Four Canadians place in top 10 at Houston Marathon

It was a day for personal bests for three Canadians at the 2024 Chevron Houston Marathon on Sunday. Cobden, Ont.’s Tristan Woodfine and Thomas Broatch of Vancouver finished sixth and seventh, running 2:10:39 and 2:11:51 respectively. While Leslie Sexton ran to a personal best 2:28:14 for eighth. 

Broatch bettered his former best time of 2:16:25 from his debut in the distance at the TCS Waterfront Marathon in October, while Woodfine bested his time of 2:10:51 at the 2020 London Marathon. “Tristan had to run a lot of time by himself, and there were not many pacers,” said Woodfine’s coach and former Canadian 50K record holder Reid Coolsaet post-race. (Neither runner achieved the 2024 Paris Olympic standard of 2:07:45.)

Big PBs at the @HoustonMarathon for 🇨🇦 men Tristan Woodfine and Thomas Broatch!

Woodfine knocked 12 seconds off his former best. A near four-minute PB for Broatch 👏

📷: @alnbrookes #houstonmarathon pic.twitter.com/IE5or5W38c

— Canadian Running (@CanadianRunning) January 14, 2024

Canadian marathon record holder Natasha Wodak and former national team athletes Leslie Sexton and Lanni Marchant all missed their goals of hitting the Paris 2024 Olympic standard of 2:26:50. Sexton and Wodak still cracked the top 10, with Sexton finishing eighth in 2:28:14 and Wodak ninth in 2:28:42. Marchant finished in 2:38:32 and 15th place.

Men’s race

The top four runners hit the Olympic standard of 2:08:10 at Sunday’s Houston Marathon, with Moroccan runner Zouhair Talbi first over the line in a course record (and personal best) time of 2:06:39.

U.S.-based Talbi, who was fifth at both the 2023 Boston Marathon and Houston Half Marathon, ran a personal best, with second-place Tsedat Ayana of Ethiopia finishing in 2:07.00, and Hendrik Pfeiffer of Germany rounding out the podium in 2:07.14. Pat Tiernan of Australia was the fourth runner in under Olympic standard in 2:07:45.

Women’s race

Ethiopia’s Rahma Tusa won the women’s race in 2:19:33. Tusa is a three-time winner of the Rome Marathon, and was fifth in the 2018 NYC Marathon.

Second-place Vicoty Chepngeno of Kenya was 22 seconds behind Tusa in 2:19:55, and Ethiopian runner Melesech Tsegaye Beyene rounded out the women’s podium in 2:24:50.

Chepngeno, who was making her marathon debut, was the 2022 winner and course record holder of the Houston Half Marathon, where she ran 1:05:03—which is the fastest women’s half-marathon time run in North America.

Non-binary race

Brooklyn, N.Y. runner Erin Anthony won the non-binary division on Sunday in 3:22:37. They were followed by Chicago’s Cynthia Kmak in 3:28:31 and Houston’s Hannah Schaible in 4:19:18.

For full results of the 2024 Chevron Houston Marathon, head here.