Noguchi headlines Berlin’s elite field

Olympic Champion Mizuki Noguchi heads a record number of  40,000 runners for this year’s real,- Berlin Marathon, which has been Germany’s biggest marathon for two decades.

When the athletes set off for the 32nd Berlin Marathon on 25 September the race will boost a record field of 40,000 runners plus walkers, wheelchair athletes and handbikers. Additionally on the same day about 8000 pupils take part in a Mini marathon.

And on the day before another 8000 inline skaters will participate in this separate Berlin Marathon. Their race will be held in the afternoon in front of an expected crowd of about 250,000. More than a million spectators are expected to watch the race on Sunday. The Brandenburg Gate will once again be the spectacular background of the finish.

WOMEN

This year the focus will be on one athlete: Mizuki Noguchi. The Olympic Marathon Champion from Athens in 2004 will run her first marathon since her biggest triumph so far, little more than a year ago.

During the last five years Berlin’s women’s winner has always come from Japan. But Mizuki Noguchi not only intends to continue this unique win streak. The 27 year-old wants to clearly improve her personal best of 2:21:18 from Osaka in 2003.

She might well become the third woman to break the 2:20 barrier in Berlin. In 2001, the gold medal winner from Sydney 2000, Naoko Takahashi, became the first woman to break 2:20 hours in Berlin, clocking 2:19:46. Last year Yoko Shibui had improved Takahashi’s course record by five seconds to 2:19:41. While she had missed the Asian record of Yingjie Sun (China/2:19:39) by just two seconds this could well be in Mizuki Noguchi’s reach. Training in St. Moritz is said to have gone very well – even better than before the Olympic Games.

There will be huge Japanese media interest and while the race is shown live on German TV (ARD/RBB), it will also be broadcasted live in Japan by Fuji TV.

MEN

The men’s race will not feature an Olympic Champion but at least an Olympic medallist. South Korea’s Bong-Ju Lee had been second at the Atlanta Olympics in 1996. He then went on to win the Boston Marathon in 2001, stopping a Kenyan win streak of ten first places in a row, and improved to 2:07:20 when he was second at the Tokyo Marathon in 2000.

As in Boston in 2001, Bong-Ju Lee will meet tough opposition from Kenya in Berlin, a race which has also been dominated by Kenyan runners. Since 1999 the winner has always been a Kenyan. And two of them will be running again: Joseph Ngolepus was the winner in 2001 while Raymond Kipkoech triumphed a year later.

Additionally there will be another former winner of the Boston Marathon in Berlin’s elite field: Kenyan Robert Cheruiyot had won that race in 2003. It was in the same year, when Michael Rotich had won the Paris Marathon with a course record of 2:06:33.

But he will not be the runner with the fastest marathon time in the field. Titus Munji had been third in the legendary World record race in Berlin 2003, behind fellow Kenyans Paul Tergat (2:04:55) and Sammy Korir (2:04:56) where he clocked 2:06:15 for third place. Now Titus Munji comes back to Berlin, aiming to be number one.

Berlin Marathon - Elite Field

MEN

Titus Munji KEN
Personal best: 2:06:15 (3rd Berlin ’03)

Michael Rotich KEN
Personal best: 2:06:33 (1st Paris ’03)
 KEN
 
Raymond Kipkoech KEN
Personal best: 2:06:47 (1st Berlin ’02)

Driss El Himer FRA
Personal best: 2:06:48 (Paris ’03)

Bong-Ju Lee KOR
Personal best: 2:07:20 (Tokyo ’00)

Joseph Ngolepus KEN
Personal best: 2:07:57 (London ’03)

Jackson Koech KEN
Personal best: 2:08:02 (Rotterdam ’05)

Philip Manyim KEN
Personal best: 2:08:07 (Rom ’05)

Peter Chebet KEN
Personal best: 2:08:43 (Chicago ’03)

Satoshi Osaki JPN
Personal best: 2:08:46 (Tokyo ’04)

Paul Kiptanui  KEN
Personal best: 2:09:09 (Turin ’99)

Ernest Kipyego KEN
Personal best: 2:09:55 (Eindhoven ’03)

Robert K. Cheruiyot KEN
Personal best: 2:10:11 (1st Boston ’03)

Toshiya Katayama JPN
Personal best: 2:10:12 (Lake Biwa ’05)

Stanley Leleito KEN
Personal best: 2:10:16 (Zürich ’05)

Andrew Letherby AUS
Personal best: 2:12:45 (Fukuoka ’03)

WOMEN

Mizuki Noguchi JPN
Personal best: 2:21:18 (Osaka ’03)
Olympic Champion 2004

Luminita Zaituc GER
Personal best: 2:26:01 (Frankfurt ’01)

Leila Aman ETH
Personal best: 2:27:54 (Berlin ’04)

Melanie Kraus GER
Personal best: 2:27:58 (Berlin ’00)

Monika Drybulska POL
Personal best: 2:29:58 (Berlin ’03)

Annemette Jensen DEN
Personal best: 2:30:07 (2004)