NOS Sport•gisteren, 10:18
Tola wins Olympic marathon, Nageeye fails to finish
Tamirat Tola has won the Olympic marathon. The 2022 world champion crossed the finish line in an Olympic record of 2:06:26.
Silver went to Bashir Abdi. The Belgian, who secured a bronze medal in Tokyo three years ago thanks to the help of Dutchman Abdi Nageeye, clocked 2.06.47. Third place this time went to Kenyan Benson Kipruto (2.07.00).
Nageeye stepped out two kilometers before the finish line, when he was in 41st place, Khalid Choukoud was 58th in 2.25.25.
AFPThe strongest three marathon runners in Paris
Nageeye was one of the prominent dropouts in the classic distance of 42.195 meters. The marathon from the city center to Versailles and back was a tribute to the thousands of Parisian women who marched to the palace of Louis XVI in October 1789, during the French Revolution, to protest against high bread prices. The race largely followed the route that the angry crowd took 234 years ago.
This eye for historical awareness, from the Paris 2024 organizing committee, resulted in the 81 athletes being faced with a gruelling hilly course, with no fewer than 436 meters of elevation gain.
AFPAbdi Nageeye during the first kilometers
The weather conditions, 19 degrees and no wind, were an additional complicating factor. Nageeye, who won Olympic silver three years ago, had armed himself against the heat by starting with a headband with cooling elements. It did not help Nageeye in his attempt to make his mark on the competition.
Nageeye thus continued a pattern. The Mogadishu-born athlete, who ran the 20th marathon of his career in Paris, usually alternates good races with bad performances.
Four months ago, Nageeye was in the form of his life in Rotterdam. He triumphed overwhelmingly on the Coolsingel, where he even found the strength to run a lap of honour. Although he recorded a top time of 2.04.45, he said it had never been so easy for him over the classic distance of 42.195 metres. “It felt like I was jogging.”
This time he didn’t even manage to reach the finish line at the Esplanade des Invalides. Nageeye left the Olympic marathon between kilometers 40 and 41 like a thief in the night.
Bouncing shoes
He also continued a trend in this respect. Since he was crowned vice-Olympic champion in Sapporo three years ago, Nageeye has not finished a single major title tournament.
In 2022, during the World Championships in Eugene, USA, he left the race in sight of the finish. Nageeye had been roped in by his sponsor just before the race to try out new footwear. The ‘bouncy shoes’, as he called the material, prevented him from reaching the finish line.
A year later, when the world championship was held in Budapest, he had, against his habit, undergone a vigorous massage the day before the race. This time, according to him, it was ‘balloon legs’ that forced him to raise the white flag prematurely as a sign of surrender.
Former world record holder Eliud Kipchoge, now 41, was another famous dropout. Halfway through the race he repeatedly grabbed his side. He too was given the letters DNF (Did Not Finish) behind his name, for the first time in his career.
The Kenyan attributes his poor performance to a back injury. Ending his career by becoming the first man to win the Olympic marathon three times in a row was not something he was granted in the twilight of his impressive career.
For another ageing great, the 42-year-old Ethiopian Kenenisa Bekele, the Olympic marathon also turned out to be a disappointment. The former track athlete, Olympic champion in the 10,000 meters of Athens 2004 and winner of the 5,000 and 10,000 meters in Beijing four years later, finished ingloriously in 39th place.
Belgian marathon runner Bashir Abdi saw all his sacrifices rewarded with silver at the Olympic marathon. The day started far from ideally for the athlete, as he had missed the last athletes’ bus to the course. “This morning there was a bit of panic. I had missed the last bus and had to take an Uber to the start,” he said with a laugh. “It was a bit stressful, but an hour and a half before the start I was finally on the course.”
With Nageeye’s withdrawal, Choukoud was the only Dutchman to reach the finish line on the Esplanade des Invalides. He attributed the fact that he left only thirteen opponents behind him to illness.
“I had to take ten paracetamols to be able to start here,” said the athlete, who was born in Fez, Morocco. “I felt like I died three times along the way. It was not normal. This course was a war of attrition, I have never experienced anything like it in my life. This was more of a cross than a marathon.”
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