Over 55,000 people have taken part in this year’s Athens Marathon across three events, with participants travelling to the Greek capital from 100 countries around the world.

The 36th Athens Marathon kicked off on Sunday morning with 18,750 people taking part in the classic race.

Brimin Kipkorir from Kenya took out the top spot in the men’s race with two hours 10 minutes and 56 seconds.

It was the third best ever time achieved at the event, and 19 seconds shy of beating the record set by fellow Kenyan Felix Kandle who won in 2014, and only one second behind Italy’s Stefano Baldini who holds the second fastest time from the 2004 Athens Olympics.

Coming in second and third not far behind were Ethiopia’s Tesfa Wokneth with 2:12:52, and Asmeraw Mengistu with 2:13:20.

Joining them in the top five were two other Kenyans.

Meanwhile in the women’s race, Kenyan Shelmith Muriuki came first with a personal best of 2:36:46.

In second place was fellow Kenyan Rebby Koech with 2:38:54, and third place went to Greece’s Eleftheria Petroulaki with 2:46:09 – an impressive effort in her first ever marathon.