Running a lone race, Kjeld Dissing was assured of victory but felt he was denied a record time in the Nike Half-Marathon yesterday. Dissing was disappointed that defending champion Michael Capper gave the Tai Mei Tuk race a miss due to work commitments. Dissing felt Capper's absence was the main reason for his failure to beat the record set by Capper last year. The Dane sprinted to a solo finish in one hour, 12 minutes and 39 seconds, 23 seconds short of Capper's mark. 'I would have liked him to run because we could have pushed each other and finished with a faster time. It was a very lonely race,' said Dissing, 40. 'I took the lead right from the start and there was a big gap between me and the other runners. 'I thought about breaking the record at the start but I bumped into other runners two to three times turning at the five-km mark and that slowed me down a little. When I ran up the dam on the last lap, the winds were strong and gusty. Then I knew my chance to set a record wasn't good.' With his attention turning to international marathons over the rest of the season, Dissing said he did not expect to make a clean sweep of this season's local titles. 'I want to concentrate on next week's Macau International Marathon and February's Hong Kong International Marathon, so I won't train specially for the shorter distances,' he said. In the women's event, Winnie Ng Lai-chu defended her title in 1:25:50.
