Mohamed Ezzher (born 26 April 1960 in

Khouribga Khouribga ( ber, ⵅⵯⵔⵉⴱⴳⴰ, xʷribga; ar, خريبڭة, ḵurībga, ) is the capital of Khouribga Province in the Béni Mellal-Khénifra region, Morocco. With a population of 196,196 (2014 census), Khouribga owes its growth to the pho ...

Morocco Morocco (),, ) officially the Kingdom of Morocco, is the westernmost country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It overlooks the Mediterranean Sea to the north and the Atlantic Ocean to the west, and has land borders with Algeria t ...

) is a French long distance runner. He represented France in the

10,000 metres The 10,000 metres or the 10,000-metre run is a common long-distance track running event. The event is part of the athletics programme at the Olympic Games and the World Athletics Championships, and is common at championship level events. The ra ...

at the

1996 Olympics The 1996 Summer Olympics (officially the Games of the XXVI Olympiad, also known as Atlanta 1996 and commonly referred to as the Centennial Olympic Games) were an international multi-sport event held from July 19 to August 4, 1996, in Atlanta, ...

. He also represented France four successive times at the IAAF

World Championships in Athletics The World Athletics Championships (until 2019 known as the World Championships in Athletics) are a biennial athletics competition organized by World Athletics (formerly IAAF, International Association of Athletics Federations). Alongside the Ol ...

doing the 5,000 in 1995, the 10,000 in

1997 File:1997 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The movie set of ''Titanic'', the highest-grossing movie in history at the time; '' Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone'', is published; Comet Hale-Bopp passes by Earth and becomes one of ...

1999 File:1999 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The funeral procession of King Hussein of Jordan in Amman; the 1999 İzmit earthquake kills over 17,000 people in Turkey; the Columbine High School massacre, one of the first major school shoot ...

and the Marathon in 2001. As a junior runner, he represented his native country of Morocco at the 1981 World Cross Country Championships. His career shows no results through most of the typically peak running years of an athlete, their 20s. After undergoing a change in eligibility, he represented France first in the

1993 IAAF World Half Marathon Championships The 2nd IAAF World Half Marathon Championships was held on October 3, 1993, in Brussels, Belgium. A total of 254 athletes, 133 men, 86 women and 35 juniors, from 49 countries took part. Complete results were published. Medallists Race Results ...

then in many cross country International championships; the

1994 File:1994 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The 1994 Winter Olympics are held in Lillehammer, Norway; The Kaiser Permanente building after the 1994 Northridge earthquake; A model of the MS Estonia, which sank in the Baltic Sea; Nelson ...

and 1996

European Cross Country Championships The European Cross Country Championships is an annual international cross country running competition. Organised by the European Athletic Association, it is the area championships for the region and is held in December each year. The championship ...

and the

and

2000 File:2000 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: Protests against Bush v. Gore after the 2000 United States presidential election; Heads of state meet for the Millennium Summit; The International Space Station in its infant form as seen from S ...

IAAF World Cross Country Championships World Athletics Cross Country Championships is the most important competition in international cross country running. Formerly held annually and organised by World Athletics (formerly the IAAF), it was inaugurated in 1973, when it replaced the Int ...

. Just months after the 2000 Cross Country meet, on 3 July, Ezzher ran the 5,000 metres in Sotteville in 13:43.15. The time beat the masters M40 world record that had been held by Frenchman

Lucien Rault Lucien Rault (born 30 March 1936 in Plouguenast) is a French long-distance runner. He represented France in the 1976 Olympics at the age of 40. He had an extensive career in cross country running with his national squad at the International ...

for 24 years. He has held that record since that date. No other man has come within much more than 10 seconds of his time. On 8 April 2001 Ezzher broke the Masters M40 marathon world record progression time at the

Paris Marathon The Paris Marathon (french: Marathon de Paris) is an annual marathon hosted by the city of Paris, France. It is the marathon with the second-most finishers in the world, behind the New York City Marathon. The marathon begins along the Champs ...

, running 2:10:32, breaking the record set by John Campbell at the 1990 Boston Marathon. Ezzher's Masters M40 marathon record was broken 2 years later by

Andrés Espinosa Andrés Espinoza Pérez (born 4 February 1963) is a Mexican former long-distance runner who specialized in marathon races. Espinosa finished ninth at the 1995 World Championships in 2:16:44 hours. He won the 1993 New York Marathon and achieved ...

References

External links

* 1960 births Living people Moroccan male long-distance runners Olympic athletes for France French male marathon runners Athletes (track and field) at the 1996 Summer Olympics World record holders in masters athletics French sportspeople of Moroccan descent People from Khouribga French Athletics Championships winners {{Morocco-athletics-bio-stub