Boston Marathon women’s preview: Sharon Lokedi ready for Kenyan showdown

For the last three years, the women’s champion at the Boston Marathon has been draped in a Kenyan flag at the finish line. Sharon Lokedi looks to continue that streak on Boylston St. on Monday. A win for Lokedi could cement her position on the Kenyan Olympic team at the summer’s Paris Olympics, where she aspires to reach the podium.

Despite facing an injury that sidelined her from the 127th Boston Marathon last April, Lokedi fought back to return and defend her marathon title in New York City last November, finishing third in a tightly contested final two miles between her compatriot Hellen Obiri and Ethiopia’s Letesenbet Gidey.

Lokedi will get the chance to line up against her competitor and friend, Obiri, once again on Monday. Obiri enters the race as the defending champion and the odds-on favourite to win, but the stakes this year in Boston are higher, with positions on the Kenyan Olympic team on the line. Both Obiri and Lokedi are among the six athletes named on the Kenyan Olympic selection shortlist earlier this month. A win or top-three finish would likely mean both women would be in a prime position to gain selection come the May 31 marathon team deadline.

“I want to run to the best of my abilities and show what sort of shape I am in,” says Lokedi. “I am really excited to be feeling healthy [this time around] in Boston and rested.”

The 30-year-old, who holds a marathon PB of 2:23:23, attested that Boston always has a world-class field and expects lots of competition come Marathon Monday.

The competition

The women’s race will feature a historically fast elite field that includes reigning Boston and New York City Marathon champion Obiri, who will be looking to become the first woman to take back-to-back wins since her compatriot Catherine Ndereba did it in 2004 and 2005. (Ndereba also won in 2000, 2001 and 2002.)

Leading the way for Ethiopia is 2:17-marathoner Tadu Teshome. She was the runner-up at the 2021 Berlin Marathon and placed fifth in the Chicago Marathon last fall. She’ll be joined by Hiwot Gebremaryam (previously Gebrekidan) (2:17:59), who was eighth in Boston last year, and five other Ethiopian women with sub-2:20 personal bests. All seven will be looking to break the Kenyan streak to become the first Ethiopian champion since Worknesh Degefa in 2019.

Other top athletes include two-time champion Edna Kiplagat, who won in 2017 (and was also subsequently named the winner of the 2021 marathon when the original winner, Diana Kipyokei of Kenya, was stripped of the title after a positive doping test), and Americans Emma Bates, who was fifth last year in 2:22:10, and Sara Hall, who finished fifth in the U.S. Olympic Trials Marathon (2:26:06) on Feb. 3.

Lokedi understands what she’s up against–not just the highly competitive field, but also the difficulty of the hilly point-to-point course, which starts in Hopkinton and finishes in the heart of the city on Boylston Street near Copley Square.

“Boston is a different animal, but I’m always excited for a challenge,” says Lokedi. She told Canadian Running she will be wearing Under Armour’s newest carbon-plated model, the Velociti Elite 2. “It has the soft foam I like, and they make me feel fast.”

The Canadian elites

There is a large Canadian presence in Boston this year, which was supposed to be led by (now) three-time Olympian Malindi Elmore, but due to a nagging hamstring injury, Elmore decided to withdraw from the Boston field to focus on her preparations for Paris.

Malindi Elmore pulls out of Boston Marathon due to hamstring injury

Quebec’s Anne-Marie Comeau will lead the way for the Canadian women’s contingent in her fourth career marathon and first major. Comeau is coming off a second-place finish at the Canadian Marathon Championships in Toronto last fall, where she ran 2:34:51 to take six minutes off her previous best. A fun fact about Comeau is that she’s a multi-sport athlete; she competed in cross-country skiing at the 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang and was the top Canadian woman at the 2023 World Mountain and Trail Running Championships in Innsbruck, Austria.

Joining Comeau on the elite list are Toronto’s Krezonoski twins, Michelle and Kim, who will be running Boston for the first time. It will be Michelle’s return to the marathon distance after an injury last year kept her out of the TCS Toronto Waterfront Marathon. Her personal best of 2:36:39 is from the California International Marathon in 2022–the same place that Kim ran her PB of 2:37:20.

How to watch

The 2024 Boston Marathon will be broadcasted live on TSN 5 at 8:30 a.m. ET on Monday, April 15. The professional women’s race will begin at 9:47 a.m. ET and will likely conclude around noon. The men’s race will begin 10 minutes earlier, at 9:37 a.m.

Canadian Running is at the 2024 Boston Marathon with Under Armour to celebrate the launch of the Velociti Elite 2, the brand’s fastest carbon racing shoe to date. Be sure to stay plugged into our socials on Instagram and X for everything Boston this weekend.