London Marathon 2023 (23rd Apr)

The headline after the London Marathon on Sunday 23rd April was Kevin Kiptum running the second fastest time in history to win in 2 hours 1 minute 25 seconds, shattering the course record, in an astonishing performance that at one stage threatened to break Eluid Kipchoge’s World best. Kiptum tired towards the end and finished 18 seconds short of Kipchoge’s record, but that aside, Mullingar thoughts were on how Kris Foster would fare among the more than 53,000 mere mortals taking on the 42.2km classic distance.

The three hour mark is the standard all men want to better in a marathon and going into the London Marathon, that was the clear goal for Kris. It’s easy to get carried away in the excitement of running with thousands of others and go off too fast, but Kris kept a cool head and sticking firmly to his race plan and drawing on all the miles and miles put in at training over many months, he kept to his plan and put in the hard yards needed in London, especially the last few painful miles, and was delighted to finish in 2 hours 57 minutes 19 seconds, well under his pre-race target.