Marathon world record holder Paula Radcliffe believes record could fall at Dubai Marathon

Alex Broun 18:15 24/01/2018
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  • Paula Radcliffe setting the Marathon world record in London in 2003.

    Former marathon world champion, and current marathon world record holder, Paula Radcliffe believes world records could fall at Friday’s Standard Chartered Dubai Marathon.

    “I think it’s going to be a very quick race,” she said yesterday in Dubai. “They’ve made the start an hour earlier – or half an hour earlier than last year – so the conditions will be cooler and more conducive to running fast. It’s a very fast course, very flat, everything is tailored towards that.”

    Radcliffe believes fast times are one of the reasons the world’s elite marathon runners head to Dubai.

    “I think the athletes come here ready to race” she said. “This is a race that they know is known for fast times, so they come here expecting that and prepared to go out and commit to it.

    “It is important because a lot of places they’ll go to and they’ll talk about “Yeah I want to run fast” but they are just there to win the race. Here they do want to come and run fast.”

    The three time winner of both the London and New York marathons said the key to breaking the records was the first half of the race.

    “It is all about how quick they go in the first half,” she said. “If you go too fast you can overcook it. If you get that right then you can run very fast here.

    “It’s 2hours 2 min 57secs (the men’s WR). I think if they went out not too fast, not too fast is fast, but like 61 and a half or something like that and then tried to come back quicker then I think that it is possible.

    “We don’t want the wind to get up too much, which is why they are starting it earlier, (but) when it is a long out and back stretch, the risk is that if the wind gets up that can cause havoc. I think if it doesn’t get up till later in the morning then (the time) could be very very quick.”

    Tamirat Tola and Worknesh Degefa, winners of the 2017 Standard Chartered Dubai Marathon

    Tamirat Tola and Worknesh Degefa, winners of the 2017 Standard Chartered Dubai Marathon

    The reigning men’s champion Tamirat Tola, who ran a personal best of 2:04:11 last year, is expecting another fast race tomorrow.

    “If we work together I have the chance to run another personal best,” said Tola. The world record is currently held by Kenya Dennis Kimetto set in Berlin in 2014.

    “From what I have learnt so far, the course is flat and fast to achieve a world-record time. But no one has run on it to really know,” continued Tola.

    “I hope to do my best, and I can’t say if the best will be enough to establish a new world record. It’s something yet to be achieved and we’ll see what happens on the race day.”

    But it could be in the fiercely contested women’s race where Radcliffe’s own world record of 2:15:25, set in London in 2003, could be most at risk.

    “On the women’s side you have (Worknesh) Degefa,” noted Radcliffe. “But it’s also going to be Mare Dibaba and (Aselefech) Mergia who are in very good shape and also (Gelete) Burka could run and could surprise a few people.”

    But they have plenty of work to do to catch Radcliffe. Mergia’s personal best is 2:19:31 (set in Dubai in 2012), Dibaba’s 2:19:52 (China 2015), Degefa 2:22:36 (Dubai last year) and Burka 2:26:03 (Houston 2014).

    Radcliffe now puts the Dubai marathon right up with the top in the world, although she feels that Dubai should become a member of the Marathon majors – Tokyo, Boston, London, Berlin, Chicago and New York City.

    “Definitely in terms of the course, (it’s right up there). If people want to run a fast race Dubai is up there alongside Berlin, possibly Chicago.

    “In terms of the history, the lure of the marathon majors, it could do with joining those majors. To be able to actually have that history of the people who have gone before winning the race makes New York, London, Boston a special place. Dubai is getting there but it needs to be patient.”

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