Beijing Marathon

The start at Tiananmen Square is at 43.1 m and the finish on the Olympic Green is at 43.5 m, so the race is a point-to-point that ends level with where it began. Between them the road reaches 56.6 m near km 11 and 38.6 m near km 38.5, a range of 18 m across the whole distance.

The climbing is front-loaded. The first 10 km add about 13 m, which takes the road from 43 m to 56 m along Chang’an Avenue, Fuxing Road and the West Third Ring Road. After the high point near km 11 the road falls, with only small rises: 50 m at the half-way mark, 47.5 m at 30 km, 38.6 m near km 38.5. The last 3.7 km rise about 5 m to the finish.

Added up, the whole course gains 41 m.

Measured

The organiser’s regulations for Sunday 18 October 2026 name the start as “天安门广场” (Tiananmen Square) and the finish as “奥林匹克公园中心区景观大道” (the Landscape Avenue in the centre of the Olympic Park). The entry notice adds that the route passes through the Dongcheng, Xicheng, Haidian and Chaoyang districts.

The route sentence begins on the road along the square’s east side and turns left onto Chang’an Avenue, then follows Fuxingmen Inner and Outer Streets and Fuxing Road, turns north onto the frontage road of the West Third Ring Road, and continues by Linglong Road and Landianchang Road to the North Fourth Ring Road. From there it runs east, follows Zhixin Road, Xueyuan Road and Xueqing Road, and reaches the Olympic Park by way of the North Fifth Ring Road.

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The organiser’s route sentence takes the field off Olympic West Road at the National Speed Skating Oval, the speed skating venue of the 2022 Winter Olympics, and round its north, inner and south roads: km 32.6 to 33.3. Kehui Road then carries the one turnaround on the Olympic Green (“科荟路（折返）” in the regulations), out and back across roughly km 34.2 to 35.2.

The Olympic Tower is 104 m off the road at km 40.6. The course turns onto the Landscape Avenue at km 40.7, leaves it for Datun North Road, Hujing East Road and Datun Road, and comes back onto the avenue at km 41.85 for the last 350 m.

Measured

Everyone starts together on “一枪发令同时起跑”, a single gun, at 07:30. The regulations’ cut-off table (“关门时间”) gives these clock times: 5 km at 08:25, 10 km at 09:00, 15 km at 09:40, 20 km at 10:20, the half-way point at 10:30, 25 km at 11:00, 30 km at 11:45, 35 km at 12:30 and the finish at 13:30.

Counted from the gun, that is 55 minutes for the first 5 km, 3 hours at the half-way mark, 5 hours at 35 km and 6 hours for the whole distance, an average of about 8:32 a kilometre. At each point the timing mat stops at the stated time and the road behind it reopens to traffic. A runner who finishes inside the limit but misses any timing mat is not ranked. Runners who are stopped can ride a sweep vehicle from a collection point to the finish.

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