It’s Berlin Marathon Week!

Racemappr
Racemappr
Sep 6, 2018 · 4 min read

It’s the biggest race week of the year for Berlin, because of one event: the Berlin Marathon! I apologize for not writing about any other events for the upcoming week, there is just too much to talk about the Berlin Marathon. If you are a runner in berlin, this is the biggest party that you have to participate in, whether it’s on the track running, or cheering with Racemappr on the sideline.

THE PRESTIGE

The BMW Berlin Marathon (BMW is the official sponsor of the event since 2011) is commonly recognized as one of the five world-wide marathons along with New York, London, Chicago, and Paris Marathon. 2018 will be its 45th consecutive annual event. What set the Berlin Marathon apart from other marathon events are its favorable landscape, supportive cheering spectators, and the often mild autumn temperature, which means only one thing: world records. Throughout its 44 years of event history, the marathon world record has been broken 10 times on the Berlin streets. 7 of the 10 were male world records, and 3 of them were female world records. In 2014, Kenyan runner Dennis Kimetto set the male marathon world record with the time 2:02:57 at the Berlin Marathon, which still stands as the world record today. For the past 7 out of 8 years, Berlin Marathon has produced the world’s fastest time on its course.The Berlin Marathon also provides the best pace-setters for the elite marathon runners, which, in turn, led to the record of fastest average-time among its all-time top ten finishers at 2:03:28. Horribly close to the world record.

THE COURSE

The course of the race makes a loop which starts and finishes at Brandenburg Gate. It travels through and past Charlottenburg, Tiergarten, Moabit, Mitte, Friedrichshain, Neukölln, Kreuzberg, Schöneberg, Friedenau, Zehlendorf, and then back to Brandenburg Gate. However, the course hasn’t always been this same route. Before 1990, because of the division of the city, the course was only limited to West Berlin. The whole course will be marked by triple blue lines on the street. One might think the blue stripes are for runners to know where to run, but it is actually for the elite runners who are challenging record times to not run any more than they have to. If you run exactly along the blue lines, you will run exactly 42,195 meters from the start to the finish.

The Berlin Morning Post created a digital representation of exactly how the 2017 Berlin Marathon went down. On the map of the course, each red dot represents each individual runner participating in the full marathon. The fastest dot finished in 2:03:32, while the slowest dot finished at the 8:47:20 mark! I applaud that last red dot, and it is honestly a real pleasure and motivation to watch that last dot move to the finish line at 60x speed. Check it out from the link below:

THE NUMBERS

The scale of the Berlin Marathon is also something to marvel at. Last year, a total of 61,131 participants joined the Berlin Marathon in its various events. 43,852 of them participated in the full-marathon, of which 39,101 runners finished the course. Among all the participants, only around 30% were women, which is a fairly low percentage when compared to other big city marathons, such as London Marathon at 40% and Chicago Marathon at 50%. Runners come from 137 countries, with UK, USA, and Denmark contributing the most participants, each over 1,500. It is also estimated that there were over a million spectators of the event throughout the entire city.

To check out some more advanced statistics about the runners of the 2017 Berlin Marathon check out the link below. The comprehensive writing details the age range, pace, participant experience, and many other insights of the participants performance from a data’s perspective.

JOIN THE PARTY

If you aren’t participating in the Berlin Marathon, but still wants to enjoy the party, come to the Racemappr office Sunday morning and cheer the runners on with us! The course of the marathon goes right under the office (Kottbusser Damm 103A). The race starts at 9:15 am, and the first runners will arrive at the area around 9:30 am. So plan your arrival accordingly, There will be flags, banners, snacks and most importantly, beer. Here’s the link to the FB event, sign up, and join us to celebrate the biggest day of Berlin running!

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We are Racemappr, the online platform which helps people discover their next sporting challenge, from organised club races to the biggest mass participation events. Search by sports like running, triathlon, swimming, cycling and obstacle race. It simplifies event search based on location and allows organisers to connect directly with the race community. Feel free to get in touch in the comments. Get inspired, and discover your next challenge at racemappr.com.

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