During the height of the running boom there was one seemingly unassailable mark, the 2:08:34 marathon world record set by Australia’s Derek Clayton in Antwerp 1969. Before that Clayton had become history’s first sub-2:10 marathoner in Fukuoka, Japan in 1967 when he ran 2:09:37.
When the new crop of world marathon stars like Frank Shorter and Bill Rodgers failed to approach Clayton’s times, and the mark held on to its position for more than a decade, there was the feeling that the record was something of an outlier. Some even suggested that the Antwerp course, staged as a highway dedication and only run once, might have been short.
Mr. Clayton, himself, railed against the thought. But it wasn’t until Alberto Salazar ran 2:08:13 in New York City 1981 on a course later found to be 149 meters short, and another big quad man from Down Under, Rob de Castella won Fukuoka several weeks later in 2:08:18 that a new era was born.
The record began to inch down in the next few years from 2:08:04 by Steve Jones in Chicago 1984 to 2:07:12 by Carlos Lopes in Rotterdam 1985 before Ethiopia’s Belayneh Densamo put the record into another decade-long deep freeze with his 2:06:50 in Rotterdam 1988.
Brazil’s Ronaldo da Costa finally lowered Densamo’s mark by 45-seconds in Berlin 1998 before Morocco’s (and later American) Khalid Khannouchi took hold of the record book in 1999 (2:05:48, Chicago and 2:05:38, London `02) before Kenya’s Paul Tergat became history’s first sub-2:05 man with his 2:04:55 in Berlin 2003.
Since then we have seen two Haile Gebreselassie marks (2:04:26 and 2:03:59 from Berlin 2007 & 2008), a Patrick Makau record (2:03:38, Berlin 2011) before a Wilson Kipsang charge (2:03:23, Berlin 2013), and finally the current mark of 2:02:57 set by Kenya’s Dennis Kimetto on the same German course in 2014.
As the sport stews in the corrosive juices of wider-than-expected PED use and consumptive degeneration of institutional corruption, one wonders where today’s marks will stand in seven years time. Even as we see how stagnant the 5000 and 10,000 meter track world records have become since Ethiopia’s Keninise Bekele set them at 12:37.35 (2004) and 26:17.53 (2005).
ALL-TIME MARATHON LIST 2009
| 1. 2:03:59 – Haile Gebrselassie – Eth. – Berlin 2008 |
| 2. 2:04:26 – Haile Gebrselassie – Eth. – Berlin 2007 |
| 3. 2:04:27 – Duncan Kibet – Ken. – Rotterdam 2009 |
| 4. 2:04:27 – James Kwambai – Ken. – Rotterdam 2009 |
| 5. 2:04:53 – Haile Gebrselassie – Eth. – Dubai 2008 |
| 6. 2:04:55 – Paul Tergat – Ken. – Berlin 2003 |
| 7. 2:04:56 – Sammy Korir – Ken. – Berlin 2003 |
| 8. 2:05:04 – Abel Kirui – Ken. – Rotterdam 2009 |
| 9. 2:05:15 – Martin Lel – Ken. – London 2008 |
| 10. 2:05:24 – Sammy Wanjiru – Ken. – London 2008 |
| 11. 2:05:29 – Haile Gebrselassie – Eth. – Dubai 2009 |
| 12. 2:05:30 – Abderrahim Goumri – Mar. – London 2008 |
| 13. 2:05:36 – James Kwambai – Ken. – Berlin 2008 |
| 14. 2:05:38 – Khalid Khannouchi – USA – London 2002 |
ALL-TIME LIST – 2016
| 1. 2:02:57 – Dennis Kimetto – Ken. – Berlin 2014 |
| 2. 2:03:13 – Emmanuel Mutai – Ken. – Berlin 2014 |
| 3. 2:03:23 – Wilson Kipsang – Ken. – Berlin 2013 |
| 4. 2:03:38 – Patrick Makau – Ken. – Berlin 2011 |
| 5. 2:03:42 – Wilson Kipsang – Ken. – Frankfurt 2011 |
| 6. 2:03:45 – Dennis Kimetto – Ken. – Chicago 2013 |
| 7. 2:03:52 – Emmanuel Mutai – Ken. – Chicago 2013 |
| 8. 2:03:59 – Haile Gebrselassie – Eth. – Berlin 2008 |
| 9. 2:04:00 – Eliud Kipchoge – Ken. – Berlin 2015 |
| 10. 2:04:05 – Eliud Kipchoge – Ken. – Berlin 2013 |
WANDERING IN A RUNNING WORLD 
Not commenting on whether or not any of these times were achieved with the assistance of PEDs, I am, and always have been, a numbers geek. I love looking at these results, and remembering when the events took place. There was a time when I could recite, from memory, every sub 2:10 performance ever recorded. Nowadays, not so much… I hope, some day, to be able to look at these lists with confidence that the results were unquestionably achieved without artificial assistance.