Mumbai:
African domination continued at the Standard Chartered Mumbai Marathon as Kenya's Laban Moiben and Ethiopian Netsanet Abeyo bagged the top honours in men's and women's categories in the ninth edition today.
Among the Indians, veteran long distance runner Ram Singh Yadav booked his berth for the London Olympics.
Moiben, whose previous best timing in a marathon was 2:09:44 -- set in Ottawa in May 2010 -- completed the 42-km race in 2:18:48. He was followed by Ethiopian Raji Assefa (2:10:48) and compatriot John Kyui (2:10:54).
Fatuma Sado (2:30:20) and Makda Harun (2:30:47), followed Abeyo (2;26:12) to complete an all-Ethiopian sweep in the women's category.
The top winners in the two categories got a prize money of USD 36,000 each.
Tanzania's Dickson Marwa and Simon Kasimili were the initial pace setters as they exchanged the lead position during the first 15 km stretch.
However, after the initial surge, Marwa fell behind and it was here that Kyui and Moiben began their domination. It was at about the 30km stretch that Moiben took the lead which he held throughout.
However, it was a close tussle for the two runners-up places which Assefa and Kyui finally managed to grab.
Yadav, who held the course record for the Indians here -- 2:18:03 set in 2009 -- finally fulfilled his potential as he completed the race in 2:16:59, bettering Olympic qualification timing of 2:18 hours.
The Armyman was followed by Elam Singh (2:18:27), who narrowly missed qualification, and T A Rajesh (2:24:25).