Mimi Belete Explained

Mimi Belete
Birth Place:	Ethiopia
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Mimi Belete Gebregeiorges (born 9 June 1988) is an Ethiopian-born middle and long-distance runner who competes internationally for Bahrain. She won the 5000 metres title at the 2010 Asian Games.

She moved to Belgium as a political refugee along with her younger sister, Almensh Belete, who is also a runner. It was in Belgium that she began competing: she ran at the 2007 Memorial van Damme in Brussels and was the 2009 winner of the Eurocross competition.^[1] She chose to transfer allegiance to Bahrain in early 2009 and her first outing for her newly adopted country was at the Asian Cross Country Championships, where she took the silver medal behind fellow convert Maryam Yusuf Jamal.^[2] She ran at the 2009 IAAF World Cross Country Championships in March and finished in 28th place. She also qualified for the 1500 metres at the 2009 World Championships in Athletics and reached the semi-finals of the event.^{[3] [4]} At the end of the year she set indoor bests at the 2009 Asian Indoor Games, taking fourth place in the 800 metres and taking the runner-up spot in the 1500 metres behind Liu Qing.^[5]

She started her 2010 with a defence of her title at the Eurocross before going on to take 16th place at the 2010 IAAF World Cross Country Championships in Bydgoszcz.^[4] She improved her 3000 metres best with a fourth-place finish in 8:32.18 at the Herculis IAAF Diamond League meeting in July,^[6] and a month later she ran a personal best of 4:00.25 for the 1500 m, taking second place behind Jamal at the Rieti Meeting.^[7] She was selected to represent the Asia-Pacific team at the 2010 IAAF Continental Cup and came in fourth place in the 1500 m.^[8] Belete won two medals at the 2010 Asian Games in November. She made a team effort with Jamal in the 1500 m and ended up with the bronze medal as Truong Thanh Hang edged her near the finish.^[9] Running in the 5000 m, she managed to fend off an Indian challenge in the form of Preeja Sreedharan and Kavita Raut to secure the gold medal in a personal best of 15:15.59 minutes, completing her first major title win.^[10]

On October 12, 2018, she won the Toronto Waterfront Marathon, with a course record time and personal best of 2:22:28.^[11]

Competition record

2009	Asian Cross Country Championships	Manama, Bahrain	bgcolor=silver	2nd	Women's race
	World Cross Country Championships	Amman, Jordan	28th	Women's race
	World Championships	Berlin, Germany	24th (sf)	1500 m	4:13.30
	Asian Championships	Guangzhou, China	6th	1500 m	4:35.30
	Asian Indoor Games	Hanoi, Vietnam	4th	800 m	2:06.67
			bgcolor=silver	2nd	1500 m	4:19.79
2010	Continental Cup	Split, Croatia	4th	1500 m	4:22.27
	West Asian Championships	Aleppo, Syria	3rd	800 m	2:09.00
			bgcolor=gold	1st	1500 m	4:21.67
	Asian Games	Guangzhou, China	3rd	1500 m	4:10.42
			bgcolor=gold	1st	5000 m	15:15.59
2011	World Championships	Daegu, South Korea	7th	1500 m	4:07.60
2012	Olympic Games	London, United Kingdom	18th (sf)	1500 m	4:05.91
2013	Asian Championships	Pune, India	bgcolor=silver	2nd	1500 m	4:14.04
	World Championships	Moscow, Russia	23rd (sf)	1500 m	4:14.22
	Islamic Solidarity Games	Palembang, Indonesia	4th	1500 m	4:21.10
2014	World Indoor Championships	Sopot, Poland	16th (h)	1500 m	4:16.02
	Asian Games	Incheon, South Korea	bgcolor=silver	2nd	1500 m	4:11.03
			bgcolor=silver	2nd	5000 m	15:00.87
2015	World Championships	Beijing, China	11th	5000 m	15:17.01
2016	Olympic Games	Rio de Janeiro, Brazil	19th (h)	5000 m	15:29.72

Other notable races

Key:

2018

Toronto Waterfront Marathon

Toronto, Ontario, Canada

1st

Women's Marathon

2:22:28

Notes and References

1. Hendrix, Ivo (2009-02-16). Kiprop and Belete are the Eurocross winners in Diekirch. IAAF. Retrieved on 2010-11-28.
2. Negash, Elshadai (2009-03-02). Jamal and Abdullah cruise to title defence - Asian Cross Country Championships. IAAF. Retrieved on 2010-11-28.
3. Hendrix, Ivo (2010-02-26). Matebo, Belete sisters the favourites in Diekirch Eurocross. IAAF. Retrieved on 2010-11-28.
4. http://www.iaaf.org/athletes/biographies/country=0/athcode=237217/index.html Belete Mimi
5. Murali, Ram. Krishnan (2009-10-31). Li Ling's vault victory and Huong's 60m triumph highlight opening day of Asian Indoor Games in Hanoi. IAAF. Retrieved on 2010-11-28.
6. http://www.iaaf.org/competitions/dlm/eventcode=4454/sex=W/discCode=3000/result.html#W3000 Herculis 2010 - Women's 3000 m
7. http://www.iaaf.org/iwc10/results/eventcode=4436/sex=W/discCode=1500/result.html#W1500 Rieti 2010 - Women's 1500 m
8. Mulkeen, Jon (2010-09-05). EVENT Report - Women's 1500 Metres. IAAF. Retrieved on 2010-11-28.
9. http://www.iaaf.org/news/kind=100/newsid=58799.html Jamal captures 1500m title in Guangzhou - Asian Games, Day 3
10. http://www.iaaf.org/news/kind=100/newsid=58829.html Bahrain takes two distance running golds - Asian Games, Day 6
11. Web site: Mimi Belete breaks Scotiabank Toronto Waterfront Marathon record . canadarunningseries.com. 2018-10-21 . 2018-12-04.