Gabriel Geay and Guye Adola Join Berlin’s Field Behind Sabastian Sawe

The Berlin Marathon has finalized its elite field for Sept. 27, adding a set of proven international contenders behind two headliners who already hold marathon world records.

The additions give both the men’s and women’s races real depth on the fastest course in the sport, a flat city loop where the men’s world record has fallen more often than anywhere else.

The men’s field is led by Sabastian Sawe, who in April became the first man to run a marathon in under two hours, clocking 1:59:30 at London to break Kelvin Kiptum’s 2:00:35. Berlin will be his first race since, and he returns as defending champion, having won here in 2025. Eliud Kipchoge set the last of the course’s world records in 2022, running 2:01:09, and the open question is how much lower Sawe can go, with two 2:03 men in the field to share the pace.

Gabriel Geay, Tanzania’s national record holder, was the Boston runner-up in 2023 and has run 2:03:00, a time that still sits inside the all-time top 20. Guye Adola knows the course better than almost anyone in the field. He ran 2:03:46 on his Berlin debut in 2017, placing behind only Kipchoge, took the Berlin title in 2021, and returned this spring by winning Rotterdam in 2:03:54.

The women’s race is built around Tigst Assefa, who holds the women-only world record of 2:15:41, set at London in April. The outright women’s record, 2:09:56, belongs to Ruth Chepngetich, who ran it at Chicago in 2024 and keeps it while serving a doping ban. Assefa has chased that number in Berlin before, running 2:11:53 here in 2023 for what was then the world record and what is still the second-fastest marathon any woman has run. She has said she will be “trying again to break the world record” in September.

Her company on the start line now includes Bedatu Hirpa, who won both Dubai and Paris last year, taking Dubai in a career-best 2:18:27, and placed second at Osaka this year in 2:19:54. The women’s field also carries defending champion Rosemary Wanjiru and Amane Beriso, the 2023 world champion.

A group of German runners from the domestic Marathon Team Berlin rounds out the entries, led by Aaron Bienenfeld, whose 2:08:47 at Hamburg in April stands as the quickest first marathon any German man has run.

The last several marathon world records were set at Chicago and London, not Berlin. Whether the sport’s fastest course adds another will not be known until Sept. 27.