Cleveland Marathon 2015 Results: Men and Women's Top Finishers

Bringing the spirit of marathon running to the heartland, the 2015 Cleveland Marathon took place Sunday. In addition to serving as a launching pad for next year's Boston Marathon, it embraces the spirit of the host city with a rock party at the finish line. 

This year's Cleveland Marathon was won by Kenya's Abraham Chelanga on the men's side and Russia's Tatiana Aryasova on the women's side. The event also includes a 10K run and half marathon for participants who don't feel like tackling 26.2 miles.

Here's the list of top male and female finishers from the full marathon:

Position	Men	Women
1	Abraham Chelanga (2:16:20)	Tatiana Aryasova (2:35:48)
2	Philip Lagat (2:19:41)	Dehininet Jara (2:39:38)
3	Christopher Estwanik (2:21:33)	Hirut Guangul (2:41:36)
4	Chris Lemon (2:22:35)	Julia Roman-Duval (2:53:35)
5	Berhanu Dare (2:25:44)	Gina Bartolacci (2:55:56)
6	Chip O'Hara (2:30:19)	Melody Fairchild (2:58:58)
7	Joseph Hengoed (2:38:30)	Molly Sords (2:59:24)
8	Jeremy Schiele (2:42:04)	Andrea White (3:08:50)
9	Isaac Bryan (2:44:27)	Marina Scheithauer (3:12:45)
10	Jeff Schuler (2:45:48)	Renee Harden (3:16:19)

Full results can be found at the Cleveland Marathon website by clicking here

Starting with the men's side of things, Chelanga had no competition as he approached the finish line. Here's how his final stretch looked, per Alyssa Raymond of WKYC in Cleveland:

Chelanga was more than three minutes clear of last year's champion Philip Lagat, and he set the pace with an average mile time of five minutes and 11 seconds. The 30-year-old's wide lead may have cost him a chance at history, as Tim Warsinskey of the Cleveland Plain Dealer noted after 18 miles he was on pace to break the race's record time:

Pavel Kokin set the Cleveland Marathon record in 2000 with a time of 2:10:29, so Chelanga fell well off the pace in the final seven miles. Yet he breezed so far ahead of the pack that he could have eased up to walk the final half-mile and still won. 

Chelanga was drawing buzz leading up to the race, with race elite coordinator John Tope telling Warsinskey that the long trip from Kenya had to mean something.

"That PR is a little old, but what's got my attention is Chelanga is coming straight from Kenya," Tope said. "Usually, if runners are making that long of a trip, they're in pretty good shape."

It's safe to say that Chelanga proved to be in excellent shape with his first victory at the Cleveland Marathon. 

There was actually less drama for the women, with Aryasova finishing nearly four minutes ahead of Dehininet Jara. The Russian star began to pull away at the halfway point, hitting the mark in just under 77 minutes and made it to the 30K mark in 1:49:48. 

Raymond tweeted out a picture of Aryasova after the race celebrating her victory:

Aryasova has had a tumultuous career, being stripped of the 2011 Tokyo Marathon title and suspended for two years after testing positive for a masking agent, per the Times of Malta. Even though that was her own doing, it's still interesting to see how an athlete responds to adversity like that. 

The veteran distance runner proved that she still has a lot left in the tank with her march through the flat course in Cleveland. Jara continues to be a hard-luck loser, as this marks her second consecutive runner-up finish in this race. 

In the half-marathon run, one of the best stories of the year happened. According to Wale Aliyu of WKYC-TV, seven-year-old Timothy Willoughby ran the race for a friend who was "born with chronic renal failure in one of his kidneys."

Willoughby's mother Nicole ran the race with him. The two finished the 13.1-mile trek in 3.5 hours, which shouldn't be a surprise since Timothy's mom told Aliyu that her son never got winded when they ran 10 miles to train.

"The longest we have ran is 10 miles and that still does not take the wind out of him," Nicole said. "After a run he still doesn't take a nap. He will go out with his friends and keep going for a couple hours. There hasn't been nap time in my house since he was three."

That's what a marathon is about, not to sound like Linus from Charlie Brown. Specialized sports like baseball and basketball aren't made for everyone, but a marathon allows everyone to try something unique and different. 

It's also a way for people to raise money and awareness for a friend or family in time of need. Willoughby may not have won the race, but he certainly came out as one of the best sports stories of the year. 

Chelanga and Aryasova deserve their accolades as well for a fantastic performance in the full marathon. They can take time to enjoy their accomplishment with some of the great music that Cleveland is certain to provide.