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Filimon Abraham
Filimon Abraham
Filimon Abraham surprised everyone at the Barcelona Marathon just over a year ago. The athlete from Traunstein in Chiemgau ran 2:08:22 hours and finished tenth, after not finishing in his two previous marathon races in Hamburg and Frankfurt 2022. At the time, he was the second-fastest German marathon runner of all time (he is now in fifth place). However, due to injury, he was then unable to run any more marathons in the autumn and winter, meaning he had no chance of qualifying for the race at the Olympic Games in Paris in the summer.
In 2022, he improved significantly with several good results. He qualified for the European Championships in Munich with a time of 28:03.39 minutes over 10,000 metres. However, he was unlucky there because he developed a fever the day before the final and suffered from a stomach problem, meaning he did not finish higher than 18th in the end. In the winter of 2022, he ran 62:35 minutes in the half marathon in Naples. However, his first attempts at the marathon were not successful: in Hamburg in April 2022, he gave up due to muscle problems, and in Frankfurt in October he also dropped out of the race early due to a cold. In December 2022, however, he made a comeback at the European Cross Country Championships near Milan with a strong fifth place. This was followed by the Barcelona Marathon in 2:08:22.
Filimon Abraham comes from Eritrea and grew up there. As a child, he was interested in cycling, which is very popular in his home country. He later followed the careers of Ethiopian superstar Haile Gebrselassie and Zersenay Tadese from Eritrea. Both athletes became his role models.
Filimon Abraham fled his home country in 2014. He travelled through Sudan and Libya across the Mediterranean to Italy and finally to Chiemgau. He started running in his home country, but his running career began in Germany, where he initially joined LG Rupertiwinkel. Filimon Abraham completed an apprenticeship as a carpenter and later began working part-time as an electrician for a lamp company. He continues to do this job. Filimon Abraham, who is also an active mountain runner, was granted German citizenship in 2020.