The 2026 TCS London Marathon’s women’s race lost its second marquee name in as many months on Tuesday, when reigning world champion Peres Jepchirchir announced her withdrawal due to a stress fracture she sustained after the Valencia Marathon last December.
Jepchirchir, 32, is the 2024 London champion, the reigning world champion, and an Olympic gold medalist. She was one of three recent London winners expected to toe the line on April 26, alongside Ethiopia’s Tigst Assefa and Dutch star Sifan Hassan. That three-way clash is now off the table. Hassan pulled out in March with an Achilles injury she picked up on a treadmill.
“It is with great sadness that I have withdrawn from the TCS London Marathon. After racing in Valencia, I was diagnosed with a stress fracture and I was only able to resume training in late January. I know that to be competitive at the TCS London Marathon you have to be at your top level and despite my best efforts, I’m just short of that due to my lack of training. I wish everyone racing the best of luck and look forward to returning to the TCS London Marathon in future years.”
A Run of Bad Luck
This is the second straight London Marathon Jepchirchir has missed. She sat out the 2025 race with an ankle injury, meaning she wasn’t able to defended the title she earned in stunning fashion — clocking 2:16:16 at the 2024 edition, a women’s-only world record at the time.
The Valencia Marathon in December appeared to cost her dearly. She finished second in the race but left with more than just a result: the stress fracture that followed pushed her return to training all the way back to late January, leaving too short a window to prepare properly for a race as competitive as London.
Jepchirchir won the World Championships marathon in Tokyo in 2025, showing she remains at the very top of the sport when healthy. Her absence from London is a genuine loss for the race.
Assefa the Clear Favorite Now
With Hassan and Jepchirchir both out, Ethiopia’s Tigst Assefa heads into the race as the strong favorite. She won the 2025 London Marathon in a women’s-only world record of 2:15:50 and owns the fastest marathon time in the field at 2:11:53, set in Berlin in 2023. That mark is more than two minutes quicker than anyone else entered.
Kenya’s Joyciline Jepkosgei will push her. Jepkosgei won the 2025 Valencia Marathon in 2:14:00 — the fourth-fastest women’s marathon in history — and is a former London champion herself, having won the race in 2021.
Hellen Obiri, also Kenyan, makes her London debut but arrives with serious credentials. Since moving up to the marathon distance, she has won New York City twice (2023 and 2025) and Boston back-to-back (2023 and 2024). She won’t be short of confidence.
The women’s race on April 26 is still loaded with talent, but the dream matchup that race organizers — and fans — had hoped for this spring will have to wait for another day.
