Tamirat Tola wasn’t thinking about breaking the course record as he was running by himself in Central Park for the last few miles of the race.
Tamirat Tola wasn’t thinking about breaking the New York City Marathon course record as he was running by himself in Central Park for the last few miles of the race. He just was focused on trying to win.
The Ethiopian runner broke the 12-year-old mark, finishing the 26.2-mile race in 2 hours, 4 minutes and 58 seconds on Sunday — eight seconds faster than Geoffrey Mutai in 2011.
“The people of New York is amazing to give me moral support every kilometer,” Tola said. “I’m happy for them. Thank you all people. It’s a long kilometers to do alone. … I’m not thinking about a lot. I’m thinking to win. So this is nice.”
Tola, who finished fourth in the race in 2018 and 2019, pulled away from countrymate Jemal Yimer when the pair were heading toward the Bronx at mile 20. By the time Tola headed back into Manhattan a mile later he was up by 19 seconds and left only chasing Mutai’s mark. The 32-year-old was a late add to the field, joining three weeks ago.
Albert Korir of Kenya, who won the 2021 NYC Marathon, finished second nearly two minutes behind Tola.
While there wasn’t much drama in the men’s race after Tola pulled away, the women’s competition came down to the final stretch. Hellen Obiri of Kenya pulled away in the final 400 meters to take the women’s title.
The 33-year-old Obiri ran New York for the first time last year and finished sixth.
“My first debut here was terrible for me, and I say like I don’t want to come back here next year,” Obiri said. “After that, I said, wow, I’m here again. So you know sometimes you learn from your mistakes, so I did a lot of mistakes last year, so I said I want to try to do my best.
