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Yes, you can bet on that: The marathon favorites are both world-record holders

Both marathon fields feature two runners far ahead of everyone else.

The women’s and men’s marathons are two of the final events at the Tokyo Olympics. The women’s marathon begins at 6 p.m. ET on Friday while the men’s marathon begins at 6 p.m. ET on Saturday.

The marathons are not even in Tokyo, either. The course is in Sapporo because of the heat and humidity that has been a staple of these Summer Games. Asking athletes to push themselves 26.2 miles for medals in the tropical conditions would be too much, so it was moved to a milder climate 500 miles away.

The course is a multi-lap one too. Runners will complete one large loop that roughly equals half of the race distance before running two laps at about a quarter of the race distance each. The race will start and finish in Sapporo Odori Park.

The favorite at BetMGM in the women’s marathon is Kenyan Brigid Kosgei (+100). She won the 2018 and 2019 Chicago Marathons and then went back-to-back in the London Marathon in 2019 and 2020. She ran a world-record time of 2:14:04 at the 2019 Chicago Marathon.

Ruth Chepng’etich is the No. 2 favorite at +250. She ran her marathon best of 2:17:08 in Dubai in 2019.

No other woman has odds of +800 or better. There are 10 women listed on the board and any other woman who isn’t listed is at +400.

On the men’s side, 2016 gold medalist and world-record holder Eliud Kipchoge is a massive favorite. Kipchoge is at -200 to win the gold medal. He set the world record in 2018 at the Berlin Marathon when he ran a 2:01:39 to win the event. That was over a minute faster than his previous time. He’s run a marathon in under two hours too. But the 1:49:40 he ran in October of 2019 wasn’t an officially classified event.

Lawrence Cherono is the No. 2 favorite at +300. This is his first race of the year and he hasn’t raced since December of 2020. That race was his only race of the year because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

No other man has odds better than +1100. Like the women’s side, any of the 10 men not listed on the board is available via the field at +400.

Best of Tokyo 2020 Day 13 slideshow embed
Best of Tokyo 2020 Day 13 slideshow embed

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