| Women's marathon at the Games of the XXX Olympiad | |||||||||||||
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 A group of runners in the marathon, including eventual winner Tiki Gelana (leftmost green shirt). | |||||||||||||
| Venue | Marathon course, central London | ||||||||||||
| Date | 5 August 2012 | ||||||||||||
| Competitors | 118 from 67 nations | ||||||||||||
| Winning time | 2:23:07OR | ||||||||||||
| Medalists | |||||||||||||
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The women'smarathon at the2012 Olympic Games inLondon was held on theOlympic marathon street course on 5 August.[1]
The course started and finished onThe Mall in central London. Runners completed one short circuit of 2.219 miles around part of theCity of Westminster and then three longer circuits of 8 miles around Westminster, theVictoria Embankment and theCity of London. The course was designed to pass many of London's best known landmarks, includingBuckingham Palace,Trafalgar Square,St Paul's Cathedral, theGuildhall,Leadenhall Market,the Monument, theTower of London and theHouses of Parliament.[2]
Tiki Gelana fromEthiopia won the gold medal, completing the course in an Olympic record-breaking time of 2 hours 23 minutes 7 seconds.Kenya'sPriscah Jeptoo finished second to win silver andTatyana Petrova Arkhipova, representingRussia, took bronze.
Prior to this event[update], the existing world and Olympic records were as follows:
| World record |  Paula Radcliffe (GBR) | 2:15:25 | London, United Kingdom | 13 April 2003 |
| Olympic record |  Naoko Takahashi (JPN) | 2:23:14 | Sydney, Australia | 24 September 2000 |
| 2012 World leading |  Mary Keitany (KEN) | 2:18:37 | London, United Kingdom | 22 April 2012 |
The following new Olympic record was set during this competition:
| Date | Event | Athlete | Time | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 5 August | Final |  Tiki Gelana (ETH) | 2:23:07 | OR |
All times areBritish Summer Time (UTC+1)
| Date | Time | Round |
|---|---|---|
| Sunday, 5 August 2012 | 11:00 | Final |
Starting in the rain, no athlete wanted to run hard from the start. Instead it was a large pack of runners, at times forming a wall across the streets. The pack slowly whittled itself down by 12 km; the ever-presentValeria Straneo emerged to take the point position on the front. Over the next several kilometres, as the rain subsided,Xiaolin Zhu emerged as Straneo's shadow through the half marathon mark in 1:13:13.
Shortly after the half-way mark,Tiki Gelana fell trying to negotiate a water station. Then the lead pack began to take a more serious focus with three Kenyans taking up the pace. Gelana rejoined the pack. Though the pace again slowed, attrition continued. By 28 km the leaders were down to just the three Kenyans and two Ethiopians; Gelana andMare Dibaba, withPriscah Jeptoo always on the outside. The first to crack was Dibaba. Meanwhile, the significantly less experiencedTatyana Petrova Arkhipova worked her way from far off the pace, past the rest of the athletes who had fallen out of the pack. Arkhipova caught the leaders from behind at 32 km. Just as Arkhipova arrived, the reigningworld championEdna Ngeringwony Kiplagat fell back, though she worked her way back into the lead group a kilometre later.
At the 35 km water stop, Arkhipova accelerated, losing Kiplagat again, this time for good. It was a pack of four through the next 5 km. At 1500 m from the finishMary Jepkosgei Keitany was the first from the group of four to fall off. At the same time, Gelana accelerated, leaving first Arkhipova, then Jeptoo. A grimacing Gelana powered home to narrowly beat theOlympic record.Tetyana Hamera-Shmyrko came from as far back as 23rd place to take fifth.
