Abebe Bikila Abebe Bikila Abebe Bikila (; August 7, 1932 – October 25, 1973) was an Ethiopian marathon runner. A double Olympic marathon champion, he won the first at the 1960 Summer Olympics in Rome while running barefoot, setting a world record. He is Africa's first world record breaking athlete in any sport and the first sub-Saharan African Olympic gold medallist. At the 1964 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, Abebe became the first athlete to successfully defend an Olympic marathon title, breaking his own world record in the process. He was a member of the Ethiopian Imperial Guard, an elite infantry division that
Sub-Saharan Africa and fourteen ancestral clusters through STRUCTURE analysis within the continent. The clustering corresponded closely with ethnicity, culture and language. In addition, whole genome sequencing analysis of modern populations inhabiting Sub-Saharan Africa has observed several primary inferred ancestry components: a Pygmy-related component carried by the Mbuti and Biaka Pygmies in Central Africa, a Khoisan-related component carried by Khoisan-speaking populations in Southern Africa, a Niger-Congo-related component carried by Niger-Congo-speaking populations throughout Sub-Saharan Africa, a Nilo-Saharan-related component carried by Nilo-Saharan-speaking populations in the Nile Valley and African Great Lakes, and a West Eurasian-related component carried by Afroasiatic-speaking populations in the Horn of Africa