Adidas reclaims super shoe crown with first sub-two-hour marathon

Adidas reclaims super shoe crown with first sub-two-hour marathon Share: Tom Ravenscroft | 28 April 2026 Leave a comment Sports brand Adidas has reclaimed bragging rights in the battle of the super shoes, with athletes Sabastian Sawe and Tigst Assefa wearing its Adizero Adios Pro Evo 3s to run the London marathon in world record times. googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('div-gpt-ad-1506076990687-0'); }); Both athletes were wearing Adidas' latest super shoe as they ran world record times in the men's and women's races at the London Marathon at the weekend, with Sawe recording the first-ever official sub-two-hour time. Sawe's time of one hour, 59 minutes and 30 seconds marks the culmination of a long-running competition between Nike and Adidas to develop a shoe that enabled athletes to break the elusive barrier. In the women-only race, Assefa also set a world record time of two hours, 15 minutes and 41 seconds. Sabastian Sawe (top image) and Tigst Assefa (above) won world records at the London marathonIn recent years, the marathon world record time has repeatedly been broken, with advances in trainer technology playing a significant role. Following the race, Sawe acknowledged "the role of innovation" in helping him achieve his time. googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('div-gpt-ad-1538138464089-0'); }); "To break the world record is something I have dreamed about for a long time, and to achieve it means so much to me and to the sport of running," he said. "It reflects the hard work behind the scenes, the support of my team, and the role of innovation in helping me push beyond limits." Both athletes set record times wearing the Adizero Adios Pro Evo 3sSet to be released later this week, the Adizero Adios Pro Evo 3 is the third trainer in the range and according to Adidas improves athlete's "running economy" by 1.6 per cent. "The race-day shoe represents the culmination of three years of cutting-edge research," said Adidas. "It is 30 per cent lighter, delivers 11 per cent greater forefoot energy return, and improves running economy by 1.6 per cent compared to its predecessor." The Adizero Adios Pro Evo 3 is Adidas' lightest race trainerThe trainer is an evolution of the Adizero Adios Pro Evo 1, which was worn by Assefa when she broke the women-only marathon record in 2023, and also aims to combine super-shoe technology with lightness. Described by Adidas as a "radical step forward", the Adizero Adios Pro Evo 3 is the brand's "first ever sub-100-gram race shoe". For comparison, the Pro Evo 1 weighed 140 grams and was considered extremely light. Each trainer weighs 97 gramsThe shoe, which weighs 97 grams, has an extra-thick sole typical of super shoes, measuring 39 millimetres high at its heel. According to Adidas, the construction of this sole was key to the trainer's success. It was made from a newly created foam, named Lightstrike Pro Evo, which is 50 per cent lighter than previous versions developed by the brand. This makes it the "lightest and most responsive foam to date", Adidas said. The lightweight foam was stabilised with carbon integrated into the sole in a newly developed system. It has a 39-millimetre-high sole"Creating the Adizero Adios Pro Evo 3 pushed us to think differently from the very start. We weren't just trying to improve on what we'd done before, we wanted to see how far we could go," said the brand. "We went through more than a dozen iterations, working closely with our athletes and…

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