Birhanu Bekele Berga

Berga Birhanu Bekele has been a marathon runner for more than a decade. However his development is very unusual. It took a long time until he improved his personal best of 2:09:41 which he ran back in 2009 in Beijing.

Ten years later Bekele, who is not related to Ethiopia’s superstar Kenenisa Bekele, finally broke his PB: He smashed it when he clocked 2:06:41 for third place in Sevilla in 2019. In between these two personal bests he had a number of strong results, winning the marathons in Florence in 2011, Nanjing (China) in 2015 and Krakow in 2018.

Despite taking a fine eighth place in the World Half Marathon Championships in 2010 he has not competed at this distance again since 2011. Instead Bekele has focussed on the marathon only. At the age of 38 he finally seems to flourish.

Age

38

Country

Ethiopia

Best Time

2:06:41

(3rd, Sevilla, 2019)