THE WARM-UP
Melissa Bishop has more competition, as Genzebe Dibaba moves to the 800m
Canada’s Melissa Bishop has yet another world class runner to battle t his year. Ethiopia’s Genzebe Dibaba, the world record holder in the 1,500m, has decided to dabble in the 800m, Bishop’s event. Bishop is Canada’s record holder, but she just missed the podium at last year’s Olympics, placing fourth. Dibaba has run world class 800m times in the second half of a 1,500m race.
Gorilla runs a marathon in London, takes six days to finish
English police off icer Tom Harrison completed this year’s London Marathon six days after the race began, wearing a gorilla costume. Harrison, who goes by “Mr. Gorilla,” raised more than a reported $45,000 for charity completing the 42.2k route on his hands and knees or feet. He completed the London Marathon for the Gorilla Organization, a conservation effort to “save the world’s last remaining gorillas from extinction.” The 41-year-old slept at friends’ houses, completing a portion of the marathon route each day. Harrison was out on the marathon course for 10 –12 hours per day, well after all the race equipment had been put away.
Registration date for the Boston Marathon, last chance Canadian races
Got a qualifying time for the 2018 Boston Marathon? Registration opens on Monday, Sept. 11, 2017, at 10 a.m. ET. The Boston Athletic Association will use the same process to register qualified runners as it has used in recent years, allowing the fastest qualifiers in their gender and age group to register first. The 122nd Boston Marathon will be held on Monday, April 16, 2018. The qualifying times for the 2018 Boston Marathon remain unchanged from recent years. Beware, achieving the qualifying standard does not guarantee entry. Those who are fastest among the pool of applicants in their age and gender group will be accepted.
Man chugs 13 beers during half-marathon, finishes in 1:43
University of Notre Dame senior Emmet Farnan drank one beer for each of a half-marathon’s 13 miles (21k). He opted to drink the beers via the shotgun method – poking a hole towards the bottom of the can and drinking through said hole after opening the tab – Farnan ran the beer half-marathon in 1:43:42, 4:45 per kilometre pace, while drinking, for 21.1k.
He captured the entire r un on camera – a requirement for recordkeeping purposes – and the video, which contains some nsfw language, has been seen more than 157,000 times on YouTube. The drinking was done as part of an official race, the Holy Half-Marathon, a student-organized event in South Bend, Ind. A friend carried the beer while biking alongside Farnan for quick access at each mile marker. It was a last-minute decision as Farnan captioned the end-of-race photo with the hashtag #IMadeThisDecisionYesterday.