Sporting Advent Calendar #6: Dennis Kimetto breaks new ground

“If you can fill the unforgiving minute

With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run

Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it...”

Even Rudyard Kipling appreciated the unforgiving minutes of distance running, and when Dennis Kimetto ran 26 miles and 385 yards in Berlin last September in two hours, two minutes and 57 seconds the earth certainly felt like his, and everything that's in it.

Not only had the 30 year-old Kenyan broken the world marathon record by the substantial margin of 26 seconds (or a second faster, for every mile), he was also the first man in history to run the distance in under two hours and three minutes.

That inevitably reignited the great debate about if, or indeed when, the two-hour barrier will be broken, although my guess is it will be later, rather than sooner.

Still, Kimetto’s performance was quite staggering – and unquestionably the single most amazing display of sustained human athleticism this year. It’s difficult to explain just how fast 2:02:57 actually is, even to those who have run a marathon at any pace. Although to go back to Kipling’s unforgiving minute, it means averaging a little over that for each lap of the standard running track – or 69.93 seconds, to be exact – for 105 continuous laps, and not many people I know could run one lap of the track in under 70 seconds.

It’s also averaging 4:41.5 per mile, for each of the 26 miles, or 14:34.9 for every 5km. Kimetto also passed halfway in 61:45, finished in 61:12, and ran 30-35km in 14:10. That is MOTOR CAR fast.

His performance – the sixth time the world record was broken in Berlin, since 2003, when fellow Kenyan Paul Tergat ran 2:04:55 – was all the more remarkable given just over two years ago, Kimetto was a peasant farmer, struggling to make ends meet by cultivating and selling maize and potatoes at the local market of the remote Kapng’etuny village, deep in the heart of the Kenyan Rift Valley.

Kimetto would run around Kapng’etuny for pleasure, as many Kenyans do, although he never once dreamed of attaining elite status. That all changed when he was spotted by some elite Kenyans, including two-time New York Marathon winner Geoffrey Mutai, who invited him to join their training group, effectively as a sort of sacrificial training lamb.

Instead, Kimetto soon out-trained and then out-raced them, winning both the Tokyo and Chicago marathons last year, and his 2:02:57 in Berlin also earning him over $100,000, ensuring he’ll never have to work on the farm again.

To win any race, it’s often said, runners have to beat everybody who shows up on the day, but to set a world record, they have to beat everybody who’s ever shown up. Indeed to win in Berlin, Kimetto needed to beat the world and everybody else, given fellow Kenyan Emmanuel Mutai also broke the old world record, when clocking his 2:03:13 to finish second.

Berlin is renowned for its flat and fast course, and Kimetto may well be back in 2015 looking to go quicker again. He certainly believes the two-hour barrier is on: “On yeah,” he said afterwards, quite bluntly, when asked if it was possible. “I believe if they train very hard someone will be able to do it. It’s all about the training. With good preparation you can do any time you want. If you’ve done the training and are prepared mentally, it can be done.”

Just don’t expect a sub two hour marathon in 2015: more like 2025, at the earliest.