Kolkata, Dec 15 (PTI) Ethiopian Sutume Kebede retained the women's crown in the ninth edition of Tata Steel World 25K, the first World Athletics Gold Label Road Race at this distance, while Ugandan Stephen Kissa triumphed over the defending champion, Daniel Ebenyo from Kenya, in the men's race here on Sunday.

The Indian elite runners also returned with splendid performances, with Gulveer Singh setting a new event record and Sanjeevani taking the title in the women's category.

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More than 20,500 people participated in various categories.

Confirming her entry just two weeks before the race, Kebede recovered from a stomach ailment just in time to defend her title here in a modest 1:19:17.

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Having set a stand-alone World Best for 25K here while winning last year's race with a time of 1:18:47, the Ethiopian runner started her campaign in 2024 with fantastic personal best in half-marathon (1:04:37) and marathon (2:15:55) to take the top spots in Houston and Tokyo respectively.

Incidentally, her timing in Tokyo made her the eighth fastest among women marathoners to date.

Coming to Kolkata with confidence and the desire to excel, Kebede started the race with some initial challenges from Bahrain's Desi Jisa, the winner here in 2022, and Kenyan Viola Chpengeno, a third-place finisher in last year's Delhi half-marathon.

The Kenyan started fading in the waning stages of the race, thus allowing Kebede to become a clear leader after 23K.

The Ethiopian runner's winning time would have been better had Chepngeno continued with her for some more time. However, Kebede signed off 2024 with another winning note.

Chepngeno finished second in 1:19:44, while Jisa finished a distant third at 1:21:29.

Redemption for Kissa

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Kissa salvaged some pride after logging his first win in an international competition in five years.

He suffered two back-to-back debacles as a non-finisher at the Olympic Games in Tokyo (10,000m) and Paris (Marathon) and took only second spots in a couple of races in between.

Hence, making a podium finish on his debut at 25K brought a happy moment for the Ugandan to cherish for a long time.

The race kicked off with a fair bit of nippiness in the air as the top bunch of Ebenyo, Benson Kipruto, Kissa, and Haymanot Alew made past the 10K mark at 28:42 but upped the ante as they were still a few seconds behind their expectation.

Defending champion Ebenyo looked strong, remained at the helm of affairs in the men's race, and ran neck-to-neck alongside Kissa in most parts of the race. They briefly exchanged the lead, but the gap between the duo did not go beyond a metre or two all the time.

The Kenyan, who also set a stand-alone World Best for 25K (1:11:13) during last year's race, was looking to improve his time in this edition.

They reached 15K in 42:56, some 30 seconds faster, with Ebenyo and Kissa still leading the pack, as the pace picked up along the tram tracks of South Kolkata.

Surprisingly, Kipruto dropped off as Kissa took the lead at the 20K mark, clocking 57:50, with Ebenyo closely behind.

But he lost focus in the last two kilometers. Instead of looking at the clock, he only focused on pulling away from the Ugandan runner. Kissa did not allow that to happen and held off the challenge to sprint out to the tape to claim the men's crown in 1:12:33 and pocket the USD 15,000 prize purse.

Ebenyo finished runner-up four seconds later, while Anthony Kipchirchir surprised everyone with a bronze position at 1:12:55.

Gulveer, Sanjeevani excel

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Gulveer Singh (26) habitually breaks the national record in every distance event. He has improved the national marks in 5000 and 10,000m twice this year.

The Guangzhou Asian Games bronze medallist, who just eight weeks ago became the Asian cross-country champion, is now turning his focus towards road running.

Sawan Barwal, the 2023 Asian half-marathon bronze medallist, led Gulveer in a significant portion of the race. As in the international category, Gulveer broke away from Sawan and sprinted to finish first and also registered another Indian Best at this distance by clocking 1:14:10.

Sawan clocked a close 1:14:11 to cross the finish line fractionally behind the leader. Gaurav Mathur completes the Indian podium in third place.

Sanjivani Jadhav, popular among women runners in the country, returned to Kolkata after 2022, where she was a top finisher among Indians. Kavita Yadav aided her by initially challenging Sanjivani before allowing her to run a solo race. The 28-year-old runner improved her best by over 5 minutes, winning in 1:29:08.

Lili Das (1:30:58) and Kavita Yadav (1:32:19) took the next two spots among the Indian women.

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