by Larry Eder
Ryan Hall will be defending the ING Philly half marathon next weekend. Ryan Hall will be using the Philly half for preparations for his run at the Bank of America Chicago Marathon on
October 10.
Matt Turnbull, the elite coordinator for the Competitor events, has put together quite a field, on both the men and women. Meseret Defar and Shalane Flanagan will lead the women’s elite field for the half marathon as well.
Ryan Hall’s win last year at the ING Philly Half was the first time since 1986, that an American
male had won the race. Mark Curp was the winner in 1986. Hall has significant pressure on himself to win a major marathon. He has run fast times, but his only marathon win was his tremendous victory at the 2008 U.S. Olympic Trials. We wish Ryan Hall good luck at ING Philly and also Bank of America!
Ryan Hall Returns to
Defend Philadelphia Title Against Glittering International Field
Historic U.S. Road Race Debuts Rock ‘n’ Roll
Format for 2010
Philadelphia, PA – September 10,
2010 – The event has a new name, but its legendary pedigree lives on as
defending champion Ryan Hall of the USA looks to repeat last year’s
1:01:52 victory at the ING Rock ‘n’ Roll Philadelphia Half Marathon on Sunday,
September 19th.
Known as the Philadelphia Distance Run for 32 years, the
legacy of the historic road race includes five World and three American
records. Last year Ryan Hall, the American record holder at the half-marathon
(59:43, Houston 2007), became the first American-born runner to win in
Philadelphia since Mark Curp turned the trick in 1986. This year Hall will use
the race as his final tune up for an assault on the American marathon record
(2:05:38, Khalid Khannouchi, London 2002) at the Oct. 10 Bank of America
Chicago Marathon.
“I am very excited to
return to Philadelphia to run in the ING Rock n Roll Half Marathon,” said Hall,
who won last year’s race by four seconds over Kenya’s Samuel Ndereba. “Now
that I have met Rocky, run the lightning fast course, heard the bands, and
experienced the energy on the streets of Philadelphia, I am even more eager to compete
in this great race.”
Hall will be joined by fellow
Stanford grad Brett Gotcher, the 2009 USA 20K champion. Gotcher, who
competes for McMillan Elite out of Flagstaff, Arizona, represented the U.S.
last year at the IAAF World Half-Marathon Championship, and this January ran
2:10:36 to finish seventh at the Houston Marathon. It was the fourth fastest
marathon debut ever by aU.S. runner.
The Americans will be
formidably challenged, however, by a powerful field of international athletes
led by Morocco’s Abderrahim Goumri, a 2:05:30 marathoner who was second
last year in the Chicago Marathon (2:06:04), Gebre Gebremariam of
Ethiopia, the 2009 IAAF World Cross Country Champion and #1 road racer of 2010
with wins at New York ‘s Healthy Kidney 10K, Atlanta’s Peachtree 10K, Cape
Elizabeth, Maine’s Beach to Beacon 10K, and the Falmouth Road Race 7 Miler on
Cape Cod. Also contending will be Australian Shawn Forrest, a
University of Arkansas grad who finished second in the NCAA 10,000 meters last
year, then took sixth in his professional road racing debut earlier this
summer at the Beach to Beacon 10K; Shadrack Biwott of Kenya, a
four-time All-American while running for the University of Oregon; Simon
Bairu of Canada and the Oregon Track Club, a University of Wisconsin grad
who bested Ryan Hall in winning the Rock `n` Roll Arizona Half-Marathon this
January, then broke the Canadian national record for 10,000m in May (27:23);
and Irish Olympian Alistair Cragg, a two-time Olympian and seven-time
NCAA champion while competing for the University of Arkansas.
“This year’s edition will be
even more exciting than last year’s,” added Hall. “With the field that’s being
assembled it is sure to be a flier! Whoever gets to the finish line first will
have to be in superb shape. My training is off to a very good start and having
this half marathon just three weeks till the Bank of America Chicago Marathon I
should be even sharper than last year.”
Wildcards expected to challenge
for podium finishes are the Kenyan trio of Matthew Kisorio, a sub-13:00
5000m runner on this year’s Samsung Diamond League track tour; McDonard
Ondara, winner of the 2007 Rock ‘n’ Roll San Jose Half Marathon; and Wesley
Korir, who won his second consecutive L.A. Marathon in March with a time of
2:09:19.
“The way you truly honor a
champion is to assemble a field worthy of taking his title away,” said race
historian Toni Reavis, who will call the race live with Olympian Carrie
Tollefson at 8 a.m. (EDT) on Competitor.com. “Throughout its long history
Philadelphia has gathered some impressive fields, but I can’t recall a year as
strong as this one.”
A Competitor event, the
sold-out ING Rock ‘n’ Roll Philadelphia Half Marathon will welcome a record
18,600+ runners to the City of Brotherly Love on Sunday, September 19th. Known
for 32-years as the Philadelphia Distance Run, one of the most renowned half
marathons in the world, the event has been rebranded as part of the nationwide
Rock ‘n’ Roll Marathon Series. The 2010 race will feature live bands and
cheerleaders entertaining participants along each mile of the historic
13.1-mile course, the home of five World and three American records.
Event weekend kicks off Friday,
September 17 with a free two-day Health & Fitness Expo at Philadelphia
Convention Center, which is open to the public. The Expo, where all
participants pick up their race number, will feature over 100 exhibitors with
free samples, the latest in running apparel and a full schedule of interactive clinics.
You can watch the men’s race LIVE on Competitor.com beginning at 8 a.m. EST.
The event concludes Sunday afternoon with a finish line festival and post race
concert in front of the Philadelphia Art Museum at Eakins Oval. For more
information, please visit philadelphia.competitor.com.
