The 11th Almaty Marathon, the largest annual running event in Central Asia, was held this Sunday, 25 September. The competition started from the Republic Square at 7:30 a.m. and involved about 12,000 amateur athletes who ran along the city streets to pass their distances.
On the start line, the marathon competitors were welcomed by complimentary speech from Marzhan Yelshibayeva, Executive Director of Kaspi.kz, and Saltanat Kazybayeva, Director of “Courage to be the First” Corporate Fund.
The first who started their run at 7:30 a.m. were participants in a 42-km distance race, professional track athletes, participants in the Kazakhstan Marathon Championship, which was held in cooperation with the Athletics Federation. The Ekiden Relay took place at the same time.
Shadrack Koech won the marathon with 2 hours 21 minutes 27 seconds. This is a new absolute record of the Almaty Marathon 42.2-km track. The track record was previously set in 2019 by Zikrillo Mamatkulov with a 2 hours 28 minutes 34 seconds result.
The half marathon runners started at 7:40 a.m. New records were set on this track as well. Rinas Akhmadeev (Tatarstan) became a winner among men. His gun time is 1 hour 4 minutes 4 seconds, which is a new record for a 21.1-km track. Earlier, the track record belonged to Shokhrukh Davlatov (Uzbekistan) with a 1 hour 9 minutes 1 second result. It is worth reminding that Rinas Akhmadeev also broke a 21.1-km track record at the Nur-Sultan Half Marathon with 1 hour 2 minutes 54 seconds. Sardana Trofimova (Kyrgyzstan) took the first place among women. Her result is 1 hour 12 minutes 49 seconds, which is also a new absolute track record.
Participants in a 10-km distance, the same distance professional track athletes, and participants of the Kazakhstan Championship started their run at 7:55 a.m.
The last to start were participants in the 10-km Nordic Walking.
“This year competition is a huge event in the global mass sports for Kazakhstan. For the first time, the Kazakhstan Championship was held as part of the Almaty Marathon that provided amateur athletes with an opportunity to compete for the first place on a par with professional athletes. The start line brought together runners from over 30 countries of the world, in particular the CIS countries,” Saltanat Kazybayeva, Director of “Courage to be the First” Corporate Fund and organizer of the competition, comments. “This year we organized the run under the motto “Join Us” encouraging all citizens to become part of a friendly community which is fond of sports and a healthy lifestyle. The number of community members increases every year, and this fact certainly encourages because the main goal of the Corporate Fund is to make sports more affordable and attractive to more people.”
After finish, all participants enjoyed a fabulous entertainment program arranged on the Republic Square with the participation of cheerleaders, music bands, and had an opportunity to attend an awarding ceremony for the marathon winners and entertainment activities from the Almaty Marathon partners. The overall leaders in the 42- and 21-km distances shared the cash prize fund amounting to 6.5 million. Winners in age categories (10 km and 42.2 km) and the Ekiden winners were awarded prizes from marathon partners.
It stands to mention that this year the Almaty Marathon introduced a race visualization tool. Data & Analytics PwC Kazakhstan has developed an interactive dashboard for the Almaty Marathon, enabling each participant to view information on the number and results of races they finished, and to familiarize with all the distances passed since 2016. PwC Kazakhstan has developed a unified system for participants to analyze their performance, compare results and get motivated for further progress. You can find the dashboard on almaty-marathon.kz.
For reference: the Almaty Marathon is a sports event pursuing the charity as one of its goals. Every year, the Almaty Marathon spends a portion of the funds generated by registration fees from the Almaty Marathon on sports infrastructure for children with special needs. This year, the Almaty Marathon plans to allocate assistance in the amount of 45,000,000 KZT.
Title sponsor: Kaspi.kz
Organizers of the Almaty Marathon: “Courage to be the First” Corporate Fund, fitness club World Class Almaty, Sh.Yessenov Science and Education Foundation and multisports Youtube-channel #Different you.
