If before today he was considered one of the best marathoners in history, after today there is no doubt that Eliud Kipchoge is the best: 2:01:39 is an unreal time, not even dreamed of by the rest of human beings on this planet, and the 33-year-old Kenyan achieved it today at the Berlin Marathon.
He cut 1 minute and 18 seconds off the record that his compatriot Dennis Kimetto held until today (2:02:57), the largest improvement to the men's marathon record in over 50 years. In an era where seconds are what get shaved off, not minutes, Kipchoge has elevated his name to the highest place in history with a perfect race, with an impeccable strategy running with negative splits (the second half faster than the first): he ran the first 21k in 1:01:06 and the second 21k in 1:00:33. He passed 5k in 14:24, at a projected final time of 2:01:31, then slightly slowed his pace, and when he ran out of pacemakers from kilometer 25 onward, instead of slowing down he sped up (see chart below).
Who is Eliud Kipchoge?
"When I was young, I was molded in a positive way, but I didn't have the luck of having two parents. When you have two parents, you have an advantage. So I was supposed to work harder than the other boys in the village. Life was hard as it was, but it's okay, I've never complained and I never will," says Kipchoge, who was born in the Nandi district in Kenya 33 years ago. It was at age 18 that he announced to the world the promise he would become when he defeated Hicham El Guerrouj and Kenenisa Bekele (two giants of history) in the 5000 meters final at the World Athletics Championships. Later, Kipchoge, who is 1.67 meters tall, went on to win an Olympic bronze in Athens 2004 and silver in Beijing 2008, both in 5000 meters. He made the move to the streets in 2013, and by the Rio 2016 Olympic Games he achieved his Olympic gold dream by winning the marathon.
Weighing just 52 kilos and with unwavering discipline, Kipchoge has won 10 of the 11 marathons he has run (he only lost his second marathon, Berlin 2013, against Wilson Kipsang when he set the record at that time of 2:03:23). He also participated in Nike's Breaking2 project, in which he achieved an unofficial mark of 2:00:25, which did not enter official records because it was assisted by a guide car and by pacemakers who took turns to maintain the pace throughout the entire course, both factors prohibited by the IAAF.
When they recruited him for Nike's Breaking2 project, scientists encountered a serious problem: Kipchoge had a relatively narrow margin for improvement, because everything he did was already almost perfect: his training, his nutrition, and his attitude. "There is a formula: 100% of me is nothing compared to 1% of the team, that is teamwork and that I value," Eliud says in an interview, revealing his wisdom for training.
Kipchoge keeps a sports diary in which he writes his workouts and emotions for over 15 years, which allows him to compare his performance and motivate himself for new races. On a normal training day he has bread and tea for breakfast (with a lot of sugar, at least 15 grams per cup). For lunch and dinner he prefers ugali (a typical Kenyan food dense in energy and high in carbohydrates) with eggs or meat as protein. The night before a race he has rice, spaghetti, or ugali for dinner.
He runs between 200 and 220 kilometers per week, and his friends tease him because he is very inflexible (he can't even come close to touching his feet with his hands while keeping his legs straight). He is an avid reader of motivational and self-improvement books and he falls asleep without fail before 9 p.m.
Some famous quotes from the world's best marathoner:
"In life, the idea is to be happy. So I believe in living a calm, simple, and low-profile life. You live with simplicity, you train hard, and you live an honest life; then you are free.
If you cannot master your mind it will master you. I let my mind know that I am truly capable of doing something, and I do it.
No human has limits, that is my message.
The marathon is life. It's not about the legs, it's about the heart and the mind. I feel that I have a potential within my heart, that I can go beyond human limits by running under two hours".
Berlin, where the last seven men's marathon world records have been set, has done it again thanks to Kipchoge, and the 2018 race will be remembered as one of the most memorable for the magnitude of the mark set by Eliud and for the fact that he ran alone, by himself, for almost the entire second half of the course. At 33 years old, it is likely that we have not yet seen all that Kipchoge has to offer, and that phrase of "I can go beyond human limits by running under two hours" is, after today, even closer to becoming reality.
