Posted: June 30, 2004

Athletics: Khannouchi And Ndereba Headline Beach To Beacon 10-K

From David Monti

(c) 2004 Race Results Weekly, all rights reserved RaceResultsWeekly.com

The organizers of the Peoples Beach to Beacon 10-K, a scenic road race scheduled for Sunday, 01-Aug in Cape Elizabeth, Me., announced today that two former world record holders in the marathon are expected to compete.

Khalid Khannouchi, the Moroccan-born U.S. marathoner with a 2:05:38 marathon career best, will try for his second Beach to Beacon victory, while Catherine Ndereba, the reigning world marathon champion with a 2:18:47 marathon best from Kenya, will try for her sixth.

"I'm not sure we could do much better than to start filling out the field with two household names on the road race circuit," said Larry Barthlow, the elite athlete coordinator for the event. "Both have held the world record in the marathon, and each of them has set a course record in winning here."

Khannouchi won the race in 1999 in 27:48, which held up as the course record until Kenyan Gilbert Okari broke it last year (27:28). Ndereba set the women's standard of 31:34 in 2001; she's broken 32 minutes at this race three times.

The race, founded by 1984 Olympic marathon champion Joan Benoit Samuelson who grew up in Cape Elizabeth and now lives in nearby Freeport, will pay the winners $10,000 this year, up from $7500 last year.

The coastal route drew 4273 finishers over the line at last year's race.