Amsterdam Marathon & Half Marathon

60 - 80 € (42K) / 25 - 40 € (21K)
8.2

Location

9.0/10

Track

9.0/10

Atmosphere

8.0/10

Organization

8.0/10

Budget

7.0/10

Pros

  • Great location and track
  • Fast and flat (good for PB)
  • It ends in an olympic stadium
  • Well organized and participated
  • Location well connected abroad with Airports

Cons

  • High-end budget
Edition:46th (2022)
World Athletics Label Road Race:Yes
Expected participants:17500 (42K) - 20000 (21K) - 7500 (8K) - 3000 (kids run)
Distances:42K, 21K, 8K + kids run (0.7K) and good morning city run (3.3K - 6.5K)
Type of race:Flat, city run
Time limit:6 hours (42K) - 3 hours (21K) - 1.05 hour (8K)

I strongly recommend the Amsterdam Marathon event (sponsored by TCS with a long lasting partnership) especially for a group journey, and for various good reasons: not only Amsterdam is an amazing european capital, that can satisfy… all kind of appetites (sex, drugs… and rock and roll! but also art, landscapes, food and nightlife).

The program

The Amsterdam Marathon is a very well organized and participated event that includes several races: the Marathon (having a capacity for 17500 runners), the half marathon (capped to 20000 participants), the 8K (reserved to 7500 runners) and even 3000 spots for the kids run, and more options, like the Good Morning City Run, where running is combined with visiting canals and most suggestive city areas.

I came here with my brother and his girlfriend, my sister and some other friends, although I have been the only one running. But in Amsterdam there is a lot to do besides participating to this event, so we have been splitting quite easily in smaller groups, meeting every night for dinner and the after dinner. We were there for four nights.

The event

The event concentrates almost 50000 runners in several activities, and the pick up of the BIB creates some queues: it took nearly an hour to go through. Consider this, and try to go in the early stages of the opening of the EXPO.

Besides that, everything well fluently: the city has a good public transport network and even having an accommodation distant from the starting point, it was easy to reach the starting area. Given the dimension of the event and being Amsterdam a touristic, and not cheap city, I recommend to avoid last minute bookings!

The course is flat and very enjoyable, and fast: it can be a good choice to try a personal best. Lawrence Cherono won the 2018 edition male race with the stunning time of 2:04:05.

There is another great reason to participate to this event: it ends inside the 22000 seats capacity Amsterdam Olympic Stadium, which hosted the 1928 Olympic games and recently, in 2016, the European Athletics Championships. Finishing your race entering the stadium and running the last hundred meters on the tartan of the athletic ring, followed by the cheering support of the spectators, will give you unique emotions.

Conclusions

I strongly recommend running the Amsterdam Marathon event, being a great combination of everything a travelling runner looks for: a great location with many opportunities before and after the race, a very well organized event, structured with many distances, if the group of runners is looking for different experiences. On that regard, the 8k (which also includes a participation medal award) race is very strategic to get on board travelling mates who would not run a longer distance: a perfect event to turn someone else to become a travelling runner!

If you have further questions please contact me and read my travelling tips with options for booking your journey to Amsterdam!

Read here more about the next edition of this race!

Picture by amsfrank on Flickr. It was reviewed on  by FlickreviewR 2 and licensed under the terms of the cc-by-sa-2.0.

Categories:

No responses yet

    Leave a Reply

    Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

    This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.