Kenya’s Evans Chebet and Sharon Lokedi ensured that the 2022 TCS New York City Marathon titles remained in the hands of Kenyans after winning the men’s and women’s races, respectively.
Chebet made a move at the 25km point and ran past the leader, who was already lying on the ground at the 32km point, to win the race in 2:08:41. Ethiopia’s Shura Kitata came strongly from behind to finish second in 2:08:54 while Abdi Nageeye of the Netherlands came in to complete the podium in 2:10:31.
There was an exciting battle between Lokedi and Israel’s Lonah Salpeter in the last two kilometres of the women’s race as Lokedi, who was slightly ahead, kept glancing behind her shoulder and Salpeter, seeming to draw some encouragement from that, not letting the gap between them to grow. Lokedi, though, held on to finish the race in 2:23:23 against Salpeter’s 2:23:30. Gotytom Gebreselase of Ethiopia finished 3rd in 2:23:39.
From the early stages of the race, where a split screen showed the men’s and women’s leaders breaking away early and opening up some significant gaps on the chasers, it appeared as though we were about to witness two surprise winners at the 2022 TCS New York City Marathon.
However, the women closed the gap on Desiree Linden as they approached the 15km point. They crossed it at 51:23, with a large pack still together. The half-marathon point was crossed at 1:12:17.
At around 32km, the leading pack that had gone down to three – Viola Cheptoo, Hellen Obiri and Gebreslase- was joined by two other runners; Lokedi and Salpeter before they all crossed the 35k in 1:59:12.
It would appear that the two had conserved their energy well as they soon overtook the earlier leaders and reduced the race for the title to a two-horse race.
In the men’s race, Daniel Do Nascimento of Brazil had crossed the 10km point in 28:42. The rest of the group came in at 30:09. As the commentator wondered aloud whether they were getting any information about the growing gap on the leader, Chebet stepped on the gas pedal. The pack began to stretch as they realized they had an opening to close. But still, Nascimento was not appearing on the horizon.
Nascimento crossed the halfway point in 1:01:22, with the gap between him and the chasers being two minutes and thirteen seconds.
Albert Korir pushed the pace ahead of the chasers as they approached the 24km mark, and Abdi Nageeye stuck just behind him despite him doing some zigzag running in an attempt to drop him behind. On the other side of the road, Chebet also made a move, and as he overtook them, Abdi quickly left the side of Korir and followed him, but not for long. Chebet was soon a lone runner.
At 25km, Chebet had reduced the gap on Nascimento by one second. Then, as he approached 29K, Nascimento had to take a break to visit a portable toilet. The action allowed Chebet to reduce the gap by another minute or so as he crossed the 30K mark in 1:030:17.
At 32km, Nascimento wobbled to the side of the road and fell, and Chebet ran past him shortly after the incident.