The Double Road Race™ made its international debut as the Athens Double was held in the seaside community of Marathon, Greece on Sun., Dec. 1. This was a doubly historic event: It not only marked the first time the Double had ever been held in Europe, but Marathon is the place where the legendary Greek messenger Phiddippedes is said to have started his run to Athens with news of the Greek victory over the Persians in the Battle of Marathon in 490 BC, a story that was the inspiration for the modern-day running competition known as the marathon.

While it might have been Phiddippides who brought the news of victory to Athens in ancient times, it was a Greek American runner named Tina Kefalas who brought the Double Road Race™ from America to her ancestral homeland this year – after she had won the women’s race and set a world record at the inaugural Pleasanton Double last Dec. 23, the first Double ever held on American soil. Tina, who lives in Hillsborough, Calif., but competed for Greece in the marathon at the 2012 London Olympics and holds numerous Greek records at various distances, served as the race director of the Athens Double – and for good measure she also won the women’s race, by almost two minutes!

She ran the 10K in 35:55 and the 5K in 17:31 for an aggregate time of 53:26. This was the fourth fastest time ever by a woman in the Double – and surpassed her (then) world-record winning time at Pleasanton last year, when she ran the 10K in 35:55 (the exact same time  as she ran at Marathon) and the 5K in 18:07 for an aggregate time of 54:03. The Athens Double was also the third Double she has run and her record for those three races is … first (Pleasanton last year), second (San Juan Bautista this year) and now first again. As a result, she winds up second on the 2013 Women’s Leader Board for the Double behind Christine Kennedy.

Finishing second to Tina Kefalas in the Athens Double at Marathon was Deniz Dimaki, who posted an aggregate time of 55:25. The third-place finisher was Andriani Domvrou, who ran 59:57.

The men’s winner – in a tight race! -- was Konstantinos Paulios, who automatically becomes the Greek recordholder, as he ran the 10K in 31:22 and the 5K in 15:16 for an aggregate time of 46:38. He also won the Double Victory Cup for the best age-graded performance  – he’s 36 years old and his age-graded score was 89.96 percent.

The second-place finisher, Dimos Magginas, ran the 10K in 31:31, nine seconds slower than Paulios, and then tried to make up the deficit in the 5K, actually running that leg in 15:12, four seconds faster than Paulios in the yellow jersey, but Magginas wound up five seconds short, posting an aggregate time of 46:43, compared to the 46:38 of the winner.

Konstantinos Drosos finished third in the men’s race, running the 10K in 31:59 and the 5K in 15:39 for an aggregate time of 47:38.

Bob Anderson, creator of the Double and former publisher of Runner's World magazine, flew across the Atlantic from California to be present for this historic event  – and as always he ran in the race, posting an aggregate time of 1:07:06 (45:20/21:46) to win the 65-69 age group.  He has now run in every Double ever held and finishes atop the 2013 Men’s Leader Board for the Double.

There were 178 finishers in this inaugural event, the competition was excellent, the halftime Recovery Zone was outstanding, and the Double is clearly off and running in the very country where the Olympic Games and the marathon (or at least the concept of the marathon) originated!

How fitting it was that the person who created the Double (Bob Anderson) and the Greek American athlete who brought the Double to Greece (Tina Kefalas) were both there for the occasion and also participated in the event. The gods on Olympus – one assumes they’re still there as they were at the time of the ancient Olympic Games – were smiling.

Certainly Constantinos Arvanetes, Tina’s late grandfather on her mother’s side, would have been pleased. A champion Greek runner in the 1930s, he won the Balkan championship in the 5000 meters and set the Greek national record of 15:15 in 1935. He died in 1965, years before Tina was born, but she was named after him – Tina is the abbreviation for Constantina.

Comments

The Athens Double Road Race was an excellent event. Can't wait to go back next year.
Bob Anderson 12/5/13 11:31 am