Marathon News - Champions To Return To Toronto Waterfront Marathon

Jul-25-2007

Champions To Return To Toronto Waterfront Marathon
by David Monti
(c) Race Results Weekly, all rights reserved

The two champions of the 2006 Scotiabank Toronto Waterfront Marathon, Daniel Rono of Kenya and Malgorzata Sobanska of Poland, intend to defend their titles on Sept. 30, race director Alan Brookes announced yesterday.

Rono, 28, won a hard-fought battle with Moroccan Abderrahim Bouramdane to win in a course record and personal best 2:10:15. His mark also came very close to Waldemar Cierpinski's Canadian all-comers record set at the Montreal Olympics in 1976: 2:09:55. Scotiabank is offering a Cn$20,000 bonus for breaking Cierpinski's mark.

"I am very pleased to come back to Toronto Waterfront," Rono said via a press release. "It is a flat, fast course. I hope we get good weather and we can run under 2:09:30."

Sobanska overwhelmed the women's field and won by more than three minutes in a course record 2:34:32. The 38 year-old from Poznan has had an illustrious and prolific marathon career that has encompassed a win at London in 1995 (2:27:43), a second place finish at Boston in 2001 (2:26:42), and a fourth place finish at the 1995 World Championships. She was also 11th at the 2000 Olympic Marathon in Sydney.

The race will celebrate its eighth running this year. The 2006 edition recorded 1841 finishers, but counting the companion half-marathon and 5-K the event saw 8027 total finishers.

"We hope our defending champions can lead us to two new course records this year," commented Brookes. "A sub-2:10 and a sub-2:30 would be very nice."