Haile Gebrselassie will return to defend his Berlin marathon title on September 30 after narrowly missing out on a world record last year.

With eight kilometres to go, the Ethiopian was almost half-a-minute inside the pace of Kenya's Paul Tergat when he set the record of two hours four minutes 55 seconds on the same course in 2003 but Gebrselassie was slowed by strong winds at the end.

His time, a personal best, was 2:05:56.