Deressa Chimsa

Deressa Chimsa Edae (born 21 November 1976) is an Ethiopian long-distance runner who competes in marathon races. He represented Ethiopia in the event at the 2009 World Championships in Athletics. His personal best of 2:05:42 hours was set at the 2012 Dubai Marathon. He won the Daegu Marathon in 2010.

Hailing from Addis Ababa, Deressa began running at a young age and trained for a long time in order to take up running professionally. His first major race came at the age of 31 at the 2008 Dubai Marathon. Unlike the other top runners at the competition, he paid for his own travel and expenses in order to participate. His performance lifted him into the elite athlete ranks as he came seventh in a time of 2:10:16 hours. His next outing at the Eindhoven Marathon later that year was less successful and he came twelfth some five minutes behind the winner Geoffrey Mutai. He returned to the Dubai race the following year and he showed significant improvement by finishing as runner-up to Haile Gebrselassie. He set a new personal best 2:07:54 hours and received US$100,000 for his placing. He won the Ethiopian half marathon championship race and gained selection for the Ethiopian marathon team for the 2009 World Championships in Athletics. At the World Championships he was among the leading pack at 30 km, fell back to sixth by 40 km, then dropped out entirely from the race.

He recovered from this setback by winning his first marathon in April 2010, taking the men's title at the Daegu Marathon. He tried his hand at the shorter half marathon distance in November, running at the New Delhi Half Marathon, but finished 14th in a large field with a time of 62:22 minutes. He attended the Dubai Marathon for a third year running and took fourth in a time of 2:09:08 hours. He ran in his first World Marathon Majors event that April, entering the 2011 Boston Marathon and in a very fast race (Geoffrey Mutai ran a world's best time on the downhill course) he managed eighth place.

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