The Trentino Runner Becomes the First Italian Ever to Win the Paris Marathon, Crossing the Line in a Personal Best of 2:05:18
On a morning of 12 April 2026 along the banks of the Seine and in the shadow of the Eiffel Tower, Yeman Crippa wrote his name into the history books of Italian sport. The 28-year-old runner from Trentino, competing for the Fiamme Oro athletics group, won the Paris Marathon in a personal best time of 2 hours, 5 minutes and 18 seconds, becoming the first Italian athlete ever to win one of the world’s most prestigious road races.
The race attracted nearly 60,000 participants. No European runner had won it in 24 years.
How the Race Unfolded
Crippa made his decisive move with approximately five kilometres remaining, inside the Bois de Boulogne, the great wooded park on the western edge of Paris. He launched his final attack with a kilometre and a half to go, on a slightly downhill cobblestone stretch, dropping Ethiopian Bayelign Teshager, Kenyan Sila Kiptoo, and Djiboutian Mohamed Ismail.
“Around the 33rd kilometre I understood it was going to be my day,” Crippa said after crossing the line. “When at the 39th kilometre I saw my rivals were struggling, I decided to attack.”
The finish line brought an emotional scene. Crippa was embraced by his father Roberto, his coach Massimo Pegoretti, and his manager Gianni Demadonna immediately after crossing the line.
A New Chapter
Sunday’s Paris race was the seventh marathon of Crippa’s career. He made his debut over the distance three years ago in Milan, after a distinguished career on the track. He holds three European Championship gold medals and is the Italian record holder at every middle and long distance event on the track. But this was something different in scale.
“My career as a marathon runner begins today,” he said. “I have finally found the right path. Today I redeemed myself for my 25th place finish at the Paris Olympics, and a completely new page opens. This morning I discovered I have a real feeling for the marathon.”
The reference to Paris was pointed. At the 2024 Olympic Games, held in the same city along a route that passed many of the same landmarks, Crippa had finished well outside the medals. On Sunday he returned to the same streets and won.
Looking Ahead
The victory does more than settle a score with Paris. It establishes Crippa as one of the leading marathon talents in the world at a moment when Italian long distance running is experiencing something of a renaissance. With the Los Angeles 2028 Olympics now firmly in view, and a personal best that places him among the fastest marathoners in Europe, Sunday’s result is not an endpoint but, as Crippa himself put it, a beginning.
For Italian athletics, a country with a proud middle distance tradition but relatively little marathon pedigree at the very highest level, the first ever victory at one of the six World Marathon Majors is a landmark to be celebrated.
ph: La Repubblica
