ATHLETICS:FORMER marathon world record holder Khalid Khannouchi has officially announced his retirement.
The Moroccan-born 40-year-old had been plagued by foot injuries and his last marathon was in New York in 2007.
“It was really my feet that betrayed me,” said Khannouchi. “Every time I go and try
to push hard, I get the pain and soreness again. I can’t train hard and if you can’t train at a certain level where you can be competitive it’s not worth it to keep wasting time.”
Khannouchi, who became a US citizen in 2000, set a marathon world record of two hours five minutes 42 seconds in Chicago in 1999, becoming the first man to go under 2:06.
He then bettered his mark in London in 2002 with a time of 2:05.38, beating Kenya’s Paul Tergat and Ethiopian Haile Gebrselassie.
Khannouchi won the Chicago marathon four times between 1997 and 2002 and London once, but never raced at an Olympic Games.
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