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Yesterday, on Sunday October 4, an adapted version of the London Marathon took place. The event was scaled down to a series of ‘elite races’ which saw athletes Eliud Kipchoge, Brigid Kosgei, Mo Farah and Manuela Schär, complete a closed, biosecure loop of 19.6 laps around St James’s Park. Others joined in remotely for the virtual race using the marathon app, on a 26.2 mile route of their choosing. In the end, more than 43,000 runners across 109 countries took part.
It’s not the way we anticipated the 40th anniversary of the marathon would go down, but in many ways, it was a success. If you’re one of the thousands of amateur runners who started training for the race in January, only for it to be cancelled three months later, now is your second chance: the public ballot for the 2021 London Marathon is now open. The timeline is tight, though: you only have until 5pm on Friday October 9 to submit.
The marathon itself is slated for October 3 2021 and If your ballot is successful, you should be notified by January 2021, which gives you a decent window of training time. Will it be possible to have a large-scale spectator-race by then? Who knows. Whether you’re a seasoned marathon runner, or a Couch to 5k lockdown cliché, you have to be in it to win it, so enter the ballot here.
Hate training alone? Join one of these London running groups.
In other 2021 news, a ‘Back to the Future’ West End musical is slated to open at the Adelphi Theatre in May.