Olympic Games 2008 - Beijing

MEN MARATHON - 2:06:32 Samuel Kamau WANJIRU (ken)
WOMEN MARATHON - 2:26:44 Constantina DITA-TOMESCU (rou)

The 2008 Summer Olympics, officially known as the Games of the XXIX Olympiad, were held in Beijing, People's Republic of China from August 8 to August 24, 2008, and followed by the 2008 Summer Paralympics from September 6 to September 17. The Olympic games were awarded to Beijing after an exhaustive ballot of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) on July 13, 2001. The official logo of the games, titled "Dancing Beijing," features a stylized calligraphic character jing (meaning "capital"), referencing the host city. The mascots of Beijing 2008 were the five Fuwa, each representing one color of the Olympic rings. The Olympic slogan "One World, One Dream", called upon the world to unite in the Olympic spirit. Athletes competed in 302 events in 28 sports. The Chinese government had promoted the games to highlight China's emergence on the world stage and had newly built 12 venues, renovated 11, temporary built eight with a grand total of 37 venues hosting the events. The men's marathon took place on 24 August at 7:30am ending in the Beijing National Stadium. The winner of the event was Samuel Wanjiru of Kenya, who set an Olympic record in the time of two hours, six minutes, and 32 seconds. He is the first Kenyan to win a gold for his country in the marathon. The qualifying standards were 2:15:00 (A standard) and 2:18:00 (B standard).

Results
1°	Samuel Kamau	Wanjiru	Kenya	2:06:32
2°	Jaouad	Gharib	Morocco	2:07:16
3°	Tsegay	Kebede	Ethiopia	2:10:00
4°	Deriba	Merga	Ethiopia	2:10:21
5°	Martin	Lel	Kenya	2:10:24
6°	Viktor	Röthlin	Switzerland	2:10:35
7°	Gashaw	Asfaw	Ethiopia	2:10:52
8°	Yared	Asmerom	Eritrea	2:11:11
9°	Dathan	Ritzenhein	United States of America	2:11:59
10°	Ryan	Hall	United States of America	2:12:33
11°	Mike	Fokoroni	Zimbabwe	2:13:17
12°	Stefano	Baldini	Italy	2:13:25
13°	Tsuyoshi	Ogata	Japan	2:13:26
14°	Grigoriy	Andreyev	Russia	2:13:33
15°	Ruggero	Pertile	Italy	2:13:39
16°	José Manuel	Martínez	Spain	2:14:00
17°	Francis	Kirwa	Finland	2:14:22
18°	Myongseung	Lee	Korea	2:14:37
19°	Janne	Holmén	Finland	2:14:44
20°	Abderrahim	Goumri	Morocco	2:15:00
21°	Aleksey	Sokolov	Russia	2:15:57
22°	Brian	Sell	United States of America	2:16:07
23°	Ottaviano	Andriani	Italy	2:16:10
24°	Dan	Robinson	Great Britain	2:16:14
25°	Haiyang	Deng	Chile	2:16:17
26°	Abderrahime	Bouramdane	Morocco	2:17:42
27°	Vasyl	Matviychuk	Ukraine	2:17:50
28°	Bong-ju	Lee	Korea	2:17:56
29°	Oleg	Kulkov	Russia	2:18:11
30°	Paulo	Gomes	Portugal	2:18:15
31°	Alex	Malinga	Uganda	2:18:26
32°	Carlos	Cordero	Mexico	2:18:40
33°	Kum-Song	Ri	North Korea	2:19:08
34°	Henryk	Szost	Poland	2:19:43
35°	José Amado	García	Guatemala	2:20:15
36°	Yonas	Kifle	Eritrea	2:20:23
37°	Nasar Sakar	Saeed	Bahrain	2:20:24
38°	José	de Souza	Brazil	2:20:25
39°	Kamiel	Maase	Netherlands	2:20:30
40°	Song-Chol	Pak	North Korea	2:21:16
41°	Iaroslav	Musinschi	Moldova	2:21:18
42°	Il-Nam	Kim	North Korea	2:21:51
43°	Juan Carlos	Cardona	Colombia	2:21:57
44°	Hendrick	Ramaala	South African Republic	2:22:43
45°	Arjun Kumar	Basnet	Nepal	2:23:09
46°	Hélder	Ornelas	Portugal	2:23:20
47°	Procopio	Franco	Mexico	2:23:24
48°	Nelson	Cruz	Cape Verde	2:23:47
49°	Roberto	Echeverria	Chile	2:23:54
50°	Yi-yong	Kim	Korea	2:23:57
51°	Zhuhong	Li	China	2:24:08
52°	Ser-Od	Bat-Ochir	Mongolia	2:24:19
53°	Norman	Dlomo	South African Republic	2:24:28
54°	Arkadiusz	Sowa	Poland	2:24:48
55°	Samson	Ramadhani	Tanzania	2:25:03
56°	Ndabili	Bashingili	Botswana	2:25:11
57°	Simon	Munyutu	France	2:25:50
58°	Antoni	Bernadó	Andorra	2:26:29
59°	Wen-Chien	Wu	Chinese Taipei	2:26:55
60°	Lee	Troop	Australia	2:27:17
61°	Costantino	León	Peru	2:28:04
62°	Goran	Stojiljkovic	Montenegro	2:28:14
63°	Alfredo	Arévalo	Guatemala	2:28:26
64°	Yousf Othman	Qader	Qatar	2:28:40
65°	Franklin	Tenorio	Ecuador	2:29:05
66°	Francisco	Bautista	Mexico	2:29:28
67°	Roman	Kejžar	Slovenia	2:29:37
68°	Joachim	Nshimirimana	Burundi	2:29:55
69°	Seteng	Ayele	Israel	2:30:07
70°	Takhir	Mamashayev	Kazakhstan	2:30:26
71°	Abdil	Ceylan	Turkey	2:31:43
72°	José	Ríos	Spain	2:32:35
73°	Bunting	Hem	Cambodia	2:33:32
74°	Marcel	Tschopp	Liechtenstein	2:35:06
75°	Pavel	Loskutov	Estonia	2:39:01
76°	Atsushi	Sato	Japan	2:41:08
Did not finish
DNF	Abdulhak	Elgorche Zakaria	Bahrain
DNF	Al Mustafa	Riyadh	Bahrain
DNF	Andrei	Gordeev	Belgium
DNF	Franck	de Almeida	Brazil
DNF	Marilson	dos Santos	Brazil
DNF	Tesfayohannes	Mesfin	Eritrea
DNF	Martin	Fagan	Ireland
DNF	Luke	Kibet	Kenya
DNF	Clement	Mabothile Lebopo	Lesotho
DNF	Moses	Moeketsi Mosuhli	Lesotho
DNF	Simon	Tsotang Maine	Lesotho
DNF	Ali Mabrouk	El Zaidi	Libya
DNF	Mubarak Hassan	Shami	Qatar
DNF	Julio	Rey	Spain
DNF	Getuli	Bayo	Tanzania
DNF	Olexandr	Kuzin	Ukraine
DNF	Oleksandr	Sitkovskyy	Ukraine
DNF	Luis	Fonseca	Venezuela
DNF	João	N'Tyamba	Angola
Did not start
DNS	Satoshi	Osaki	Japan
DNS	Mohamed	Ikoki Msandeki	Tanzania
DNS	Augusto	Soares	Timor-Leste
Disqualified

The Women's marathon took place on August 17, 2008 around an urban circuit specifically designed for the competition, and finished in the Beijing National Stadium. The qualifying standards were 2:37.00 (A standard) and 2:42.00 (B standard). The winner was Constantina Dita-Tomescu of Romania who at one point took a lead of over a minute and maintained it ahead of the chasing pack all the way into the stadium. She completed the marathon in a time of 2:26:44. At 38 years of age, she became the oldest Olympic marathon champion in history (previously the oldest man to win an Olympic marathon was age 37 and the oldest woman was age 30). In second place was Catherine Ndereba of Kenya who completed the race in 2:27:06, closely followed by bronze medalist, Zhou Chunxiu of China who finished in a time of 2:27:07. World record holder Paula Radcliffe of Great Britain took part in the race despite injury problems that bothered her throughout the previous year. However, she did not feature for much of the race and had to pause and do some exercises to rid herself of cramp at one point. She then proceeded to finish the marathon in twenty-third place in a time of 2:32:38.

Results
1°	Constantina	Dita-Tomescu	Romania	2:26:44
2°	Catherine	Ndereba	Kenya	2:27:06
3°	Chunxiu	Zhou	China	2:27:07
4°	Xiaolin	Zhu	China	2:27:16
5°	Martha	Komu	Kenya	2:27:23
6°	Mara	Yamauchi	Great Britain	2:27:29
7°	Irina	Timofeyeva	Russia	2:27:31
8°	Lidia	Simon	Romania	2:27:51
9°	Souad	Aït Salem	Algeria	2:28:29
10°	Salina	Jebet Kosgei	Kenya	2:29:28
11°	Živile	Balciunaite	Lithuania	2:29:33
12°	Kum-Ok	Kim	North Korea	2:30:01
13°	Yurika	Nakamura	Japan	2:30:19
14°	Anna	Incerti	Italy	2:30:55
15°	Dire	Tune	Ethiopia	2:31:16
16°	Nina	Rillstone	New Zealand	2:31:16
17°	Bruna	Genovese	Italy	2:31:31
18°	Luminita	Talpos	Romania	2:31:41
19°	Madaí	Pérez	Mexico	2:31:47
20°	Christelle	Daunay	France	2:31:48
21°	Benita	Johnson	Australia	2:32:06
22°	Svetlana	Zakharova	Russia	2:32:16
23°	Paula	Radcliffe	Great Britain	2:32:38
24°	Monika	Drybulska	Poland	2:32:39
25°	Eun-jung	Lee	Korea	2:33:07
26°	Liz	Yelling	Great Britain	2:33:12
27°	Blake	Russell	United States of America	2:33:13
28°	Beata	Naigambo	Namibia	2:33:29
29°	Vincenza	Sicari	Italy	2:33:31
30°	Dorota	Gruca	Poland	2:33:32
31°	Tetyana	Filonyuk	Ukraine	2:33:35
32°	Marisa	Barros	Portugal	2:34:08
33°	Lisa Jane	Weightman	Australia	2:34:16
34°	Kirsten	Melkevik Otterbu	Norway	2:34:35
35°	Liza	Hunter-Galvan	New Zealand	2:34:51
36°	Yong-Ok	Jong	North Korea	2:34:52
37°	Rasa	Drazdauskaite	Lithuania	2:35:09
38°	Melanie	Kraus	Germany	2:35:17
39°	María	Portillo	Peru	2:35:19
40°	Helalia	Johannes	Namibia	2:35:22
41°	Shujing	Zhang	China	2:35:35
42°	Lucia	Kimani	Bosnia and Herzegovina	2:35:47
43°	Sandra	Ruales	Ecuador	2:35:53
44°	Kate	Smyth	Australia	2:36:10
45°	Yesenia	Centeno	Spain	2:36:25
46°	Ana	Dias	Portugal	2:36:25
47°	Nebiat	Habtemariam	Eritrea	2:37:03
48°	Bun-Hui	Jo	North Korea	2:37:04
49°	Tabitha	Tsatsa	Zimbabwe	2:37:10
50°	Bahar	Dogan	Turkey	2:37:12
51°	Marily	dos Santos	Brazil	2:38:10
52°	Susanne	Hahn	Germany	2:38:31
53°	Eun-hee	Chae	Korea	2:38:52
54°	Alessandra	Aguilar	Spain	2:39:29
55°	Patricia	Rétiz	Mexico	2:39:34
56°	Sun-young	Lee	Korea	2:43:23
57°	Eva-Maria	Gradwohl	Austria	2:44:24
58°	Yuliya	Arzipova	Kyrgyzstan	2:44:41
59°	Sonia	Calizaya	Bolivia	2:45:53
60°	Eléni	Dónta	Greece	2:46:44
61°	Karina	Pérez	Mexico	2:47:02
62°	Bertha	Sánchez	Colombia	2:47:02
63°	Pauline	Curley	Ireland	2:47:16
64°	Maria José	Pueyo	Spain	2:48:01
65°	Petra	Teveli	Hungary	2:48:32
66°	Epiphanie	Nyirabarame	Rwanda	2:49:32
67°	Zuzana	Šaríková	Slovakia	2:49:39
68°	Gabriela	Traña	Costa Rica	2:53:45
69°	Oksana	Sklyarenko	Ukraine	2:55:39
Did not finish
DNF	Berhane	Adere	Ethiopia
DNF	Gete	Wami	Ethiopia
DNF	Beáta	Rakonczai	Hungary
DNF	Reiko	Tosa	Japan
DNF	Mamorallo	Tjoka	Lesotho
DNF	Valentina	Delion	Moldova
DNF	Inês	Monteiro	Portugal
DNF	Galina	Bogomolova	Russia
DNF	Olivera	Jevtic	Serbia
DNF	Mariana	Dias Ximenes	Timor-Leste
DNF	Deena	Kastor	United States of America
DNF	Magdalena	Lewy-Boulet	United States of America
Did not start
DNS	Nadia	Ejjafini	Bahrain
Disqualified