Super shoes and perfect conditions — how Sabastian Sawe broke the two-hour mark at the London Marathon

There’s a saying about London buses which can be adapted for the 2026 London Marathon and the sub-two-hour holy grail: you wait ages for one and then two come along at once.

Nearly seven years have passed since Eliud Kipchoge ran 1:59:40 in Vienna, Austria, at INEOS’ carefully curated 1:59 Challenge. The wait for an equivalent performance in record-legal conditions, while always a case of when and not if, had been getting tantalisingly longer.

That was until Sunday, when Kenyan Sabastian Sawe clocked 1:59:30 in London. Yomif Kejelcha, just 11 seconds behind him, is arguably an even more impressive story — this was the Ethiopian’s marathon debut after years of success on the track and in the half marathon.

Yomif Kejelcha, finishing second behind Sabastian Sawe, also broke the two-hour mark (Warren Little/Getty Images)

Two 1:59 marathons at once, while Uganda’s Jacob Kiplimo also ran under the old world record (2:00:35 by Kelvin Kiptum in 2023) to become the fastest third-placer ever by nearly three minutes.

A quarter of an hour before all this, Ethiopia’s Tigst Assefa had lowered her women’s-only marathon world record. Her 2:15:41 run was nine seconds better than in this marathon last year, and she led Kenyans Hellen Obiri and Joyciline Jepkosgei to sub-2:16 times, the first instance of the entire podium breaking that threshold.

Tigst Assefa broke her own world record (Alex Davidson/Getty Images)

So what’s going on? A few things have happened at once. The conditions are key. Last year London was especially warm and sunny, while winds made things challenging in 2024. Temperatures on Sunday were around 13C (55F) at race start — the elite women went off first at 9:05, the elite men 30 minutes later — and 16C (60F) by the finish.

For east Africans, these are mild conditions. “We saw the weather would be good, all the conditions were in place,” Assefa said, through a translator, in the post-race press conference. She has a tendency to go out fast and try to hang on, running 66:40 and 69:10 for the two marathon halves to win 12 months ago. This year she, Obiri and Jepkosgei were even faster at halfway (66:12). Assefa said pre-race that she was in better shape — the conditions were better too.

Also significant was the calibre of the elite fields and the pack running. Spencer Barden, the head of elite athletes at London Marathon, told The Athletic in a pre-race interview that he makes significant efforts to get the previous year’s champion back. He succeeded with Assefa and Sawe, who retained their titles from 2025 — the first man and woman to do so since Kipchoge in 2019 and Brigid Kosgei in 2020 respectively.

The money now is in the marathon. London pay out five-figure sums for place finishes and will give their winners six-figure rewards for beating time bonuses. It’s why, among others, Kejelcha has stepped up to the marathon aged 28. Kiplimo, at only 25, has made the switch to the roads even earlier than most. Long gone are the days of athletes sticking it out on the track and only racing marathons in their twilight years.

Having strength in depth — Kejelcha and Kiplimo are the two fastest half marathoners ever — ensures packs can be maintained for longer at faster speeds. There’s research from 2015 which, through analysis of World Championship half marathons, identified that pack running produced the fastest finishing kicks and was the best way to sustain speed.

That concept is even more true in the full marathon and it showed in London. “We had a strong team, the pacers did their jobs well,” Sawe said post-race. “I was ready because the pace was so fast, I knew something good would come.” This was his fourth marathon major win from as many races, with Sawe running 2:02 in all of the previous three.

A group of six men went through halfway on target pace (60:30) and, once the pacemakers dropped out, it became about working together. Kiplimo did not go with the breakaway by Kejelcha and Sawe on 18 miles: “It was a little bit too fast for me, because I knew that the guys that are ahead are pushing too fast,” he said. “I’m happy to be part of breaking the world’s record.”

Sawe told reporters that he knew he had won at 40km, because then Kejelcha had finally been broken. “Before 41km, I’m enjoying it, I’m relaxed, my body feels great,” Kejelcha explained. “Exactly at 41km my body is stuck. I feel my power (disappear), I try to push but my leg is stopped, done.”

To run with support that deep into the race makes a difference. Sawe ran splits of 13:54 and 13:42 for the final two full 5km segments, pushing speeds way quicker than 1:59 marathon pace and making sub-two possible — he negatively split the race, running the second-half faster (59:01), and he credited Kejelcha for making it possible.

“He shows me today that he is strong,” Sawe said of the Ethiopian. “We helped each other. He was trying his best, I was trying my best also. Finally, in the last moment, I was stronger. If it was not (for) him, maybe the world record was difficult.”

Obiri and Jepkosgei were both in contention before Assefa ran away from them. Assefa explained her tactics: “The pacemakers dropped out at 27km and I went to the front. I kept the pace going for 3km, but from 36km onwards Hellen (Obiri) took over, at that point I just waited until my final kick.”

At one stage late in the race, the trio were running side-by-side, and were all in contention to win inside the last mile. “Today was special because of the way I finished, I’d been working on my speed and I was able to show how fast I could finish,” Assefa said.

The final element is the shoes. This year marks a decade of the super shoes era, defined by the pivot to chunky, maximalist shoes embedded with a carbon plate. These have revolutionised the sport. Assefa and Sawe produced the 10th and 11th marathon world records since 2017, almost as many as there were from 2000 to 2016 (12).

While it was Nike who broke the market with their Vaporfly, other brands have caught up and Adidas dominate the podiums currently. This London Marathon was no different: champions Assefa and Sawe, plus sub-two man Kejelcha, are all Adidas athletes.

They were wearing Adidas’ newly-released Adizero Adios Pro Evo 3s, an upgrade on the models which were worn for six marathon major wins and six more podium places in 2025. This design has brought in some of the pre-super shoe thinking: that weight matters most.

Adidas have reengineered the foam, the rubber outsole and the carbon elements of the shoe, keeping the chunky design while limiting the weight to 97g — they say it is 30 per cent lighter while giving 11 per cent more forefoot energy return, which equates to almost two per cent improvements in running economy.

“Great shoes for racing, very light,” Assefa said. “Before my coach said you can win and break the world record, it was the confidence from him (that made the difference).”

“It’s very thin, it feels faster. I don’t know, but it’s different,” Kejelcha explained of the Pro Evo 3 shoes.

All these elements came together for the greatest day in marathon history. On their own, each part might account for tens of seconds. Added together, the impact is record-breaking. “It’s something not to be forgotten, it will remain in my mind forever,” Sawe said.