Eliud Kipchoge of Kenya sprinted to victory at the Berlin Marathon on Sunday, shattering his own world record and lowering it to 2:01:09.
Kipchoge ran a pace that no one could equal over the entire 26.2 miles to win his 15th career marathon out of just 17 starts, shaving 30 seconds off the record he set at the same race four years earlier.
Guye Adola, the defending champion, and Andamlak Belihu of Ethiopia kept up with the 37-year-old for the first half of the race before losing contact as Kipchoge pushed on to victory. Kipchoge eventually crossed the finish line in front of the Brandenburg Gate by himself.
In Vienna in 2019, double Olympic champion Kipchoge became the first athlete to complete a marathon in under two hours, but this achievement was not recognized as a world record because it was accomplished without an open competition and with the aid of a team of alternating pacemakers.
Kipchoge got out to a quick start for this official record, clocking a 10-kilometer time split in just 28 minutes and 23 seconds and finishing in under an hour.
Adola battled him step for step for the first 10 kilometers, but by the halfway point of the race, only Belihu was able to keep up with Kipchoge.
After 25 kilometers, Kipchoge started to distance himself from Belihu as well. Despite a minor slowdown in his blistering pace, he maintained a comfortable lead over the world record all the way to the finish line.
More than four minutes later, in 2:05:58, was his fellow countryman Mark Korir, who came in second. Tadu Abate, an Ethiopian, finished third with a time of 2:06:28.