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Berlin Marathon winner Tigst Assefa “completely destroyed” her right Achilles tendon during Sunday’s race and has undergone surgery on the rupture.
The 29-year-old was on course to beat Ruth Chepng’etich’s world record with 2km remaining before she suddenly began limping, but she pushed through visible pain to complete the course in 2:11:04.
While she missed out on Chepng’etich’s landmark time by 68 seconds it was still the third-fastest time ever and quicker than Assefa’s own previous record in the German capital and personal best of 2:11:53, which she set in 2023.
Her representative Gianni Demadonna told AP on Tuesday: “She was no longer able to run, because when she was going to put her foot on the ground she had no power.
“She completely destroyed the tendon at the end, because running without the tendon — I mean the last 500 meters maybe she ran without the tendon, only with the heel, so that was a disaster because maybe (if) she had stopped, (it) was not so bad, but she ran 2km with the problem.”
Demadonna said Assefa had begun experiencing pain 31km in but was only properly afflicted by the injury at the 40km mark.
The Ethiopian collapsed after crossing the line, having secured her third victory in Berlin, and was attended to by medical staff as well as distance-running legend Haile Gebrselassie and other well-wishers.
She was then immediately flown to Munich and transported to Murnau, a town near the Austrian border, to undergo “very complex surgery” on the rupture.
Demadonna said: “She was on to run 2:09:30, 2:09:40, so that was the goal, and she still had 8 minutes (to run) the last 2.2 kilometers. That is amazing.”
Chepng’etich set the record of 2:06:56 at the Chicago Marathon in 2024 but there remains disquiet over that benchmark following the Kenyan’s three-year ban after admitting doping, which was imposed in 2025. Her record still stands.
Demadonna said Assefa will see another doctor in Munich on Thursday to see how the surgery went and to start the long road to recovery.
He said: “After starting walking and bicycle, maybe (she can) start running in three months, so I think seven months to compete in another marathon, maybe London Marathon 2027 at the end of April, but difficult to say now.
“We have to stay patient and see what the doctor will say.”
He added that Assefa “is very sad, but what can we do? She knows that it’s a long way to recover, but the doctor said, ‘don’t worry, you can recover.’ So we will see.”
Additional reporting by AP
