A select number of Irish runners will get to compete at a 2021 National Marathon Championships in October, only it will mean travelling to the North as the event will be staged as part of Belfast City Marathon already set for Sunday, October 3rd.
Athletics Ireland announced on Thursday that only 100 male and 100 female entries would be made available, and interest in being sought “from athletes who have acquired suitable times over the last three years”. The closing date is Thursday week, August 19th.
Unlike the 2021 Dublin Marathon, cancelled for the second year running due to Covid-19, organisers of the Belfast event have got the go ahead. The total entry number is capped at 4,800.
Runners can also be included in the Irish National Marathon if they secure a regular race entry, which will cost them £63. Closing date for that is Friday, August 27th.
Last year’s cancellation of the Dublin Marathon meant there was no National Marathon for 2020, the event being staged as part of the Dublin Marathon for the last number of years.
Other National Road events did proceed this year, Tuam Athletic club organising the National 20km walk championships in June, one week after the numbers were allowed post Covid restrictions, and 150 senior and junior athletes competing, including Tokyo bound Olympians Brendan Boyce and David Kenny.
The Belfast Marathon route takes in the four areas of Belfast; North, South, East and West, starting at Stormont Estate at 9am and finishing in Ormeau Park.
Given the date, reigning Irish men’s marathon champion Stephen Scullion from 2019 won’t be running as he is set to run the Boston Marathon, postponed from its normal date in April to October 11th. Reigning women’s champion Aoife Cooke from Cork may be in a position to defend her title, however.
In early July, for the second year running, organisers of the Dublin Marathon were forced to cancel the event outright given the still “many unknowns” around outdoor mass participation events for the rest of the year.
While always unlikely to be the full 25,000 sell-out entry of runners originally signed up in advance of the 2020 edition, postponed in May of last year due to Covid-19, there had been some hope and expectation a more limited entry will get the go ahead.
Despite Dublin’s cancellation, other big city marathons set for the autumn include New York (November 7th), Chicago (October 10th), Berlin (September 26th) and Tokyo (October 17th). The London Marathon, also traditionally held in April, is now set for October 3rd, the organisers there opening up 50,000 entries, most of which were decided by lottery, an increase of more than 7,000 on the previous finisher record.
