A round-up of some of the age-group action at Sunday’s marathon

Emma Stepto ran in the Virgin Money London Marathon elite women’s race and with 2:35:41 the 45-year-old retained her overall title to place the top veteran aged 40 or over.

Many eyes were also on senior world marathon record-holder Paula Radcliffe as she made her swansong appearance in the event. The now 41-year-old had told the BBC’s One Show: “My plan is to run the first half and finish strongly.” However, a quicker first half meant that her second half was slower and she wound up a minute down on Stepto’s mark. Nevertheless, Radcliffe s 2:36:55 did earn her the W40 gold medal, despite Achilles problems having interrupted her preparations.

Stepto later tweeted: “Amazing support today, delighted with time and second GB lady. Over moon with team-mates times.”

The men’s veteran race saw a win for Gareth Raven but the Sale Harrier s 2:24:08 was 40 seconds down on the leading M40 time set by 2014 London winner Chris Greenwood in Manchester a week earlier.

Raven went second on the rankings for the year but was much quicker at the half-marathon point after going through in 71:00 but slowed in the second half, particularly near the finish.

Full results can be found here.

See the April 30 edition of Athletics Weekly magazine for more on masters marks together with other reports, news, results and photographs. An online report covering the elite men’s race action can be found here, while an elite women’s online race report is here

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