Men's Race: Kiplimo Wins Chicago in 2:02:23

• Jacob Kiplimo took the men's title in 2:02:23 (4:40/mi), leading wire-to-wire through a field of 29,548 men.
• Alex Masai was the race's great mover, climbing from 13th at halfway to 3rd at the finish — posting the fastest men's split from 35K to 40K to seal his podium in 2:04:37.
• Conner Mantz ran the second-fastest 35K–40K split in the men's field to hold 4th in 2:04:43, edging Huseydin Mohamed Esa (5th, 2:04:49) — who answered with the fastest men's closing split from 40K to the finish.
• Galen Rupp returned to the Chicago podium conversation at 16th in 2:09:41 — four years after finishing 2nd here in 2021.

Jacob Kiplimo never relinquished the lead, sitting 1st at every checkpoint from start to finish and clocking the fastest men's split on the 5K–10K segment. His 2:02:23 — a 4:40/mi average across 26.2 miles on a cool, nearly still morning in Grant Park — was the kind of performance that commands a men's field of nearly 30,000. Amos Kipruto shadowed him just as faithfully, holding 2nd at every single checkpoint and finishing in 2:03:54, posting the fastest men's split from 20K to the half. The gap between them — 1:31 — was clear and consistent; this was a race decided at the front, not in the final miles.

The real drama unfolded further back. Alex Masai was running in 13th as late as the halfway point, but his 35K–40K surge — the fastest of any man in the field on that segment — carried him all the way to 3rd in 2:04:37. Conner Mantz was no slouch on that same stretch, posting the second-fastest split there to lock in 4th at 2:04:43, while Huseydin Mohamed Esa saved his best for last, running the fastest men's closing kick from 40K to the tape to finish 5th in 2:04:49. Five men under 2:05 at one of the Abbott World Marathon Majors — that's a brutally competitive top end.

Further down, Seifu Tura — who won this very race in 2021 in 2:06:12 — returned to finish 6th in 2:05:17, a faster time than his winning effort four years prior. Galen Rupp, who stood on the podium here in 2021 as runner-up, crossed 16th in 2:09:41 at age 39. Colin Mickow, 6th here in 2021, rounded out the top 20 in 2:11:24. Chicago 2025 rewarded the patient and punished the complacent — and on a crisp October morning through 29 neighborhoods, the men's race delivered from wire to wire.