Sammy Wanjiru to Run Fortis City-Pier-City Half-Marathon in the Hague on March 15 By Wim van Hemert with David Monti (c) 2008 Race Results Weekly, all rights reserved February 19, 2008
THE
HAGUE (19-Feb) -- World record holder Samuel Wanjiru will again compete
at the Fortis City-Pier-City Half-Marathon in The Hague on Satusrday,
March 15, organizers announced today. It will be the 34th edition of
the flat and fast half-marathon where the 21 year-old Kenyan set the
current world record last March: 58:33.
For Wanjiru it was the
third time he broke the world half-marathon record. The first time he
did it was on September 11, 2005, in the Fortis Half-Marathon in
Rotterdam with a 59:16 clocking, still the world best for juniors. In
2007 he broke Haile Gebrselassie's 2006 world standard from Phoenix
(58:55) with a 58:53 finish time at the Ras Al Khaimah International
Half-Marathon in the United Arab Emirates, before lowering his own
record in The Hague to 58:33 about five weeks later.
Joining
Wanjiru in The Hague will be his compatriot Martin Lel, the reigning
Flora London and ING New York City Marathon champion. Lel has a
half-marathon personal best of 59:30; he is currently training to
defend his London title on April 13.
With Wanjiru and Lel added
to the field, there are now five athletes in the race with personal
best times under 60 minutes. Earlier the start of the Kenyans Patrick
Makau Musyoki (58:56) and Francis Kibiwott (59:26), and Ethiopian
Deribe Merga (59:16) had been announced.
