Samoei and Atancha take marathon titles

More than 40,000 runners took part in this year’s event, which featured the 42.195km marathon, 21.1km half-marathon, 10km mini-marathon and 4.5km micro-marathon (walk-and-run for health) and 1.5km walk. All events were held on Sanamchai Road adjacent to the Royal Grand Palace and Sanam Luang.

The exhausting full marathon kicked off at the unusual time of 3am. That was to beat the heat and humidity, which would have affected the participants. Samoei, who was running his third Bangkok marathon, crossed the finish line in 2 hours, 30.24 minutes. Edwin Kipkemei Lagat and Shardack Kipkosgei completed the sweep for Kenya. Kipkemei clocked 2:30.37 and Kipkosgei covered it in 2:32.91.

“I’m very happy to win. This is my third Bangkok Marathon. In 2009, I ran here for the first time to finish fifth but early this year [the 24th edition was held on January 12] I came in 10th position,” said Samoei, who finished a disappointing 8th in this year’s Khon Kaen International Marathon.

“I did not make a good start. I think I ran slowly from the beginning and broke away from the chasing pack to lead all challengers at the 35th kilometre mark. The weather is quite good. It’s not hot. Unfortunately, I could not break my personal best time of 2:16 set in Germany in 2010,” added Samoei, who also topped the 30-39 age group category to receive Bt30,000.

Atancha crossed the finish line first in the women’s Open marathon, clocking 2:50.12. She finished 10th place overall.

Jirattikarn Boonma was the best of the Thais, crossing the finish line with the time of 2:51.10 that also put him at 13th overall. Paichayon Jenchang and Phanom Khansamon finished second and third among the Thais after clocking 2:51.52 and 2:54.15 respectively.

In the half-marathon, Joseph Ngre Mwangl and Magaret Njuguna Wanjui captured the men’s and women’s events after clocking 1:06.03 and 1:18.46 respectively.