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Mary Keitany, Wilson Kipsang win New York City Marathon

Wilson Kipsang of Kenya held off Lelisa Desisa to win Sunday’s New York City Marathon.Getty Images

NEW YORK — Wilson Kipsang had held the world record and had won on flatbread courses in London and Berlin but he'd never taken Manhattan, the Bronx, and Staten Island. What he wanted, he said, was a place where he could 'give a real measure of yourself', a hillier layout with no pacemakers and a blast of November bluster. Not to mention a bonus as big as the Ritz.

"The only chance for me to win the jackpot was to win this race," Kipsang declared Sunday after he'd outkicked Ethiopia's Lelisa Desisa to win the 44th New York City Marathon by 11 seconds and collect not only the $100,000 payout but also the $500,000 that comes with the World Marathon Majors title, which he won by one point ahead of countryman Dennis Kimetto, who'd erased his global mark in Berlin in September.

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Taken with Mary Keitany's three-second triumph over countrywoman Jemima Sumgong in the women's race, it marked the second straight Kenyan sweep and helped lift the dark cloud that appeared above the event on Friday when fellow Kenyan Rita Jeptoo, the two-time defending champion at both Boston and Chicago, was reported to have tested positive for doping. "I thank God for this opportunity," said the 32-year-old Keitany, the two-time London victor who was running her first 26-miler since the Olympics after taking a maternity sabbatical.

Keitany, who was third here in 2010 and 2011, had squandered her last opportunity three years ago when she ran at half-marathon pace and was run down by the Ethiopians. This time she was content to bide her time in the middle of the pack, which was the only reasonable strategy on a morning when the temperature was in the low 40s and the wind in the high 20s and the wheelchair start had to be moved off the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge to the three-mile mark.

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It was a day for gloves and long sleeves and knitted hats, when nobody wanted to be the masochist up front amid swirling head and crosswinds, which is why the task in the women's race fell to Portugal's Sara Moreira, who came third in her marathon debut, and why the men passed the lead among everyone from Meb Keflezighi to Nick Arciniaga to Japan's Yuki Kawauchi (running his 10th 26-miler of the year) to Kipsang.

"I tried not to be in the lead as much as I can but sometimes you can't help it," said Keflezighi, the 2009 champion who was in front at 15 miles and ended up fourth behind 2010 titlist Gebre Gebremariam of Ethiopia.

Given the cautious approach that the conditions dictated, the race organizers could have switched off the clock. Kipsang's time of 2 hours, 10 minutes and 55 seconds was the slowest by a winner since Mexico's German Silva ran 2:11:00 in 1995. With Kenyan women's world champion Edna Kiplagat out of contention by the Queensboro Bridge after 15 miles (she'll win the WMM crown if Jeptoo is disqualified) and Ethiopia's Firehiwot Dado and Buzunesh Deba happy to sit back, Keitany saw no need to bust out.

So she waited until the final five miles, after the leaders had re-entered Manhattan from the Bronx, and set off with Sumgong on a side-by-side duel through Central Park. For a short while Sumgong was ahead by a stride or two but Keitany wouldn't let her get away and at 24 miles they were shoulder-to-shoulder again. "I would see if I would go or she would go," said Keitany. When Keitany, who finished in 2:25:07, made her decisive move in the final stretch her rival had no answer. "My tactic was to win," said Sumgong, who lost a dash down Boylston Street to Sharon Cherop two years ago. "But it was Mary's day."

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Their countryman Geoffrey Mutai, who finished sixth in his bid to become the first man to win three in a row since Alberto Salazar in 1982, took his shot coming up First Avenue at 18 miles when the pack still numbered 10. But Kipsang and Desisa hung with him and by the time they were coming down Fifth Avenue they were by themselves.

Desisa, the 2013 Boston champion who'd been craving a bathroom break since the 9-mile mark, was in distress. "My stomach is become big, because I have no relax," he said.

But Desisa had one more surge left in him and in the final couple of hundred yards he took his shot, brushing Kipsang's shoulder as he went by him on the right. "What happened?, Kipsang asked him, and then the Kenyan took off as if he was running the 400.

That's how he did it on the speedways in London and Berlin but no man ever had won those races plus New York until the 32-year-old Kipsang hit his post-Halloween jackpot. He has not yet visited the circuit's ultimate trick-or-treat venue, the one with the spooky names — the Scream Tunnel, Hell's Alley, Heartbreak Hill, the Haunted Mile. Boston always has been the place to give the real measure of yourself.

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Tatyana McFadden and Kurt Fearnley posed with their medals after winning the men's and women's wheelchair division of the 2014 New York City MarathonREUTERS

John Powers can be reached at jpowers@globe.com.