London is the flattest of the majors, about 125 meters of gain along the Thames, from Greenwich past the Cutty Sark and over Tower Bridge to The Mall. The catch is getting in: the 2026 ballot drew 1.13 million applications for roughly 17,000 spots, a 1.5 percent shot, so most of us run it on a charity place instead. Late April sits 7 to 15 degrees, usually dry. For 2027 it runs over two days, 100,000 finishers.
Better info coming — we're still verifying 2 fields on this race.
Why we'd pick it
- 125 m of climbing: rolling, not pancake-flat.
- It's a lottery. Enter the day it opens, not the week before.
- A non-racing partner gets a real weekend here — 5/5.
- Race day usually sits 7–15°C, about 25% chance of rain.
The course
Flat and fast along the Thames, from Greenwich to The Mall past the Cutty Sark, over Tower Bridge near halfway, and through the Canary Wharf canyons before the flag-lined finish by Buckingham Palace. Around 125 meters of total gain, much of it the early downhill out of Blackheath; the course nets downhill and runs that way. The crowds are loud the whole route, but the opening miles bottleneck hard with the pack packed onto narrow southeast-London streets.
