Riga has confirmed what organisers are calling the strongest half marathon elite team in the event's history for Sunday's 17 May edition, with two-time Boston Marathon champion Sharon Lokedi headlining a women's field that also features defending Rimi Riga champion and German marathon record-holder Domenika Mayer and Ethiopia's World Championship 5000m bronze medallist Ejgayehu Taye. The men's side is led by Kenya's Victor Kipchirchir, the only entrant in the field with a sub-60 minute personal best at 59:19.
Lokedi's appearance is the marquee announcement. The Kenyan, who defended her Boston title on 20 April with another sub-2:19 performance, has built her schedule this year around a return to the half marathon for the first time since New York in March 2024 and Riga marks her first competitive outing on European roads in 2026. Mayer arrives as the defending course champion after winning here last May, while Taye is making her half marathon debut against marathon specialists, an unusual but increasingly common pivot for elite track women looking to extend the season.
Kipchirchir's men's start list is matched by depth rather than headline pace. Ethiopia's Abera Mamo, who set a 1:00:42 personal best at the Lille International Half Marathon in February, lines up alongside Uganda's Ezekiel Mutai, the 2024 Lille winner with a 1:00:43 best. Behind them sits a quartet of 60:50–61:30 men capable of pressuring the leaders in the closing kilometres along Riga's old-town cobbles. The course profile remains flat through the first 18 km before the short rise across the Vansu bridge that has historically decided sprint finishes here.
The marathon distance, run on the same morning, retains the men's elite cast announced in early May — Eritrea's Nguse Amlosom and Kenya's Wisley Kimeli at the front of a deep field, with Ethiopia's Ayantu Kumela and world cross-country champion Bone Cheluke headlining the women's race. Latvian icon Jelena Prokopcuka will make her farewell elite appearance at the marathon distance, drawing the home support that has defined Rimi Riga since the race moved into Old Town in 2017.
Total field size for the weekend has settled at just over 40,000 across the five distances, organisers confirmed on Tuesday — a record number that includes 5,400 international entrants from 86 countries. The half marathon and marathon both start at 09:00 local time on Sunday 17 May from Brivibas Boulevard, with the full elite field assembled at the line and live timing on the official Rimi Riga Marathon results portal. World Athletics has classified the course at Elite Label status for the third successive year.