Final (?) update for the Abbott World Marathon Majors

As mentioned previously the Tokyo marathon opened up for more participants through travel agents, so suddenly I got moved up 2 years meaning that instead of running Tokyo marathon and completing my 6 Marathon Majors in March 2026 I got the opportunity to do it in 2024. I didn't need much convincing to do that.

This means that I have now completed the 6 marathons majors as follows:

Berlin - September 2019 - 3:58:16
New York - November 2019 - 4:11:53
Boston - April 2022 - 3:59:30
Chicago - October 2022 - 3:58:02
London - April 2023 - 3:58:42
Tokyo - March 2024 - 3:59:06

So this is the final update for the marathon majors.

Well, maybe not completely final; Cape Town and Sidney are considered candidate runs in an attempt to be accepted as the 7th and 8th majors, and further out Shanghai is also lurking on the horizon. Interesting times ahead. But for now, I'm enjoying the accomplishment and my new medal.

3rd of March – Tokyo marathon

We were getting picked up by a bus at 0645 but not having fully recovered from my jetlag I once again avoided my alarm and thus had a relatively relaxing morning – all considering. I had expected to be able to see parts of the city on the way to the starting area, but a few minutes after leaving the hotel we dipped down into a tunnel, and a few minutes before arriving at our destination we came back up onto street level. So that was… something.

 

As this was my last of the 6 majors I got this to put on my shirt. 

I put it on the back and I was surprised at how much response I got from others with encouragements and thumbs-ups. 

It was a cold morning and there was nothing to do in the starting area in the 1½ hours before they’d close the starting corrals, so the wait felt even longer.

As opposed to similarly-sized runs we were all sent off in a rolling start instead of in waves. So when the gun went off at 0910 there was very little extra waiting necessary, the only wait was for the runners ahead of you – and app. 8 minutes later I crossed the starting line. The start was made possible by the fact that the start was on some very wide streets so despite it being crowded (which naturally happens when 38000 runners set off at almost the same time) it never felt uncomfortably crowded.

 

And we're off!

Being a cold morning it was a bit rough starting but reaching around 4-5 km we finally passed some space between the tall buildings and were hit by the sun and thereby got some actual warmth which greatly improved the conditions. For the rest of the run we often switched between sun and shade with significant change in temperatures. While there was a breeze we were protected from it most of the time – when we weren’t it was nice to be cooled down, though it didn’t take long before it got cold. During the last 7-8 km the wind had dwindled and being out in the open it was by far the hottest part of the course.

The course had a lot of repetition in form of going out and back on the same streets. It didn’t bother me as much as I had expected; you got to see the same from a different angle (which might as well have been a completely different place not knowing the city and focusing on trying to survive the run) and you got to greet other runners even if they were far ahead or behind you. At around 14-ish km and the following few km we were running parallel with the course’s +/- 31 km marker and at the point in time I got there I got to see Kipchoge racing along (who turned out to “only” be at around 10^th place at the time) so we got to cheer him and some of the other elites along.

 

I may be smiling on several photos but this was how I genuinely felt. 

The Japanese are quite reserved, even in cases like this, so you never got the chaos and noise from the onlookers that you’d experience during the large US races or London. But there weren’t many passages along the way where there weren’t people cheering us on. But if you managed to gain eye contact with someone their enthusiasm spiked and you got your own little personal energetic cheer to get you along.

 

Tokyo Tower in the background.

Due to the wide streets it was difficult to avoid excessive zig-zagging when getting water and getting back into the flow, so when crossing the finish line my watch said 43,17 km. I speculated that some of that could have been due to the GPS signals bouncing between the tall buildings, but those I talked with after the run had registered similar distances, so apparently the wide streets just resulted in more cross-movement than usual.

Despite the extended distance (and a way too long wait at a toilet break where I lost around 3 minutes) I still managed to reach my goal of completing below 4 hours – my finishing time was 3:59:06. I came in as 13089 out of 35411 overall (top 36,96%), 10905 out of 26682 men (top 40,87%) and 1929 out of 3757 in my age group (51,34%). A result I am quite happy with and quite similar to other equal runs. 

 

The final majors medal representing all 6 marathons 

(Berlin, New York, Chicago, Boston, London and Tokyo). 

Crossing the finishing line meant that I had completed all the 6 marathon majors and when getting the probably least inspiring medal for the run I could continue waddling along and pick up my 6 star finisher medal, one that is significantly more impressive-looking. We also got handed a back that got filled with energy drink, water, bath salts(??), wipes, heating blanket and a parka. There was a miserable lack of snacks which I crave after such a run. I found “my” bus and only a few minutes later we were off and returned to the hotel – this time above ground.

Returning to the hotel I had a long much-needed shower before heading back outside and visited the kiosk right outside to stock up on snacks for the afternoon. By time, too, as I was walking around slightly lightheaded.

The land of uncooked fish

According to my last update I was to run the Tokyo marathon in 2026. Towards the end of September last year I received a mail from the marathon travel company letting me know that they had extra spots for the 2024 run. So my schedule got bumped up 2 years. The horror!

For obvious reasons I’m not traveling across the world for just a weekend to run a marathon so I’ll have a few other things planned for the trip.

27th of February – 3rd of March
Flying out to Tokyo on a direct flight; leaving around 1100 and arriving the following morning less than 14 hours later. I’ll have a few days to catch my breath and have a look around, including running a 5km run Saturday morning (“Friendship Run”) before running the marathon on Sunday the 3rd.

The course starts near Shinjuku at the Metropolitan Government office, going east and reaching north of Imperial Palace and Chiyoda City. From there we have a short detour north towards Ueno before returning to Chiyoda City, going further south before turning east and north to Taito City, returning the same way for a bit before going further east and south past the Tomioka Hachimangu Shrine before once again returning the way we came. Reaching the east side of Chiyoda City again and Tokyo station we continue further south all the way to Tamachi and passing Tokyo Tower and once again turning around, the same way back, finishing the run at Tokyo station.

Quite a bit of repetition on the course with running on roads in both directions which I’m not a big fan of, but it’s a completely new city for me so that’s a big plus.

4th – 8th of March
The day after the run, hopefully not too sore, I’ll be checking out from the hotel and taking the shinkansen to Osaka where I’ll spend the following four nights. Not many plans other than hanging out and seeing the city. I do have plans on the Wednesday to grab the train to Himeji to see the castle there – dated from 1333 and the largest in Japan – and on the way back stop by Kobe where I have a reservation for a hopefully delicious dinner centered around kobe beef.

8th – 21st of March
I’m doing a 2-week group tour starting in Tokyo so I’ll take the shinkansen back to Tokyo to meet with the group. From there we’ll start off going west to Kanazawa, continuing to Takayama, then going south all the way down to Hiroshima, and returning passing through Kyoto and Fujikawaguchiko (near Fuji) before returning to Tokyo. We’ll be spending 1-2 days at all the locations giving us time to see the city/area before shinkansen’ing on to the next location.

One could argue that a day (or the two in Kyoto) isn’t enough to see it everything a city has to offer, but if you were to stay long enough to be fully satiated these two weeks could have been more than double the time. I suspect it will likely at times feel a bit rushed but also a good balance between getting to see a large part of the country and still at least having some time at each stop.

22nd – 30th of March
Returning to Tokyo I’ll spend the rest of my trip there, having time to have a good look around and get to see the different parts of the city. I am looking into doing day trips out of the city, maybe north as that is a part that hasn’t been covered by the previous days. I have already booked a tour in Nagano on the 25th – not because it was the site for the winter Olympics in 1998, but you can see the
Japanese macaques (snow monkeys); those known for sitting in the hot pools surrounded by snow. Being relatively late in the winter there may not be much snow left when I get there, but I guess I’ll see when I get there. The cherry trees are forecast to start blossoming around the 22nd in Tokyo and being fully blossomed a week later, so I will just have time to see that (hopefully – depending on weather and such) before flying home Saturday morning.

As far as I can see this will be the longest trip I’ve been on yet, but considering how interesting the country (and food!) seems I felt it would be waste not spending some extra time now that I was there for the run. There will likely be a certain level of cultural shock when getting there but that’s all part of the fun, right?

New update for Abbott World Marathon Majors

With last year's completion of Chicago and Boston marathons, and the mail received letting me participate in the 2023 London marathon, things have been moving forward in more sense than one. On top of that its satisfying being able to cross them off one at a time. This means that 4 of the World Marathon Majors are complete, one is in the near future and one is still some years in the future.

As things are currently, this is the current schedule, past and future.

Berlin - September 2019
New York - November 2019
Boston - April 2022
Chicago - October 2022
London - April 2023
Tokyo - March 2026

So in a few months I will have only one left, so I guess I'll have to find other runs in the mean time to keep me on my toes. Sounds like a horrible concept. Also, there are rumors that they are planning on adding another run to the group, so even if I can see the end of it now it might change in the future. It'll be interesting to see how that turns out as there have been talk for a long time to add more run(s). We'll see, but I worry this will be an endless chase with always another one in the future that has just been added, and not being able to actually finish the group like I did with the Superhalfs. 

Update on the Abbott World Marathon Majors

For someone who enjoys travelling it has been some frustrating years to get through, and carefully laid plans got moved around, cancelled and postponed. With the pandemic seemingly reaching the end one could hope that the current planning might hold going forward.

I was supposed to run in Boston April last year, and after being postponed multiple times it seems like I now have a spot for the run next year. Similarly with Chicago, and with the US borders not opening until November this year it looks like I'll be running that next year. Also, due to cancellation of Tokyo a marathon and them being careful on the first post-pandemic (halving the capacity), my spot for Tokyo has been pushed back to 2026. So the schedule for the 4 remaining marathons (having already done Berlin and New York) looks something like this:

Boston – April 2022

Chicago – October 2022

London – April 2025

Tokyo – March 2026

It looks like, as things are currently, that this schedule should hold, but I have learnt not to rely on any vacation scheduling more than a couple of weeks in advance. Hopefully things settle down and I can look forward to joining some of the big runs in the world again, it'll feel great getting back out and running.