Barcelona Eyes Sabastian Sawe Invite After Historic London Marathon Win

Barcelona’s Cursa dels Nassos is looking beyond its festive 10K finish for a name that can travel. Organizers are considering an invitation to Sabastian Sawe after his historic London Marathon victory, a move that would tie the city’s year-end race to the most eye-catching performance in marathon running this spring.

Sawe won the TCS London Marathon on 26 April 2026 in 1:59:30, and World Athletics described the run as the first official men’s marathon performance under two hours in a record-eligible race. World Athletics lists Sabastian Kimaru Sawe as born 16 March 1995 and ranked No. 1 in the men’s marathon, with 1:59:30 as both his world record performance and his season’s best for 2026. For Barcelona, that kind of profile is exactly the sort of headline that can lift a city race into a broader international conversation.

The appeal is not just about star power. The Cursa dels Nassos has already built a reputation as Barcelona’s most visible year-end running fixture, and the 2025 edition was expected to draw about 13,000 participants, including more than 4,700 women. Its format combines a mass 10K with an elite 5K, giving the race both a public-facing festival feel and a sharper competitive edge.

That elite side has been producing results with real weight. On 31 December 2025, José Carlos Pinto won the men’s elite 5 km in 13:10, with Magnus Tuv Myhre second in 13:13 and Thierry Ndikumwenayo third in 13:22. In the women’s race, Likina Amebaw won in 14:23, while Pinto’s run also delivered a Portuguese record. The race’s international status was already underscored in 2023, when Beatrice Chebet ran 14:13 in Barcelona to set the women’s world 5 km record.

That is the balance Barcelona is trying to strike: recruit a global name like Sawe, and the city’s running brand gets louder, brighter and harder to ignore. But the Cursa dels Nassos also works because it belongs to ordinary runners finishing the year in a race that feels local, crowded and celebratory. If Sawe does receive an invitation, it will say as much about Barcelona’s ambition as about its confidence that a prestige chase and a grassroots finish-line tradition can still coexist.