| Firehiwot Tufa Dado | |
| Country: |  Ethiopia |
| Birth Date: | 9 January 1984 |
| Birth Place: | Assela, Arsi, Ethiopia |
Firehiwot Tufa Dado (born January 9, 1984, in Assela, Arsi)[1] is a female long-distance runner from Ethiopia, who won the New York City Marathon in 2011 with a personal best time of 2:23:15 hours. She also took three consecutive victories in the Rome City Marathon.[2]
She has also competed in 10K competitions and was the 2008 winner of the Casablanca Women's Run.[3] She made her marathon debut that year at the Košice Peace Marathon and managed to finish as runner-up on her first attempt.[4] She received a late-minute invitation to run the Rome City Marathon in March 2009 and went on to surprise the field by winning the race in a time of 2:27:08 hours – over ten minutes faster than her previous best.[5] Her second race over the distance that year came at the Frankfurt Marathon, where she again finished under two and a half hours to take fourth place.[6] Firehiwot won the Boulogne-Billancourt Half Marathon in November with a course record time of 1:09:26 – the first time a woman had run under an hour and ten minutes at the race.[7]
She fell back in the second half the 2010 Mumbai Marathon, eventually taking fifth place,[8] but returned to form at the Rome Marathon, where she defended her title in a best of 2:25:28 hours She set a previous personal best of 2:25:28 in the classic distance on March 21, 2010, in Rome, Italy.[9] The 2010 Fifth Third River Bank Run saw her break the course record for the 25K race, beating Joan Samuelson's time which had stood since 1986.[10] She won the Florence Marathon that year, beating second-placed Meseret Mengistu by almost two minutes.[11]
Firehiwot took an unprecedented third straight title in Rome in 2011 and knocked over a minute off her best in the process, completing the race in 2:24:13 hours.[12] She established herself among the world's foremost women marathon runners with a victory at the 2011 New York City Marathon, where she held off Buzunesh Deba and Mary Keitany to win in a time of 2:23:15 hours.[13] She opened her 2012 season with a course record win at the New York City Half Marathon, where she maintained a fast starting pace to hold off Kim Smith and set a new best of 1:08:35 hours.[14] The 2012 Boston Marathon was undertaken in warm conditions and she managed fourth place behind a Kenyan trio.[15] She won the 2014 Prague Marathon in a time of 2:23:34 as six Ethiopians finished in the top six in the women's competition.[16]
| Representing | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2008 | Košice Peace Marathon | Košice, Slovakia | bgcolor=silver | 2nd | Marathon | 2:37:34 | |
| 2009 | Rome City Marathon | Rome, Italy | bgcolor=gold | 1st | Marathon | 2:27:08 | |
| Frankfurt Marathon | Frankfurt, Germany | 4th | Marathon | 2:29:20 | |||
| 2010 | Mumbai Marathon | Mumbai, India | 5th | Marathon | 2:33:38 | ||
| Rome City Marathon | Rome, Italy | bgcolor=gold | 1st | Marathon | 2:25:28 | ||
| Florence Marathon | Florence, Italy | bgcolor=gold | 1st | Marathon | 2:28:58 | ||
| 2011 | Rome City Marathon | Rome, Italy | bgcolor=gold | 1st | Marathon | 2:24:13 | |
| New York City Marathon | New York City, US | bgcolor=gold | 1st | Marathon | 2:23:15 | ||
| 2012 | New York City Half Marathon | New York, US | bgcolor=gold | 1st | Half Marathon | 1:08:35 | |
| Boston Marathon | Massachusetts, US | 4th | Marathon | 2:34:56 | |||
| 2014 | Prague Marathon | Prague, Czech Republic | bgcolor=gold | 1st | Marathon | 2:23:34 | |