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This weekend, Eliud Kipchoge, Lelisa Desisa and Zersenay Tadese will attempt to run a marathon in under two hours. It\u2019s a bold \u2013 and some say impossible \u2013 goal, and a hell of a marketing campaign for Nike, which has been dumping time, money and resources into Saturday\u2019s event for a few years now.<\/p>\n
The Breaking2 race<\/a> (not to be confused with the mid-80s breakdancing sequel of similar name<\/a>) was announced late last year, but its timing was only unveiled earlier this week, due to a confluence of factors involved in making the conditions perfect for the three runners involved. The event goes down at 5:45 a.m local time in Monza, Italy, just outside of Milan. The actual event will be closed to the public Nike will, naturally, be live streaming the race<\/a>, which kicks off at 8:45PM PT, 11:45PM ET tonight.<\/p>\n So what\u2019s Nike bringing to the table here? Setting is part of story, as is the selection of the three runners from its roster of sponsored athletes. Sixty-five employees have been working on the project, along with a team of researchers at the shoe giant\u2019s Sport Research Lab, poked and prodded around 20 or so candidates to determine who was best suited to hit the goal, based on factors like running economy and VO2 Max, which measures oxygen intake during a workout \u2013 that thing that they\u2019re calculating when runners wear the mask with all the tubes on the treadmill.<\/p>\n