Ottawa, Canada - David Cheruiyot successfully defended his title in the 2008 ING Ottawa Marathon today winning a tactical race in 2:10:59 to earn US $15,000.

The ING Ottawa Marathon is an IAAF Silver Label Road Race.

The temperature at the 7:00 a.m. start was 8 degrees but without any cloud cover whatsoever it rose to 17 degrees by the finish.

After the pacemaker dropped out at 24km Cheruiyot followed countryman Vincent Kiplagat and Ethiopia’s 21-year-old Solomon Molla who took turns injecting some life into the race. By 36 kilometres Kiplagat had fallen back and it was a two man race. The pair remained locked in battle until the final 150 metres when Cheruiyot sprinted ahead for the victory, his third in four years. He also won in 2005.

Molla was pleased with his second place time of 2:11:04.8. He goes back to Addis Ababa $10,000 richer.

“I feel good for the win but we missed the course record,” the 38-year-old Cheruiyot said afterwards. “For the course record we needed to be at 1:31 at 30km but we were at 1:33 so I knew that we wouldn’t get the record.”

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