Kenan Malik in Pandaemonium:
Some sporting moments achieve mythical status because of their sheer audacity. Muhammad Ali’s ‘rumble in the jungle’ defeat of George Foreman in Kinshasa in 1974 to regain his world heavyweight title comes to mind.
Others astound with a seemingly impossible perfection such as Nadia Comăneci’s perfect 10 in gymnastics at the 1976 Montreal Olympic Games.
And then there are those that astonish by redefining one’s perception of what it’s possible for a human being to achieve.
Eliud Kipchoge’s completion of a marathon in under two hours was one of those moments. People have long dreamt of, even predicted, a sub-two hour marathon. But the possibility of breaking the two-hour mark had seemed more for the imagination than for the road. On Saturday we witnessed imagination being given form.
More here.