What Marathon Racing Shoes Did The Pros Wear In The 2014 New York City Marathon?

by: LetsRun.com
November 6, 2014

At this year’s Bank of America Chicago Marathon, we asked the pros what shoes they were wearing in the race. The article we published for Chicago was quite popular with so we’ve brought it back for the 2014 TCS New York City Marathon. Nearly all the pro runners are contractually obligated to wear a certain brand of shoe, but it is still interesting to see what shoe within that brand they wear on race day.

Click to see a larger photo of Kimetto's shoes. Click to see a larger photo of Kimetto’s shoes.

The winners Wilson Kipsang and Mary Keitany were both wearing the adidas adizero adios Boost 2. That is the same shoe that Dennis Kimetto wore in his 2:02:57 world record in Berlin. However, as an astute message boarder noted in the thread “Kimetto’s shoes” on the LetsRun.com forums, the shoe Kimetto wore has a different outsole than the traditional adidas adios Boost 2 sold in stores. Click on the photo to the right to see Kimetto’s shoes.

The adidas product team chimed in and said that Kimetto and many of the top marathoners like to wear the adidas adios Boost but with two traditional rubber strips replacing DSP on the bottom. DSP is a cutting edge material that is lighter than rubber, but Kimetto and some others like the traditional grip feel of rubber.

Mike McManus, the Senior Director of Global Sports Marketing Running for adidas, sent us the picture below of his own shoes showing the difference between the rubber adidas adios Boost 2 (left) and the DSP version (right). He said the athletes are given the choice of either shoe, but otherwise they wear them off the shelf.

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adidas adios Boost (rubber on outsole on left, DSP on right) adidas adios Boost (rubber on outsole on left, DSP on right)

Just as some of the adidas runners opted for the rubber over the newer DSP, some of the Nike runners are still choosing to race in the older and discontinued Nike Zoom Streak 3 vs the New Nike Zoom Streak 5 (we have a chart below).

Go Meb Speed 3 NYC Go Meb Speed 3 NYC

The Americans – Meb Runs in the Shoes Named After Him
The only runner in the race with a shoe named after himself was 2014 Boston Marathon champ Meb Keflezighi.

Meb runs for Skechers and not only do they have the Go Meb line, but for New York they made a special edition Go Meb Speed 3 NYC.

That is the shoe Meb ran in in NYC although Merhawi Keflezighi, Meb’s brother and agent, did relay the info that Meb’s race shoe “does have a custom fit that is built on a cast specific to Meb’s foot as it is narrow.”

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Deena Kastor, the queen of American marathoning, was racing in the Asics Hyperspeed 6, and her agent Ray Flynn said she’s “totally in love with this shoe from 5k to the marathon.”

Desi Linden, the top American women in New York, like all the Brooks runners we spoke to in New York and Chicago, was running in her Brooks T7s.

Under Armour is trying to get established in running and Nick Arciniaga told us he was going to race in the Under Armour SpeedForm RC Vent (although Sneaker Report says Nick’s shoes were the Speed Form Apollo).

Caroline Wozniacki
The masses might be more interested in what shoe Caroline Wozniacki, the US Open tennis finalist this year, was running in in her first marathon, as she wasn’t wearing a racing shoe. She was in the pink adidas Supernova Glide 6 Boost.

Below we’ve got a chart of the shoes of the top runners in New York. We’ve got the top 10 men and American Luke Puskedra. On the women’s side, the Rita Jeptoo doping story broke on the day of the women’s press conferences, so we didn’t ask most of the women what shoe they were racing in. We’ve got Mary Keitany, the most prominent American women, and Caroline Wozniacki.

The website Sneakerreport.com took a picture of the top 100 shoes across the finish line in New York and listed them on 100 different pages. Unfortunately, they didn’t summarize the info or note whether it’s a custom version of the shoe, but when noted with SP that means we got the info from their photos (and do not know if it is a custom shoe).

 Athlete  Racing Shoe
1. Geoffrey Mutai adizero adios boost 2.0 (r)
2. Lelisa Desisa Nike Zoom Streak 3* (SR)
3. Gebre Gebremariam adizero adios boost 2.0 (r)
4. Meb Keflezighi Go Meb Speed 3 NYC (custom fit)
5. Stephen Kiprotich Nike Zoom Streak 3* (SR)
6. Geoffrey Mutai adizero adios boost 2.0 (r)
7. Masato Imai adidas Adizero Takumi Sen 2 (SR)
8. Peter Kirui adizero adios boost 2.0 (r)
9. Ryan Vail Brooks T7
10. Nick Arciniaga UA SpeedForm RC Vent
Luke Puskedra Nike Air Zoom Streak 5
Women
Mary Keitany adizero adios boost 2.0 (r)
Desi Linden Brooks T7
Deena Kastor Asics Hyperspeed 6
Kara Goucher Go Meb Speed 3 NYC (SR)
Caroline Wozniacki adidas Supernova Glide Boost

Key:
*discontinued shoe
r – rubber outsole instead of DSP.
SR – Sneaker Report’s photos of finish is the source.

If you are a pro or an agent and want to add your athlete to the list, email us at letsrun@letsrun.com. If the shoe is custom made, please tell us.

The adidas adizero adios Boost 2 The adidas adizero adios Boost 2

Disclosure: Sometimes if you buy shoes from an external link on LetsRun.com we get a commission.

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