Word: marathons
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 2000-2009
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...these competitive long-distance runners don't make up the bulk of any marathon's participants. On Sunday in Chicago it was the average runner - the man or woman who has trained during lunch hours and is running in hopes of setting a personal best, or as a means of qualifying for a more prestigious race such as the Boston marathon - who formed the marathon's second wave. Numbering in the tens of thousands, they ran through their third and fourth hours (the race began at 8 a.m.) underneath a glaring sun - which, despite official numbers, caused one temperature gauge...
...numbers alone told much of the story: At the 30th annual Chicago Marathon Sunday morning, one man died, more than 300 needed medical attention from the city's overloaded emergency services - which were forced to reach out to the suburbs for additional ambulances - and fewer than 25,000 of some 45,000 registered runners actually finished the 26.2-mile course on an early October day where the midday temperature reached a record 87 degrees...
...statistics don't give a sense of the chaotic scene on the ground during the marathon. Beyond the very real challenges posed by the weather, the problems included a communication breakdown between event organizers and competitors, a water shortage that left novices dangerously dehydrated, and a wave of anger among experienced runners over the decision to cancel the event when some were as little as a mile away from the finish line...
...many accounts, there wasn't just one marathon being run Sunday in Chicago but, depending on how fast you ran, three different races that came to three very different conclusions. By 10:30 a.m., the first contest was already over: an epic, exciting, down-to-the-wire finale in a men's competition that lasted just over two hours and came to a rousing photo finish when Patrick Ivuti (2:11:11) edged out runner up Jaouad Gharib by a matter of hundredths of a second...
...shortly after noon when Schuster crossed mile 23 - on a corner where several hundred onlookers cheered the racers, shouting "It's all downhill from here!" - and first heard the announcement from a squad car's loudspeaker that the marathon was cancelled. As she neared mile 25, she encountered policemen standing in the middle of the street, urging runners to stop and walk and informing them that it was now just a 'fun run.'" Other runners said they were given even less clear-cut directions from festival officials - some runners said the only notice of the race's cancellation they received...