Houston Marathon

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Houston Marathon

Date and location	Second Sunday in January Houston, Texas
Race type	Road
Distance	Marathon
Official site	houstonmarathon.com

The Houston Marathon is an annual marathon held every January in Houston, Texas. With thousands of runners and spectators, it is the largest single day sporting event in the city. It is run concurrently with a half marathon and a 5K race. The 2007 race included the first-ever satellite running of the event, run simultaneously in Fallujah, Iraq.^[1]

The first marathon, run on December 30, 1972, featured 113 runners and a crowd of approximately 200 people. Today, as many as 15,000 take part in front of a far larger crowd of 200,000. The course has been repeatedly selected for many world-renowned road-racing competitions, including:

The 2007 and 2008 USATF Men’s and Women's Half Marathon National Championship
The 2005 and 2006 USATF Men’s Half Marathon National Championship
The 1998 USATF Women’s Marathon Championship
The 1992 USATF Women’s Olympic Marathon Trails and
The 1979 USATF Men’s and Women’s Marathon Championship.^[2]

The current corporate sponsor of the marathon is Chevron Corporation. Aramco sponsors the half marathon and the Houston Press and Smart Financial sponsor the concurrent 5K run.

The event supports many charities, including the American Red Cross, the Texas Children's Hospital and the American Cancer Society.

Along with the Dallas White Rock Marathon and the Austin Marathon, the Houston Marathon forms the middle leg of the Marathons of Texas, a series of winter marathons held approximately one month apart from each other from December through February in Texas.^[3]

1 Course Details
2 Open Results
3 External links
4 Videos

[edit] Course Details

The fast and flat course starts in the downtown area at Minute Maid Park and takes runners past scenic Bayou City neighborhoods, including the historic Heights and Montrose areas, past Hermann Park and Rice University, over to the Uptown and Tanglewood districts, including the famed Houston Galleria, and then through Memorial Park and Allen Parkway, finishing at the George R. Brown Convention Center downtown. The course is USATF certified and is popular with runners seeking to qualify for the Boston Marathon. The race time limit is 6 hours and a limit of 15,000 entries is enforced.

[edit] Open Results

	Male Marathon Winners			Female Marathon Winners
Year	Name	Time	Country	Name	Time	Country
January 13, 2008
January 14, 2007	Feyisa Tusse	2:11:39	Ethiopia	Dire Tune	2:26:52 (course record)	Ethiopia
January 15, 2006	David Cheruiyot (2)	2:12:02	Kenya	Firaya Sultanova-Zhdanova	2:32:25	Russia
January 16, 2005	David Cheruiyot	2:14:50	Kenya	Kelly Keane	2:32:27	United States
January 18, 2004	Marek Jaroszewski	2:18:51	Poland	Margarita Tapia	2:28:36	Mexico
January 19, 2003	Sean Wade	2:24:43	United States	Albina Gallyamova	2:42:37	Russia
January 20, 2002	Drew Prisner	2:28:43	United States	Becky Sondag	2:50:49	United States
January 14 2001	Chris Ciamarra	2:29:27	United States	Stacie Alboucrek	2:43:40	United States
January 16, 2000	Stephen Ndungu (3)	2:11:28	Kenya	Tatiana Pozdniakova (3)	2:32:25	Ukraine
January 17, 1999	Stephen Ndungu (2)	2:14:56	Kenya	Tatiana Pozdniakova (2)	2:33:23	Ukraine
January 18, 1998	Stephen Ndungu	2:11:23	Kenya	Gwyn Coogan	2:33:37	United States
January 12, 1997	Ake Eriksson	2:19:21	Sweden	Claudia Dreher	2:36:13	Germany
January 21, 1996	Tumo Turbo	2:10:34	Ethiopia	Adriana Fernandez	2:31:59	Mexico
January 15, 1995	Peter Fonseca	2:11:52	Canada	Tatiana Pozdniakova	2:29:57	Ukraine
January 16, 1994	Colin Moore	2:13:34	England	Alevtina Naumova	2:34:47	Russia
January 24, 1993	Frank Bjorkli	2:13:21	Norway	Kristy Johnston	2:29:05	United States
January 26, 1992	Filemon Lopez	2:13:12	Mexico	Janis Klecker	2:30:12	United States
January 20, 1991	Carey Nelson	2:12:28	Canada	Veronique Marot (3)	2:30:55	England
January 14, 1990	Paul Pilkington	2:11:13	United States	Maria Trujillo	2:32:55	United States
January 15, 1989	Richard Kaitany	2:10:04 (course record)	Kenya	Veronique Marot (2)	2:30:16	England
January 17, 1988	Geir Kvernmo	2:11:44	Norway	Linda Zeman	2:34:52	United States
January 18, 1987	Derrick May	2:11:51	South Africa	Bente Moe	2:32:37	Norway
January 19, 1986	Paul Cummings	2:11:32	United States	Veronique Marot	2:31:33	England
January 6, 1985	Marty Froelick	2:11:14	United States	Sylvie Ruegger	2:28:36	Canada
January 15, 1984	Charles Spedding	2:11:54	England	Ingrid Kristiansen (2)	2:27:51	Norway
January 16, 1983	Hailu Ebba	2:12:17	Ethiopia	Ingrid Kristiansen	2:33:27	Norway
January 24, 1982	Benji Durden	2:11:12	United States	Laurie Binder	2:40:56	United States
January 10, 1981	Bill Rodgers	2:12:20	United States	Patti Catalano	2:35:28	United States
January 19, 1980	Ron Tabb (2)	2:13:35	United States	Vanessa Vajdos	2:44:45	United States
January 20, 1979	Tom Antczak	2:15:28	United States	Sue Petersen	2:46:17	United States
January 21, 1978	Ron Tabb	2:17:11	United States	Peggy Kokernot	3:01:54	United States
January 22, 1977	Clent Mericle (2)	2:27:46	United States	Dorothy Doolittle (2)	3:00:34	United States
January 17, 1976	Jeff Wells	2:17:46	United States	Marsha Johnson	3:37:04	United States
January 18, 1975	Clent Mericle	2:35:00	United States	Dorothy Doolittle	3:31:24	United States
December 29, 1973	Juan Garza	2:37:47	United States	Nancy Laird	4:29:07	United States
December 30, 1972	Danny Green	2:32:33	United States	Tanya Trantham	5:11:55	United States