Kenyan takes the half marathon honors with Amanal Petros breaking her German record and Likina Amebau battling for women’s victory.
Conditions may have been cool, but race temperatures were still high at the Generali Berlin Half Marathon on Sunday morning (March 29).
In the men’s race, Andrea Kipto enjoyed the biggest win of his career so far, hitting the line first in 59:11, but only after fellow Kenyan Dennis Kipkemoi, running as paceman, pulled away in the closing stages.
Third place went to Amanal Petros, who beat his German record by 9 seconds in 59:22 to beat Switzerland’s Dominique Lobalou in 59:23, while France’s Etienne Daguinos had a personal best of 59:27 for fifth. Britain’s Phil Sesemann also clocked his fastest time by a second as he warmed up for next month’s London Marathon in 61:21 in 16th place.
In the women’s race, honors went to Ethiopia’s Likina Amebau, who led most of the race in 65:07 to secure a 14-second victory over Kenya’s Daisila Gerono (65:21), with Kenya’s Veronica Loleo third in 65:35.
Esther Pfeiffer, running just a week before winning the German half-marathon title in Frankfurt, was fifth in 67:25, a personal best by three seconds, while Sam Harrison led Britain in 11th place in 68:38.
Hopes were high that Petros could threaten Andreas Almgren’s European record of 58:41, but ebbs and flows meant those ambitions would not be realised. He was initially part of a leading group of Kipto, Lobalu, Michael Temoi and Ayensa Alemu, but when Temoi passed them in 14:02 with 5km to go, the Eritrean-born German was showing signs of struggle.
As Kiptoo reached the 10km mark in 27:50, after the second 5km in 13:47, the gap widened as Peter crossed in 28:07. The leading four became three as Temoi pulled away in the last 5km before Kipto also started to leave Lobalu.
Kipkemo’s character suddenly became much more prominent, however, as he ran step by step with the leader and showed no signs of letting up. Even as they picked up the pace, the pair were clearly debating in the final kilometer before the pacesetter decided too late not to issue his own claims.
Behind them, Petros rallied and made an impressive late charge to make up ground, the world marathon silver medalist clearly still happy to have broken his national record in preparation for London.
Seseman was also pleased with his day’s work and will now turn his attention to the final stages of his marathon build-up, with ambitions to go faster than his personal best of 2:07:11.
“I’m going to push things really hard,” said the 33-year-old, who was followed home by Jake Smith (24th in 62:07) and Mark Scott (29th in 62:50). “I don’t want a good run in London, I want a really good run, so I’m going to take a risk, push things and hopefully push my level up to a (marathon) personal best. I feel like 2:06 is possible.”
Amebau controlled the women throughout the race, but only put a clear light between her and her rivals in the closing stages. Harrison was followed home from the British contingent by Charlotte Dunnatt (23rd 70:42), Lily Partridge (28th 71:24) and Natasha Phillips (72:11 30th).
Full results here
