Solomon Deksisa and Amane Gobena lived up to their billing as the fastest athletes in the elite men's and women's field respectively as the Ethiopian pair galloped to victory in the 2018 Tata Mumbai Marathon on Sunday. Deksisa crossed the tape in 2:09:34, almost a full minute short of Gideon Kipketer's course record (2:08:35) and even further behind the 2:06 mark he had sounded confident about completing the race in a couple of days earlier. But the 23-year-old, who had to endure some anxious moments on the final stretch thanks to compatriot Shumet Akalnaw's late charge, was still a contented man, this being his first ever win in a marathon.
Akalnaw emerged a surprise runner-up, having started the run with the 16th fastest time among the elite men, but managing to set a new personal best mark of 2:10. Kenyan Joshua Kipkorir, last year's runner-up, was in the mix between the 28 and 34km mark before 'pain in his stomach' effectively ended his challenge and left him crossing the finish thirty seconds after Akalnaw in third.
Like Deksisa, Gobena too had fancied her chances of victory in Mumbai and the 35-year-old finished her maiden marathon here in 2:25:49. The near three-minute gap between Gobena and Bornes Kitur (2:28:48), the defending champion from Kenya, was an indication of how dominant a run this was from the Ethiopian, a veteran marathon runner. Gobena's compatriot and friend Shuko Genemo, who had scripted an authoritative win of her own in 2016, appeared to struggle in the warmer conditions that prevailed on this occasion and settled for third (2:29:41).
The men's race expectedly got off to a quick start, with the runners possibly aiming to make the most of the conditions over the first 10km before the sun began to make its presence felt once the leading pack approached the sea link. The pacesetters, though, were apparently struggling to live up to the expectations of the runners as 11 men crossed the halfway mark in 64:28 - 30 seconds slower than the time requested by the latter.
Akalnaw and Kipkorir both made their displeasure known. "The problem was the pacemakers. They did not want to push, I had to tell them to push," said Kipkorir. "One dropped around the 15km, then 25k, another one dropped. So I tried to make the race quicker."
