2009.7.7

With the impressive time of 2:26:33, a young runner from Wulanchabu called Zhang Zhenlong won the second Grassland Extreme Marathon held in Xiwuqi on Monday. 13 minutes later, silver medalist Tony Orvain from France came in followed by Jiang Yongliang from Huhehaote.

Except for many local participants, many nationalities such as South Africa, Australia, Sweden etc where represented in the race which also had a 21km and 10km group. Michael Meredith from Australia had been doing the MTB race the days before, but he is actually a runner, and so he did a great performance finishing 5th in the 42km on 3:12:56. Michael said that he was so lucky after he had finished that he almost wanted to cry.

You could find some real marathon enthusiasts in the race among a group of Taiwanese coming especially to participate in the marathon race. Many of them such as Ma Chengfu has done over 70 marathon races. He and the others collect race certificates from each competition they participate in and their goal is to get to a hundred marathons...

Of the runners in the Taiwanese group, Li Jingming had the best time of 3:24.43 and he could along with his friends pick up his Grassland Extreme Marathon race certificate after the run

The weather was sunny all day, and that was perhaps good for Zhang Xiuzhu, the only female participant in the 42km who kept going for 5 hours before she could take a rest and pick up her prize money. Lets hope that there are more women joining her next year!

Click HERE to view the results

Nr. 4014, Zhang Zhenlong impressed by winning the 2nd Grassland Extreme Marathon

Tony Orvain who had three days biking in his legs still had a lot of power to run for a strong 2nd place after Zhang Zhenlong.

Dirk Liedy (GER) came from Changchun to run the 21km with his friend Ronny. Lin Dongcheng came from Taiwan to take part in the 42km. He finished 12.

Zhang Xiuzhu, only female participants in the 42km ran to an unthreatened victory

Runners in the 21km race: Percy Naidoo RSA (front left) and Kenneth Hermansson SWE (back)