo 🇺🇬
Ronald Musagala 🇺🇬
Abdallah Mande 🇺🇬
Thomas Ayeko 🇺🇬
Mande Bushendich 🇺🇬
Timothy Toroitich 🇺🇬

Jacob Kiplimo, who won himself bronze in the 10,000m final in Tokyo, together with Ronald Musagala, were part of the team that set the pace as Kipchoge  made history, busting the mythical two-hour barrier for the marathon in the “best moment” of his life on a specially prepared course in a huge Vienna park in 2019.

With a time of 1hr 59min 40.2sec, the Olympic champion became the first ever to run a marathon in under two hours in the Prater park with the course readied to make it as even as possible.

The 36-year-old already held the official men’s world record for the distance with a time of 2hr 01min 39sec, which he set in the flat Berlin marathon on September 16, 2018.

Kipchoge returns in the next hour to try and become back-to-back marathon Olympic champion, but he cannot count on Ugandan support this time.

Three Ugandans, led by 2012 Olympic champion Stephen Kiprotich, will be part of a strong field out to deny Kipchoge in the final athletics event of Tokyo 2020 that starts in the next one hour.

Kiprotich whose best qualifying time was 2:08:31 set in 2019 has the second best time on Uganda’s team of 2:09:04 set earlier this year at the NN Mission Marathon in Enschede, Netherlands.

He makes history, by joining Benjamin Kiplagat as athletes that have represented Uganda at three straight Olympics. Kiprotich won gold in 2012 and finished 14th in 2016.

Kiprotich has also competed at four World Championships, 2011, 2013, 2015 and 2019. He won gold in 2013.

Fred Musobo has the second best qualifying time of 2:06:56 set in April 2019. He however is top in current form, having run 2:08:24 from the Siena, Italy marathon also this year.

The final place on Uganda’s Olympics marathon team to Tokyo was taken by Felix Chemonges, who had the best qualifying time of 2:05:12 which is also the national record set in October 2019, but on current form is 4th at 2:09:59.

The long marathon qualification period, that started in 2019 before the COVID-19 pandemic struck, has seen seven Ugandans qualify before the deadline that was pushed to May 31, 2021.

Kiprotich made claim to a place among the contenders by beating previous top contenders Filex Chemonges and Geoffrey Kusuro in Enschede .