Letesenbet Gidey breaks Sifan Hassan’s two-day-old 10,000m world record
The previous women’s 10,000-meter record was only set on Sunday, but Ethiopia’s Letesenbet Gidey has already bettered it.
Gidey’s time of 29:01.03 in the Dutch city of Hengelo on Tuesday took five seconds off the record set by the Netherlands’ Sifan Hassan on the same track last week.
Competing in the Ethiopian Olympic Trials, Gidey is now the first woman since Norway’s Ingrid Kristiansen between 1986 and 1993 to hold both the 5,000m and 10,000m records.
She broke the 5,000m record in Valencia, Spain, last October with a time of 14:06.62.
Visit CNN.com/sport for more news, videos and features
“I expected to run the world record,” Gidey said of her performance on Tuesday. “Next, I will try again, to run maybe 28:56.”
Both Gidey and Hassan were wearing “super shoes” with carbon fiber plates embedded in the soles — technology that has been attributed to causing records to tumble in the past few years.
They also used Wavelight technology — flashing lights on the side of the track that provide athletes with an indication of the pace they need to run in order to set a world record.
Gidey passed through the halfway point in 14:42 on Tuesday, slightly behind world record pace. But she upped her speed in the final stages and completed the last lap in 63 seconds to improve on Hassan’s time.
Prior to Hassan, the 10,000m world record had been set by Ethiopia’s Almaz Ayana at the 2016 Rio Olympics.
