Nike's 'Moonshot': What Will It Take to Run a Marathon in Under 2 Hours?

Lelisa Desisa (left), Eliud Kipchoge (center) and Zersenay Tadese (right) are the three

athletes who will try to run a marathon in less than 2 hours as part of Nike's Breaking2 project. Credit: Nike When Kenyan runner Dennis Kimetto passed under the Brandenburg Gate and stormed to the finish line of the Berlin Marathon in 2014, spectators saw an incredible number flash before their eyes: 2:02:57. Kimetto had set an astounding new world record and became the first man to run a marathon in under 2 hours and 3 minutes. And while that feat already seemed superhuman to some at the time, others had, decades earlier, set their sights on a far more ambitious — and perhaps even impossible — goal: breaking through the 2-hour barrier in the marathon. Now, three athletes stand poised to chase down the historic milestone as part of Nike's Breaking2 project. Reigning Olympic marathon champion Eliud Kipchoge, current half-marathon world-record holder Zersenay Tadese, and Lelisa Desisa, winner of the Boston Marathon in 2013 and 2015, will attempt to run 26.2 miles (42.2 kilometers) in less than 2 hours on Saturday (May 6) at the Autodromo Nazionale Monza, a Formula One racetrack located north of Milan, Italy. This weekend's attempt is being heralded as a "moonshot marathon," one that Nike formally announced six months ago to much fanfare. But can it be done? Posting a finish time of 1:59:59 means sustaining a blistering pace of just under 4 minutes and 35 seconds per mile for 26.2 miles. And though shaving 3 minutes off the current world-record time may seem like a small gap to bridge, at this sport's elite level, cutting finish times down by even 1 minute can be a gargantuan effort. [In Photos: How to Build the World's Fastest Marathoner]     https://www.livescience.com/58997-nike-attempts-marathon-under-2-hours.html