Kenyan runners won both the men’s and women’s titles in the 2008 ING Taipei International Marathon yesterday.
Sammy Chumba won the men’s title with a time of 2 hours, 15 minutes and 37 seconds, while Caroline Kilel took the women’s title, clocking 2:30:44 and knocking 26 seconds off her previous personal best in the process.
Chumba’s countrymen Chelimo Luka Kipkemboi (2:15:43) and Lawrence Kiptoo Saina (2:16:32) came in second and third respectively in the men’s race, while Tabitha Tsatsa of Zimbabwe came second with a time of 2hrs 35mins 46secs and Suzuki Junko of Japan came in third at 2hrs 45 minutes and 25 seconds in the women’s.
PHOTO: LIN CHENG-KUNG, TAIPEI TIMES
Kilel took home NT$1.33 million (US$41,000) in prize money after breaking the 151-minute Taipei marathon women’s record set by her countrywoman Jane Auro in 2006. Chumba collected the first prize of NT$100,000 for his win.
Kilel said she would use her prize money to buy a piece of land in her home country. As a professional athlete, Kilel said, she depends entirely on her sport for a living.
Chumba said he would use his prize money to make improvements to his home and improve his family’s living conditions.
Local marathoner Wu Wen-chien (吳文騫) won the Taiwanese men’s title in a time of 2:17:24, while Hsu Yu-fang (�?�) won the Taiwanese women’s title in 2:47:00. Wu finished fourth in the men’s marathon and Hsu finished 19th in the women’s.
The 2008 ING Taipei International Marathon kicked off at 7am at the plaza in front of Taipei City Hall, with 121,000 runners from 40 countries taking part in five categories of road racing, said ING Antai Insurance Co, a key sponsor of the event.
A record 27,000-plus runners competed this year, representing a year-on-year increase of 30 percent, the ING said.
This year also marked the last time that the annual road race is held under the title of the “ING Taipei International Marathon,” as the company is now owned by Fubon Financial Holding Co (富邦金控), which in October announced it would acquire ING Life Insurance (Taiwan) for US$600 million.
The new owner is expected to continue holding the race, as ING had previously signed a three-year contract with the Taipei City Government, which is still valid next year.
The title, however, may have to be changed.
“We are confident that we will do it well, of course,” Fubon president Victor Kung (龔天行) said in a TV news interview yesterday. “The company is also known for its healthy image.”
ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY SHELLEY SHAN
CHIP WAR: The new restrictions are expected to cut off China’s access to Taiwan’s technologies, materials and equipment essential to building AI semiconductors Taiwan has blacklisted Huawei Technologies Co (華為) and Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp (SMIC, 中芯), dealing another major blow to the two companies spearheading China’s efforts to develop cutting-edge artificial intelligence (AI) chip technologies. The Ministry of Economic Affairs’ International Trade Administration has included Huawei, SMIC and several of their subsidiaries in an update of its so-called strategic high-tech commodities entity list, the latest version on its Web site showed on Saturday. It did not publicly announce the change. Other entities on the list include organizations such as the Taliban and al-Qaeda, as well as companies in China, Iran and elsewhere. Local companies need
CRITICISM: It is generally accepted that the Straits Forum is a CCP ‘united front’ platform, and anyone attending should maintain Taiwan’s dignity, the council said The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) yesterday said it deeply regrets that former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) echoed the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) “one China” principle and “united front” tactics by telling the Straits Forum that Taiwanese yearn for both sides of the Taiwan Strait to move toward “peace” and “integration.” The 17th annual Straits Forum yesterday opened in Xiamen, China, and while the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) local government heads were absent for the first time in 17 years, Ma attended the forum as “former KMT chairperson” and met with Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference Chairman Wang Huning (王滬寧). Wang
CROSS-STRAIT: The MAC said it barred the Chinese officials from attending an event, because they failed to provide guarantees that Taiwan would be treated with respect The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) on Friday night defended its decision to bar Chinese officials and tourism representatives from attending a tourism event in Taipei next month, citing the unsafe conditions for Taiwanese in China. The Taipei International Summer Travel Expo, organized by the Taiwan Tourism Exchange Association, is to run from July 18 to 21. China’s Taiwan Affairs Office spokeswoman Zhu Fenglian (朱鳳蓮) on Friday said that representatives from China’s travel industry were excluded from the expo. The Democratic Progressive Party government is obstructing cross-strait tourism exchange in a vain attempt to ignore the mainstream support for peaceful development
ELITE UNIT: President William Lai yesterday praised the National Police Agency’s Special Operations Group after watching it go through assault training and hostage rescue drills The US Navy regularly conducts global war games to develop deterrence strategies against a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan, aimed at making the nation “a very difficult target to take,” US Acting Chief of Naval Operations James Kilby said on Wednesday. Testifying before the US House of Representatives Armed Services Committee, Kilby said the navy has studied the issue extensively, including routine simulations at the Naval War College. The navy is focused on five key areas: long-range strike capabilities; countering China’s command, control, communications, computers, cyber, intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance and targeting; terminal ship defense; contested logistics; and nontraditional maritime denial tactics, Kilby
RSS