Marathon
🏙 Capitals / Major cities🗽 Exceptional monuments📰 Culture & Histoire🏘️ In the city⛲️ Public park🌉 Bridge/Viaduct
📅Mon, April 19, 2027
🏃 Road race:26.22 mi
↗️ Elevation gain:165mD+ / -
Inspired by the success of the first Olympic marathon in Athens in 1896, the Boston Marathon was born a year later, on April 19, 1897. A historic member of the Abbott World Marathon Majors, this legendary event stands out for its extreme difficulty and its strict system of qualifying time standards required to enter.
On race day, logistics are an adventure in themselves: the 30,000 participants must board buses to reach the start line in Hopkinton, more than 42 kilometers from downtown. Once the gun goes off, the rolling course offers no respite. The challenge peaks at kilometer 33 with the dreaded Heartbreak Hill, a climb that breaks legs and spirits, before dropping down toward relief in the streets of Boston.
But Boston also draws strength from its resilience. Deeply scarred by the April 15, 2013 attacks (which left 3 dead and more than 260 injured), the event found a way to reinvent itself. As early as the following edition in 2014, the running community showed up in force with a historic record of 36,000 participants, turning this sporting monument into a universal symbol of courage and solidarity.
This marathon takes place on Patriots’ Day, a day of celebration in Massachusetts and Maine on the 3rd Monday of April each year. The day commemorates the Battles of Lexington and Concord, which marked the beginning of the American Revolutionary War. This symbolic public holiday is also known as “Marathon Monday”.
Boston’s 42.195 kilometers once welcomed a notorious cheat: Rosa Ruiz. Selected thanks to her record time at the New York City Marathon—where she had also cheated—the runner stayed in a hotel near the finish line. After slipping into the crowd at just the right moment, falsely sweating, she finished the marathon first in 2 hours and 31 minutes! Journalists quickly exposed her, given the many inconsistencies in her story.
The Boston Marathon is one of the hardest races in the world to get into because, unlike most major marathons that rely on a lottery, it requires runners to meet strict qualifying time standards based on age and gender.
Marathons.com
Marathons.com
Marathons.com
Marathons.com