OK, he might be "injured". Rossa says they´ll gonna make the decision if he´s racing or not on race day. If he´s racing he´ll be up for serious damage - Martin Lel.
Geb might be fast, very fast but Lel is strong, very strong. He wins races. 3 London Wins is a hit and he´ll be up for the fourth there is no doubt.
Despite only running two marathons, Lel had a superb year in 2008. Not only did he retain his London title, his third in all, but he smashed the six-year-old course record in 2:05:15 leading three men under 2:06 and six under 2:07 for the highest
quality race of all time. Lel’s superb performance guaranteed his place on Kenya’s Olympic team for Beijing and in the heat of the Chinese capital he collaborated with teammate Sammy Wanjiru on setting a blistering pace that laid the foundations for the swiftest marathon ever seen at a major championships. Lel’s fifth place added a point to his World Marathon Majors total and ensured he became the 2007/08 WMM champion.
Lel ran his first marathon in 2002 at Prague, but after going through the halfway point in 1:04:51 he did not finish. Five months later he placed second at Venice in 2:10:02. He gave early notice of a breakthrough in 2003 when he won the Lisbon Half Marathon in 1:00:10 and had two additional wins at the distance at Virginia Beach and in a sprint finish at the World Championships in October. A month later he won the New York Marathon.
Exclusively a road runner, he broke the hour barrier with 59:51 for second in 2004 and with 59:42 for fourth in the 2005 Lisbon half marathon. Six weeks later he took three minutes off his marathon best to win London in 2:07:26 after making a break
just beyond 23 miles.
In 2006 Lel smashed his personal best in the half marathon by running 59:30 to win in Lisbon, beating world record holder Wanjiru. A month later Lel battled Felix Limo on the London course to muscle out a 2:06:41 personal best, but could not catch Limo
who sprinted ahead in the final 200 metres to win by two seconds.
Lel also won the Peachtree Road Race 10km on 4 July in 27:25, the second fastest time in the history of that race. After finishing third at the World’s Best 10km in
San Juan in February 2007, in 28:13, Lel returned to London that April and took a second victory after another dramatic sprint finish. He went on to defeat Wanjiru again at the Great North Run (60:10) before closing the year with his second victory at the New York Marathon, thus becoming the first man ever to win both London and New York in the same year.
He began 2008 hiding from the tribal violence that erupted in Kenya. He was forced to flee to tea plantations to continue his training and eventually relocated
to Namibia. The disruption did little harm, however, for he arrived in London in superb shape, and left a few days later as the fourth fastest man in history.
He starts 2009 with 26 points in the 2009/10 WMM series, just 14 behind Wanjiru. But he’ll be confident of making up at least some of the ground after beating Wanjiru in the Lisbon half marathon in March. Lel won the race in 59:56, while Wanjiru was seventh.
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