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Dec-10-2005
Defending Champions Lead Honolulu Elites
by David Monti
(c) Race Results Weekly, all rights reserved
The elite fields for tomorrow's Honolulu Marathon are led by defending champions, Jimmy Muindi of Kenya and Lyubov Morgunova of Russia, who also happen to be the event's course record holders.
Last year's edition of the race was held in unusually cool conditions with mostly overcast skies allowing Muindi, 32, and Morgunova, 34, to run 2:11:12 and 2:27:33, respectively. The 2:12 barrier had been broken here only twice before, in 1986 and 1989, but that was on an easier course.
"At last we got it," said a smiling Muindi after breaking the course record last year. "I just wanted at least to break it."
For Morgunova, she broke her own course record of 2:28:33 set in 2000. The tropical conditions here often combine with difficult winds making the achievement of fast times unlikely. Indeed, in the history of the race the 2:30 barrier has only been broken by women six times, all of them by
Russians: Morgunova (three times), Sevtlana Zakharova (twice) and Albina Ivanova.
With the exception of three-time champion Mbarak Hussein, who was born in Kenya but became a U.S. citizen last year, the elite men's race is an all-African affair. Muindi, who has four Honolulu victories and a career best time of 2:07:50 to his credit, will have to hold off a strong group of Kenyans led by Joseph Riri, the only man in the field to have broken 2:07.
The other Kenyans are David Mutua (2:12:11 PB and second here last year), Eric Nzioki (2:10:34 PB), Solomon Wachira (debut/1:02:24 half-marathon PB, 1998), and Nicholas Muindi (2:15:59), Jimmy's younger brother who acted as a pacemaker here last year.
Hussein, now 40, and 1996 Olympic Marathon gold medalist Josiah Thugwane, 34, of South African are perhaps the sentimental favorites. Hussein is the reigning U.S. open marathon champion and finished third here last year.
This will be his 11th Honolulu Marathon. Thugwane won the Loskop Marathon 50-K last April in South Africa, passing through the standard marathon split in about 2:14. He failed to finish his last marathon (Vienna last May), and hasn't finished a standard marathon since April, 2003.
"I start again," he told RRW simply earlier this week about his stalled marathon career. Many had thought he had retired.
Morgunova will be facing stiff competition from 2003 champion Eri Hayakawa
(2:28:11 PB) who finished second here last year, despite taking a nasty fall in the fourth mile. Alevtina Ivanova of Russia (2:29:05 PB) has finished second and third here previously, while Russian twins Olesva (2:29:35 PB) and Elena (2:29:49 PB) Nurgalieva are making their Honolulu debuts after finishing 12th and 13th, respectively, at the ING New York City Marathon last month. Mina Ogawa of Japan (2:28:47) rounds out the elite women's field.
Wilberforce Talel (KEN) and Tatyana Chulakh (RUS) will pace the men's and women's fields, respectively.
Prize money will be paid five-deep: $15,000-8,000-5,000-3,000-1,500, but athletes are also eligible to earn bonuses for couse records ($10,000) and fast times. The weather should be good by Honolulu standards: about 70°F
(21°C) at the start at 5:00 a.m. accompanied by 70% humidity. As the sun rises, the high temperature for the day will reach about 80°F (27°C) with somewhat lower humidity. The winds are forecast to be 14 MPH out of the northeast. That will push the runners in to the finish after the turnaround point at the 16 mile mark.
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