Kiplimo trains with Galaxy Watch

Jacob Kiplimo is training for the 2026 London Marathon with a Samsung Galaxy Watch8 on his wrist, and Samsung says he is using it less like a step counter and more like a dashboard for sleep, recovery, heart rate, pace, and running form. (samsungmobilepress.com) Kiplimo is not a hobby runner testing gadgets for fun. World Athletics says the Ugandan star ran 56:42 for the half marathon in Barcelona on February 16, 2025, a world record that made him the first man under 57 minutes for 13.1 miles. (worldathletics.org) He is also heading into one of the deepest marathon races on the calendar. World Athletics says Kiplimo is in the men’s elite field for the TCS London Marathon on April 26, 2026, alongside Sabastian Sawe, Joshua Cheptegei, Tamirat Tola, and Yomif Kejelcha. (worldathletics.org) The basic idea behind this kind of training is simple: marathon runners are trying to balance stress and repair every day for months, because one hard workout helps only if the body absorbs it before the next one. A wearable watch matters here because it can collect the same kinds of daily signals a coach used to estimate from feel alone. (news.samsung.com) Samsung says Kiplimo checks sleep first, because sleep is the closest thing endurance athletes have to overnight maintenance. In the interview, he says poor sleep can change the next day’s session, which means the watch is helping decide when to push and when to back off. (news.samsung.com) He also uses Samsung Health’s running analysis tools to look at pace, heart rate, and asymmetry. Asymmetry is the small left-right imbalance in how you run, like a shopping cart that pulls slightly to one side before you notice it. (samsungmobilepress.com) Samsung says Kiplimo covered more than 100 kilometers in one training week, and even his rest day can include a 3 kilometer run. That is the kind of workload where a tiny mistake in recovery can turn into a sore calf, a flat workout, or a missed race. (news.samsung.com) The shift here is that consumer wearables are being presented as part of elite race prep, not just general wellness. Samsung is using one of the world’s best road runners to show that watch data now sits inside decisions about marathon training load, recovery timing, and form checks. (samsungmobilepress.com) That does not mean a watch creates a champion. It means an athlete who already runs world-record times is treating daily data the way a Formula One team treats tire temperature, with small readings used to avoid big mistakes before race day in London. (news.samsung.com)