Sawe becomes first athlete to run a sub-two-hour marathon in a competitive race

https://www.bbc.com/sport/athletics/articles/crm1m7e0zwzo

by berkeleyjunk • 3 months ago

519 303 3 months ago

https://www.letsrun.com/news/2026/04/15930-sabastian-sawe-sh...

https://news.adidas.com/running/two-adidas-athletes-sabastia...

3 people beat the previous world record in this race! This is some combination of improved tech and extraordinarily good weather.

London is a fast course. Let’s see what happens in Chicago and Berlin. If it was primarily tech that did it, we should see the record fall again.

vessenes• 3 months ago

Don’t forget Yomif Kejelcha who finished in 1:59:41, a world record up until 11 seconds prior. Amazing.

ronbenton• 3 months ago

Imagine having the second fastest marathon time ever yet not winning the marathon you ran it in

m463• 3 months ago

Nobody ever remembers who was in 2nd. sigh.

twobitshifter2• 3 months ago

Apparently 3 people broke the record in the same race!

curt15• 3 months ago

Don’t forget Yomif Kejelcha who finished in 1:59:41, a world record up until 11 seconds prior. Amazing.

In his marathon debut too.

giarc3• 3 months ago

I read that as well... how could it be his first marathon? Or is it his first "big" marathon?

clutter555613• 3 months ago

~~A car going as fast as him would have gotten a speeding ticket in the residential areas of Wales. Crazy.~~

Edit: I was thinking in km/h and mixed it up. Sorry.

edo_cat• 3 months ago

Speed limit is 20mph right? He ran 26.1 miles in 2 hours so average speed is 13 mph

adzm• 3 months ago

Looking this up, fastest human is still Usain Bolt at 27.78mph (at one point in a 100 meter dash)

clutter555613• 3 months ago

Damn was thinking km/h. Thanks for the correction.

not_a_bot_4sho• 3 months ago

Amazing to me that I'll never get my *half* marathon time close to his full marathon time.

nradov6• 3 months ago

A 1:59 half marathon time is achievable for pretty much anyone who doesn't have a serious physical disability and is willing to put in the necessary training. I've done it a few times and have no particular talent for running.

PaulDavisThe1st12• 3 months ago

That's a 9m10sec per mile for 2 hours. While I'd agree that there are millions or even billions of people who could train to do that, I think it's wrong to suggest that "pretty much anyone" could do that.

freediver• 3 months ago

Incredible result! (on the day I did my own 5K pb)

This is a nice video of the last 10 mins of the historic marathon race finish

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1voTDQQQf5g

cowthulhu• 3 months ago

Wow, that’s ~13 mph, basically a full-on sprint for a mere mortal. Absolutely insane.

soupfordummies• 3 months ago

Yeah I can barely even ride my bike that fast much less keep that pace for two hours.

willsmith72• 3 months ago

You must be crawling on your bike I'd love to see that

Cthulhu_• 3 months ago

I'm not a runner at all, but people say that they can do that for like a minute, maybe two at best... and these guys did it for two hours straight.

PaulDavisThe1st12• 3 months ago

The fastest marathoners are moving at 4m30sec per mile or faster.

Very few mere mortals could run that fast for even 100m.

jonplackett4• 3 months ago

Sometimes they have big running machines with a crash mat around them running at 2h marathon pace at running shows. I’ve o ly seen them on video - no one can keep up with it for more than 30 odd seconds. It’s INSANE they are running this fast.

Also bear in mind running a single mile under 4 mins was considered impossible for a long time.

petepete• 3 months ago

There's an interesting video by Mark Lewis on this.

https://youtu.be/xkBmYQucyMs

jmb992• 3 months ago

Very few mere mortals could run that fast for even 100m.

That works out to roughly a 16.7-second 100m. While certainly not crawling, that would be a fairly average pace for a fairly fit middle- to early-high-schooler with a bit of practice.

Yes that’s insane to maintain for a marathon, but it’s not even remotely out of reach for 100m for most relatively-fit people at some point in their lives.

hackingonempty3• 3 months ago

Here's a random high school in Northern California. Everyone on the team is beating 16.7 seconds in the 100m. For the 1600m there are six kids with times under 4m30s and another seven with times under 4m40s, all in the last month.

https://www.athletic.net/team/770/track-and-field-outdoor/20...

* of course one mile is hardly comparable to the marathon that pros are able to sustain such speeds over...

acomjean• 3 months ago

We used to be amazed when I ran cross country in high school that these pro marathoners would best all of us in our approx 5K(3ish mile) races and then go on to repeat that distance multiple times.

It’s totally remarkable.

malbs• 3 months ago

The fastest 1km I ever ran was around 3m20s, I felt like I was sprinting, and was fully cooked at the finish line.

Afterwards I did some quick numbers and realised the average marathon runner was not only going a lot quicker than I was, but they were doing it for a further 41km

fredley• 3 months ago

He did his _last_ mile in 4.17. Insane.

mkl3• 3 months ago

21.19km/h on average, or 17 seconds per hundred metres on average.

croemer2• 3 months ago

No, it's slower than most people's sprints. It's 17 seconds per 100 metres which is slow. Most teenagers can do this starting from rest.

wavemode• 3 months ago

That's literally running a 4:30 mile, 26 times in a row. Jesus.

ccheever• 3 months ago

4:33

almost_usual2• 3 months ago

While consuming about 800 calories.

adverbly• 3 months ago

Wait two runners beat it in the same race?

Was there perfect conditions.or something?

Insane you could run 1:59:41 and not win!

hdndjsbbs• 3 months ago

Pacing is a big part of endurance sport. If you're in the lead you know intellectually you want to pace for sub-2 hours, but if you're watching someone beat you maybe it gives you the extra edge?

It does sound like the course and the weather made it more likely to happen. And technical advances in shoe composition.

PaulDavisThe1st12• 3 months ago

That's not a description of how the pacing for this race actually happened.

The leading men went through halfway in 60 minutes and 29 seconds: fast but not exceptionally so. But it turned out that Sawe was merely warming up.

Between 30 and 35 kilometres, Sawe and Kejelcha ran a stunning 13:54 for 5km to see off Kiplimo. Yet, staggeringly, more was to come as the pair covered kilometres 35 to 40 in 13:42. To put this into context, that time is two seconds faster than the 5km parkrun world record, set by the Irish international Nick Griggs.

It was only after a 24th mile, run in 4:12, that Kejelcha wilted. But still Sawe kept going. Astonishingly, he crossed the line having run the second half in just over 59 minutes.

“Before 41 kilometres, I’m enjoying, I’m relaxed,” said Kejelcha, who had won silver over 10,000m at last year’s world championships.

“My body is all great. At exactly 41 kilometres, my body stopped. I tried to push, but my legs were done.

Sawe, though, powered on to set the fastest official marathon time in history. For good measure, it was also 10 seconds faster than Eliud Kipchoge’s unofficial 26.2 mile best, set in Vienna in 2019.

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2026/apr/26/sabastian-sawe...

rkagerer• 3 months ago

Three of them, actually:

Sabastian Sawe 1:59:30

Yomif Kejelcha 1:59:41

Jacob Kiplimo 2:00:28

The previous official record was Kelvin Kiptum's time of 2:00:35 in 2023. Eliud Kipchoge did 1:59:40 in 2019, but that wasn't record-eligible as it was held under controlled conditions. Source: The article.

mkl3• 3 months ago

Two beat two hours is what they meant.

nradov6• 3 months ago

Weather and course conditions were good but not perfect. There is potential to take a few more seconds off the world record in slightly colder conditions and on a course with fewer turns. I wouldn't be surprised to see someone run 1:58 in the next few years.

ohyoutravel• 3 months ago

This is probably right. We’ll also see at least five unique sub-2s before the end of 2027.

ternaryoperator• 3 months ago

And the only place this appears on ESPN is if you click on "Olympics," which has nothing to do with this race. Where coverage should be: on the home page.

conductr2• 3 months ago

It’s certainly noteworthy and interesting but I could see how Running as sport isn’t popular enough for front page. Especially during NBA and NHL playoffs, NFL draft, and whatever else might be going on.

brewdad5• 3 months ago

If this happened at Chicago, it would be front page news. Boston and NY aren’t WR eligible. Since it happened in London, place it behind soccer in the priority list.

timerol• 3 months ago

This is the most significant record in running to fall since 1954 when a sub-4 minute mile was run. I think running can be front page news once a century

nikcub• 3 months ago

Stunning results at the top of the field. Some interesting takeaways on both fuelling and shoes.

Maurten spent months working with Sawe and other runners getting their gut capacity trained so they could absorb and burn 100 carbs per hour[0][1]

The Maurten research team was embedded with Sawe’s team in Kenya for 32 days across six trips between last and this April. They were training his gut to absorb that load by mimicking race-day protocol in training. The hydrogel technology they have developed over the past 10 years now allows athletes to absorb 90–120 grams of carbs per hour without GI distress.

Second is the shoes. Adidas Adizero weigh 96 grams[2] with new foam tech and new carbon plates

Nike and INEOS spent millions over years to get Kipchoge to a sub-2 in artificial conditions, and now the elite end of the field are knocking that barrier out in race conditions. Unreal.

Running tech and training have been revolutionized in the past few years.

[0] https://marathonhandbook.com/sebastian-sawe-arrives-in-londo...

[1] https://www.instagram.com/p/DXmvAUvkWaq/

[2] https://www.runnersworld.com/uk/gear/shoes/a71129333/sabasti...

edit: correct :s/calories/carbs thanks

nradov6• 3 months ago

The leaders were burning a lot more than 100kcal per hour. I think you mean 100g of carbohydrates per hour.

brianwawok2• 3 months ago

Not burning, eating. They are eating 100g of carb per hour. Burning 1000+ calories.

ekr____2• 3 months ago

Correction: 100g of carbohydrate/hr. That's approximately 400 calories/hr.

groggo• 3 months ago

One gram of carbs is 4 calories., so more like 400 calories per hour.

It was confusing when the running industry switched from calories to grams of carbs, but that's all anyone talks about now.

whycome2• 3 months ago

It’s also confusing that most nutritional labels say “calories” (Cal) when they really mean kilocalories (kcal). And those are different from regular (‘small’) calories (a measure of energy needed to heat 1g water 1c).

1 food calorie as listed on a food label is enough to heat 1kg of water by 1c

justinwp• 3 months ago

It's deliberate, because you generally do not want calories from fat or protein during a marathon or other running race.

mbesto2• 3 months ago

Because calories simply do not matter. At high intensities of working out, it's the amount of carbohydrates you can consume that allow more fuel to be burnt.

"In the aerobic exercise domain up to ~100% of maximal oxygen uptake (VO2max), CHO is the dominant fuel, as CHO-based oxidative metabolism can be activated quickly, provide all of the fuel at high aerobic power outputs (> 85-90% VO2max) and is a more efficient fuel (kcal/L O2 used) when compared to fat."

https://www.gssiweb.org/sports-science-exchange/article/regu...

addaon• 3 months ago

100 g of carbs is 400 calories, not 100.

PaulDavisThe1st12• 3 months ago

could absorb and burn 100 calories per hour

burning a hundred calories an hour is trivial. Most people will burn 100 calories per mile when walking or running, and more if moving as fast as these athletes, and many, many humans can do this for far, far longer than 2 hours.

It's the absorbtion that's the challenge. Maurten is not somehow alone in the particular stuff they've developed - ultra runners are generally shifting up into the 90-120 gram/hr range (or beyond!), using a variety of different companies' products. The gut training protocols for this are widely discussed in the world of running for almost any distance above a half marathon.

loeg4• 3 months ago

burning a hundred calories

GP left out the units but is clearly talking about grams ("absorb ... 100 carbs per hour"), not calories (no one needs training to absorb 25g/hr). Carbs are 4 kcal/g. 100g of carb (400 kcal) an hour isn't replacement level for even casual athletic efforts, but it does mitigate the loss of glycogen in muscle somewhat.

chongli• 3 months ago

Wow so he was absorbing 400 calories per hour with this gel, but he was likely burning 3-4x that amount (or even more) while running 13.1 miles per hour!

bethekind• 3 months ago

Where does discussion on gut training occur? All I know is you need a 5:4 ratio of glucose to fructose? Then when you train, you use the gels and the more you do it, the more capable your gut gets at absorbing without distress.

Is that all the science to it?

wging4• 3 months ago

I've read that even if you absorb it all, there's some question about whether it's useful. This Alex Hutchinson article suggests, among other things, that it may spare your fat stores rather than your muscle glycogen:

Even if you can absorb 120 grams per hour, it might not make you faster. In Podlogar’s study, cyclists burned more exogenous carbs when they consumed 120 rather than 90 grams per hour, but that didn’t reduce their rate of endogenous carb-burning—that is, they were still depleting the glycogen stores in their muscles just as quickly.

https://www.outsideonline.com/health/training-performance/en...

https://archive.ph/Vpk0h

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9560939/

gield• 3 months ago

The last few years, cycling and triathlon have been experimenting with upto 120g carbs intake per hour. Last year, Cameron Wurf ate 200g carbs per hour when he broke the world record for fastest bike split ever in a triathlon (which was broken again a few months later).

alfiedotwtf3• 3 months ago

Is there anything here a people who should be dieting could learn here? I’ve found when running, every 3-4km if I do t have sugars/gatorade my blood sugar gets so low I end up almost confused… running suburban streets is tough because I’ve got to cross the road when I’m midly delirious!

aitchnyu• 3 months ago

What are the long term effects of a lot of processed carbs on the gut?

ChrisArchitect• 3 months ago

Adidas all over this one https://news.adidas.com/running/two-adidas-athletes-sabastia...

canucker20164• 3 months ago

The Adidas Adios Pro Evo 3 - https://news.adidas.com/running/adidas-unveils-its-first-sub...

  adidas introduces the Adizero Adios Pro Evo 3 – the lightest and fastest Adizero shoe ever, weighing an average 97* grams.

  The race-day shoe represents the culmination of three years of cutting-edge research. It is 30% lighter, delivers 11% greater forefoot energy return, and improves running economy by 1.6% compared to its predecessor - making it a record breaker before it’s even laced up.

  The shoe will launch with a highly limited release, with ambitious runners able to sign up for the chance to get their hands on a pair from April 23. This will be followed by a wider release in the fall marathon season. The Adizero adios Pro Evo 3 will cost $500/€500.

For other marathon racing shoes, Google says:

  The Nike Alphafly 3 is the lightest in the series, weighing approximately 7.0–7.7 oz (198–218g) for a men's size 9, and 6.1 oz (174g) for women's sizes.


  The PUMA Deviate NITRO™ Elite 3 is exceptionally lightweight, typically weighing 194g (6.8 oz) for a men's size 8 (UK)

tokai• 3 months ago

Pro cycling has been on the high fueling strategy for a while, with huge results for record times. Its a game changer for endurance sports.

rimliu3• 3 months ago

Can someone explain this in more details? Like will you run out of energy, your result will suffer drastically, anything else?

The reason I am asking - I hike a lot, and for shorter hikes (<35km) I don't even bother with food. Just last Saturday I did 28km hike with 550m elevation gain - last meal I had was 5pm on Friday. No breakfast. No problem. I walk at a brisk (for layman) pace, ~7±2 km/h. Am I missing something by not caring about food there, or for my level of "performance" it does not matter anyway? The original question still stands.

tedggh• 3 months ago

I normally consume 90g of carbs per hour when long distance biking, so do a few other riders I know. No GI issues. I use Skratch some other guys like Precision.

dogmatism2• 3 months ago

Yeah, I just literally use table sugar, which is 1:1 glucose:fructose. Maurten et al using 1:0.8, close enough! And I don't believe the hydrogel thing is any magic, just marketing.

But yeah, this is a thing. There is some gut distress for sure at higher levels of intake. See guy finishing second -- still under 2 hrs! immediately puking, which is fairly common at the high intakes. I've heard of Blumenfeld (the triathlete) taking like 200g/hr or more. Insane. Though he's had some epic GI disasters too, lol.

rpearl• 3 months ago

it is a lot more challenging when running than when biking. The jostling is not your friend.

bluecalm2• 3 months ago

It's much easier when cycling and there is much more freedom with your breakfast choice and timing. You are stable on the bike. When running there are constant vibrations and up and down movement that can easily upset your stomach/intestines.

thefz2• 3 months ago

Maurten spent months working with Sawe and other runners getting their gut capacity trained so they could absorb and burn 100 carbs per hour[0][1]

In trail running especially it's not uncommon to exceed the recommendation of 1g/Kg bodyweight/hour, up to 120g of carbs per hour, for those that can take it.

paganel• 3 months ago

Which is why this feels so artificial and why it’s the 3rd most read article on the front page of the FT. Running as a sport has been very sadly and irremediably gentrified, gone are the days of Zatopek and of Abebe Bikila winning an Olympic marathon barefooted. Fuck Ineos and its owner, too, while I’m at it.

aucisson_masque9• 3 months ago

The Maurten research team was embedded with Sawe’s team in Kenya for 32 days across six trips between last and this April. They were training his gut to absorb that load by mimicking race-day protocol in training. The hydrogel technology they have developed over the past 10 years now allows athletes to absorb 90–120 grams of carbs per hour without GI distress.

That common knowledge, nothing revolutionary here.

There are 2 types of sugar, fructose and glucose, you can max out on glucose around 60g/hour and train you guts to max out also on fucose.

Personally I reached 90g/hour without training, no diarrhea or vomiting.

And you know the best ? White sugar in everyone kitchen is almost perfectly 50% glucose, 50% fructose.

You don't need 'advanced' gel to do that, a bottle of water with 120g of white sugar an hour.

And the shoes, yeah they're light but guess what. Other competitors also have sponsors and excellent shoes, some even run bare feet and yet they don't go faster.

No the real reason why he is able to run so fast is first excellent genetic, that's the common base.

Secondly, excellent training, coaching.

Third, his steroid/peds program is on point and his body is responding well to it.

Typically for endurance runner you want profiles with low natural hematocrit so you can max out on the EPO, but there are also other considerations. For instance, are his tendons responding well to GH and other peptides ?

ragazzina• 3 months ago

Third, his steroid/peds program is on point and his body is responding well to it.

Do you have any evidence of this?

_blk2• 3 months ago

I'm not the expert on the bio but the gel has the advantage of being consumable while running. Try drinking while running. Even at a slower pace it's hard not to spill. If you want the dosage correct you can't spill.

aembleton3• 3 months ago

You don't need 'advanced' gel to do that, a bottle of water with 120g of white sugar an hour.

Did you carry all of these bottles on a marathon? Did you have to stop to get them out of your bag? How did you find drinking whilst running?

I find gels much more compact and for the amount of time I need to run one - over 4 hours there's a lot of weight I need to carry. I can store a lot of them up front in my running vest and keep going.

pfix• 3 months ago

That common knowledge, nothing revolutionary here.

I've never read about that. So it's not "common knowledge" - except maybe in the running community.

I like your comment for putting some facts into place (how far you can go with common options). But as I never heard of this before, I have no idea how common it actually is and the effects and the science around it, what research does say to this, how and why this is used in other sports - or why not.

zackify• 3 months ago

I agree with you. I used maurten 160, 320, and the gels years ago.

Now I just throw honey into water on my runs.

It doesn't upset me even though maurten does feel a little better, its worth saving tons of money over buying maurten

boringg2• 3 months ago

Pushing up to and over 100 is the challenge. If i remember right 90 is 60-30 (gluc and fruc) and the upper limit after that GI distress.

You a cyclist or have you been doing that from running?

From homemade concoctions… you can use maltodextrin for pure glucose.

whycome2• 3 months ago

The hydrogel technology they have developed

At what point is this just a performance enhancing “drug” — what makes something a drug?

adrian_b2• 3 months ago

You certainly do not need an advanced gel, but sugar solution is not the only alternative.

You can make easily and cheaply at home a gel by boiling in water a mixture of corn starch with fructose. The best way is to do this for a few minutes in a microwave oven, because it is fast and reproducible.

This has the advantage that it does not feel so sweet as a sugar solution, which becomes unpleasant in too great quantities.

I am not aware of any other difference in the commercial gels, except that those use pre-digested starch, whose long molecules are broken in shorter molecules, for a decreased time until absorption. I doubt that this short absorption time is always an advantage, because it leads to wider fluctuations in the blood glucose level during periodic feeding.

kakacik• 3 months ago

Do we know of any adverse effects on such long term consumption of that amount of simplest carbs? While good source of immediate energy, simple carbs are basically a slow acting poison to various internal organs and over time bring stuff like diabetes.

Its great they don't sit idly around in the body and get transformed into fat but rather they are burned in muscles, but still flooding body again and again with this may have long term negative effects that far outweigh any health gains gained from doing these sports, even at such intensity.

Definitely not a diet one could recommend for regular sporty guys, unless they are uber-competitive freaks who have to win at all costs.

adrianN• 3 months ago

I don’t think there is any elite level sport that doesn’t trade long term health for performance in competitions.

adjejmxbdjdn• 3 months ago

simple carbs are basically a slow acting poison to various internal organs and over time bring stuff like diabetes.

Do you have any evidence for this? The problem with simple carbs (if you don’t already have insulin issues) is that they’re easy to digest and provide minimal satiety so you end up consuming significant calories.

But as far as I’m aware there is no evidence that they’re worse for you than the rapid calorie addition.

snowwrestler• 3 months ago

These athletes are eating nutritionally complete diets overall. The simple carb intake is a strategy just for the run itself.

That said, pretty much everything about highest-end athletics is net negative for long-term health. It’s incredibly hard on the body to run a marathon in general, let alone at record breaking pace.

bluecalm2• 3 months ago

Race day super shoes certainly help a lot but another difference is that super shoes allow them to train a lot more. Running training is limited by tendons. This is the reason even elite runners often train only 9-11 hours a week while many dedicated amateurs can easily spend 20+ hours per week cycling. This is also the main reason runners "double" that is they run 2 times a day. The body absorbs 2x45 minute session much better than one 1x90 minutes session.

Super shoes are changing the game here allowing for more volume for months without injuries. When you look at Sawe's training his volume is insane. His easy/endurance days are 20km in the morning and 10km in the evening. This is some 100-110 minutes of running on "easy" days. His total time on feet must be around 14-15 hours per week - approaching cycling volume territory (especially when you consider that cyclists do significant % of their volume cruising/descending without putting almost any power at all which inflates the time).

ano-ther• 3 months ago

Re [0] how do they measure this reliably during a race, especially the C-isotopes in the breath?

From the picture it looks like he is only wearing a watch and there is perhaps a little bulge on his left side.

entropiae• 3 months ago

They collected samples every 5k in the 30k long run before the marathon, see Substrate section in http://athlete.maurten.com/

boringg2• 3 months ago

In terms of getting to higher caloric loading due to gut system restraints. It sounds like running has finally caught on to what professional cycling has been doing over the last couple years. Bodies ability to handle high caloric loading is the rate limiting step.

amai• 3 months ago

Not to forget the sodium bicarbonate loading 2h before the start.

soopypoos2• 3 months ago

I hope there was a runner dressed as the finish line

soopypoos2• 3 months ago

too soon

dmurray2• 3 months ago

There's something about the London course today that made for very good running.

Three athletes broke the men's world record. One athlete broke the women's world record, and three were in the all time top 5. An Irish record was also broken, likely other countries too that I'm not familiar with.

Not to take anything away from the achievements. Incredible running.

PaulDavisThe1st12• 3 months ago

One athlete broke the women's world record

Not so. She broke a record for a female-only-pacer marathon time. The women's world record was much, much faster.

ekr____2• 3 months ago

To add some color here: It is very helpful to have someone pace you so that you can run an ideal pace without worrying about whether you are running the right speed. However, the rules require that pacers start with you [0], which means that by definition if you are running faster than anyone has ever gone before you have to run some of the race alone.

However, because marathon are often mixed gender and the best male runners are significantly faster than the best female runners, it is possible for a woman to be paced from the gun to the tape by a male runner. For this reason, there are separate records for the women's marathon for women's only events.

[0] This is one of the things that made Kipchoge's original sub 2 result not record-eligible.

dmurray2• 3 months ago

I stand corrected, but I don't think this changes my point at all.

She broke the thing that the IAAF have gone back and forth on calling "the world record". It's the relevant record for this event - there was no more chance of her beating the man-paced record than of beating the men's record or the Le Mans lap record.

NooneAtAll3• 3 months ago

what does female-only-pacer even mean?

tim3332• 3 months ago

It was good weather for London. Clear skies and cool.

tasuki• 3 months ago

It was good weather for London.

Unusual!

piker• 3 months ago

Insane; and second place was sub-2:00 as well. Relegated to trivia questions for the next decade.

It would be interesting to adjust this speed to account for the insane advancements in shoe technology over the last decade. Could it be as simple as measuring the delta in median marathon performance? Then look backwards to, say, 1996 and see what the technology-adjusted 2:00 mark is.

nradov6• 3 months ago

The confounding variable is higher carbohydrate intake based on optimizing the glucose/fructose ratio and improved techniques for gut training. That happened at about the same time as the new carbon fiber shoes so it's hard to isolate how much impact the shoes had alone.

wry_durian• 3 months ago

I suspect there would be larger deltas due to improvements in nutrition and fueling. As another poster has mentioned, today's runners are ingesting so many more carbs per hour than 20 or 30 years ago. And if doping trends have changed over time, that's another factor. (No clue either way, but it's a potential factor.)

There's been lots of research into shoes though, so you might be able to work something out. For instance Jack Daniels (the running coach, not the beverage!) found that adding 100 grams to a running shoe increased aerobic effort by around 1%.

canucker20164• 3 months ago

Second place male runner was running his first marathon race as well.

Sub-2hr marathon, beat the previous world record before Sunday, on your first try, and you don't win! Bad timing...

Prize money for London Marathon 2026 - https://www.thesun.co.uk/sport/38880592/london-marathon-2026...

Looks like first place male gets US$330K. Second place will get US$180K.

Divide by 2 to get the approximate hourly rate. :)

michaelt• 3 months ago

Could it be as simple as measuring the delta in median marathon performance?

The popularity of running waxes and wanes - and the performance of the median runner varies with popularity.

Back in the 1980s the average half marathon finishing time was 1 hour 40 minutes - whereas today it's a little above 2 hours because there are a lot more people particpating.

UebVar• 3 months ago

This is historic. To put this into perspective for people how to not follow running: This is about about as big as "derGrobe" beating the one-minute-mark in 4b2c.

jonplackett4• 3 months ago

These were Sabastian Sawe's splits

5km - 14:14 10km - 28:35 15km - 43:10 20km - 57:21 Half - 60:29 25km - 71:41 30km - 1:26:03 35km - 1:39:57 40km - 1:53:39 Finish - 1:59:30

Yomif Kejelcha also ran sub-two, clocking 1:59:41 on his debut marathon

You have to feel for Kejelcha - breaking 2h marathon and not even winning the race!

spenjovewkwhalo3• 3 months ago

Posted to my in-laws, who asked how:

Super shoes. Most shoes have carbon plates in them now, they act as a spring, storing energy and propelling athletes forwards.

Better understanding of fuelling. Most athletes are taking between 100-120g carbs (sugar) per hour. Bicarbonate of soda has also been effective.

Better planning tools. Athletes look at elevation, headwind, tailwind and will plan a strategy around going harder into the hard stuff and knowing when they can back off and rest.

And to be honest, probably a metric tonne of PEDs (performance enhancing drugs) - unfortunately this is very common across all sports at the top level.

k2enemy• 3 months ago

Most shoes have carbon plates in them now, they act as a spring, storing energy and propelling athletes forwards.

This seems unlikely to be true, although it is repeated in every article I read about carbon plated shoes. The people that study them in a lab environment seem to disagree. See some of the papers here:

https://www.wouterhoogkamer.com/science2

However, I agree wholeheartedly with the overall points in your post!

spenjovewkwhalo3• 3 months ago

Ooooh, interesting- I’ll take a read, thanks!

I’m guessing like most things of this nature, you’re likely to have super-responders, responders and non-responders?

jimt1234• 3 months ago

I thought those carbon plate shoes were barred from competition???

lukeinator42• 3 months ago

nope, nike vaporflys are super popular. There are usually limits on stack height for many marathons though.

pcchristie2• 3 months ago

Posted elsewhere, they have tightened regulations to clamp down on the "franken-shoes".

40mm stack height maximum One carbon plate only (some shoes were including a second). Must be on sale to the public for < 4 mths before the race in question

Puma makes a shoe that's non-compliant with the above (two plates, not sure about the stack height), for what it's worth.

tejohnso• 3 months ago

Super shoes. Most shoes have carbon plates in them now, they act as a spring, storing energy and propelling athletes forwards.

I wonder where that leaves the barefoot movement. Hype dust?

brewdad5• 3 months ago

Was the barefoot movement ever about running faster? I always thought they sold injury prevention by strengthening tissues that running shoes tend to over support.

dogmatism2• 3 months ago

No competitive distance runner since like Zola Budd ran barefoot or minimal shoes.

The carbon plate revolution is the main driver for drop in times over the last 5+ years

riknos314• 3 months ago

As a 16 year wearer of mostly barefoot shoes, "barefoot" for me is about comfort in general day to day activity. It isn't a specialized tool and certainly isn't the obvious choice for extreme environments.

If I'm going bouldering I absolutely cram my toes into a tiny rock climbing shoe, because it allows me to stand on ledges I couldn't without the extra support from the shoe.

That being said, if barefoot generally feels good to you and you're not chasing the pinacle of performance it's probably a perfectly fine choice for your recreational runs.

ungreased06753• 3 months ago

I still prefer to run in minimalist shoes because I like to feel the ground. The new breed of running shoes seem comically thick to me. I tried a pair for a few weeks, they still feel wrong. If a company would make a low stack height shoe with one of the new super foams, I’d probably buy three.

benhurmarcel• 3 months ago

They never claimed it was faster, but healthier

twobitshifter2• 3 months ago

Well at least on the PED front, saw has been doing an extreme amount of testing to try to eliminate those doubts.

nl3• 3 months ago

probably a metric tonne of PEDs (performance enhancing drugs)

Note that Sawe funded extra testing drug testing for himself for the 2 months before winning the Berlin marathon. The testing followed Athletics Integrity Unit protocols (so surprise testing etc):

https://www.letsrun.com/news/2026/04/how-sabastian-sawe-conv...

rao-v• 3 months ago

This is news to me and genuinely impressive. Putting extra work into ensuring your attempt at one of the few records that will last the duration of humanity is damn smart.

e44858• 3 months ago

Drug testing has its loopholes: https://www.npr.org/sections/thetorch/2016/07/19/486595080/r...

mmooss• 3 months ago

going harder into the hard stuff and knowing when they can back off and rest.

Why is going harder in the hard stuff and easier in the easy stuff more efficient or faster than vice versa? I imagine arguments either way:

Going harder when it's easy gives you higher ROI. Or maybe going easier when it's hard is just too slow. And maybe that is too simplistic: Maybe it depends on how hard; that is, maybe there is a threshold.

bigiain• 3 months ago

Completely uninformed speculation:

Wind drag goes up with v squared, so power required goes up with v cubed.

If you run at 105% speed downhill,that requires almost 16% more power to overcome wind drag. You might be better off running at 100% speed downhill (and "saving" that 16% power), and pushing harder to run as close as you can to 100% speed on the uphill stretches that would otherwise have you running slower than 100%. The power used to increase your potential energy going uphill is "zero sum" because you get it back when you go back downhill -n there no pesky v squared or v cubed non linearity there (assuming the race starts and finishes at the same elevation).

rich_sasha• 3 months ago

A fun little effect is that average speed is time-averaged not distance-averaged. So when you go slower, you lose doubly - lower speed to average and over a longer time (higher weight). Hence one of the reasons why putting more energy into the harder bits is actually optimal.

thinkingtoilet• 3 months ago

Can you not accuse people of cheating unless you have proof?

spenjovewkwhalo3• 3 months ago

Yes, apologies.

shusaku• 3 months ago

Better understanding of fuelling. … Better planning tools.

When I was young everyone acted like running was all about who could endure misery the longest. I think if I had known about these aspects it would’ve seemed more strategic and interesting (especially with smart phones to help). Alas, these days all my effort is in making sure my run doesn’t kill my knees :\

xarope• 3 months ago

the consensus seems to be that the foam itself is the spring (hence the successful adidas evo sl and dynafish xiaonian), and the carbon plate/rod/whatever is more to control/manage that "spring".

xutopia• 3 months ago

Heat training does much of what EPO used to do. It's amazing how much science has caught up in this field.

alex1138• 3 months ago

WHAT???? NO. WAY.

That's not me being sarcastic. I never, ever thought this would happen

mkl3• 3 months ago

Why not? People were not far from it and have been getting closer and closer to it for years. To me it seemed almost certain that it would happen this decade or next.

Metacelsus• 3 months ago

It's always interesting to see East Africans doing so well. Even with technology like advances in shoes and diet/training, genetics is still a huge factor.

Also it must be an crazy feeling to be Kejelcha, the guy who came in 2nd place. It would have been a world record, except for Sawe!

geargrinder• 3 months ago

It was his first marathon, so he is probably thinking next time he will be the one to break the record.

elchief2• 3 months ago

Not necessarily genetic. They run a lot, at altitude, from childhood

kyawzazaw• 3 months ago

i feel like over a time, it becomes encoded

tdiff• 3 months ago

Is it actually allowed to suggest that some races are better than others in some areas?

tialaramex3• 3 months ago

Kinda, sorta. There's a statistical effect here but it's crucial to remember these are outliers and so these people are extraordinary in how far from the median they are regardless of that statistical effect.

It's also worth remembering that "race" is a social construct and is only somewhat correlated to genetics, whereas almost certainly any effect we're talking about here is dominated by genetics, although fun fact, Sawe's uncle is apparently a moderately famous runner and hooked him up with a trainer, so it's not like "Knowing a guy who knows a guy" didn't help and that's way less to do with genetics.

The "scientific racism" of confusing "The world's fastest sprinters tend to be from this Haplogroup" with "Everybody in that Haplogroup is an Athlete and so can't do intellectual stuff" is completely insane, that's how you get "I bet this old white man from a Reality TV show will be a better executive leader than that black politician we had last time".

codezero• 3 months ago

Those shoes are gonna sell like crazy now but it would be hilarious if they were to be found to have been giving an unfair advantage because of some mechanical property of the shoe.

sergiotapia• 3 months ago

what else could it possibly be if not that?

robot_jesus• 3 months ago

Well, the marathon record has been broken 53 times since the early 1900s. So, there are a lot of factors at play. Better training, better nutrition, better tactics, and, yes, better shoes.

The advancements in shoes have made a measurable impact, but there are lots of optimizations being worked on.

jonplackett4• 3 months ago

There’s info in one of the other threads about better carb intake too.

But yeah at this point, “it’s the shoes, stupid” should defo be the main part of the conversation.

icegreentea2• 3 months ago

Reviews say that they have very very good, but not record breaking energy return and shock absorption. But what they are is insanely light at sub 100g.

https://runrepeat.com/adidas-adizero-adios-pro-evo-3

parsimo20102• 3 months ago

For a while it was all about getting the lightest shoes, because picking up heavy shoes slowed you down. Then the energy return (pebax foam, carbon plates/rods) became the main focus because the weight didn't matter as much when the shoe was literally springy. Surely this is now going to spark a race for the optimal balance between weight and energy return.

mbesto2• 3 months ago

The Nike Zoom Vaporfly's already had set this precedent years ago: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/07/18/upshot/nike-v...

The big improvement then was a carbon plate. Adidas (and others) followed suit. The subsequent improvements since then have been marginal but the margins are thin at that level. In this case the big advancement has been the weight of the shoe.

EDIT: Also it's worth noting these shoes are $500 retail. Adidas will for sure get a boost in sales from this, but there's definitely competition in the $200~$300 marathon running shoe space that won't solely draw everyone to Adidas)

pclmulqdq2• 3 months ago

Do these new Adidas shoes have anything major over the Vaporfly shoes? Maybe they are a bit lighter?

I think the big story here may be the nutrition science to get these guys to absorb a lot of carbs during the run, more than the shoes.

loloquwowndueo• 3 months ago

Well if they’re sold in stores and next year everyone will have a pair, then it’s not going to be an unfair advantage, is it?

colechristensen• 3 months ago

There is a whole class of running shoes banned from various competitions.

Essentially the argument given was too much advantage came from the shoes and they didn't want racing to be about shoe technology development.

signorovitch• 3 months ago

Feel a bit bad for Yomif Kejelcha who also broke the 2-hour mark, with this being his first competition marathon, but managed to neither break a record nor win.

MengerSponge• 3 months ago

Real "Bad Luck Brian" energy

https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/bad-luck-brian

parsimo20102• 3 months ago

While that seems like a bummer, as long as he doesn't quit he'll have many more chances to set the record himself.

darth_avocado• 3 months ago

While I know competitors want to always strive to be the best, as a completely normal human who struggles to complete a half marathon under two hours, I do not feel bad for the guy. He’s still one of the only two people to do it (outside of the very controlled run from Kipchoge). Not a feat to feel bad about at all.

cflewis• 3 months ago

The majority of people in the world cannot complete a half marathon, let alone under two hours. I was pleased to train enough that I managed under three. You're doing great!

potamic• 3 months ago

There is the silver medal syndrome.

Aurornis• 3 months ago

I'll admit I'm not familiar with running, but in other sports it's not uncommon for amazing early career athletes to hold back a little bit on their first attempts.

It's easier to draw attention (and therefore sponsorships) if you leave some room to improve on successive attempts. It's riskier to give everything up front and then risk plateauing or regressing in your subsequent attempts.

nerdsniper• 3 months ago

3rd place runner also set a new world record, but just didn't break the 2-hour barrier.

glenngillen• 3 months ago

But he has the best average time of any competitor in the history of the event! ;)

elchief2• 3 months ago

Kipchoge broke 2h a few years ago, but it was on a closed, low altitude track, with a fleet of rotating runners in front of him, providing wind blocking/drafting as well as pacing

Amazing these guys did it in a real race with no one in front of them (at the end at least)

readthenotes1• 3 months ago

A purist might want the athletes to wear the same gear as Pheidippides

jonplackett4• 3 months ago

A purist just wants it to be about the runner not the shoe.

_carbyau_2• 3 months ago

Purism is extremism about a thing. Pick a thing, be purely about that thing.

I used to love F1 for the tech that would filter down to my car in ten years time, but that is not a thing anymore.

I for one love the advances in technology in something as supposedly simple as a shoe. And maybe I'll get to use it on a hike in a few years.

mayneack2• 3 months ago

Why stop there. Why not deny them modern medicine or nutrition?

SecretDreams• 3 months ago

Let's save that for the second act. Need to draw these feats of strength out to sufficiently monetize the experience.

pclmulqdq2• 3 months ago

Such a purist should also note that Pheidippides was likely the runner who ran to Sparta and back, hundreds of miles, the preceding week to ask for their aid at Marathon.

rhplus• 3 months ago

Is there also something beneficial about the shirt he wore? It has a unique embossed pattern on the chest. Is it just a nice design or does it also provide aerodynamic or heat wicking advantage?

https://news.adidas.com/sabastian-sawe---london-marathon/a/0...

double0jimb0• 3 months ago

Good eye! Almost like an inverted golf ball. If I remember correctly from undergrad aero, purpose of dimples on golf ball is to detach/disrupt more of any laminar flow earlier as air passes around the ball, which decreases drag. Golf balls travel way faster than a runner, but possibly still has some minor effect?

cevn• 3 months ago

I can sort of visualize an aero improvement. If wind hits you flat on it goes all around and right against you, and it can bump into itself and then back on you since it's almost directionless. However if you have 'needles' coming out it gives the wind a 'direction' other than straight at you, lessening the pressure against your front.

bbcc902• 3 months ago

I'm a runner, and it's a bit sad that distance running is not longer purely about the runner.

Based on the quote below, next thing we will see is a "constructors championship" similar to F1 for winning shoe constructor in the 'major' marathons :-(.

" This dominance continued in 2024, with adidas athletes wearing Adizero models winning six out of 12 World Major Marathons – more than any other brand."

and yes, of course i race in super shoes :-).

nerder92• 3 months ago

It was never about the runner, it has always been about technology and innovation. Shoes tech is just one of them. Better nutrition, novel training techniques, better air quality etc.

Of course innovation in shoes will have a bigger marginal impact (because physics).

bbcc902• 3 months ago

For sure but most of that innovation pre-super shoes was optimizing the runner, not the shoes

foxglacier• 3 months ago

Of course it's also about the runner, that's why the Kenyan models dominate with their biological innovation.

jampekka• 3 months ago

Can't help but think that the wins and records done barefoot and without refreshments in the 1960s are still a bit more about the runner than running with essentially spring loaded shoes, lab-optimized nutrition gels, computer optimized pacing strategies and multisensor real-time measurement devices.

It's also somewhat ironic for a race supposedly modeling a messenger running the distance in an emergency situation.

jfengel• 3 months ago

The winner is doing a completely different sport from me. I never even see the winners at a marathon. They are long gone by the time I get to the start line, and they've gone home by the time I finish.

There are age group leaders as well. That's perhaps a hundred people, of the tens of thousands running next to me.

Marathons are about running my own pace. The fact that there exists a world record is a piece of trivia.

aembleton3• 3 months ago

Marathons are about running my own pace. The fact that there exists a world record is a piece of trivia.

I do find the record fascinating. If I take the 5k, 10k and half-marathon world records and double them then I can run faster than that. But for the marathon I'm a long way off. There's something uniquely difficult about it because it's not just going for a run, but fuelling and training your gut and pacing. I've only done 2 marathons, but I do find them uniquely difficult so for me its extra special to see how fast a human can do it in.

mellosouls• 3 months ago

Great achievement. Worth remembering also the previous world record holder, Kelvin Kiptum who sadly died at 24 in a car accident a couple of years ago.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kelvin_Kiptum

zhoujing204• 3 months ago

Previous research indicates improvements of 2–4% in running economy (RE), which translates into an approximate 1–2% improvement in running performance when running in these shoes.

- https://www.mdpi.com/2813-0413/5/1/2

- https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29143929/

- https://sportrxiv.org/index.php/server/preprint/view/297

Daz912• 3 months ago

Capitalism does it again

aucisson_masque9• 3 months ago

He is the Armstrong of running, popularity wise and other things...

geoffbp• 3 months ago

Very cool, amazing!

What effects does marathon running have on the body long term?

kwar13• 3 months ago

2:50m/km. most people couldn't sustain that pace for even 2 minutes. id go as far as saying most people couldn't close their eyes and imagine consistently how fast that is.

dwayne_dibley2• 3 months ago

Thats my sprinting speed - which I can sustain for around 30 seconds.

Pixelora• 3 months ago

Interesting perspective, thanks for sharing.

Sawe becomes first athlete to run a sub-two-hour marathon in a competitive race

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