Frank Charles Shorter is an American former long-distance runner who won the gold medal in the marathon at the 1972 Summer Olympics and the silver medal at the 1976 Summer Olympics. His Olympic success, along with the achievements of other American runners, is credited with igniting the running boom in the United States during the 1970s.
Juan Carlos Zabala, also known as "El Ñandú Criollo", was an Argentine long-distance runner, winner of the marathon race at the 1932 Summer Olympics.
Aigars Fadejevs is a former Latvian athlete, competing in 20 km, 50 km walk and marathon running, and a rehabilitologist for sprinters.
Gelindo Bordin is an Italian former athlete, winner of the marathon race at the 1988 Summer Olympics. He is the first Italian to have won an Olympic gold in the marathon and the only male to win both the Boston Marathon and the Olympic gold medal in this event.
Karel Lismont is a former Belgian long-distance runner. He competed at the 1972, 1976, 1980 and 1984 Olympics in the marathon and 10,000 m events. He won two marathon medals: a silver in 1972 and a bronze in 1976, finishing ninth and twenty-fourth in 1980 and 1984, respectively; he was less successful in the 10,000 m, finishing eleventh in 1976 and failing to reach the final in 1972. His personal best for the marathon was 2:11:12.6 at the 1976 Olympic Games.
Ethiopia, also known as the Derg, competed at the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow, USSR. The nation returned to the Olympic Games after boycotting the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. 41 competitors, 39 men and 2 women, took part in 26 events in 3 sports.
António Coelho Pinto is a retired Portuguese long-distance runner. He was born in Vila Garcia, Amarante.
Peter Dickson Pfitzinger is an American former distance runner, who later became an author, exercise physiologist and sports administrator.
Dale Warrander, sometimes incorrectly spelled Warrender, is a New Zealand long distance runner. His personal best in the marathon is 2:12.58, set in Fukuoka, 2004.
Todd Dwayne Williams is a retired long-distance runner from the United States, who represented his native country at two consecutive Summer Olympics, starting in 1992. Williams was born in Monroe, Michigan. During high school he won the Michigan team race title twice. He was a two-time United States cross country champion, with victories in 1991 and 1993. He attended the University of Tennessee where he was an All-American for three years. Is also a Brazilian jiu-jitsu blackbelt under Luiz Palhares and runs an ASICS sponsored company known as RunSafer.
Karel David is a retired long-distance runner from the Czech Republic, who won the 1991 and 1992 edition of the Vienna Marathon. David represented Czechoslovakia twice in the men's marathon at the Summer Olympics. He set his personal best time (2:11:57) on 23 May 1993 at the Hamburg Marathon.
Manuel Fernando Gonilho Matias is a retired long-distance runner from Portugal, who won the 1989 edition of the Fukuoka Marathon, clocking 2:12:54 on 3 December 1989. A year earlier he triumphed in the Paris Marathon. Matias represented his native country at the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, Georgia, finishing in 46th place (2:20:58).
Jörg Peter is a German former long-distance runner. He held the German record over the marathon distance from 1988 till 2015.
Derek Owen Froude is a former long-distance runner from New Zealand, who represented his native country at two Summer Olympics: 1984 and 1992 (Barcelona). He finished in 34th and 35th place in the men's marathon. He set his personal best (2:11:25) in the classic distance in 1983.
Albert Richard "Whitey" Michelsen was an American long-distance runner who is recognized as having set a world's best in the marathon on October 12, 1925, with a time of 2:29:01 at the inaugural Port Chester Marathon in Port Chester, New York. According to the International Association of Athletics Federations, Michelsen held this record until Fusashige Suzuki posted a 2:27:49 performance in Tokyo, Japan on March 31, 1935.
Jacques "Jacky" Boxberger was a track and field athlete from France who specialized in long-distance races.
The marathon at the Summer Olympics is the only road running event held at the multi-sport event. The men's marathon has been present on the Olympic athletics programme since the first modern Olympics in 1896. Nearly ninety years later, the women's event was added to the programme at the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles.
Mosinet Geremew is an Ethiopian middle-distance and long-distance runner.
The East and Central African Championships was an annual international athletics competition between nations in East and Central Africa.
Roza Dereje Bekele is an Ethiopian marathon runner.
Ethiopia 
