The Moroccan Mohammed Hadji cemented his victory at the Land Rover Malta Marathon for a second year running with a winning time of 2 hours, 19 minutes and 4 seconds. However Hadj courted some controversy in post race comments to this newspaper where he stated that the course is actually 700 metres longer than the 42 kilometres which normally makes up a marathon race.

Another Moroccan, Abdelkarim Kedouri placed second, incidentally as also happened last year with a time of 2 hours, 25 minutes and 34 seconds. The third place went to the first Maltese Jonathan Balzan who again placed third with a time of 2 hours 32 minutes and 25 seconds, his position was gained when in the final kilometer he managed to overcome German athlete Dennis Memel who was in third place but finished fourth.

Visibly emotional after his run, Balzan at first did not even know that he finished third and was in fact very emotional when he got to know his placing.

“I have no words to describe my position in this marathon as I was definitely not sure that I would manage. I managed to pass Samuel Kiprotich who was in fifth place at one point and I spurred myself forward to garner third place, passing the German in the last few hundreds of metres. I am coming from an injury which has taken time to recover from and in fact I was not even certain that I would be running in the full marathon. The final result was truly something I was not expecting and am extremely proud of”.

Both Balzan and Hadji commented on the strong winds encountered at Ta’ Qali which had a considerable effect on their final timings. The strong North Westerly winds blew throughout the course and obviously had their own effect on the course.

Commenting on his first placing, Mohammed Hadj said that he was satisfied with his result and said that this was a difficult course and the fact that there was a lot of wind and that he was alone up front had a considerable effect on his final timing.

“I am just coming from first place in the marathon in Marrakesh and hoped to clock a time of around 2 hours 15 minutes but the wind which was very strong had an effect on my final time. I clocked 2 hours 17 minutes on my watch but was given a time of 2 hours 19 minutes which is probably due to the course being around 700 metres longer”.

The second placed athlete, Kedouri was not available for comment.

Malta’s Carmen Hili from St Patrick’s Athelitics Club was the first female in the full marathon with a time of 3 hours, 3 minutes and 16 seconds while the first female in the half marathon was Italian Cinzia Begliomini.