World’s best marathon runner Sabastian Sawe chooses Berlin over Tokyo worlds

Kenya's Sabastian Sawe crosses the line to win the men's race at the 2025 London Marathon. PHOTO: AFP

UPDATED Jun 18, 2025, 05:02 PM

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NAIROBI – Kenya’s world-leading marathon runner Sabastian Sawe has decided to run September’s Berlin marathon instead of the world championships in Tokyo.

Already a winner of two marathons in Valencia in December 2024 and London last April, Sawe was expected to spearhead the Kenyan men’s challenge at the Tokyo worlds.

The men’s marathon in Tokyo will be held on Sept 15, only six days before the Berlin marathon.

“I am preparing for Berlin,” said Sawe, whose meteoric rise in the marathon world has been compared to his compatriot, the late Kelvin Kiptum who died in a road accident in February 2024.

Like Kiptum, Sawe won the Valencia race on his debut over the 42km distance in December 2024, clocking a world-leading 2:02.05.

He followed that up when he destroyed an elite field at this year’s London marathon, winning in a time of 2:02.27.

The Berlin flat course is considered the fastest in the world, accounting for 13 individual world records for men.

Sawe said he is expecting to run a fast time on his Berlin debut but ruled out setting a new world mark.

“It’s too early to talk about a world record. It takes time and clear planning to achieve it,” he said.

Kiptum posted the current world record of 2:00:35 in the Chicago marathon in October 2023.

Kiptum broke the previous record of fellow Kenyan Eliud Kipchoge, who has won Berlin a record five times, including clocking 2:01:09 in September 2022.

In other news, Olympic gold medalist Noah Lyles said he was prepared to race Miami Dolphins star wideout Tyreek Hill in New York before plans fell through.

Speaking at a Sport Beach event in Cannes, France, Lyles spoke about the proposed event that seemingly came to fruition after several months of back-and-forth trash talk.

“We were very deep into creating the event. In fact, it was supposed to happen this weekend,” Lyles said, per the New York Post. “Unfortunately there were some things, complications, personal reasons that it just didn’t come to pass, but we were full on.

“We were gonna have a big event, we were going to shut down New York Times Square and everything, we were gonna have all the billboards for the event, it was going to be a lot of fun.”

Lyles did not elaborate on the “complications” or “personal reasons” that he referenced.

Lyles, 27, won the gold medal last summer at the Paris Olympics in the 100 meters and is a three-time world champion, winning the gold medals in the 100m, 200m and 4x100m events in 2023.

Hill, 31, entered a track meet on Friday in California and won the 100-meter dash in a personal-best 10.15 seconds. AFP, REUTERS

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