From: Essayas Fessahaye (essayasf@yahoo.com)
Date: Sun Mar 01 2009 - 15:56:00 EST
Eritrea's Second Best Marathon Runner Yared Asmerom Finishes 3rd in Lake Biwa
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Essayas Fessahaye (EAAA)
March 1, 2009
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Eritrea's Yared Asmerom stood 3rd in the Lake Biwa Marathon following former world record holder and two time olympic silver medalist Kenya's Paul Tergat and two-time Lake Biwa champion Spain's Jose Rios today, Sunday March 1, 2009.Â
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The 2008 runner up Yared Asmerom held off Japan's Masaya Shimizu in one second to place third in 2:10:49.
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The prolific Kenyan pulled ahead of Spain's Jose Rios with one kilometer remaining and crossed the finish line in 2 hours, 10 minutes, 22 seconds on Sunday, March 1, 2009.
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Rios, the two-time Lake Biwa champion who was gunning for his third Lake Biwa title, was second in 2:10:36 beating Yared Asmerom for a third place in 2:10:49.
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The winner of Sunday's race Paul Tergat held the marathon world record from 2003 to 2007. Currently, he has all-time second fastest time in the world with 2:04:55.
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It was in this competition that Yared Asemrom set his personal best time of 2:08.34 last year when he stood second. This time gaveYared a visa to his first Olympic competition in Beijing where he squeezed him self within the list of top 10 winners in 2:11:11.
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Last year, Yared Asmerom was beaten by Qatar's Mubarak Hassan Shami to stand second place in the same race. The Kenyan-born Shami — formerly Richard Yatich — crossed the finish line with a time of 2 hours, 8 minutes, 23 seconds, with Yared Asmerom 11 seconds back.Â
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Spain's RIOS Jose who stood second in the 2009 Lake Biwa edition was 6th last year with a time of 2:09:38.
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Lake Biwa Marathon is Yared's first competition after his 8th place Beijing Olympic Marathon race back in August 2008. Before he left Asmara a week ago, Yared was complaining about a hip injury that messed some of his training schedules for this specific competition.
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Despite his hip injury, Yared's dream was to finish the race in '2:06:34' .
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Lake Biwa Marathon is the oldest continuous marathon in Japan.
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