"It was in our dream to come here and win, and make history of two brothers winning Boston," Korir said Tuesday, a day after overcoming an early fall to become, with Wesley, the first members of the same family to win the world's oldest and most prestigious annual marathon.
“One day, one time we’ll have a child from Transend Academy win Boston,” John Korir said. “That’s now our next dream: to mentor, to bring up a champion who will come one day, come and win Boston.”
The reigning Chicago Marathon champion, who had top 10 finishes in both of his previous Boston attempts, Korir broke away from the pack heading into Heartbreak Hill on Monday and ran alone for much of the last 6 miles to win in 2 hours, 4 minutes, 45 seconds — the second-fastest winning time in course history.
Fellow Kenyan Sharon Lokedi also took advantage of near-perfect marathon weather to win in 2:17:22 — more than 2 1/2 minutes faster than the previous course record. Korir said he, too, might have challenged for the course record if he'd had another runner to push him.
“But because I was alone, had to try my best and see how fast I could run,” he said.
Korir ran more than 26.19 miles with a scraped up knee and hand after getting tripped in the crowded start on East Main Street in Hopkinton, sending him sprawling headfirst down the double yellow line in the middle of the road.
His race bib was messed up even worse.
Korir quickly popped back up and saw his bib was torn off his shirt in three of its four corners; he detached the last one, folded the bib and tucked it into his shorts as he rejoined the still bunched-up leaders at the rear.
The absence of a bib — the professionals' have their names, not numbers like most of the 30,000 runners in the field — was mostly a curiosity for onlookers. But it posed a potential problem for race organizers: On the back is a timing device that registers when the runner crosses a checkpoint.
The system provide runners with their split times and also proves that someone ran the entire race — something Boston officials didn’t have in 1980, when Rosie Ruiz was initially declared the winner before they found she took a shortcut to the finish line.
Ruiz, an unknown before she broke the tape, didn't show up on any pictures or video along the course. Korir — who was running among the leaders, right behind the lead vehicle with the TV camera — was literally front and center.
“It was kind of a nonissue because he was in the main (pack). I mean, the camera was focused on him,” Boston Athletic Association President Jack Fleming said, holding up Korir’s mangled bib. “This is an identification and a timing and scoring device. So he was clearly identified; we knew who he was. We didn’t actually need this to identify him as John Korir. And it just so happened that the timing tag was intact.”
Fleming said organizers noticed Korir’s missing bib early on and went looking for video to find out what had happened. But they also saw that he was showing up at each checkpoint, as normal. No one knew how until he pulled the bib out of his shorts as he ran down Boylston Street to the finish.
“For him to have the presence of mind, with all of that adrenaline, to grab the bib and to hold on to it, tuck it away, ... it's amazing,” Fleming said.
The timing devices have come a long way: Early models were plastic chips tied into the runners’ shoelaces, but now they are a thin metallic sticker on the back of the bib, surrounded by a sponge-like protective guard. The bib itself is a papery plastic similar to the material used to wrap building frames during construction.
It is strong enough to withstand 26.2 miles of pounding in all kinds of weather, but it is not indestructible.
“It’s the first thing that’s stated on the back of the bid: Do not fold or bend this bib number,” Fleming said, reading the warning printed on every bib. “But it worked.”
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