[[Image:TV-icon-2.svg|thumb|110px|Official Highlights]]
[[Image:TV-icon-2.svg|thumb|110px|Official Video]]
The Men's marathon at the 2004 Summer Olympics took place on August 29 in the streets of Athens, Greece where one hundred and one athletes from 59 nations competed. Keflezighi caught the fading De Lima as well to take the silver in 2:11:29. Finishing at 2:12:11, De Lima was able to hold off Jon Brown, beating him by 15 seconds for the bronze.
Incident
The event was marked by an incident in which Neil Horan, an Irish priest, grappled Vanderlei de Lima of Brazil while de Lima was leading the event with around 7 kilometers remaining and dragged him to the crowd. Greek spectator Polyvios Kossivas helped de Lima free from Horan's grasp and back into his running. De Lima lost about 10 seconds of time because of the interruption, and finished third in the event with a time of 2:12:11, winning the bronze medal. De Lima received the rarely awarded Pierre de Coubertin Medal for sportsmanship in addition to his bronze.
Despite the fact that the incident had seriously hindered his chances of winning the gold or silver medal, he did not complain and graciously acknowledged the crowd's cheers in the home straight. The protester had a sign on his back that read "The Grand Prix Priest. Israel Fulfilment of Prophecy Says The Bible. The Second Coming is Near."
The phrase "Grand Prix Priest" refers to Horan's previous protest, in which he ran onto the track at the Silverstone Circuit during the 2003 British Grand Prix, intentionally running directly into the path of oncoming cars.
Background
This was the 25th appearance of the event, which is one of 12 athletics events to have been held at every Summer Olympics. Returning runners from the 2000 marathon included silver medalist Erick Wainaina of Kenya and fourth-place finisher Jon Brown of Great Britain. The reigning world champion was Jaouad Gharib of Morocco. There was "no definite favorite" in the field.
Belarus, the Czech Republic, and Saint Lucia each made their first appearance in Olympic men's marathons; East Timor made its first formal appearance, though it had had one Independent Olympic Athlete from East Timor in 2000. The United States made its 24th appearance, most of any nation, having missed only the boycotted 1980 Games.
Qualification
The qualification period for athletics was 1 January 2003 to 9 August 2004. For the men's marathon, each National Olympic Committee was permitted to enter up to three athletes that had run the race in 2:15:00 or faster during the qualification period. The maximum number of athletes per nation had been set at 3 since the 1930 Olympic Congress. If an NOC had no athletes that qualified under that standard, one athlete that had run the race in 2:18:00 or faster could be entered.
Competition format and course
As all Olympic marathons, the competition was a single race. The marathon distance of 26 miles, 385 yards was run over a point-to-point route through the streets of Athens.
Records
, the existing world and Olympic records were as follows.
No new records were set during the competition.
Schedule
The day was "the hottest day ever for an Olympic marathon", just above .
{| class="wikitable sortable" style="text-align:center"
! Rank !! Athlete !! Nation !! Time !! Notes
|-
| ||align=left| Stefano Baldini || align=left| || 2:10:55 ||
|-
| ||align=left| Meb Keflezighi || align=left| || 2:11:29 ||
|-
| ||align=left| Vanderlei de Lima || align=left| || 2:12:11 ||
|-
| ||align=left| Jon Brown || align=left| || 2:12:26 ||
|-
| ||align=left| Shigeru Aburaya || align=left| || 2:13:11 ||
|-
| ||align=left| Toshinari Suwa || align=left| || 2:13:24 ||
|-
| ||align=left| Erick Wainaina || align=left| || 2:13:30 ||
|-
| ||align=left| Alberto Chaíça || align=left| || 2:14:17 ||
|-
| ||align=left| Alberico di Cecco || align=left| || 2:14:34 ||
|-
| 10 ||align=left| Paul Tergat || align=left| || 2:14:45 ||
|-
| 11 ||align=left| Jaouad Gharib || align=left| || 2:15:12 ||
|-
| 12 ||align=left| Alan Culpepper || align=left| || 2:15:26 ||
|-
| 13 ||align=left| Leonid Shvetsov || align=left| || 2:15:28 ||
|-
| 14 ||align=left| Lee Bong-ju || align=left| || 2:15:33 ||
|-
| 15 ||align=left| Ambesse Tolosa || align=left| || 2:15:39 ||
|-
| 16 ||align=left| Gert Thys || align=left| || 2:16:08 ||
|-
| 17 ||align=left| Ji Young-joon || align=left| || 2:16:14 ||
|-
| 18 ||align=left| Antoni Peña || align=left| || 2:16:38 ||
|-
| 19 ||align=left| Grigoriy Andreyev || align=left| || 2:16:55 ||
|-
| 20 ||align=left| Haile Satayin || align=left| || 2:17:25 ||
|-
| 21 ||align=left| Jonathan Wyatt || align=left| || 2:17:45 ||
|-
| 22 ||align=left| Janne Holmen || align=left| || 2:17:50 ||
|-
| 23 ||align=left| Dan Robinson || align=left| || 2:17:53 ||
|-
| 24 ||align=left| Nikolaos Polias || align=left| || 2:17:56 ||
|-
| 25 ||align=left| Ndabili Bashingili || align=left| || 2:18:09 ||
|-
| 26 ||align=left| Pavel Loskutov || align=left| || 2:18:09 ||
|-
| 27 ||align=left| José Rios || align=left| || 2:18:40 ||
|-
| 28 ||align=left| Lee Troop || align=left| || 2:18:46 ||
|-
| 29 ||align=left| Michael Buchleitner || align=left| || 2:19:19 ||
|-
| 30 ||align=left| Anuradha Cooray || align=left| || 2:19:24 ||
|-
| 31 ||align=left| Li Zhuhong || align=left| || 2:19:26 ||
|-
| 32 ||align=left| Joachim Nshimirimana || align=left| || 2:19:31 ||
|-
| 33 ||align=left| Dale Warrender || align=left| || 2:19:42 ||
|-
| 34 ||align=left| Waldemar Glinka || align=left| || 2:19:43 ||
|-
| 35 ||align=left| Jong Myong-chol || align=left| || 2:19:47 ||
|-
| 36 ||align=left| El-Hassan Lahssini || align=left| || 2:19:50 ||
|-
| 37 ||align=left| Michał Bartoszak || align=left| || 2:20:20 ||
|-
| 38 ||align=left| Ahmed Jumaa Jaber || align=left| || 2:20:27 ||
|-
| 39 ||align=left| Ali Mabrouk El Zaidi || align=left| || 2:20:31 ||
|-
| 40 ||align=left| Samson Ramadhani || align=left| || 2:20:38 ||
|-
| 41 ||align=left| Lee Myong-seung || align=left| || 2:21:01 ||
|-
| 42 ||align=left| Tomoaki Kunichika || align=left| || 2:21:13 ||
|-
| 43 ||align=left| José Alirio Carrasco || align=left| || 2:21:14 ||
|-
| 44 ||align=left| Ernest Ndjissipou || align=left| || 2:21:23 ||
|-
| 45 ||align=left| Nicholas Harrison || align=left| || 2:21:42 ||
|-
| 46 ||align=left| Tereje Wodajo || align=left| || 2:21:53 ||
|-
| 47 ||align=left| Aguelmis Rojas || align=left| || 2:21:59 ||
|-
| 48 ||align=left| Abel Chimukoko || align=left| || 2:22:09 ||
|-
| 49 ||align=left| Saïd Belhout || align=left| || 2:22:32 ||
|-
| 50 ||align=left| Matthew O'Dowd || align=left| || 2:22:37 ||
|-
| 51 ||align=left| Juan Carlos Cardona || align=left| || 2:22:49 ||
|-
| 52 ||align=left| Daniele Caimmi || align=left| || 2:23:07 ||
|-
| 53 ||align=left| João N'Tyamba || align=left| || 2:23:26 ||
|-
| 54 ||align=left| Roman Kejžar || align=left| || 2:23:34 ||
|-
| 55 ||align=left| Procopio Franco || align=left| || 2:23:34 ||
|-
| 56 ||align=left| Wu Wen-chien || align=left| || 2:23:54 ||
|-
| 57 ||align=left| Antoni Bernadó || align=left| || 2:23:55 ||
|-
| 58 ||align=left| Julio Rey || align=left| || 2:24:54 ||
|-
| 59 ||align=left| Asaf Bimro || align=left| || 2:25:20 ||
|-
| 60 ||align=left| Sisay Bezabeh || align=left| || 2:25:26 ||
|-
| 61 ||align=left| Silvio Guerra || align=left| || 2:25:29 ||
|-
| 62 ||align=left| Mathias Ntawulikura || align=left| || 2:26:05 ||
|-
| 63 ||align=left| Róbert Štefko || align=left| || 2:27:12 ||
|-
| 64 ||align=left| José Amado García || align=left| || 2:27:13 ||
|-
| 65 ||align=left| Dan Browne || align=left| || 2:27:17 ||
|-
| 66 ||align=left| Han Gang || align=left| || 2:27:31 ||
|-
| 67 ||align=left| Eduardo Buenavista || align=left| || 2:28:18 ||
|-
| 68 ||align=left| Driss El Himer || align=left| || 2:29:07 ||
|-
| 69 ||align=left| Andrés Espinosa || align=left| || 2:29:43 ||
|-
| 70 ||align=left| Mpesela Ntlot Soeu || align=left| || 2:30:19 ||
|-
| 71 ||align=left| Franklin Tenorio || align=left| || 2:31:12 ||
|-
| 72 ||align=left| José Ernani Palalia || align=left| || 2:31:41 ||
|-
| 73 ||align=left| Dmitriy Burmakin || align=left| || 2:31:51 ||
|-
| 74 ||align=left| Mindaugas Pukštas || align=left| || 2:33:02 ||
|-
| 75 ||align=left| Bat-Ochiryn Ser-Od || align=left| || 2:33:24 ||
|-
| 76 ||align=left| Zhu Ronghua || align=left| || 2:34:02 ||
|-
| 77 ||align=left| Alfredo Arevalo || align=left| || 2:34:02 ||
|-
| 78 ||align=left| António Zeferino || align=left| || 2:36:22 ||
|-
| 79 ||align=left| Valery Pisarev || align=left| || 2:40:10 ||
|-
| 80 ||align=left| Zepherinus Joseph || align=left| || 2:44:19 ||
|-
| 81 ||align=left| Marcel Matanin || align=left| || 2:50:26 ||
|-
|rowspan=20 data-sort-value-82| — ||align=left| Hendrick Ramaala || align=left| ||data-sort-value=5:00:00| || After 35 km
|-
|align=left| Zebedayo Bayo || align=left| ||data-sort-value=5:00:00| || After 30 km
|-
|align=left| Hailu Negussie || align=left| ||data-sort-value=5:00:00| || After 30 km
|-
|align=left| Viktor Röthlin || align=left| ||data-sort-value=5:00:00| || After 30 km
|-
|align=left| Al Mustafa Riyadh || align=left| ||data-sort-value=5:00:00| || After 25 km
|-
|align=left| Rômulo Wagner || align=left| ||data-sort-value=5:00:00| || After 25 km
|-
|align=left| Ian Syster || align=left| ||data-sort-value=5:00:00| || After 25 km
|-
|align=left| Zsolt Bácskai || align=left| ||data-sort-value=5:00:00| || After 25 km
|-
|align=left| Azat Rakipov || align=left| ||data-sort-value=5:00:00| || After half
|-
|align=left| Dmytro Baranovskyy || align=left| ||data-sort-value=5:00:00| || After half
|-
|align=left| Rachid Ghanmouni || align=left| ||data-sort-value=5:00:00| || After half
|-
|align=left| Rachid Ziar || align=left| ||data-sort-value=5:00:00| || After half
|-
|align=left| Mustapha Bennacer || align=left| ||data-sort-value=5:00:00| || After half
|-
|align=left| André Luiz Ramos || align=left| ||data-sort-value=5:00:00| || After half
|-
|align=left| Luis Fonseca || align=left| ||data-sort-value=5:00:00| || After half
|-
|align=left| Khalid El-Boumlili || align=left| ||data-sort-value=5:00:00| || After half
|-
|align=left| John Nada Saya || align=left| ||data-sort-value=5:00:00| || After 20 km
|-
|align=left| Gil da Cruz Trindade || align=left| ||data-sort-value=5:00:00| || After 20 km
|-
|align=left| Jussi Utriainen || align=left| ||data-sort-value=5:00:00| || After 10 km
|-
|align=left| Jean-Paul Gahimbaré || align=left| ||data-sort-value=5:00:00| || After 10 km
|-
|data-sort-value=102| — ||align=left| Luc Krotwaar || align=left| ||data-sort-value=9:00:00| ||
|}
References
External links
- IAAF Athens 2004 Olympic Coverage