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Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Intensity Grows In Boston Marathon Field Strongest In Years As Kenyans, Mexicans Eye Supremacy

Associated Press

The 101st Boston Marathon is being billed as “The Rematch,” another confrontation between defending champion Moses Tanui and three-time winner Cosmas Ndeti, both of Kenya.

A more appropriate title would be “The Rivalry,” as three talented Mexicans - German Silva, Andres Espinosa and Dionicio Ceron - threaten to end the Kenyans’ six-year domination of the world’s oldest continuously staged marathon.

“It should be a good battle because the last few years it has been all Kenyans. Now, we have rivals,” said Ndeti, the race winner from 1993 through ‘95 before finishing third last year, when the Kenyans swept the first five places and took seven of the first eight places.

Espinosa, the runner-up to Ndeti in 1994 when he set a course record of 2 hours, 7 minutes, 15 seconds, and third in 1992, also likes the rivalry in Monday’s race.

“It makes for two teams who want to push each other and maybe get fast times at the end,” said Espinosa, winner of the New York City Marathon in 1993, second there in 1991 and 1992 and fifth last year.

Espinosa praised the additions of Silva and Ceron, who are running Boston for the first time but are proven international marathoners. Silva won the New York City Marathon in 1994 and 1995 and was sixth at last year’s Olympics, and Ceron won the London Marathon three straight years before declining to defend this year in an attempt to win Boston.

“When I look to my right, there will be Mexicans there, and when I look to my left, there will be Mexicans there, instead of being alone in the middle of 20 Kenyans,” Espinosa said.

The rivalry is friendly, not bitter, Espinosa said.

“After the race, the Mexicans and Kenyans will go out together and have a beer,” he said, laughing.

While the Kenyans, who make up about half the men’s elite field, and the Mexicans figure to stage a fierce struggle for men’s supremacy, the women’s race will have more of a wide-open international flavor.

Germany’s Uta Pippig is the three-time defending champion and course record-holder (2:21:45), but she has not raced since dropping out of the Olympics with a stress fracture and a sciatic nerve inflammation, then sustaining another stress fracture four weeks later.

That’s why she said, “There is not so much pressure on me because I am not the favorite.”

To select a favorite is extremely difficult because the women’s field is loaded.

In addition to Pippig, it includes Olympic champion Fatuma Roba of Ethiopia; two-time world cross country champion and 1992 Olympic 10,000-meter gold medalist Derartu Tulu of Ethiopia in her marathon debut; and South African Elana Meyer, the world record-holder in the half-marathon, the third-place finisher at Boston in her marathon debut in 1994 and the runner-up in 1995.

Also competing are 1993 world champion Junko Asari of Japan, 1996 Berlin Marathon winner Colleen De Reuck of South Africa and first-time marathoner Delillah Asiago of Kenya, the women’s road racer of the year in 1995 when she won six races.

The top American men are Keith Brantly, 28th at last year’s Olympics, and 1993 world champion Mark Plaatjes, who has been strapped by injuries. The leading U.S. women are Olga Appell, the 1996 winner in Minneapolis, and Spokane’s Kim Jones, third at Boston in 1989 and second in 1991 and 1993 but dogged by injuries recently. xxxx BOSTON MARATHON FACTS Starting time:- 9 a.m. PDT, Monday TV: 8:55 a.m. (ESPN2). Course records: Men, 2 hours, 7 minutes, 15 seconds, Cosmas Ndeti, Kenya, April 18, 1994; women, 2:21:45, Uta Pippig, Germany, April 18, 1994. World records: Men, 2:06:50, Belayneh Densimo, Ethiopia, at Rotterdam, April 17, 1988; women, 2:21:06, Ingrid Kristiansen, Norway, at London, April 21, 1985. Prize money: $500,000, with $75,000 each for men’s and women’s first-place finishers in Open divisions, and $10,000 each for men’s and women’s first-place finishers in Masters and Wheelchair divisions.