A 5-Minute Guide to the Marathons at the 2022 World Championships

By Jonathan Gault
July 15, 2022

The World Championships marathon can sometimes be an afterthought. The Olympics and some of the World Marathon Majors carry more prestige, and because there’s a World Championships unfolding on the track at the same time, the Worlds marathon can get caught in the shuffle.

Seriously, can you name the reigning world champions in the marathon? Go on, take your time.

(Lelisa Desisa and Ruth Chepngetich are the answers).

Don’t feel bad if you couldn’t remember. After all, those champions were crowned at 2:30 a.m. on a deserted Corniche in Doha.

The World Championship marathon occupies an odd space in our sport. The fields are often quite strong, which is certainly the case this year, but Worlds is not always a marathoner’s most important race of the year. And this Worlds comes at a very strange time indeed — the middle of July, a time when virtually no other marathons of consequence are held.

But the fields are quite strong this year and with great weather forecasts, the races could be historically fast by WC standards. In the men’s race (Sunday, 9:15 a.m. ET), we’ll get to see Kenya’s Lawrence Cherono — aka the Best Marathoner in the World Not Named Eliud Kipchoge — as well as Olympic marathon medalists Abdi Nageeye and Bashir Abdi, Ethiopian star Mosinet Geremew (2:02:55 pb, #4 all-time), Chicago champ Seifu Tura, two-time NYC champ Geoffrey Kamworor, and a two-time Olympic medalist by the name of Galen Rupp.

In the women’s race (Monday, 9:15 a.m. ET), world/Chicago/Nagoya champ Ruth Chepngetich of Kenya will face 2:17 women Ashete Bekere and Angela Tanui and Berlin champ Gotytom Gebreslase, plus American record holder Keira D’Amato. Below, a quick guide to the races.

*Course map

1) Which stud is going to win?

Shocker alert, Kenya and Ethiopia — by far the best marathon nations on Earth — have some pretty loaded teams.

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On the men’s side, five of LetsRun’s top 10 marathoners in the world last year will be at Worlds: Bashir Abdi, Lawrence Cherono, Seifu Tura, Tamirat Tola, and Abdi Nageeye. Cherono’s recent track record is simply amazing. Here’s what he’s done starting in the fall of 2018: 1st Amsterdam, 1st Boston, 1st Chicago, 2nd Valencia, 4th Olympics, 1st Valencia, 2nd Boston. The dude is a machine. And yet he’s facing two of the men who beat him at the Olympics in Sapporo last year in Abdi and Nageeye, as well as a guy who has won five global titles between XC and the roads, Geoffrey Kamworor of Kenya (who will be looking to avenge a poor 18th-place showing in Boston in April). And there’s Mosinet Geremew, who was the silver medalist in 2019 and has run 2:02:55. That’s a very tough lineup.

The women’s race only features three of LetsRun’s top 10 from 2021 (#3 Angela Tanui, #6 Ashete Bekere, #9 Gotytom Gebreslase) but it was initially supposed to have two more (#1 Peres Jepchirchir and #10 Molly Seidel) only for the latter two to pull out with injury. But considering how well Chepngetich (2021 Chicago champ, 2022 Nagoya champ in 2:17:18) and Ashete Bekere have been running recently (2:18:18 for 3rd at 2021 London, 2:17:58 for 2nd at 2022 Tokyo), this is still a strong field up top.

Inevitably, some of the top athletes struggle at Worlds. It’s usually hot (though it shouldn’t be this year…keep reading), it’s not a time of year when most marathoners are in shape, and many will have one eye on the fall season, where they can actually get paid to run (there are no appearance fees at Worlds). Plus you’ve got all the usual difficulties of a marathon — injuries in the buildup, cramp/fueling difficulties on race day, etc. But whoever wins is going to be a stud. There are too many fast men and women in the field for it not to be.

2) Could we see some fast times?

Normally it’s foolish to think about time in a World Championship marathon. All the reasons in the preceding paragraph — particularly the hot weather — are not conducive to running fast. In Doha three years ago, the winning times were 2:10 and 2:32.

But the marathons in Eugene are starting early — 6:15 a.m. local time on Sunday and Monday — and as a result the conditions are nearly perfect for marathoning. Check this out (per DarkSky):

Sunday conditions: 53 degrees at the start, 57 degrees at the finish, 3 mph wind, dew point of 46.
Monday conditions: 50 degrees at the start, 55 degrees at the finish, 4-5 mph wind, dew point of 41.

World Marathon Majors race directors would kill for those conditions. Of course, there are no pacers at the World Championships, but if anyone is willing to push the pace early, we could see some fast times, especially now that the top athletes all have supershoes. The championship records of 2:06:54 (Abel Kirui, 2009) and 2:20:57 (Paula Radcliffe, 2005) could be in danger.

3) Could an American medal?

Americans rarely medal in the World Championship marathon. Not only is it a difficult race to medal in, but the US rarely sends its very best athletes to Worlds in the marathon as they would rather get paid to run a major (totally understandable). That’s not the case in 2022 though: these may be the strongest squads the USA has ever sent to Worlds in the marathon. (Even though the selection process was fundamentally flawed).

On the women’s side, the US is running Sara Hall (2:20:32 pb, #3 all-time US), Emma Bates (Chicago runner-up), and American record holder Keira D’Amato (2:19:12 pb). D’Amato was only added to the team two weeks ago after Olympic bronze medalist Molly Seidel withdrew due to injury, which means she hasn’t had time to get in a full buildup. The good news is D’Amato is still very fit at the moment as she ran 31:17 to win the BAA 10K on June 26.

The men’s team features 2016 Olympic bronze medalist Galen Rupp, NYC Marathon 4th placer Elkanah Kibet, and Colin Mickow.

Colin who? 

Colin Mickow, who is actually one of the coolest stories of the World Championships. A decent collegiate runner at Illinois (14:08/29:10 pbs) Mickow stopped running competitively after graduating in 2012. He then took about seven years away from the sport before running Chicago in 2019 in 2:14:55. He improved his pb to 2:13:45 to finish 15th at the Olympic Trials in 2020, and then to 2:11:22 at the Marathon Project later that year before earning his spot on Team USA with a 6th-place finish in Chicago last fall.

Mickow, 32, works full-time as a financial analyst and logs 140-150 miles a week by waking up a 4 a.m. each weekday to train. He’s not going to medal, but the fact that he’s on Team USA at all is pretty crazy.

Can any American medal? The weather can often serve as an equalizer — that’s one of the reasons Seidel was able to medal in Sapporo last year — but it’s not going to be a factor in Eugene, which will make it tougher for the US runners to contend. D’Amato probably has the best shot at a medal on the women’s side as her 2:19:12 pb isn’t that far off the top women, but the fact that she hasn’t had a real buildup could come back to bite her. Bates hasn’t done much this year but she has yet to run a bad marathon in her career and could surprise some people. Hall started off 2022 strongly by breaking the American record in the half in Houston, and though she ran a solid 2:22 in Tokyo in March, she had to withdraw from Boston in April due to injury. Since then, her results haven’t been great (she ran 31:50 and 31:41 in a pair of road 10Ks in May and June), making a medal difficult.

As for the men, Rupp, who was 2nd in Chicago last year in 2:06:35, would have been a serious medal threat if healthy but he hasn’t been healthy for much of 2022. He was only 7th at the US 15K champs in March and then had to drop out of the NYC Half two weeks later with what was later diagnosed as a herniated disc. He then got COVID in June. As a result, he’s had a rocky buildup. It’s hard to see Rupp going from awful and injured in March to a World Championship medal four months later, but he’ll have incredible motivation and a lot of support as the race will run around his old college stomping grounds of Eugene.

Kibet is coming off two personal bests (2:11:15 for 4th in New York, 2:09:07 for 9th in Boston) but a good day for him would realistically be top 10, not a medal.

Men’s Entrants

Women’s Entrants