Kenyan champion breaks women’s world record as she wins London Marathon

A record number of runners are pounding the capital’s streets today as the London Marathon gets under way.

More than 50,000 people, from elite athletes to fancy-dressed fundraising fun runners, are taking part in the 26.2-mile event, which is now in its 44th year.

And for once the weather is on their side with a bright, dry outlook an temperatures remaining relatively cool with highs of around 12C.

Before the start, there was a poignant pause and a 30-second round of applause in memory of last year’s elite men’s race winner Kelvin Kiptum.

The 24-year-old athlete, who set a new London Marathon record of two hours, one minute and 25 seconds last year and a new world record of two hours and 35 seconds in Chicago in October, died in a car accident in Kenya in February.

Then the elite athletes were off, first off the blocks were the wheelchair athletes at 9.05am.

Marcel Hug of Switzerland won the wheelchair race for the fourth year running, and a fifth time overall, followed by the United States’ Daniel Romanchuk in second place, and Britain’s David Weir in third. The Swiss also proved victorious in the women’s wheelchair race with Catharine Debrunner crossing the line first in one hour, 38 minutes and 54 seconds.

This year’s race is the first time that wheelchair and non-disabled athletes have received the same prize money for a marathon.

All four winners of the elite races will receive £44,000, with the runner-up receiving £24,000 and third place £18,000.

Mr Weir, who was racing his 25th consecutive London Marathon, and has won eight times, said he had not expected the change to happen in his lifetime.

Jasmin Paris, the first woman to complete the ultra-endurance Barkley Marathons, started the elite women’s race at 9.25am on Sunday before Dame Kelly Holmes, who won two gold medals at the 2004 Athens Olympic Games, starts the elite men’s race and mass event at 10am.

Kenyan runner Peres Jepchirchir won the women’s race in a women’s-only record time of two hours, 16 minutes and 16 seconds, smashing the record by 45 seconds.

Tigst Assefa, from Ethiopia, took second place and fellow Kenyan Joyciline Jepkosgei came in third.

In the men’s race, it was another Kenyan success as Alexander Mutiso Munyao crossed the line in two hours, four minutes and one second. Ethiopian Kenenisa Bekele came second and in third place was Brit Emile Caress, securing a place at the Paris Olympics.

For the rest of the competitors, it was a staggered start from Greenwich Park in south east London between 10am and 11.30am as they made their way past some of the city’s most famous landmarks including the Cutty Sark, Tower Bridge, the House of Parliament to end up at The Mall by Buckingham Palace.

Among the mass of participants this year are 20 MPs and peers, the most in the event’s history, including Chancellor Jeremy Hunt, Thangam Debbonaire (Labour’s shadow secretary of state for culture and sport), Tory peer Lord James Bethell and former health secretary turned reality star Matt Hancock.

Event director Hugh Brasher said the event will be “more inclusive than before” with support for more than 200 disabled participants as well as a faith space and a quiet space for neurodivergent participants in the finish area.

There are female urinals, sanitary products available and a family support section which includes a private breastfeeding area.

It has become the largest annual one-day fundraising event in the world, last year’s marathon raised £63 million for thousands of charities, and this year is expected to be no exception.

Comedian and presenter Romesh Ranganathan is running for suicide prevention charity Campaign Against Living Miserably, the day after starting his new Radio 2 Saturday morning show, taking over from Claudia Winkleman.

Other comedians swapping stand up for keep up include Rosie Jones, Ivo Graham, Maisie Adams and Joel Dommett.

Golden Globe-winning actor Ruth Wilson is running and raising funds for Alzheimer’s Research UK. Former Olympic rower and veteran marathon runner James Cracknell is also taking part.

Mikey Hoszowskyj, the son-in-law of TV presenter and actress Kym Marsh, is running the marathon for Prostate Cancer UK in honour of his wife’s grandfather, Dave Marsh.

EastEnders actors Emma Barton and Jamie Borthwick will be running as their television characters Honey and Jay.

McFly drummer Harry Judd, former Doctor Who actor Christopher Eccleston and singer Tom Grennan have also donned trainers to take part.

One of those running for Young Lives vs Cancer is Phil Dunster, best known for his role as Jamie Tartt in Ted Lasso. Mr Dunster is running in memory of his cousin’s four-month-old son Rory, who died from medulloblastoma, a type of cancerous brain tumour.

Former hostage Anoosheh Ashoori, 70, who was detained for nearly five years at Evin prison in Iran, is fundraising for Hostage International in what will be his third London Marathon since his release in March 2022.

“I think I’m still stuck in the 1970s rather than being 70, and I am very excited about the marathon,” he said, adding: “I used to run with my friends in Evin prison, so sometimes I feel they are here with me, running by my side.”

Among the costumed runners is a man attempting to run the fastest marathon in a rhino outfit to raise awareness for the animals.

On the course, David McNab told news agency PA the current rhino record stands at four hours six minutes.

And endurance running expert Russ Cook, known as ‘Hardest Geezer‘ after finishing running the entire length of Africa on 7 April , will take part in support of the Running Charity.

Unlike the extreme condition Hardest Geezer faced in Africa, the Met Office said London Marathon runners can expect sunshine, dry weather and top temperatures of around 12C today.

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Meteorologist Rebecca Mitchell said there was a “very small chance” there could be a “light shower” at some point during the morning, but added: “It should stay dry throughout the marathon.

She said: “We’ve got quite a lot of sunshine to start the day with then a little bit of fair-weather cloud developing throughout the morning and into the afternoon but otherwise, quite a nice day.”

She added: “Waterproofs shouldn’t be necessary tomorrow, so that’s one less thing to worry about.”