World Athletics has officially ratified Yomif Kejelcha’s road 10km performance as a world record, cementing the Ethiopian’s mark of 26:31 set in Castellón, Spain, on 16 February 2025. The recognition, which came on 1 June 2026, elevated Kejelcha’s run from the second-fastest time ever to a standalone world record following the retrospective disqualification of the previous holder.
A vacant record claimed by clearance
Kejelcha’s elevation was triggered by the stripping of Rhonex Kipruto’s 26:24 from Valencia 2020 after a biological passport violation. The Athletics Integrity Unit sanctioned the Kenyan in June 2024, and the Court of Arbitration for Sport upheld the ban—reducing it to five years—in April 2026, voiding all results between September 2018 and May 2023. Kejelcha’s performance, already a personal best and course record, therefore became the fastest clean mark in history.
A blistering solo tempo through Castellón
On the streets of the 10K FACSA Castellón, Kejelcha attacked from the gun. He set a fierce rhythm and held it alone, covering the flat urban circuit without a recorded challenge from a visible rival group. The resulting 26:31 carved six seconds off his own previous best of 26:37 from Laredo the year before, confirming the Castellón course as one of the fastest available.
The performance came before Kejelcha’s record-breaking half marathon in Valencia later in 2024, where he clocked 57:30, and well in advance of his startling 1:59:41 marathon debut in London in April 2026. In that context, the 10km record appears not as a peak but as an early waypoint on a steep trajectory.
A career built on range
The 10km road crown adds a second global record to Kejelcha’s collection, alongside his half-marathon mark. The achievement stands on a foundation of middle-distance and track dominance: an indoor mile world record of 3:47.01 in 2019, two World Indoor 3000m titles, and a World Junior 5000m gold from 2014.
With Kipruto’s mark erased, Kejelcha joined the thin club of men who have broken 27 minutes on the roads, and did so at a moment when the record books were wiped clean. “Siempre hemos defendido que el circuito del 10K FACSA es rápido,” said Castellón’s mayor, Begoña Carrasco, after the ratification, “pero ahora queda reconocido oficialmente.”
For an athlete who began as a teenage world junior champion and has since rewritten the rules of mid-distance and road racing, the Castellón Sunday morning now reads as the quiet opening statement of a historic year.
