The mantle of victory has been passed from Tigst Assefa to Tigist Ketema.
With this triumph the prize of winning the prestigious BMW BERLIN-MARATHON remains not only within the same training group in Addis Ababa but among friends.
Shortly before, Milkesa Mengasha had been the first man through the Brandenburg Gate, leading a record number of 54,280 finishers across the line in the 50th anniversary edition of the race. The Ethiopian triumph was complete.
Milkesa Mengesha and Tigist Ketema offer examples of two athletes who have won Berlin while being relative newcomers to the marathon. They are standard bearers for a new generation of runners.
Mengesha is just 24 and was a 5,000m specialist only three years ago, running that distance in the Tokyo Olympics of 2021. Previously he was notable for winning the junior title at the 2019 World Cross Country Championships.
In Berlin on Sunday he improved his marathon best by over two minutes in running 2:03:17 to secure his place among the world elite.
He ran the third fastest time in the world this year and reflected: “I’d done many tough training sessions which turned out to make the race a little easier for me and I could enjoy it. The atmosphere was wonderful.”
Milkesa Mengesha comes from the western province of Welega in Ethiopia and has six siblings.
After Tigst Assefa had improved the course record to 2:15:37 in 2022 and pulverised the world record with 2:11:53 in Berlin last year, her training partner Tigist Ketema has in turn won the event.
As with Assefa, she was originally a middle distance runner then made, so successfully, the enormous move up to the classic distance of marathon.
Ketema was third at 800m in the World Junior Championships of 2016. But that didn’t prove fast enough to have a lasting impact on the event internationally. Hence she changed to the marathon, training for around a year before making her debut.
It proved a sensational triumph, achieving the fastest woman’s time ever as a debutant of 2:16:07 in Dubai in January.
“I had some fears about the distance – but now ask myself, why was that?” explained Tigist Ketema after her win in Dubai.
“My plan was actually to run a personal best in Berlin. But I am delighted with the w in and about my time,” said Ketema, who is part of the training group of Gemedu Dedefo in Addis Ababa.
Apart from the world record holder and Olympic silver medallist Tigst Assefa, others in the group include the World champion Amane Beriso and the men’s Olympic champion Tamirat Tola. They combine to make perhaps the strongest training group in the world at present.
Will the winning sequence for this group continue next year?
“I would like to compete in Berlin in 2025 and write another wonderful page in history,” announced Tigst Assefa when she appeared as a guest of honour at this year’s BMW BERLIN-MARATHON.
The world record holder sees further potential for improvement and even said in an interview with the British magazine ‘Athletics Weekly’ earlier this year: “In future, I’d like to run under 2:10!”
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