by: LetsRun.com

October 10, 2014

Shoe companies spend collectively millions of dollars sponsoring runners, but one thing we rarely hear is what shoes do the pros race in.

So we decided to ask a handful of the male top pros at the 2014 Bank of America Chicago Marathon what shoes they race in.

Kenenisa Bekele, the world’s most credentialed distance runner, the world record holder at 5000m and 10,000m, had the best response. “The yellow ones.” Then he corrected himself and said, “No, the black ones.”

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He wasn’t sure what they were called. We said we were surprised he didn’t get his own custom shoe from Nike. He then joked that Nike has forgotten about him the last four years (since he got injured). It was a pretty funny exchange.

We asked Bekele’s agent, Jos Hermens, about his racing shoes and he said they are the Nike Streak 3 which has been replaced by the Nike Streak 4 and 5. (See this message board thread from April, which pointed out many pros continue to race in the Nike Streak 3 instead of the newer Streak 4 or 5).

Eliud Kipchoge, Bekele’s #1 rival on Sunday, is also a Nike guy, but he races in the newer streak 5s.

Bekele, wasn’t the only pro who races in an older version of a shoe (see Christo Landry below).

The three Brooks Hanson’s guys we talked to were the quickest to give a response to what shoe they race in: The Brooks T7.

*Discontinued shoe

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If you are a pro or an agent and want to add your athlete to the list email us at [email protected] If the shoe is custom made, please tell us.

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