Wilfred Kigen takes Hamburg - 15,000 runners but 2:28 was good for 10th

Wilfred Kigen and Sharon Cherop took the 25th edition of the Möbel Kraft Hamburg Marathon on Sunday. The two Kenyans clocked winning times of 2:09:22 and 2:28:38 respectively. The jubilee edition of Germany’s biggest spring Marathon had 15,174 runners.

After a fast 10 k split time of 30:02 the pace settled in the men’s race. Five runners were still in the leading group after 30Km. Then Urige Arado Buta (Norway) and Beyene Zerea Beraki (Eritrea) increased the pace and opened a gap. But Kigen managed to get back to them, overtook Beraki and had something left. On the long finishing straight he kicked perfectly and passed Buta to win in 2:09:22. Buta clocked a personal best of 2:09:27 while the next three runners achieved sub-2:11 times: Beraki ran 2:10:06, followed by Kenyans Justus Kiprono (2:10:16) and Matthew Kibowen (2:10:57).