LONDON, May 27 – Kenya’s Micah Kogo outlasted Zersenay Tadese to retain his title at London’s 10,000metre road race on Monday.
In a repeat of the Great Manchester Run 12 months ago where he set the UK All-Comers record of 27 minutes 21 seconds, Kogo defeated Eritrea’s Tadese, the 2007 IAAF World Cross Country Champion, by seven seconds in a time of 28:08.
Britain’s Mo Farah finished third with a time of 28:39 in terrible weather conditions over a course expected to host a stretch of 2012 London Olympic marathon.
Kogo, who covered the second half of the race in 13min 34sec, said: "I was pleased with my performance today in this Bupa 10,000, it didn’t matter to me it was raining."
Germany’s Irina Mikitenko, a surprise but brilliant winner of last month’s London Marathon, was again in top form when claiming an easy victory ahead of Mara Yamauchi and Aniko Kalovics.
The Kazakhstan-born star clocked 32:02 on her return to the capital, beating Yamauchi by 24secs and with Hungary’s Kalovics third in 32:59.
The trio all set off at a quick pace and broke clear with only Liz Yelling, who along with Yamauchi and Paula Radcliffe was last week named in the GB Marathon team for the Beijing Olympics, remaining in touch.
Yelling fell away before the midway mark, when Mikitenko – who had a one-second advantage on Yamauchi – began to stride forward into an invincible lead.
"We were together until about halfway but I couldn’t quite stay with her," said Tokyo-based Yamauchi, who immediately after the race left for an altitude training camp in St Moritz.
"It was all right, I felt good actually and I was catching her at the end.
"I’m really pleased. This was a bit of a sharpener really, I’ve been doing a lot of endurance type training and I didn’t have much speed in my legs.
"I hope to be in really good shape by August, and I may do another race before then if it fits in with my schedule."
About The Author
