Tamirat Tola broke the course record, Hellen Obiri won a dramatic victory and Catherine Debrunner and Marcel Hug set records in the wheelchair divisions. New Yorkers turned out in droves to cheer on the race’s thousands of runners.
From left, Letesenbet Gidey, Hellen Obiri and Sharon Lokedi.Credit...Uli Seit for The New York Times
A decorated women’s field had slowly come unglued over the final few miles of the New York City Marathon on Sunday, to the point where just two runners remained in the hunt for the title.
Hellen Obiri, a two-time Olympic medalist for Kenya in the 5,000 meters and the reigning Boston Marathon champion, tends to run with ferocious power. She does not run a course so much as she attacks it, all arms and legs and palpable determination.
Letesenbet Gidey, on the other hand, seems to cover the ground beneath her with effortless grace, as if her stride were conceived by the distance-running gods. The women’s world-record holder in the 10,000 meters and an Olympic bronze medalist for Ethiopia, Gidey tucked behind Obiri as the finish line came into view.
Their contrasting styles were on full display as Dathan Ritzenhein, Obiri’s coach with the Boulder, Colo.-based On Athletics Club, watched and worried. Before the race, he had advised Obiri to avoid trying to break away until Mile 24.
“I was very much second-guessing whether or not it was the right strategy at that point,” he said.
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This year’s women’s race was oddly slow until the last few miles.Credit...Karsten Moran for The New York Times
Obiri, though, was fearless, and with one final burst of speed before a cheering crowd, she dropped Gidey and charged to a dramatic victory in 2 hours 27 minutes 23 seconds. Gidey finished six seconds back in second place, while Sharon Lokedi of Kenya, who won last year, placed third.
“In a marathon,” Obiri said, “it’s about patience.”
While the women’s race was slow and tactical until the late stages, Tamirat Tola of Ethiopia seized the men’s title by running hard from the start. Tola, who was the world champion in the men’s marathon in 2022, finished in 2:04:58, breaking Geoffrey Mutai’s course record from 2011 by eight seconds. Jemal Yimer, also of Ethiopia, finished second, and Albert Korir of Kenya was third.
Tola had arrived in New York with questions about his fitness after he dropped out of the marathon at the world championships in Budapest this summer. He quelled those concerns as Sunday’s race wore on.
“The people of New York are amazing to give me moral support every kilometer,” said Tola, who added that he had succumbed to a stomach bug in Budapest. “I’m happy.”
Clear skies and mild temperatures greeted a field of about 50,000 athletes who gathered at the base of the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge on Staten Island for their annual pilgrimage across the five boroughs.
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Tamirat Tola led the men’s elite pack from the beginning of the race.Credit...Peter Foley/EPA, via Shutterstock
Among them, Obiri, 33, had redemption in mind. When she made her marathon debut in New York last year, she went out fast before struggling to a sixth-place finish. It turned out to be a punishing experience for a runner unaccustomed to failure.
“My debut here was terrible,” she said, adding: “I didn’t want to come back.”
Ritzenhein recalled that Obiri was so physically and psychologically beat up from the race that he had a hard time getting her to leave her hotel room. But after returning to Boulder, she began training again.
“Sometimes,” Obiri said, “you learn from your mistakes.”
She put those lessons to use in Boston earlier this year when she won her first world marathon major. In the wake of that triumph, Ritzenhein could sense that Obiri felt she had unfinished business in New York.
Sunday’s race was an odd one, though. The top women went out slow — at least based on their standards — which meant that a large leading pack remained intact well past the halfway point.
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Hellen Obiri surged ahead of Letesenbet Gidey to win.Credit...Uli Seit for The New York Times
“It was a super weird race,” said Kellyn Taylor, who placed eighth as the top American woman. “New York traditionally starts off a little bit slow, and then it picks up the second half. This year, it just seemed to lag.”
In fact, the race in many ways did not start in earnest until the leaders covered Mile 22 in 5:18, which was their fastest mile of the morning — and then it only got faster.
Obiri was among those who proceeded to cover Mile 23 in 5:04. By then, only Obiri, Gidey, Lokedi and two others — Viola Cheptoo, the runner-up in 2021, and Brigid Kosgei, a five-time world marathon major champion — were still in contention.
But those surges took their toll on everyone, including Gidey, who tried hard to stick with Obiri on the race’s final climb in Central Park. Ritzenhein was cautiously optimistic since the overall pace had been slower than Obiri’s long runs in training, he said.
“But you never know,” he said. “And then you could see, at the end, that she had a lot of fuel in her tank.”
With about a quarter-mile to go, Obiri was in a full sprint. She peeked behind her at Gidey, who reached down to tuck her necklace inside the top of her singlet as she tried to muster one final burst of speed that never quite materialized.
Afterward, Obiri said she was hopeful that Kenya would select her to compete in the marathon at the 2024 Olympics in Paris: “I’ve shown that I can do it.”
Nov. 5, 2023, 3:36 p.m. ET
Jennie Coughlin
Runners will continue to finish the marathon for several hours. In the evening, many of the pro runners and others will be there to cheer as the final finishers come in -- a tradition that has drawn admirers in other cities too. In 2019, after the London Marathon got a lot of publicity for a poor experience for slower runners, Nick Bitel, the London Marathon CEO, was at the New York marathon finish line.“We saw what New York did to celebrate the final runner, and that really brought it home to us what could be done,” he said Friday at the New York marathon expo. He said London has since adopted many changes to its race to create a similar experience.
Nov. 5, 2023, 3:34 p.m. ET
Lola Fadulu
Steve Espaillat celebrated his 47th birthday by running the marathon.Espaillat, along with more than dozen other New York Police Department officers, ran in honor of Alexis Martinez, a 26-year-old officer who was killed in a murder suicide over the summer.
“We’re here today to honor him,” he said, adding that Martinez’s family was here too.
Espaillat said he was glad that his own family was there to support him too.
“They got to see me in some rough times, and they got to see me crossing the finish line,” Espaillat said.
Running down 44th Drive in Queens, a man juggles as he makes his way toward the Ed Koch Queensboro Bridge.
Nov. 5, 2023, 3:18 p.m. ET
Jennie Coughlin
Andy Crossley, 28, traveled from Australia for the marathon today. He hoped to run in under 2:40 but said his goal "slipped away in the last 10K.”
Still, he would run the race again. This was his first time, but he said he has run five or six other marathons.
“The atmosphere is probably the best” of all of those, he said. “Crowds all the way.”
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Credit...Jennie Coughlin for The New York Times
Nov. 5, 2023, 3:15 p.m. ET
Lola Fadulu
Runners are still trickling in through the finish line. A young boy is jumping and holding three “Happy Birthday” balloons. Volunteers in hot pink jackets and orange hats, are greeting the runners as they walk off the course.
Nov. 5, 2023, 3:15 p.m. ET
Claire Fahy
Quite a few groups of spectators are using karaoke machines to serenade runners while intermittently offering words of encouragement.
Runners near the starting line at Sunday’s New York City Marathon.Credit...Maansi Srivastava/The New York Times
How do you get to be one of the 50,000 runners lining up on the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge in 2024? There are several ways, though not all of the options are still available for next year’s race.
Ways to enter the New York City Marathon
The drawing: In February, the window to enter the lottery will open. New York Road Runners, which organizes the race, will select the lucky winners in March. Pay the entry fee ($295 for U.S. runners who are not members of the Road Runners) and you’re in.
Entrants are divided into three pools: People who live in New York City or within 60 miles of the city, U.S. residents outside the New York City area and non-U.S. residents. But since so many people enter the drawing — more than 128,000 for the 2023 race — you’ll need some luck.
Run with New York Road Runners’ Team for Kids: Each runner who picks this choice must raise at least $2,620 for Team for Kids, which supports the organization’s youth and community running programs. Runners also get coaching and some race-day perks, and they can sign up now.
Run with another charity: The race partners with nonprofits to provide charity bibs. Like Team for Kids, runners must raise money to enter. The minimum amounts vary by charity and can start at $3,000, $4,000 or $5,000. The official list of charities for 2024 has not been announced yet.
Book a tour: Runners outside the United States can book a marathon package that includes race entry through select international tour operators. Those packages must include a “travel package,” which might offer airfare, a hotel stay or both, and they have to be booked through an approved tour operator on the list on the race’s website.
Run a fast half-marathon or full marathon: Unlike the Boston Marathon, the New York race doesn’t require runners to have run an earlier race in a certain amount of time in order to compete. But some faster runners can nonetheless bypass the New York lottery by achieving qualifying times in 2023 races.
Qualifying times must be run in 2023, and times run in New York Road Runners races take priority over other competitions. If the race isn’t run by the organization, the runner’s time must be verifiable online, and the runner must submit that time during the application window in February.
The available time qualifier slots are first-come, first-served for runners who don’t have a qualifying time at a Road Runners event, and the courses must be certified. Required times vary by age group.
Run the race 15 times: Once runners finish the marathon 15 times, they are eligible for guaranteed entry in future years, although handcycle racers and other athletes with disabilities who have entered past races through Achilles International aren’t eligible in this category.
Runners who canceled their 2023 race entry under the official cancellation guidelines can claim guaranteed entry in 2024, but this works only once. If the 2023 entry was a 2022 cancellation, it doesn’t provide guaranteed entry a second time.
There are also some options for entering if runners are willing to wait until 2025.
Ways to enter the 2025 New York City Marathon
Complete the 9+1 program: In a calendar year, if you run nine eligible New York Road Runners races and volunteer at one qualifying event, often a race, you get entry for the following year.
The count resets on Jan. 1 for entry into the 2025 race. Runners also must have an active New York Road Runners membership as of Dec. 31 of the year they complete the 9+1 program.
Run the marathon virtually: There have been multiple virtual options of the marathon the past few years, and one provides a guaranteed entry the following year. The virtual race has to be completed by Nov. 5, and is already sold out, so this is only an option for runners to do in 2024 for 2025 entry.
The New York City Marathon generates a good amount of trash: Last year it was 235 tons, to be exact, of Gatorade cups, squeezed-out energy gel packets, banana peels and spectators’ discarded signs cheering the racers on.
As soon as the first runners start to cross the finish line, over 250 Sanitation Department workers set to work, using mechanical brooms and backpack blowers to pick up the miles of trash strewn across each segment of the race. Come Monday morning, the job is done.
“It’s one of those things that people don’t really think about, but it’s incredible,” said Jessica Tisch, the sanitation commissioner. “Less than 24 hours after 50,000 people have run across so many miles of the city, the entire route is cleaned by the next morning.”
This year, those Gatorade cups will be made from bamboo, and after the race, they will be sent to a farm upstate to be composted. Eighty-one volunteers are stationed at the start line and finish line to sort trash for recycling and composting.
In terms of cleanup challenges, Ms. Tisch said the marathon ranks right on top of the list, along with New Year’s Eve in Times Square.
And while that annual celebration is concentrated in Midtown Manhattan, trash from the marathon ends up in each of the five boroughs.
Runners and waiting family members are sprawled across the stairs at Lincoln Center.
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Credit...Jennie Coughlin for The New York Times
Nov. 5, 2023, 2:49 p.m. ET
Erin Nolan
On Vernon Boulevard in Queens, members of the Selden Hills Warriors — a running club from Long Island — dangled a homemade Super Mario Bros. power-up box over the runners. Whenever a runner reached up and hit the box, a brief jingle from the video game played out of speakers on the side of the road.
“People love it,” said Tommy Haddock, 33, who made the box. “Runners will cross diagonally across the street to hit it.”
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CreditCredit...Erin Nolan for The New York Times
Nov. 5, 2023, 2:41 p.m. ET
Claire Fahy
With the streets surrounding First Avenue closed to traffic, the sidewalks outside local bars are turning into block parties as the marathon wears on.
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Credit...Claire Fahy for The New York Times
Nov. 5, 2023, 2:33 p.m. ET
Claire Fahy
The marathon route along First Avenue runs through the heart of two residential neighborhoods, the Upper East Side and Harlem. That means many New Yorkers are able to watch the race and cheer on runners from the comfort of their own homes — or, at least, their fire escapes.
Namuun Bayaraa, 33, came from California to run and raise money for the Mongolia chapter of Achilles International, which encourages people with disabilities to participate in athletics. People warned her about the bridges, and she said she still hadn’t expected them to be as hard as they were, especially the Queensboro.
“The spectators, the people, really carried me,” she said, especially in the Fort Greene section of Brooklyn.
But her favorite part was at the start, running over the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge. “The Frank Sinatra song, that was great,” she said. “I got goosebumps.”
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Credit...Jennie Coughlin for The New York Times
Nov. 5, 2023, 2:20 p.m. ET
Erin Nolan
A band from William Cullen Bryant High School has been providing a soundtrack for spectators and runners on 44th Drive in Queens since early this morning.
Some 50,000 athletes turned out on Sunday under clear skies and unseasonably warm temperatures to test their endurance in the New York City Marathon. Thousands more lined the racecourse across all five boroughs to cheer them on.
Marathon Day is something of an unofficial holiday for New York City, as people come out with costumes, cow bells, live music and signs to support the runners. Times photographers captured the scenes across the city. Here are some of their photos.
It was hard to miss Mark Aaron Polger, Alexi Pappas and Masashi Kondo at the New York City Marathon on Sunday.
As 7 a.m. approached on Sunday, a crowd of runners stumbled blearily off the Staten Island Ferry in fleece blankets and body glitter. The blankets were for warmth, and the body glitter for morale to help them through the 26.2 miles that lay ahead.
With energy gels and bodega coffees in hand, the crowd made its way to Fort Wadsworth, where thousands of runners congregate each year before running the New York City Marathon.
Speed demons wearing Nike Vaporflys and short-shorts mingled with casual runners wearing “Monsters, Inc.” onesies. Some used their attire to make political statements — flags were plentiful — or personal ones like “It’s my birthday,” which was scrawled in rainbow Sharpie on the T-shirt of a freshly minted 27-year-old. Runners tossed extra layers into donation bins as the morning heated up.
Alexi Pappas, the filmmaker and Olympian, said she was cheered to see the self-expression on display within a sport that could sometimes feel “very furrowed-brow and grit-forward.” Red and blue bows cascaded past a tattoo of the Olympic rings on her bicep. “I believe that joy and performance are not mutually exclusive,” she said.
Below, a twirl through some of the best looks at the starting line.
Adam Tjolle, 53; and Simon Waterhouse, 53
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Edinburgh, Scotland, and Newmarket, England
Where did the hats come from? A.T.: We studied in veterinary school together and just met up here to do the marathon. We thought it would be fun to have some veterinary reference.
How did you decide who would be the horse, and who would be the cow? S.W.: I’m a horse veterinarian.
Are you going to keep them on for the whole race? A.T.: Yeah.
S.W.: I’ve run in a Spider-Man outfit and in a Buzz Lightyear outfit. So the hat is easy.
Do you think you’ll be the fastest runner dressed as a cow today? A.T.: I hope so. That’s the record I’m going for.
S.W.: It’s a small field.
Malina Roberts, 38
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Brooklyn
Tell me about your nails. Since I started doing marathons, me and one of my friends started doing nail tributes. We’re usually repping New York City, and we’ll put how many miles we’re doing. When I did the Tokyo marathon, I put Tokyo on my nails. And I did Berlin too.
How many marathons have you done? This will be my seventh. And my fourth in New York.
What’s the strangest thing you’ve seen someone wear to run a marathon? It’s more about what they’re not wearing. I see a lot of people not wearing shoes. I wonder what that’s about. It’s like, they’ve got a little relationship with the Earth.
Stephen Zachensky, 32
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Westchester, N.Y.
How’d you choose your outfit? The jorts are just because I’m ready to party.
Are they made of denim? Absolutely not. I thought about running in jeans, but then I compromised with these bad boys.
Did you do any training runs in them? No. These are like a tuxedo. You only break them out for the big occasion.
Marlinda Francisco, 43; and Mika Shaw, 31
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Credit...Maansi Srivastava/The New York Times
Tucson, Ariz. and Ogden, Utah
Tell me about what you’re wearing today. M.F.: We are part of the Native Women Running team. Our ribbon skirts represent who we are. Each of us has a different color. We’re representing our families and our different tribes.
M.S.: They’re usually longer, but for our run we made them a little bit shorter.
Do you often wear this necklace when you run? M.F.: In the Tohono O’odham Nation, the seashell necklace is what we wear as we’re running. It reminds us that our men used to run to the ocean and bring back seashells. The seashells also remind us how the ocean sounds as we’re running.
Masashi Kondo, 55
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Japan
Do you usually run dressed as Pikachu? Yes. I first wore a costume for a run 19 years ago, and I got a lot of applause.
Are you going to wear this the whole time? I’m going to take it off during the run. If there’s a child, I will give it to them.
What do you do with the Pikachu hand puppet? Give high-fives.
Alexi Pappas, 33
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Los Angeles
Has the way you’ve dressed for races changed during your running career? Even when I was competing very hard at the Olympic level, the way I chose makeup and chose my clothes felt like a way of staying on my own team. I first wore glitter on my face three New York City marathons ago, when I was coming back from a really serious hamstring surgery. I wanted people to know that I was OK, and I wanted to remind myself to have fun.
Where did you get a shirt with so many bows? It’s from a brand that also makes dresses for lizards. To me it says that you can try hard but have a sense of humor and have fun. And feel fabulous.
Mark Aaron Polger, 49
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Manhattan
What made you choose tie-dye for the marathon? I wear this every single day. It’s not a marathon thing.
Oh! What is it about tie-dye, then? I’ve had a lot of loss in my life, and tie-dye makes me happy. Same with running. Running is therapeutic, even though I’m going to be running really, really slowly.
Interviews were edited and condensed for clarity.
Nov. 5, 2023, 2:10 p.m. ET
Adrienne Grunwald
"More cowbell" says Juan Jose Abreu as he cheers on runners in East Harlem.
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CreditCredit...Adrienne Grunwald for The New York Times
Nov. 5, 2023, 2:10 p.m. ET
James Estrin
Lauren Mask took a break from the race to greet family members who were there with photo cutouts of her.
Alison Mohsen, 37, just finished her third New York marathon. She ran her first two, in 2013 and 2018, in virtually the same time: 3:21 and change. She had a “third time’s the charm” sign pinned to her shirt and said her goal was to break 3:21 this year. And she did: she finished in 3:20.
The third time was indeed the charm.
Nov. 5, 2023, 2:00 p.m. ET
Erin Nolan
It’s been three years since Elaine Cheung first dressed up as a banana at the New York marathon to ensure her friend who was running would see her cheering from the sidelines a little more than half a mile from the Ed Koch Queensboro Bridge.
"It turns out that when you wear a big banana, people start asking you for bananas,” said Ms. Cheung, 35.
She now dons the bright yellow costume and hands out bananas to passing runners every year.
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Credit...Erin Nolan for The New York Times
Nov. 5, 2023, 1:59 p.m. ET
Lola Fadulu
It looks like the final group of marathoners are passing through 4th Avenue and Flatbush Avenue on Mile 8. Whitney Houston’s "I Wanna Dance With Somebody" blared from the nearby stage.
Nov. 5, 2023, 1:57 p.m. ET
Jennie Coughlin
Corey Crouch, of Charlottesville, Va., had a big goal coming into today’s race: a 2:50 finish. But coming off the Queensboro Bridge, his right hip flexor seized up. He fell at one point, and his pace went from 6:30 per mile to 11 minutes over the last 10 miles. He finished in 3:25.
He expects to be out for four to six weeks because of his injury, but he’s not soured on the distance or the course.
“I’m coming back for my revenge,” he said. “It’s going to happen.”
Broadway near Lincoln Center is blocked off to cars, but not pedicabs. With thousands of tired runners exiting, the pedicabs are lined up ready to cart runners to their destination.
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Credit...Jennie Coughlin for The New York Times
Nov. 5, 2023, 1:46 p.m. ET
Lola Fadulu
It’s pretty warm now, in the mid 60s, and many of the marathoners approaching Mile 8 have taken off sweatshirts and jackets and tied them around their waists.
Nov. 5, 2023, 1:44 p.m. ET
Corey Kilgannon
At 97th Street and Fifth Avenue in Manhattan, a running club called Run & Chug is handing out free cups of light beer to runners. The club meets Wednesday evenings to run four miles, and then drink in a bar afterward. They have a few members in the race, but the beer is for anyone who wants it.
One member, Jessica Wilks, said that the group has gotten shut down in the past by the police, but not this year.
She said it helps perk up runners at this late stage in the race, even if they don’t take the beer.
“We hand out light beer," she said. "We’re not giving away IPAs here."
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Credit...Corey Kilgannon/The New York Times
Nov. 5, 2023, 1:36 p.m. ET
Claire Fahy
Gabriella and Emily Tedesco wanted to make sure their sister, Annie, could see them cheering for her in the crowd. So, they dressed up as chickens.
“We needed to stand out for her,” Emily Tedesco said.
Annie wasn’t the only beneficiary. The costumes gave the runners making their way through Harlem a laugh. Some made time for a hug or a high five.
Each year, The New York Times works to print the names of as many marathon finishers as possible.
As some marathoners finish the race, The New York Times is competing in its own race, one to get as many of the finishers’ names and times as possible into Monday’s city edition of the paper.
The list, known as the marathon agate, is a popular memento for runners, and the edition that carries it sees a bump in newsstand sales of almost 50 percent compared with a typical Monday paper.
“Agate” is a newspaper term for information, like sports scores ad stock market listings, that is printed in smaller type.
In this case, the type is just a quarter-inch high, helpful when the goal is to get as many of the 50,000 runners’ names in the paper as time and space allow.
Runners make their way through Bay Ridge in Brooklyn.Credit...Amr Alfiky for The New York Times
Show up at the New York City Marathon, and you’ll be on a first-name basis with many of its runners.
Each year, hundreds of participants introduce themselves in large block letters on their singlets. The shirts function as giant name tags, allowing members of the crowd to call out personalized cheers of encouragement — or frank feedback.
“Pick up the pace, Timmy!” Tim Carvin once heard a stranger yell as he turned onto First Avenue in Manhattan. He did his best to oblige.
Mr. Carvin, 41, who lives in Manhattan, is running his third New York City Marathon and has his name printed on his chest this year.
“You are a participant in the biggest sporting event on the planet that day,” he said. “People screaming your name is one of the really cool aspects of it, especially when it’s people you’ve never seen in areas you’ve never been.”
Some runners personalize their attire themselves using markers, duct tape or iron-on letters. Others go to the professionals.
Gifted NYC, a T-shirt shop in Greenwich Village, has been printing names on marathon singlets for the past 15 years. Douglas John, one of its owners, says he prints about 500 each year. And at Paragon Sports, near Union Square, name pressing was free this year.
Calla Murphy, who organizes Paragon’s run club, said that spectators calling out your name “really gives you that momentum to take that next step forward.” She went with sparkly gold lettering when she ran the marathon last year.
The tradition is much easier for those with short first names, said Geoffrey Wohlgamuth, 40, who lives in Manhattan and has run the New York City Marathon twice. This year, he painstakingly traced each of the eight letters of his name on a sheet of paper to ensure that he could squeeze them all onto the fabric across his torso.
“I am pushing the upper limits of name length,” he said. “I’m nipple to nipple, to be blunt.”
Runners on the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge at the start of last year’s New York City Marathon.
One woman said it was worse than childbirth. Several people had passed out, or laid out, near the Queensboro Bridge. And my heart was racing. I was in tears.
Last year’s New York City Marathon — the hottest in 51 years — was brutal. Everyone agreed that it felt as though New York was against us.
This year, temperatures on marathon Sunday are in the low 60s, ideal running conditions. If only we had been so lucky.
After training all summer, I was in peak form and ready for my second New York marathon. In the first half, I was hitting my target pace and flying by my friends and colleagues in Brooklyn.
But as I approached the Pulaski Bridge, I couldn’t bring my heart rate down and overheated. I slowly trotted the rest of the race, finishing about an hour over my predicted time. I was absolutely crushed.
Running the New York City Marathon is an ode to the city and the streets we know so well, a final performance that is the culmination of hours of training we hoped would pay off in the end.
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My medal from last year’s marathon.
But disappointment fades. What remains are memories of what I love most about running this race in this city:
Laughing at the sanitation workers on the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge holding a sign cheekily saying, “Only 25.2 miles left!”
The children on Bedford Avenue in Brooklyn handing out Halloween candy to runners in need of a sugar boost.
The mother in Astoria, Queens, with an incredible sign that said, “My son runs from commitment and relationships so a marathon makes sense.”
My own friends made signs and followed me as I slowed down, and medics in Central Park gave me ice. It was a reminder that we are all in this together through those grueling grinding miles, putting one foot in front of the other in order to make it to the finish line.
I’m not running in the New York marathon on Sunday, but I will be at Mile 9 in Brooklyn, cheering everyone on as they make their own 26.2-mile journey through the city we love.
I’m rooting for the weather to stay perfect this year.
Staten Island & Start Line
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Athletes wait to begin the race at Fort Wadsworth in Staten Island.
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Runners on the Staten Island Ferry heading to Fort Wadsworth for the marathon.
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Items left on the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge behind the starting line, including water and ibuprofen.
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Athletes from Wave 2 wait in the corrals to begin the race in Staten Island.
Brooklyn
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A water stop in Williamsburg.
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Children in Bay Ridge make signs as the race begins.
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A man crosses Bedford Ave during the race.
Queens and the Bronx
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A runner stretches before reaching the Queensboro Bridge.
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Many runners slowed down as they approached the Bronx because of the high heat and humidity.
Manhattan & Finish Line
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The final stretch! Runners enter Central Park for the final time and head toward the finish.
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Runners receive medals after crossing the finish line in record high heat and humidity.
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Runners stretch and recover shortly after crossing the finish line.
“I’m getting decrepit by the hour,” said Garth Barfoot, who trained for the New York City marathon by running back and forth from his retirement home to a coffee shop.Credit...Natalie Keyssar for The New York Times
Garth Barfoot’s training regimen has been fairly straightforward: daily runs to his favorite coffee shop and back home.
“It’s a decent distance from the retirement home,” Barfoot said.
The 87-year-old New Zealander, who lives in a suburb of Auckland, is the oldest participant at this year’s marathon. About 60 other registered runners are at least 80 years old, according to the New York Road Runners Club.
At just under 3 hours, he was nearing Mile 8 with an average pace of 22 minutes 27 seconds per mile.
This won’t be Barfoot’s first marathon — he says he has run dozens of others, including last year’s London Marathon, which he finished in 8 hours 17 minutes and 19 seconds — but it is his first New York marathon.
“I’m getting decrepit by the hour,” he said in an interview, noting a series of health issues, in recent years, including a heart valve transplant and three hip replacements. “So I’ve got to sort of hurry up and do this race before it’s too late.”
Barfoot didn’t really get into running until his 50s, inspired by his wife, Judy.
These days, though, she doesn’t always support his exercise regimen, he says.
“‘Must you run every day, Garth?’” Barfoot said his wife says, adding, “‘You don’t have to do that — this is a retirement home.’”
He’s the only marathoner who lives in his retirement home, but the routine lifestyle of living there makes training easy, he said.
His running group gets him in touch with younger people, and his runs help him spend time away from the home.
“The ambient noise of old people talking loudly to each other is so much,” Barfoot said.
He has, however, felt a lot of support from his retirement community ahead of the marathon.
“They sort of take a bit of pride in me,” Barfoot said. “I think they think I’m a good advertisement for retirement homes.”
He has one clear goal for Sunday’s race: “I’m looking forward to not falling over.”
Hellen Obiri finished in 2:27:23, breaking ahead of a pack of elite women.Credit...Uli Seit for The New York Times
Hellen Obiri of Kenya separated herself from a decorated women’s field on Sunday to win her first New York City Marathon, winning in 2:27:23.
It was a moment of redemption for Obiri, 33, who had labored to a sixth-place finish on the streets of New York last year in her marathon debut.
On Sunday, though, she exercised patience in the final miles — and even in the final meters, as she pumped her arms and lengthened her stride to break away from runner-up Letesenbet Gidey of Ethiopia, the world-record holder in the 10,000 meters and the half marathon.
Obiri, a two-time Olympic medalist in the 5,000 meters, continues to impress in the marathon. She won the Boston Marathon in April.
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