Ronaldo da Costa

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Ronaldo da Costa (born June 7, 1970 in Descoberto, Brazil) broke the ten-year-old marathon world record in 1998 in Berlin. The record was previously held by Belayneh Densamo from Ethiopia at the Rotterdam Marathon in April, 1988.

The youngest of eleven children, Da Costa became a national hero after winning the traditional São Silvestre Brazilian road race (15km) in 1994. Da Costa stunned the world with a then world record performance of 2:06:05 to win the 1998 Berlin Marathon. Running in only his second marathon – his debut was a 2:09:07 (5th place finish) in the 1997 Berlin Marathon) – Da Costa took the lead after a lethargic 1:04:42 first half, and stormed home with a 1:01:23 split. He took a full 45 seconds off the former world record of 2:06:50 that was set by Densamo.

Da Costa began running in 1989, and has respectable best times on the track of 13:37 for 5,000m and 28:07 for 10,000m. He also finished third in the 1994 IAAF World Half Marathon Championships in 1994, and won Brazil’s most prestigious running race, the Sao Silvestre 15K, that same year.

Da Costa’s family lives about 120 miles north of Rio de Janeiro in the small town of Descorberto. He has five sisters and seven brothers, including a twin, who used to train with him. Even before his world record break-through, he was supporting an extended family of over twenty people, and pays his young nephews a small amount of money to carry water and pace his training on their bicycles. He is married, has one daughter, Victoria, born in 2000.

Injuries cut short Da Costa's international career, but he still competes domestically within Brazil.