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Bahrain’s Eunice Jepkirui Kirwa claimed the kingdom’s first medal at the 2016 Rio Olympic Games by winning silver in the women’s marathon.
With a time of two hours, 24 minutes and 13 seconds she was a mere nine seconds behind her friend, Kenyan Jemima Jelagat Sumgong, who evaded a protester who leapt onto the course on Sunday, to become the first woman from her country to win Olympic marathon gold. Ethiopian Mare Dibaba took the bronze in 2:24:30.
Sumgong, 31, said the man on the course immediately brought to mind memories of the April London Marathon, when she experienced a similar incident. Sumgong said: “I was like scared, maybe I’m in trouble.”
It was not immediately clear if the man, who went head-over-heels over a metal barrier, had been arrested or what his motive had been.
At the Athens Olympics in 2004, defrocked Irish priest Neil Horan tackled Brazil’s Vanderlei de Lima near the finish, knocking him out of the lead. The bronze medallist lit the Olympic cauldron at Rio’s opening ceremony on August 5.
Sumgong, 31, bided her time throughout the race, staying with the leading pack and not moving ahead until the end.
She later told reporters that Kirwa kept her company during the race. The two women took on the mighty Ethiopians and other favourites to lead the marathon. Kenya-born Bahraini Kirwa lived just a stone-thrown from Sumgong in Kapsabet, Nandi County in Kenya.
“When the other Kenyans were left behind, I did see her close to me, in fact we talked so much on the way but I couldn’t help her since she was running for another country, and I was running for Kenya.
“All I wanted was this gold for my fans back home,” Sumgong told Kenyan journalists in Brazil. “I didn’t even know that I was going to win, and I didn’t want to look back, because I knew I had strong competitors. I only noticed they were left behind some few metres to the end.”
Determined to compete in international competition, in December 2013 Kirwa, right, transferred her eligibility to Bahrain. She became able to run for her adopted nation in July 2014. On her international debut for Bahrain she came away with the marathon gold medal at that year’s Asian Games.
Her husband, Joshua Kiprugut Kemei, is also a long-distance runner. They have one son.
