The short version
Andreas Almgren won the 2026 New York City Marathon on Sunday in 2:06:01, in his first marathon. He beat Italy's Yemaneberhan Crippa by 13 seconds.
He was wearing the Nike Apex, a shoe that does not go on sale until January. It was the Apex's first win at a major marathon.
Sheila Chepkirui won the women's race in the Adidas Adizero Adios Pro 3, making her the eighth winner of a 2026 major marathon in that same shoe.
That is the commercial story in one line: Adidas has spent the year winning majors in a shoe you can buy today. Nike just won one in a shoe nobody can buy yet.
The race itself was extraordinary. Almgren is the first man to win New York on debut since 2010, and the first European man to win it since 1996. The top seven finishers all ran times inside the course's all-time top ten.
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What happened on Sunday
- 🥇 Andreas Almgren (Sweden): 2:06:01, in his marathon debut.
- 🥈 Yemaneberhan Crippa (Italy): 2:06:14, 13 seconds back.
- 🥉 Kamohelo Mofolo (Lesotho): 2:06:26, on his 21st birthday.
- 4️⃣ Benson Kipruto (Kenya): 2:06:27, the defending champion.
Why it was remarkable:
- 🆕 First man to win New York on debut since 2010, and the first European man to win it since 1996.
- ⚡ Almgren ran his second half more than two minutes faster than his first, finishing in under 62 minutes.
- 📊 The top seven finishers all ran times inside the course's all-time top ten. Before Sunday, only seven men in the race's 50-year history had ever gone under 2:07. Six did it on the same morning.
- 🏅 Six weeks earlier he won the world half-marathon title in Copenhagen in a European record of 58:06.
In the women's race, Sheila Chepkirui won for the second time, with American Jess McClain second, ending an eight-year wait for a US woman on the New York podium.
The part that is actually a business story
Almgren won in the Nike Apex. It is not for sale until January.
That is a deliberate sequence. A shoe company gets one chance to introduce a product, and a debut victory at a major marathon is a better introduction than any advertisement it could buy.
What Nike says the Apex does: it carries two Air Zoom units stacked at the forefoot, with a claimed 40% improvement in energy return over the Alphafly 3. That is the company's own figure, not an independent measurement.
Meanwhile, Adidas spent the year winning. Chepkirui's victory came in the Adizero Adios Pro 3, which has now been worn by eight winners of 2026 major marathons. The same shoe was on the feet of Sebastian Sawe for the first official sub-two-hour finish at London, and Tigst Assefa for a women's world record at the same race.
So the scoreboard reads: Adidas, a year of majors in a shoe on shelves now. Nike, one major in a shoe arriving in January.
Which is the better commercial position? Genuinely unclear, and that is what makes it interesting. One is proof you can act on. The other is anticipation you have to wait for.
And the context behind that question is what makes it matter. Nike's shares have had an extremely difficult run: we wrote about the stock hitting a new low, around 80% below its peak, and again when it beat earnings and still fell 9%. A marathon win does not fix that. But a credible flagship racing shoe is the kind of thing a turnaround is built from.
Meanwhile the category itself is growing. Running shoe sales rose 13% this year, and the brands taking share are not only the two in this race. On has more than doubled since its IPO and signed Mbappé away from Nike, which tells you how contested this market has become.
And shoes are only one part of what runners buy. The same boom runs through everything else on a runner's body:
- ⌚ Garmin is quietly doing about $2 billion a quarter, and Dubai has named a metro station after it, which tells you something about how far the brand has travelled from sat-nav.
- 💍 Oura was heading for a listing and then pulled it, postponing despite demand reported at four times the offering. A reminder that a hot product and a completed listing are different things.
So the running economy is shoes, watches, rings and race entries, and the listed companies behind it are multiplying rather than consolidating. That is the market the Apex is launching into.
So the Apex arrives into a growing category, a crowded field, and a company that badly needs a win. That is the real stake on Sunday, rather than one result.
What a marathon win is actually worth
Almost nothing on its own, and quite a lot cumulatively.
One race does not move the revenue of a company Nike's size. What it does is settle an argument that runs for years: which brand makes the fastest shoe.
Why that argument matters commercially:
- 🏃 Serious runners buy the winning shoe. The racing model is expensive, replaced often, and bought by people who follow results closely.
- 👟 Everyone else buys the brand around it. The halo from an elite racing shoe sells trainers to people who will never run a marathon, and that is where the volume is.
- 📆 The effect compounds. Eight major wins in one shoe, as Adidas has managed this year, is a marketing position that money alone cannot buy.
This is the same mechanism we wrote about when McDonald's walked away from a 32-year World Cup sponsorship, having concluded it had become too reliant on borrowed attention. Sport is one of the few places a brand can demonstrate something rather than assert it, which is exactly why it costs so much.
The difference here is that the demonstration is about the product itself. A sponsored shirt tells you a company paid. A winning shoe tells you something about the shoe, or at least appears to.
The super-shoe arms race
Since 2017, racing shoes have become technology products, built around carbon plates and specialised foams, and they have rewritten the record books.
Sunday's result shows how far it has gone. Six men went under 2:07 in a single race when only seven had ever done it in New York before. The course is the same. The athletes are extraordinary, and the equipment has changed.
For the companies, that creates an unusual dynamic:
- 🔁 Product cycles are short. The Apex replaces a shoe that was itself recent. Each generation has to beat the last.
- 💰 Research is expensive, and the shoes that result sell in small numbers at high prices.
- ⚖️ Regulation sets the ceiling. World Athletics limits stack height and plate construction, so the competition happens inside rules that can change.
And the risk is obvious: when every brand has a carbon-plated super shoe, the advantage narrows, and the thing being sold goes back to being a brand rather than a technology.
What could go wrong
- 📉 One race is one race. A debut winner in a new shoe is a great story and a rounding error in the revenue of a company this size. Do not confuse a marketing moment with a financial event.
- 🏷️ The Apex is not on sale yet. Everything about its commercial performance is unknown until January, including price, supply and whether buyers care.
- ⚖️ The 40% energy return figure is Nike's own. It has not been independently verified here, and claims of this kind are notoriously difficult to compare between brands.
- 🥊 Adidas has the stronger year on the scoreboard, with eight major winners in one shoe, a sub-two-hour finish and a world record.
- 📋 Rules can change. World Athletics sets limits on shoe construction, and a regulatory change can erase a technical advantage overnight.
- 🧦 And footwear is a crowded, cyclical business, exposed to consumer spending, inventory cycles and currency, none of which a marathon result affects.
Nike (NKE) and Adidas (ADDYY) are examples to research, not recommendations.
What should investors take from this?
Watch what a company chooses to prove, and where it chooses to prove it.
Nike could have launched the Apex with an advertising campaign. It chose to put it on a debutant in New York and let the result do the talking. Adidas has spent a year accumulating the same kind of evidence, one major at a time.
That is a real competitive contest, and it plays out in public before it ever shows up in a results statement.
Three habits:
- 🔍 Separate the marketing event from the financial one. The first is visible immediately; the second takes quarters to appear, if it appears at all.
- 🏷️ Treat company performance claims as claims, including the 40% figure above. Companies test their own products.
- 🧺 And remember both are inside your index anyway. Nike sits in the S&P 500, where the ten largest companies make up roughly 38% of the index and everything else shares the rest.
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FAQs
Who won the 2026 New York City Marathon? Andreas Almgren of Sweden won the men's race in 2:06:01 in his marathon debut, ahead of Yemaneberhan Crippa (2:06:14) and Kamohelo Mofolo (2:06:26). Sheila Chepkirui of Kenya won the women's race for the second time, with American Jess McClain second.
What shoes did the winners wear? Almgren wore the Nike Apex, giving the shoe its first major marathon win. It is scheduled to go on sale in January. Chepkirui wore the Adidas Adizero Adios Pro 3, which has now been worn by eight winners of 2026 major marathons.
What is the Nike Apex? A racing shoe with two Air Zoom units stacked at the forefoot. Nike claims a 40% improvement in energy return over the Alphafly 3. That figure is the company's own.
Why does a marathon win matter to a shoe company? It settles, publicly, which brand makes the fastest racing shoe. That sells the racing model to serious runners and creates a halo that sells ordinary trainers to everyone else, which is where the volume is.
Can I invest in Nike or Adidas from the UAE? Nike trades on the New York Stock Exchange as NKE, and Adidas trades in the US as an American Depositary Receipt under ADDYY. On Nemo.money you can research and invest in eligible US-listed stocks and ETFs from $1 with zero commission, with uninvested cash earning 6% AER interest, paid daily in USD. Both are examples to research, not recommendations. Your capital is at risk.
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