Pretty sure new WR? No doubt a sub 2:00 will be done in competition very soon.

Adjusted my original post. Official time was 2:01:39. Broke the WR by a minute and 18 seconds!(?) The most incredible athletic feat I’ve ever witnessed. No pacers after 25K. You could tell that breaking the WR was a huge weight off his back. I guess this pretty much ends any GOAT debate.

It looks like the struggle to buy the new Zoom Vaporfly 4% Flyknit will be real.

I don't know. What do you count as very soon? Does the time inspire greater effort (like the Nike project) or act as a mental barrier (like the 4 minute mile). Do we see Kipchoge breaking it himself or someone else? If so who? I think there are lots of ways this could play out.

And he did it without compression socks! That settles that. Although he did have athletic tape on his calves.

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They constantly try to escape from the darkness outside and within
Dreaming of systems so perfect that no one will need to be good T.S. Eliot

What is that, around 3 seconds a mile faster than previous record pace? Truly incredible. Think of how much faster that is... at pace these guys are running.

He wears the compression around his arms 😀

We will have to change that!!!

Can’t make sense of that pace in my brain for that far. Insane.

Incredible of course. But when did Berlin Marathon turn into a time trial instead of a race. Each of the contenders are given their own 3 pacers told to run different pace for each contender? All Berlin is now is a Breaking2 project on the roads of Berlin rather than an F1 track in Italy. I get it, these World Majors all want to be host to the WR, but what happened to racing?

Berlin has always been a time trial

Berlin has always been a time trial with pacers for the field, not for each athlete. It used to be, let's assist the field in making it be a fast race. Now it is: let's assist particular runners by providing pacing and drafting assistance in order to achieve WR. The only difference between today and Breaking2 is that fresh pacers did not cycle in and the pacecar was not set to a pace. But, the lead car did show the real-time speed for Kipchoge so served the same purpose.

In my mind the difference between Breaking2 and this morning are very subtle and make me wonder why 2:00:23 is not the WR. If Breaking2 were repeated with a pace car but without rotating pacers, would it be? Should it be? How is it different than this morning?

Or the other way. If Berlin provides an athlete with pacers whose sole purpose is to set pace and block wind for defined period of time, and not to finish the race or really even be a participant in the race, then why must these pacers start at beginning? They're not really racers so why are they restricted to start at start. Why can they not do like Breaking2 and start at mile 5, mile 10 and mile 15 and mile 20. I feel like either you can have external assistance, which is what these racers are, or you cannot. And, if you can, as Berlin and the WMM have clearly decided, why not go the full Breaking2 route with the assistance given.

The guy is amazing and this record will hold for decades (unless taken down by Kiphoge himself). I hope he's clean.

Khalid Khannichi was the last runner to break the record (best time, whatever) somewhere other than in Berlin. That was in October 1999 when a lot of people were worrying about where they were going to be on New Years. Once a race has the reputation as the fastest then they almost have to organise it that way don't they? What's the alternative?

I'd imagine the pacers are assigned to an athlete and the athlete agrees the pace. Maybe the different paces are shared, maybe they aren't. But either way it's just a different form of racing. If someone wanted to run with Kipchoge or set a faster pace then there was nothing stopping them. Certainly the race organisation won't be setting the times. From the limited footage I've seen he set off fast and ran very consistent splits. I think I'm right his 1st km was the fastest which may be geography (I don't know the course) or may be getting out fast so he isn't pulling a competitor along. I know Gebrselassie sometimes didn't make a record attempt because the field was too strong and he didn't want to set the pace for someone else to break it.

Basically I don't think the fastest course in the world should do anything other than set the conditions for the fastest times.

Eliud Kipchoge.


02:01:39


He must have had ramen noodles for breakfast.

I think part of it is you have to be able to enforce a rule. Suppose you didn't allow pace makers then how could you prove an athlete who starts, leads to half way then drops out is or isn't doing it to set the pace for another athlete? Once an athlete can set up there own pacemakers you might as well organise it. But you can certainly enforce the having to start with everyone else bit.

ETA presumably this is why the women's race starts at a different time. Not long ago the best women had male pace makers. Hard to stop that if the 2 races start together. Now you don't see it.

Kipchoge has always seemed like a class act in interviews. I’m a fan and it’s nice to see him finally have the record. I think this definitely cements him as the GOAT. 10 victories in 11 tries. His lone loss in 2013 where the winner (Kipsang) set the then world record. I always thought Bekele might end break the WR but I don’t see that happening anymore. I’d love to see him come do two of the World Marathon Majors he is missing (Boston and New York). But I don’t think that’ll happen.

As for the run itself. Went out in a 61:06 and came back in a 60:33. Very impressive. I’m betting his participation in Nike’s Breaking2 helped. He saw what was possible with his body and was able to break through the mental side of things. Not to mention all the testing, gear, research, etc that went into it. This was also the biggest jump in the WR on the men’s side since 1967

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Matt

Hahaha give him a break!!! hahah

In cycling you have road races and you have time trials. And they have different rules. But, now in marathoning we have races and we have time trials, but they are acting as if there's no distinction.

Could Berlin use bike pacers instead of running pacers to serve the purpose of the Breaking2 drafters/pacers? Would that be within the rules?

I think what strikes me is that Breaking2 showed what a true distance running time trial looks like. And it is only subtly different than a Berlin marathon race. Which then makes me wonder, what should the WR be, because if Berlin counts then why not Breaking2?

Just thinking out loud on a Sunday morning. 2:01:39 is beyond comprehension.

Wow, I knew Berlin was fast, but Berlin is done as a time trial race and not an normal mass start event? I had no idea.

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Brooks Doughtie, M.S.
Exercise Physiology
-USAT Level II

Nice write up over at letsrun.com. They talk about how the pacers/pacing didn’t go exactly to plan and how Kipchoge made a surge in the final 2k to make sure he broke 2:02. There is also a video of the finish at the end. Looks like some wheelchair finishers were confused on what finishing chute they were supposed to go down and almost got in his way.

http://www.letsrun.com/...018-berlin-marathon/

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Matt

So cycling has to fundamentally change a races whole structure to make a time trial fair. Marathons run in those conditions would be very very different. But this is also why the Olympic tri is drafting legal, they didn't want to get into enforcing no drafting. Personally I think no drafting is a purer sport but then look at no draft triathlons and it's a catering size can of worms.

My point is you can easily enforce bikes not pace setting in marathons, pacers not dropping in halfway through the race and men not pacing women. But how do you enforce someone not pacing someone who starts the same race? Once you decide you can't stop it then you might as well embrace it.

I actually agree with you so do not interpret any of my responses as argumentative.

I think what rubs me the wrong way and makes my mind wonder "if this is ok, why is Breaking2 not?" is that the RD is not tolerating that it's a mass start race and you cannot prevent pacing, but rather making pacing an artificial aspect of the race. Kipchoge had his own pacers. In their own uniforms and with PACER as numbers. Kipsang had his own pacers, same thing. These people are not part of the race; they are artificial assistance and no different than bikes or robots doing that job. This is very different than the move to have women have their own start in order to reduce pacing from males.

I think it's one thing to have pacers for the field like in Grand Prix T&F meets, in order to lube up the entire race to a fast time rather than an Olympic slow pace until last lap snorefest. But, I don't like these athlete-specific pacers in order to give athletes drafting and pacing (mental) assistance in the quest for an ever faster WR.

Subtle, yes, and in the LR article it sounds like the pacers couldn't even do their job for long (despite 2:04 credentials) but there's just something that rubs me wrong about the RD taking pacers to this extreme. Just me.

Now that’s funny right there!!

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Jim Hallberg
USAC level II
USAT Level I
http://www.d3multisport.com
WATTS UP!!

Flotrack reported that he didn't have any pacers after 25K so there's that....

Those splits!!! Kipchoge (2018) 14:24 14:37 14:37 14:18 14:28 14:21 14:18 14:30#berlinmarathon2018@koechspoti just SICK!!!!

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"see the world as it is not as you want it to be"