Tola wins first gold for Ethiopia at the Paris Olympics in men's marathon

Photo Credit Nicholas Bamulanzeki (@bamulanzeki)

In a show of great determination and resilience, Ethiopia’s Tamirat Tola just won the first gold medal for his country in a new Olympic record of 2:06:26 at the ongoing Olympic Games in Paris. Bashir Abdi of Belgium won the silver medal in 2:06:47, while Kenya’s Benson Kipruto finished third to take home the bronze medal in 2:07:00.

This was a welcomed medal for the Eastern African country with so many past successes and rich history in the marathon distance. It was also a consolation for them after Lamecha Girma, who stood a great chance to win gold in the men’s 3000m steeplechase race, got a nasty fall on the last lap of the race while he was in the lead.

Tola, the 2022 world champion and reigning New York City Marathon champion, made his intentions known at around 18km into the race and continued to dominate the remaining kilometres in a gutsy and solo run in the last stages of the race.

At the start of the race, being the defending champion, all eyes, focus, and cameras were on Kipchoge. Known for running under 2 hours for the marathon and winning some of the fastest marathons in the world from Berlin to London, to Chicago, and to Tokyo marathons, it was understandable. He even had a differently coloured bib from the rest of the field. But, it remained to be seen how he was going to fare on a hard course with no pace setters on a warm and humid day.

Indeed, it didn’t go well for the two-time Olympic champion. The 39-year-old—who had shown up with a headband designed to help cool his body during the race—failed to finish the race after clutching the side of his stomach in the first half.

The Paris Olympics course, apparently, was a course set to spring up surprises.

After a relatively slow start, Eyop Faniel of Italy made a surge after the 10 Km point, and the rest of the leading pack appeared hesitant to follow him, seeming to let Kipchoge make the decisions as he seemed to be controlling the chasing pack.

Faniel was 23 seconds ahead of them at the 15 km mark, where he crossed it in 45:38. After a hilly 5 km and crossing the 20 km point in 1:01:32, the gap had reduced to eleven seconds as Tola was slowly closing in on him.

The half-marathon point was passed in 1:04:51, with Tola taking the lead and seven other runners closely behind him. The pace slowed down a bit after that and the leading pack swelled again to about fifteen runners as they passed the 25K mark in 1:16:08.

A hilly section around 28K started to stretch the leading pack again, and Tola began to open up a slight gap ahead of the rest. At 1:31:14, Tola was 11 seconds ahead of the single file behind him as he transitioned to a steep descent after the hills. He had extended the lead slightly at the 35K mark, crossing it in 1:45:14, as a trio of DEresa Geleta, Bashir Abdi, and Benson Kipruto followed in 1:45:32.

Some seconds behind Tola, Bashir and Kipruto appeared to have secured the other podium places as they left Geleta behind at around 40K. They maintained their medal positions to the end of the race.