Six days after Canadian distance runner Rory Linkletter set a private greatest over the half-marathon distance in Japan, he was again on the beginning line at Saturday’s Mesa-Phoenix Half Marathon in Arizona. Linkletter, who’s gearing up for the 2025 Boston Marathon on April 21, gained the race outright with a time of 62:36.
“Two half marathons in 6 days,” Linkletter wrote on social media. “An effective way to transition into the subsequent section of the Boston construct.”
The 28-year-old admitted he hadn’t absolutely recovered from his 60:57 run in Japan the earlier week. Nonetheless, he says he pushed his physique to 90 per cent of his most effort to safe the win. “The target was to run solely as onerous as I needed to to be able to win and observe some racing techniques,” Linkletter wrote on Strava. “I went 10K chill with the group, made a 2-3 min onerous transfer, settled once more after which pushed the final two kilometres.”
Linkletter in the end gained the race by 11 seconds over American-German marathoner Aaron Gruen, who completed second in 62:47.
It’s not typically you see athletes getting ready for races by racing half marathons on reverse sides of the world on back-to-back weekends. Linkletter says his technique was to arrange his physique for the rigours of the 2025 Boston Marathon, now 10 weeks away.
Final fall, Linkletter underwent a big change in his coaching after his earlier coach, Ryan Corridor, stepped away from the game. He teamed up with American marathon coach Jon Inexperienced, who additionally coaches American Olympic medallist Molly Seidel. Below Inexperienced’s steerage, Linkletter completed within the high 15 on the 2024 NYC Marathon, recording the quickest time ever by a Canadian on the race (2:11:45).
Linkletter wasn’t the one Canadian searching for the nice and cozy February climate in Arizona to check their health. Canadian ladies’s marathon file holder, Natasha Wodak, completed fifth within the ladies’s area with a time of 1:11:13. The ladies’s race was gained by American path runner Lauren Gregory in 69:12.
For full outcomes from the 2025 Mesa Marathon weekend, examine right here.