On a perfect fall morning in Berlin, Ethiopia’s former women’s marathon world record holder Tigst Assefa made a bold attempt at the controversial 2:09:56 marathon mark set by Kenya’s Ruth Chepngetich in Chicago in 2024. The Kenyan’s time remained standing even after Chepngetich subsequently tested positive in an out-of-competition drug test in 2025. But since the Chicago record preceded the positive finding, it remained on the books as valid.

Notwithstanding its controversial standing, Assefa went after it without hesitation. Leaving her competitors behind from the jump, she joined her pacers at 2:10 pace on a bright, clear morning that seemed to welcome the attempt on the 52nd running of the great race.

As the kilometers clicked over like dominoes falling, the two-time Berlin champion and former world record holder (2:11:53 in 2023) hovered at a perfectly calibrated near-record pace. Amid the ongoing drug scandal plaguing the sport, the women’s marathon record is one that many fans would love to see taken down.

As late as 39K, acclaimed British commentator Tim Hutchings called it “a bit of a stroll in the park for her.”

Just ahead, men’s leader Guye Adola of Ethiopia was negotiating the final stretch, his angular shadow striding just to his right as he passed through the Brandenburg Gate in the mid-morning slant of sun. He had slowed in the final kilometers, 3:04 in his last, and was now running no faster than Assefa. 

After the 35-year-old Adola completed his second win in the German capital in a 2:02:50 PR — five years after his last victory in Berlin — the coverage shifted from the men’s podium finishers back to the women.

Immediately, it became apparent that something significant had happened to Tigst Assefa in the 4½ minutes that we were away watching the finish of the men’s race.

The serenity of her record rhythm was gone. In its place was the rictus of an athlete in the throes of a crisis.

She had passed 40K in 2:03:00, still on world-record pace. Her previous four 10K segments had been remarkably consistent, all between 30:41 and 30:48. She was projected to finish in roughly 2:09:44.

But now, as the grimace spread across her face and the limp in her stride worsened, the question became whether she could finish at all as she tried to maintain her effort amid the pain.

With the crowds urging her on, her 41st kilometer ballooned to 3:22, and the record was gone.

We hadn’t seen such a struggle since I don’t know when. In the era of super shoes and super nutrition, when technology has made the marathon increasingly precise in its management of pace, fuel and fatigue, the distance had suddenly returned to something much older and more elemental.

But this wasn’t fatigue. She was experiencing a problem with her chassis.

She couldn’t stride out. Every step was agony and a warning. Even the midsole cushioning of her super shoes couldn’t protect her. Yet the Brandenburg Gate loomed just ahead like a summons, while a course record and personal record still remained as goals.

The 2024 Olympic and 2025 World Championship silver medalist had trained 200 to 250 kilometers a week in the rarefied altitude outside Addis Ababa. All of that work had brought her to this moment.

In the end, she bravely managed to cross the finish line. The clock stopped at 2:11:04, a 49-second personal best, a new course record, and the third-fastest time ever by a woman.

But the unspoken goal of a new world record had vanished in those last two brutal kilometers.

The marathon had once again revealed her cruelty.

Assefa fell to all fours atop a storm grate along the curb within a step of crossing the line. Whatever discomfort her knees might have felt at that moment was less than the stabbing pain coming from her lower right leg.

Former world record holder and four-time Berlin champion Haile Gebrselassie rushed over to attend to her, along with the medical team from Berlin.

Such a sight has largely been erased over the last decade as the sport entered the super-shoe and super-nutrition era. But when pushed to the ragged edge, the once-mighty marathon had shown that she still had some fight of her own to reclaim supremacy over her 26.2-mile, 42.2-kilometer borders.

A daring effort by Assefa had been met by a strong defense from the marathon herself.

It was a riveting exchange.

P.S. Word after the race is that Assefa suffered a torn Achilles tendon in her right leg in the final two kilometers. She will undergo surgery in Munich on Monday and faces at least six months of recovery.

News of the injury sheds new light on what was an especially gutty last eight minutes on the famed Berlin course. We can only wonder whether such determination was worthwhile, given the severity of her injury.

We are told over and over to “read our bodies.” But Assefa had invested so much in her preparation, and in the race to that point, that her determination to complete the task overrode whatever signals her broken body was desperately sending.

The human will is an astonishing force. We wish her a full recovery after what is now a legendary performance.

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