Marathon world record progression

The late Kenyan athlete Kelvin Kiptum set a men's world record time of 2:00:35 on October 8, 2023, at the 2023 Chicago Marathon, a mixed-sex race.

[1][2] Kenyan athlete Ruth Chepng'etich broke the women's world record with a time of 2:09:56 on October 13, 2024 at the 2024 Chicago Marathon, a mixed-sex race.

In qualifying races for the 1896 Summer Olympics, Greek runners Charilaos Vasilakos (3:18:00) and Ioannis Lavrentis (3:11:27) won the first two modern marathons.

[10][nb 1] Three months later, British runner Len Hurst won the inaugural Paris to Conflans Marathon (also around 40 km) in a time of 2:31:30.

[nb 2] Later, Shizo Kanakuri of Japan was reported to have set a world record of 2:32:45 in a November 1911 domestic qualification race for the 1912 Summer Olympics, but this performance was also run over a distance of approximately 40 km.

[18] It is possible that Stamata Revithi, who ran the 1896 Olympic course a day after Louis, is the first woman to run the modern marathon; she is said to have finished in 5+1⁄2 hours.

[24][nb 4] In the 1953 Boston Marathon, the top three male finishers were thought to have broken the standing world record,[26] but Keizo Yamada's mark of 2:18:51 is considered to have been set on a short course of 25.54 miles (41.1 km).

[28] On October 25, 1981, American Alberto Salazar and New Zealander Allison Roe set apparent world bests at the New York City Marathon (2:08:13 and 2:25:29), however, these marks were invalidated when the course was later found to have been 151 meters short.