Ethiopian Tigst Assefa, runner-up at the 2024 Olympics and 2025 World Championships, secured her third Berlin Marathon title yesterday, finishing the race in 2 hours, 11 minutes, and 4 seconds, marking the third-fastest time in the history of the 42.195-kilometer marathon.
Assefa was running about 20 seconds ahead of the world record held by Kenyan Ruth Chepngetich, set at the Chicago Marathon in October 2024 with a time of 2 hours, 9 minutes, and 56 seconds, before her pace slowed in the final three kilometers after suffering an injury to her right leg or foot. She continued the race, limping heavily until the finish line under the Brandenburg Gate.
Assefa left the finish area struggling to place her right foot on the ground, assisted primarily by her compatriot Haile Gebrselassie, the marathon legend and former world record holder, who won the Berlin Marathon four consecutive times between 2006 and 2009.
Accompanied by a pacemaker, Assefa appeared to be in pain as she navigated the final kilometers, having still been 11 seconds ahead of Chepngetich's time at the 40-kilometer mark. She also performed stretching movements for her leg several times while running in an attempt to alleviate the pain.
Despite the injury, Assefa improved her personal best by about 50 seconds, having recorded a time of 2 hours, 11 minutes, and 53 seconds three years ago. At that time, she was the first female runner to break the 2-hour and 12-minute barrier in a marathon.
Since then, two runners have managed to record faster times: Chepngetich in Chicago in 2024, and Ethiopian Fotyen Tesfay with a time of 2 hours, 10 minutes, and 51 seconds on March 15, 2026, in Barcelona.
Adola wins the men's race
Chepngetich is currently serving a three-year suspension, effective from April 19, 2025, due to testing positive for "hydrochlorothiazide," a prohibited diuretic, in a test conducted on March 14, 2025. The Kenyan runner's results recorded before that test, including her world record, remain valid.
Assefa holds the world record for the women-only marathon, having won the London Marathon in April 2026 with a time of 2 hours, 15 minutes, and 41 seconds.
In major championships, Assefa has settled for the silver medal on two occasions, losing by a narrow margin in the final meters.
In contrast, her training partner Guye Adola completed the Ethiopian double, winning the men's race with a personal best time of 2 hours, 2 minutes, and 50 seconds.
This was Adola's second victory in Berlin, five years after his first win, and he finally succeeded in improving his personal record, which he set in his first marathon appearance in the German capital nine years ago.
The race saw the absence of Kenyan Sebastian Sawe due to injury, the first runner to break the two-hour marathon barrier (1:59:30 in London in April), while the pace of the German race remained for a long time at a speed approaching 2 hours and 2 minutes.
