With all variables tailored to his advantage, it was still the full marathon distance but it was no regular marathon race, which means his jaw-dropping finishing time will not be ratified by IAAF.ĭifferent to an ordinary race, event organizers had set a nine-day window to be flexible and stage the run in the best possible weather conditions.Īlso, Kipchoge was supported throughout his run by 36 pacemakers who accompanied him in alternating groups, with five athletes running ahead of him in a V-shape and two others closely following. #INEOS159 #NoHumanIsLimited /wD6clIzHM0- Olympic Channel October 12, 2019 is the first human to run a marathon in less than two hours! His official time of 1:59:40 is now immortal. I expect more people all over the world to run under two hours after today.”

“I am the happiest man in the world to be the first human to run under two hours and I can tell people that no human is limited. “It is a great feeling to make history in sport after Sir Roger Bannister,” Kipchoge said. The 34-year-old Kenyan completed the 42.195 kilometers (26.2 miles) in 1 hour, 59 minutes, 40.2 seconds at the INEOS 1:59 Challenge, an event set up for the attempt.Īhead of the event, Kipchoge even compared the feat to being “like the first man on the moon.” Afterward, he drew comparisons to Bannister, the late Briton who 65 years ago became the first athlete to run a mile in under four minutes. But this time there’s an asterisk: Olympic champion Kipchoge performed his feat under conditions so tightly controlled to maximize his success that it won’t appear in the record books.

Like the sub-four minute mile, running a marathon in less than two hours had seemed impossible - until Saturday.

Download marathon under 2 hours