Two marathon frontrunners took the wrong path. Another runner sprinted to the finish and won. [View all]
Morning Mix
Two marathon frontrunners took the wrong path. Another runner sprinted to the finish and won the $3,000 prize.
By Andrea Salcedo
Today at 6:33 a.m. EDT
Elijah Mwangangi Saolo and Luke Kibet were so far ahead of the other runners as they sprinted through the final stretch of the annual Quad Cities Marathon on Sunday that something had to go extremely wrong for the pair to lose the first and second places, the
Quad-City Times reported.
It did.
Instead of following the designated track, Saolo and Kibet followed a marathon volunteer who mistakenly led both runners off the route, automatically disqualifying the two Kenyans from the 26.2-mile run that begins and ends in downtown Moline, Ill.
Their loss was Tyler Pence’s win.
Pence, the
head track and cross-country coach at the University of Illinois Springfield, witnessed everything unfolding and saw his opening. He stuck to the marathon’s path, becoming the first U.S. runner since 2001 to win the race.
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By Andrea Salcedo
Andrea Salcedo is a reporter on The Washington Post's Morning Mix team. Before joining The Post in 2020, she covered breaking news and features for the New York Times metro desk. Twitter
https://twitter.com/andreapsalcedo