Kim Smith victorious in Sunday’s BAA Half-Marathon

By Peter Gambaccini
Photo by Rowan Greig

Kim Smith and Allan Kiprono will take home $100,000 bonuses after their victories in Sunday’s B.A.A. Half Marathon also gave them the overall women’s and men’s titles in the B.A.A. Distance Medley. The Medley also includes the B.A.A. 5K and B.A.A. 10K, contested earlier this year, and the Medley winners are determined by lowest cumulative time in the three races.

Smith, a New Zealand Olympian based in Providence, Rhode Island, went into the half-marathon with a 16-second lead over Aheza Kiros of Ethiopia. On Sunday, she got clear of Kiros around 14 kilometres in and defeated her by a commanding 1:10:57 to 1:12:50.

Smith, who considers the half marathon “definitely the distance I feel most comfortable with,” managed to make the B.A.A. Distance Medley a priority during an Olympic year, noting, “It all seemed to work out pretty well. The 5K [in April] was early enough in the marathon training where I wasn’t feeling too bad. That’s definitely always going to be the hardest event for me. The 10K [in June] fit in well as it was six weeks out from the Olympics.” For the half-marathon, Smith noted, she “definitely had to come back a little quicker after the [Olympic] marathon, and just kind of balance between recovering from the marathon and getting ready for this race, as well as the New York City Marathon” on 4 November. More

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