Kipchoge will not break the world record in Boston – 04/12/2023 – Na Corrida

I don’t have a crystal ball, but I can say with conviction: Kenyan Eliud Kipchoge will not break the world record after running the 42 kilometers of the Boston marathon, next Sunday.

For those who don’t know, a brief summary of Kipchoge’s achievements. He is the only human being to cover the distance in less than 2 hours. He reached the mark of 1h59min40 in a closed event promoted by Nike, in 2019. In official competitions, he set the record in Berlin, last year, with a time of 2h1min9s.

Despite being the most traditional and respected marathon in the world, with more than a century of tradition, the Boston race does not comply with the rules of World Athletics (formerly the International Federation of Athletics) for the homologation of records.

I explain.

The main body of world athletics defines criteria to validate a record. In jumping disputes, for example, the wind cannot blow strongly in favor of the athlete, at the risk of influencing performance. The same goes for speed events, such as the 100m dash.

Marathons take place in different places around the world, with their climatic and topographical peculiarities. A race in Tokyo is different from a race in Patagonia, which has nothing to do with the São Paulo marathon. Basically, these events only have in common the fact that they require the athlete to cover 42,195 meters.

In an attempt to level the advantage that athletes may have on certain courses, World Athetics establishes two criteria for the homologation of the record. The first concerns the starting and finishing points. WA prefers circular routes, when the start and finish take place at the same place. This ensures that athletes ascend and descend the same number of meters without gaining a topographical advantage. Even so, according to the rules in force, routes approved for breaking world records are those in which the starting and finishing points are less than 50% apart from each other (that is, less than 21km in the case of marathons, and 10.5km for half-marathons).

The second rule concerns topography. So that athletes do not benefit from long descents, the WA establishes that the altimetry variation cannot be negative by more than 1 meter per kilometer of race. In the case of the marathon, the start could not be at an altitude higher than 42 meters from the finish.

The complete rules in English are here, for those who are curious:

The Boston Marathon does not meet these criteria. The test starts outside the city. The start takes place in the rural town of Hopkinton, and from there the athletes travel through New England roads until they finish in downtown Boston. In addition, between going up and down hills and slopes, the altimetry of the route is negative by almost 150 meters – that is, practically three times the limit established by the WA.

Now, if the dear reader asks me if Kipchoge will run under 2 hours, or if he will do it in a time shorter than the mark established in Berlin, I remember what I said in the first sentence of this text: I don’t have a crystal ball.

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