This time, all the straw polls and online surveys I saw found that about two thirds of respondents thought he’d succeed. Two years ago, when Kipchoge was preparing for the Breaking2 marathon exhibition, fans and experts were nearly unanimous in dismissing his chances of even getting close to two hours.
On an intellectual level, I already understood how far the goal posts have moved. The surprise, instead, came the next day in Chicago, when a less heralded Kenyan, Brigid Kosgei, slashed more than a minute off Paula Radcliffe’s 16-year-old marathon world record-a mark some scientists considered intrinsically harder than the two-hour barrier for men. He ran 1:59:40.2 for 26.2 miles, a feat that until a few years ago would have sounded like bad science fiction.
The most surprising thing about Eliud Kipchoge’s barrier-smashing, rule-bending performance in Vienna over the weekend was how unsurprising it actually was.
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