Gate of the 10 km race Valencia Ibercaja 2024, in a picture from the organization.federico gomez jimenez-fotografi
The music of Chimo Bayo thundered at the start of the Valencia Ibercaja 10km race. “Because it is the bomb that will explode…” was heard from the speakers at the start of the race, while the DJ of the old Ruta del Bakalao, a “Boomer” icon in Valencia, could not even have imagined that 28 minutes and 46 seconds had passed Later, the bomb that was about to explode at the finish line of the Paseo de la Alameda set the new world record for 10 kilometers. A woman, Agnes Ngetich, cried with emotion because she had just become the first athlete in history to complete 10,000 meters on the track and on asphalt in less than 29 minutes. The Kenyan beat the previous record of the Ethiopian Yalemzerf Yehualaw (29:14 minutes in Castellón two years ago) by 28 seconds. A remarkable bite that raises this record to the level of the big bombs of the last three years: the world records of Tigist Assefa in the marathon and Letesenbet Gidey in the half marathon.
The focus was on Jacob Kiplimo, the man with the half marathon and 15K records, who was also competing for the 10K records. But at the start of the race, already in the second kilometer, Ngetich remained just 200 meters from the front, just 200 meters from Kiplimo, who had started a little slower than expected. The first three women flew. The Kenyan followed her rabbit, Japheth Kipkemboi Kosgei, and as she crossed the equator all alarms went off because the stopwatch of this young runner, only 22 years old, showed 14:13 minutes and set the world record for 5 kilometers – the the first of that explosive morning – which Beatrice Chebet had reached just two weeks earlier, on New Year's Eve, in the Cursa dels Nassos in Barcelona.
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It remained to be seen whether he could keep up with this wild pace. If what exploded was his body, he would not be able to sustain a speed of two minutes and 52 seconds per kilometer. But Ngetich didn't give up, he finally released Emmaculate Anyango, who also stayed under 29 minutes (28:57 minutes), and he held firm to reach the finish line and drop his bombshell. Announcing that she is the long-distance runner who has come to compete with the best in the world. Because his progress is amazing and every year he improves his 10 kilometer mark by almost a minute: 31:20 minutes in 2021, 30:30 minutes in 2022, 29:26 minutes in 2023 and 28:46 minutes in Year 2024.
His result eclipsed the triumph of Kiplimo, who is fifth all-time in the world rankings with a time of 26:48 minutes. The news was Agnes Ngetich, a woman who began to shine in 2023 with a bronze medal at the World Cross Country Championships and a sixth place in the 10,000 m final at the World Championships in Budapest and who starts 2024 with a record better performance in the Hungarian table than the world records of Assefa and Gidey in the marathon and half marathon. The female background is in one of the highlights of the story.
Although in reality Ngetich had already broken the 10km world record once. That was in September 2023 in Brasov, Romania, in a women's only race, without male bunnies, and she managed a time (29:24 minutes) that allowed her to be greeted with necklaces and heroin honors at the airport. The celebration was cut short a few days later when the organization of this race in Transylvania announced that it had been measured incorrectly and was 25 meters shorter.
The Valencia Ibercaja 10km race also set a Spanish record for Abdessa Oukhelpen. The Moroccan athlete, who took Spanish citizenship in 2019 and trains in Soria with Enrique Pascual, former coach of Fermín Cacho and Abel Antón, crossed the finish line in 27:44 minutes, four seconds less than the record set by Toni Abadía in 2019 Laredo had set the mark also serves as the RFEA minimum for the Paris Olympics in 10,000, making Valencia the city of records. In addition to this 10K race, national men's and women's marathon and half marathon records were broken on its roads.
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