The 2010

London Marathon The London Marathon is an annual marathon held in London, United Kingdom, and is the 2nd largest annual road race in the UK, after the Great North Run in Newcastle. Founded by athletes Chris Brasher and John Disley in 1981, it is typically he ...

was the 30th running of the annual marathon race in

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

, England, which took place on Sunday, 25 April. The elite men's race was won by Ethiopia's Tsegaye Kebede in a time of 2:05:19 hours and the elite women's race was won by

Aselefech Mergia Aselefech Mergia Medessa ( Oromo: ''Asallafach Margaa Mardaasaa''; Amharic: አሰለፈች መርጊያ; born 23 January 1985) is an Ethiopian long-distance runner who competes in the marathon. She was a bronze medallist in the event at the 2009 ...

, also of Ethiopia, in 2:22:38. In the

wheelchair race Wheelchair racing is the racing of wheelchairs in track and road races. Wheelchair racing is open to athletes with any qualifying type of disability, amputees, spinal cord injuries, cerebral palsy and partially sighted (when combined with another ...

s, Canada's Josh Cassidy (1:35:21) and Japan's

Wakako Tsuchida (born 15 October 1974) is an athlete from Tokyo, Japan, who is an accomplished women's wheelchair marathoner, ice sledge racer and triathlete. She was the first professional wheelchair athlete from Japan and the first Japanese athlete to win g ...

(1:52:33) won the men's and women's divisions, respectively. Around 163,000 people applied to enter the race: 51,378 had their applications accepted and 36,956 started the race. A total of 36,553 runners, 24,423 men and 12,130 women, finished the race. In the under-17 Mini Marathon, the 3-mile non-disabled and wheelchair events were won by Jack Gray (14:29),

Jessica Judd Jessica Warner-Judd (born 7 January 1995) is an English middle- and long-distance runner. She won two individual medals in the Under-20 and U23 age-group races at the European Cross Country Championships and a gold medal for the 5000 metres ...

(16:39), Daniel Lucker (12:36) and

Hannah Cockroft Hannah Lucy Cockroft (born 30 July 1992) is a British wheelchair racer specialising in sprint distances in the T34 classification. She holds the world records for the 100 metres, 200 metres, 400 metres, 800 metres ...

(15:48).

Summary

The men's event was won by Tsegaye Kebede of Ethiopia with a time of 2:05:19 and the women's event by

of Ethiopia with a time of 2:22:38, a position moved up after numerous disqualifications for doping. Kebede became the first non-Kenyan to win the men's event in seven years. The men's wheelchair event was won by Josh Cassidy of Canada with a time of 1:35:21 while

of Japan won the women's wheelchair event. The event saw 74

world record A world record is usually the best global and most important performance that is ever recorded and officially verified in a specific skill, sport, or other kind of activity. The book ''Guinness World Records'' and other world records organization ...

attempts, including one involving 34 runners bound together by bungee cord to form a "human caterpillar", among whom was

Princess Beatrice of York Princess Beatrice, Mrs Edoardo Mapelli Mozzi (Beatrice Elizabeth Mary; born 8 August 1988) is a member of the British royal family. She is the elder daughter of Prince Andrew, Duke of York, and Sarah, Duchess of York. She is a niece of Charle ...

, the fifth in line to the

British throne The monarchy of the United Kingdom, commonly referred to as the British monarchy, is the constitutional form of government by which a hereditary sovereign reigns as the head of state of the United Kingdom, the Crown Dependencies (the Baili ...

, who became the first royal family member to participate in the marathon. Of the attempts, 41 were successful. The marathon was sponsored by Sir Richard Branson's

Virgin Group Virgin Group Ltd. is a British multinational venture capital conglomerate founded by Richard Branson and Nik Powell in February 1970. Virgin Group's date of incorporation is listed as 1989 by the Companies House, who class it as a holding co ...

, having signed a five-year contract, taking over from previous sponsors,

Flora Flora is all the plant life present in a particular region or time, generally the naturally occurring (indigenous (ecology), indigenous) native plant, native plants. Sometimes bacteria and fungi are also referred to as flora, as in the terms '' ...

. Branson also ran the marathon for his first time. Prior to the marathon, there had been concerns that the air-travel disruption caused by the

2010 eruptions of Eyjafjallajökull Between March and June 2010 a series of volcanic events at Eyjafjallajökull in Iceland caused enormous disruption to air travel across Western Europe. The disruptions started over an initial period of six days in April 2010. Additional locali ...

could disrupt the event, though many athletes from outside of the United Kingdom were brought in by an aircraft specially chartered from Spain. Both of the 2009 winners,

Samuel Wanjiru Samuel Kamau Wanjiru (10 November 1986 – 15 May 2011) was a Kenyan long-distance runner who won the 2008 Beijing Olympics Marathon in an Olympic record time of 2:06:32; becoming the first Kenyan to win the Olympic gold in the marathon. He beca ...

and

Irina Mikitenko Irina Mikitenko, ''née'' Volynskaya (russian: Ирина Волынская (Микитенко); born 23 August 1972 in Bakanas, Kazakh SSR, Soviet Union), is a retired German long-distance runner who competed in marathons. She won the Ber ...

, were present to defend their titles. However, neither athlete managed to finish the race as they both stopped around the mid-way point.

Results

Elite men

Elite women

Wheelchair men

Wheelchair women

References

;Results
Men's Results
Association of Road Racing Statisticians. Retrieved 2020-04-25.
Women's Results
Association of Road Racing Statisticians. Retrieved 2020-04-25.

External links

Official website
{{World Marathon Majors 2010 Marathon

London Marathon