Marathon, Men

Because of concerns over the Tokyo summer heat, the marathons and race walk events had been moved to Sapporo, on the northern Japanese island of Hokkaido, which had also hosted the 1972 Olympic Winter Games. This change had been made even before the 2020 pandemic postponement, and it helped as Sapporo was cooler than Tokyo, but hardly ideal marathon conditions as the dew point was 22° C. (72° F.), although overcast skies did give the runners some relief.

Kenyan Eliud Kipchoge was the defending gold medalist and the heavy favorite. He had won 14 of his 16 career marathons, was the world record holder, and in a special paced race in Wien (Vienna) in October 2019, had broken the fabled 2-hour marathon barrier, although because of pacing, and other assistance, it was not eligible for world record status.

Likely because of the heat, the early miles were run at a leisurely pace, with over 30 runners together at the halfway point. At 25 km Kipchoge went to the lead and picked up the pace, and 10 runners remained with him to 30 km. At that point he challenged them, and nobody could answer. He had run a 15:07 split from 25-30 km, but Kipchoge ran the 30-35 km segment in 14:28 and the battle for gold was over, as the final 7 km loop was but a victory lap. He eventually finished in 2-08:38 to win by over a minute.

Behind Kipchoge a pack of five runners were together from 30-35 km, which included the Netherlands Abdi Nageeye, his Belgian training partner Bashir Abdi, both originally from Somalia, and Kenya’s Lawrence Cherono. Those three would finish almost together in a close sprint finish, with Nageeye taking silver and Bashir bronze, as Cherono trailed in fourth, only four seconds separating the three.

Kipchoge’s victory made him only the third marathoner to win two Olympic gold medals, after Ethiopia’s Abebe Bikila in 1960-64 and East German Waldemar Cierpinski in 1976-80. It was also his fourth Olympic medal as he had won bronze in the 5,000 metres in 2004, improving to silver in that event in 2008.