Ethiopia\u2019s Fotyen Tesfay made history on Sunday at the Zurich Barcelona Marathon, finishing in 2 hours 10 minutes 53 seconds to record the second-fastest women\u2019s marathon time ever.<\/p>\n
\nTesfay came within a minute of Ruth Chepngetich\u2019s 2:09:56 world record set in Chicago in 2024, while also establishing a new Ethiopian national record.<\/p>\n
\nThe 28-year-old, who entered the race as the third-fastest women\u2019s half-marathon runner in history, maintained her speed over the full distance. She ran the first 10 kilometres in 31 minutes 5 seconds, staying behind two male runners, and reached the halfway point in 1 hour 5 minutes 5 seconds.<\/p>\n
\nShe hit 30 kilometres in 1 hour 32 minutes and continued to 40 kilometres in 2 hours 3 minutes 31 seconds, demonstrating remarkable endurance despite strong winds in the final stretch.<\/p>\n
\n\u201cToday was fantastic \u2013 not what I was expecting, but it is good,\u201d Tesfay said through an interpreter, according to World Athletics.<\/p>\n
\n\u201cMy plan was to attack the world record but today there was a lot of wind, I was not able to push in the last part of the race. Today I did not succeed, but in the next marathon I would like to try for the world record.\u201d<\/p>\n
\nTesfay won by nearly eight minutes ahead of Kenya\u2019s Joan Jepkosgei Kiplimo, who finished in 2 hours 18 minutes 42 seconds. Ethiopia\u2019s Zeineba Yimer took third in 2 hours 18 minutes 49 seconds.<\/p>\n
\nHer performance also marks the fastest-ever debut by a woman in a marathon, signalling a remarkable start to her career at the distance.<\/p>\n
\nAfter placing seventh at the Paris 2024 Olympics and eighth at the World Athletics Championships Tokyo 25 in the 10,000 meters, Tesfay has now confirmed her potential over the marathon distance.<\/p>\n
\nIn the men\u2019s race, Uganda\u2019s Abel Chelangat claimed victory in 2 hours 4 minutes 57 seconds, pulling ahead of Kenya\u2019s Patrick Mosin late in the race.<\/p>\n
\nMosin finished second in 2 hours 5 minutes 1 second, while Kenya\u2019s Jonathan Samanayo Korir took third in 2 hours 5 minutes 29 seconds.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ethiopia\u2019s Fotyen Tesfay made history on Sunday at the Zurich Barcelona Marathon, finishing in 2 hours 10 minutes…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":32766,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[19543,6222,19542,19536,19539,11760,19544,19545,19538,19541,19537,51,19540],"class_list":{"0":"post-32765","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-zurich","8":"tag-abel-chelangat","9":"tag-athletics","10":"tag-ethiopia-athletics","11":"tag-ethiopias-fotyen-tesfay-sets-second-fastest-womens-record-ever-at-zurich-barcelona-marathon","12":"tag-fotyen-tesfay","13":"tag-headlines","14":"tag-kenya-distance-running","15":"tag-marathon-results","16":"tag-ruth-chepngetich","17":"tag-womens-marathon-record","18":"tag-world-athletics","19":"tag-zurich","20":"tag-zurich-barcelona-marathon"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ch\/116237130944048445","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32765","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32765"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32765\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32766"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32765"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32765"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32765"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}