We’re simply days away from the primary Abbott World Marathon Main of the autumn season, the 2024 Berlin Marathon, happening on Sunday, Sept. 29. The 2023 race was unforgettable, with Ethiopia’s Tigst Assefa shattering the ladies’s marathon world file in 2:11:53. Whereas there aren’t any marathon world file holders within the 2024 elite discipline, the race is stacked with up-and-coming expertise able to steal the highlight.
The lads’s race
For the previous decade, the Berlin Marathon has been dominated by two of the best marathoners in historical past: Kenenisa Bekele (two-time champion) and Eliud Kipchoge (five-time champion). With each taking time without work after the 2024 Paris Olympics, a brand new champion will probably be topped in Berlin.
The highest contender is Ethiopia’s Tadese Takele, the quickest seed on this 12 months’s race. Takele completed third in Berlin final 12 months with a U23 world-best marathon time of two:03:24. A former 3,000m steeplechaser who represented Ethiopia on the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, Takele’s marathon greatest is over a minute sooner than his nearest competitor, making him the person to beat.
Difficult the younger Ethiopian will probably be a trio of Kenyans: Cybrian Kotut, Josphat Boit and former half-marathon world file holder Kibiwott Kandie. Kotut, who will probably be topped champion of the 2023 Amsterdam Marathon after the four-year doping suspension of Joshua Belet final week, has a private greatest of two:04:34 and enters the race with the second-fastest seed time. Boit, who is thought for pacing Kipchoge to his 2018 Berlin world file, will look to enhance on his 2:05:42 from final 12 months, when he completed thirteenth.
German followers will probably be cheering for marathoner Hendrik Pfeiffer, who had a podium end on the 2024 Houston Marathon and adopted up with a top-10 end on the 2024 London Marathon. He has a private greatest of two:07:14.
The ladies’s race
Though this 12 months’s ladies’s discipline lacks among the greatest names, like Sifan Hassan, Hellen Obiri or Assefa (who’re all recovering from the Paris Olympics), we may witness the rise of a brand new star. Main the cost is Ethiopia’s Tigist Ketema, who clocked the second-fastest time on the earth this 12 months with a 2:16:07 on the 2024 Dubai Marathon in January. Her time locations her ninth all-time in ladies’s marathon historical past and fifth amongst Ethiopian ladies. Regardless of her lack of expertise in marathon majors, if Ketema can match her private greatest on Sunday, the race is hers to lose.
Genzebe Dibaba, the previous 1,500m world file holder, hasn’t but made the affect within the marathon many anticipated. After working a 2:18:05 in her debut at Amsterdam two years in the past, she recorded a DNF in London and completed sixth in Chicago the next 12 months. Berlin’s flat, quick course fits her working model, so this may very well be the race the place Dibaba lastly makes her marathon breakthrough.
Germany’s Melat Kejeta will probably be seeking to rebound from her DNF on the Paris Olympics simply six weeks in the past. With a private greatest of two:21:47 and a podium end on the 2023 Tartan Houses Ottawa Marathon, Kejeta may very well be a dark-horse contender.
There aren’t any Canadian males or ladies within the 2024 Berlin Marathon elite discipline.
The right way to watch
You’ll be able to catch the motion stay on FloTrack beginning at 2:15 a.m. ET Sunday, with the elite race kicking off at 3:15 a.m. ET. Join a FloTrack account to stream the occasion.