Elvan Abeylegesse of Turkey clocked a course record and world-leading time of 1:07:07 on her Half Marathon debut at the Ras Al Khaimah race on Friday. (Picture Alliance)

Turkey's 2008 Olympic 5000m and 10,000 silver medallist Elvan Abeylegesse moved up distance and made a sparkling debut at a Half Marathon, clocking a course record and world-leading time of 1:07:07 at the Ras Al Khaimah race on Friday.

She also reduced the Turkish record by the massive margin of more than six minutes.

However, her chances of beating the world and European record of 1:06:25, held by the Netherlands' Lornah Kiplagat since 2006, were hampered by a relatively slow start in comparison to the world record pace set by the former SPAR European Athletics Cross Country Championships gold medallist.

Abeylegesse went through 5km in 16:03, as part of a 10-woman group at the head of the race, in comparison to Kiplagat's intermediate time of 15:38.

Six women were still together as 10km was passed in 31:56, with the Dutch woman having clocked 31:10 en-route to winning the 2006 IAAF World Road Running Championships gold medal.

Abeylegesse passed 15km in 48:03, while Kiplagat had been timed at 46:59, and there were still four others alongside her at that point in the race, but the diminutive Turk speeded up over the final stages of the race and her rivals were shaken off one-by-one.

The last runner to be dropped was Azerbaijan's Mare Dibaba, who was only beaten in the last kilometre, and crossed the line in a national record 1:07:13 for second place.

Abeylegesse's run makes her number four in the European all-time list for performers on unaided courses.

"I now plan to do a 5000 and 10,000 metres double at this coming summer‘s European Athletics Championships in Barcelona but, I think, my debut at a full marathon will have to wait until after the 2012 Olympics," commented Abeylegesse, having got a bronze medal over 5000m at the 2006 European Athletics Championships.

Further down the field the Netherlands' Hilda Kibet, the 2008 SPAR European Cross Country Championships gold medallist, finished seventh in a personal best of 1:08:39, while Italy's Rosaria Console was 12th in 1:11:49.

The men's race was won by Kenya's Geoffrey Mutai in 59:43 with Azerbaijan's Tilahun Aliyev being the first European home and setting the fastest time by a European so far this year when finishing in 11^th place with 1:02:14.