Marathon runners target two-hour mark
elite runners backed by a small army of scientists will on Saturday attempt an audacious assault on the boundaries of the possible by trying to run a marathon in less than two hours.
Reigning Olympic marathon champion Eliud Kipchoge from Kenya, Ethiopia’s Lelisa Desisa and Eritrea’s Zersenay Tadese will aim to complete the classic marathon distance of 26.2 miles (42.195 kilometres) in 1hr 59min 59 sec or faster on a fixed loop at the Monza National Autodrome racing circuit in Italy.
In their pursuit of sporting immortality the trio will need to set a ferocious pace of 4min 34sec per mile — seven seconds quicker than the pace of the existing world record of 2:02:57 set by 2014 Berlin Marathon.
In many respects it is the distance running equivalent of attempting to put a man on the Moon requiringthesortofevolu that is usually only achieved over decades.
But increasingly scientists are convinced that the sub-two-hour marathonisachievable “People magical sub-two-hour marathon for a long time,” said Wouter Hoogkamer, lead researcher of a study recently published by the University of Colorado, Boulder.
“Our calculations show that a sub-two-hour marathon time could happen right now, but it would require the right course and a lot of organisation,” Hoogkamer said in the study published by the journal Sports Medicine.
Kipchoge, Desisa and Tadese were selected by Nike after an exhaustive analysis of their physical make-up and technique.
The Colorado study estimated that to be successful, runners would need to wear shoes roughly 100 grams lighter than those worn by Kimetto during his 2014 world record. Nike produced shoes to be worn by the athletes making the attempt, the “Zoom Elite”, pitched as the ideal blend of weightlessness energy return