Athletics: Australian worth cheering for

Kerryn McCann narrowly beats Kenya's Hellen Cherono Koskei yesterday. Picture / Mark Mitchell

For just one minute you could almost feel at one with the raucous Australians as 38-year-old marathon-running mother of two Kerryn McCann threatened to sweep you away in a wave of unbridled emotion.

After days of repeatedly standing to yet another rendition of Advance Australia Fair as gold medals were draped over green and gold, this was time, surely, to share more of the glory around.

The opening event of the hectic Commonwealth Games athletics programme gave some hope of that - for all but the last couple of hundred metres of the 42.2km dogfight when, on cue, the Melbourne Cricket Ground exploded.

With a close to capacity crowd of more than 76,000 it was easy to imagine the deafening cacophony of an AFL grand final or one-day cricket international.

But a mum running her 22nd and second-to-last marathon?

The giant screen had whipped the crowd to fever pitch as McCann and Kenyan Hellen Cherono Koskei, who had been hammering it out stride-for-stride for 20-odd kilometres, raced to within the shadows of the "G".

Down the ramp and on to the track at the 300m mark they charged.

Cherono Koskei edged ahead.

Stunned, the assembled burst back to life, the deafening roar thrust McCann, the defending champion, back to the now.

She dug as deep as she had ever had to, found what she was looking for, and roared off.

Well, not quite, but her legs did get her round the bend just a tad quicker than her 22-year-old rival and into the straight, which must have appeared to stretch forever.

Not daring even a quick look anywhere, McCann made it, wobbled a stride or two, slumped to the brick-red track and savoured the moment.

Another sport on the Games programme had produced a first-up Aussie winner.

Swept away by it all, the mere 2secs margin in her modest 2h 30m 54s victory, had whipped the crowd into another frenzy. McCann got to her feet and, on remarkably steady legs, jogged to a back straight family reunion.

A quick hug and a kiss for Mum, husband and 2-year-old daughter Josie and she was off again with son Benton, 8, in tow. They, with Australian flags in hand, did the obligatory lap to set the Ockers off again.

With the end nigh - a fourth attempt in New York later this year beckons as her last run over the ultimate distance - McCann is looking further ahead.

Remarkably, she had not won a marathon before her triumph in Manchester four years ago. She has not won one since.

Before yesterday's race McCann, the oldest member of Australia's 106-strong team, had said: "I don't feel that [my age]. My body is fantastic. But, having said that, the mind is starting to get a bit tired."

After the race, yet another gold medal dangling from an Australian neck, she said simply: "I just want to be a mum, a normal person."

Elsewhere, in the men's marathon, normal transmission resumed with an African one-two but without the bedlam that had erupted minutes earlier.

Winner Samson Ramadhani Nyonyi of Tanzania was born on Christmas Day 1982. He ran more than 3min slower yesterday than his personal best of 2h 08m 01s.

But he still had 34secs in hand in clocking 2h 11m 29s to beat Kenyan Fred Mogaka Tumbo, who improved almost 2 min on what he had done before in claiming silver.

Nearly 3min further back England's Daniel Robinson got home for bronze followed across a bit later by Australian Scott Westcott.

* New Zealanders Rebecca Moore and Liza Hunter-Galvan didn't raise a yelp in the women's race.

Hunter-Galvan cried off with cramp between 30km and 35km after being within sight of the leaders at halfway.

Moore finished 18th in 3h 03m 35s. Only Tanzanian Sarah Majah Selli, thirty-something minutes later, finished behind the New Zealander.