Athletics at the 2012 London Summer Games:

The race started in a downpour that lasted for the first half of the race, only to see the sun break through and shine on the runners in the final half. The pre-race favorite was Kenyan Mary Keitany, who had won the London Marathon in April, but her teammates, Edna Kiplagat and Priscah Jeptoo were expected to challenge, having placed 1-2 at the 2011 World Championships. The Kenyan team was so strong that they had swept the medals at Daegu, and third-place finisher Sharon Cherop was not even selected for the Olympic team.

The race started slowly in the rain, and at the halfway point 28 runners remained together. At 25 km Kiplagat made the first serious attack, dropping all but her teammates and the three Ethiopians, led by Tiki Gelana, who had won the Rotterdam Marathon in April in 2-18:58 and won at Amsterdam in October 2011. Russian Tatyana Arkhipova bridged to the leaders at 32 km, and by 35 km, only four were left in the main pack to contest the medals – Keitany, Jeptoo, Gelana, and Arkhipova. Keitany attempted a surge on The Embankment, similar to the one that had won her the London Marathon, but nobody budged. The four went through 40 km together and Gelana then attacked, with only Jeptoo able to respond. Gelana quickly opened about 20 metres on Jeptoo but that margin stayed intact through the finish line, as Jeptoo could not close, and Gelana could not open further, winning the gold medal by five seconds. Behind them Keitany was spent and would drop to fourth, as Arkhipova won bronze.