Posted: December 14, 2005

Athletics: London Beefs Up Men's Marathon Field

From David Monti

© 2005 Race Results Weekly, all rights reserved RaceResultsWeekly.com

The Flora London Marathon will once again be extraordinarily strong on the men's side as race director David Bedford announced today the addition of several top level athletes for the 2006 edition of his race.

Reigning and two-time world champion Jaouad Gharib of Morocco; reigning Olympic champion Stefano Baldini of Italy; former world record holder Khalid Khannouchi of Ossining, N.Y.; reigning London Marathon champion Martin Lel of Kenya; reigning LaSalle Bank Chicago Marathon champion Felix Limo of Kenya; and 2004 London Marathon champion Evans Rutto of Kenya were all added to the field today. They join superstars Paul Tergat, Haile Gebrselassie and Hendrick Ramaala who had already been announced.

"I am certain this is the strongest men’s field we have ever seen in London," said Bedford in a prepared statement. "It will be a bookie's nightmare! This race will go down as a true classic."

This will be the first time that Tergat, Gebrselassie and Khannouchi will face each other in the same marathon since the 2002 edition of London where Khannouchi upset the two track stars to win in a world record 2:05:38, a mark since broken by Tergat in Berlin in 2003 (2:04:55). Interest in the London race in 2002 was particularly keen because it was the debut marathon for Gebrselassie; he finished third in 2:06:35.

For good measure, Bedford has assembled an excellent supporting cast in Shigeru Aburaya and Tsuyoshi Ogata of Japan, Shami Mubarak Hassan of Qatar, Jon Brown of Great Britain, and Christopher Isegwe of Tanzania.

The London Marathon is scheduled to take place on Sunday, April 23. A recap of the field with career best times is below:

Paul Tergat (KEN)            2:04:55 WR
Khalid Khannouchi (USA)      2:05:38
Evans Rutto (KEN)            2:05:50
Felix Limo (KEN)             2:06:14
Haile Gebrselassie (ETH)     2:06:20
Jaouad Gharib (MAR)          2:07:02
Martin Lel  (KEN)            2:07:26
Stefano Baldini (ITA)        2:07:29
Shigeru Aburaya  (JPN)       2:07:52
Hendrick Ramaala  (RSA)      2:08:32
Tsuyoshi Ogata   (JPN)       2:08:37
Shami Mubarak Hassan (QAT)   2:09:22
Jon Brown (GBR)              2:09:31
Christopher Isegwe (TAN)     2:10:21