How Adidas created its 1:59 marathon super shoe: From ‘unreasonable ambition’ to ‘actual magic’
By Liam Tharme
No sooner had Sabastian Sawe broken the tape at the London Marathon than the Kenyan was posing for photos, proudly holding up his Adidas shoe, with “1:59:30” and “WR” written along the sole in black ink.
History had been made, a significant barrier surpassed, the first legal sub-two-hour marathon. He did not just break the world record, he obliterated it, beating Kelvin Kiptum’s mark (2:00:35 at the 2023 Chicago Marathon) by more than a minute. Yomif Kejelcha, coming home second, also ran under two hours, finishing just 11 seconds behind. Tigst Assefa lowered her own world record by nine seconds (to 2:15:41) in the women’s race.
All three are Adidas athletes and all raced in the Pro Evo 3. It was an incredible debut for a shoe that Adidas says is the lightest and best it has made — testing data shows 1.6 percent running economy improvements compared to the Pro Evo 2.