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≡ WORLD MARATHON MAJORS ≡
Now, there are seven, as the Sydney Marathon was announced a new member of the World Marathon Majors program on Sunday (3rd) as the seventh race in the World Marathon Majors program:
“ABBOTT WORLD MARATHON MAJORS today confirmed that the TCS Sydney Marathon presented by ASICS will join the series in 2025 to become the seventh marathon in the Abbott World Marathon Majors series.
“The TCS Sydney Marathon, which will take place on August 31, 2025, joins six races including the Tokyo Marathon, the Boston Marathon presented by Bank of America, the TCS London Marathon, the BMW BERLIN-MARATHON, the Bank of America Chicago Marathon and the TCS New York City Marathon as part of the greatest marathon series in the world.”
Inaugurated in 2000 as a lead-up event to the 2000 Olympic Games in Sydney and continued as a legacy of that Games, the race has expanded to 20,272 finishers on 15 September 2024. However, Sunday’s announcement was clear that this is not the end of the World Marathon Majors expansion program:
“Sydney will form part of the journey towards the next Major milestone, the new Nine Star medal, which will begin when two more races are added to the series; however Sydney finishers can start counting the race toward their Nine Star in 2025.
“Sanlam Cape Town Marathon and Shanghai Marathon, which are currently in the candidacy process, could join the series in as early as 2026 and 2027 respectively should they pass two years of assessments.”
The original World Marathon Majors schedule had five races for the initial season in 2006: Boston, London, Berlin, Chicago and New York. Tokyo was added for 2013 and Sydney will be added 12 years later as the seventh.
The original Sydney Marathon course was quite hilly, but was flattened in 2010 and the current race records were set in the 2024 race:
● 2:06:18 for men, by Brimin Kipkorir (KEN)
● 2:21:41 for women, by Workenesh Esesa (ETH)
The Sydney men’s race record is slower than the six current World Marathon Majors, but the women’s mark is faster than the New York City Marathon record of 2:22:31 by Margaret Okayo (KEN) from 2003.
In terms of scheduling for 2025, the seven-race plan shows:
● 02 Mar.: Tokyo Marathon
● 21 Apr.: Boston Marathon
● 27 Apr.: London Marathon
● 31 Aug.: Sydney Marathon
● 21 Sep.: Berlin Marathon
● 12 Oct.: Chicago Marathon
● 02 Nov.: New York City Marathon
Wayne Larden, race director of the TCS Sydney Marathon said:
“Becoming the seventh Abbott World Marathon is just incredible for the event, the city of Sydney and State of New South Wales. We could not have achieved the incredible growth and uplift in delivery to make it into the Majors if it wasn’t for the support of the NSW Government and Destination NSW plus our key partners TCS and ASICS. Our team are first rate and have put in so much work to make this happen. It is really special for all of us.
“This amazing milestone is going to have a profound impact on running in Australia, inspiring the community to become marathoners and do something special for themselves, their families and friends. Community health will benefit alongside a huge increase in fundraising.”
Becoming a World Marathon Major brings with it interest from runners who want to complete all of the Major races. There were 12,772 six-star finishers through the end of 2023, with more after the finish of the NYC Marathon on Sunday, and while the next new medal will be the nine-star, runners will come to Sydney in 2025 to start working toward that goal.
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