Is Berlin the fastest marathon course out there? Could Kipchoge have run faster today on a different record eligible course?

My strava says only 288 ft of elevation gain which matches the official numbers. I think your mate's strava's mis calibrated.

Frankfurt

Ahhh that makes more sense. His reading was 900 ft. and that seemed either not right or that there are faster courses out there. Thanks!

NewtotheSouthSide wrote:

Just looking at the Strava on some of my mates that ran the race and the gain is almost 1000 feet throughout the course of the marathon. There don't appear to be any major climbs but the course looks like it moves slightly up and down throughout the race? Can anyone confirm their experience on the course? I know World Records go to die in Berlin but race organizers also invest in that with a small field and pacers versus paying out a bunch of runners for good competition.

What if Chicago only invited 5 big names on each side and brought pacers back? I know Chicago has a bunch of turns but it only gains 200 or 300 ft per Strava. Would that not be a better place to run fast? Might London or Rotterdam be faster?

Your mates' Strava is wrong. I have run Berlin four times now and there is minimal elevation gain. One very slight gradual incline up to the 5 km mark and a small bridge before the 15 km mark that I can think of and really nothing else. I would say 200 to 300 feet sounds about right. It feels absolutely flat. And the asphalt seems faster than other courses I've run. Plus, the crowd is amazing and covers almost 100 % of the course. London is great at points but there are parts where you run without fans. Can't compare to Boston.

There probably is some faster course purely going by the route somewhere (think I read Poland?). But considering fans and competition, Berlin has to be the fastest overall (you're probably better off running with other fast people than on a slightly faster course somewhere in nowhere) and for sure the fastest Major.

Dubai has exactly four turns and zero gain over the entire course. Good prize money, too, but the Kenyans tend to shy away from it.

Chicago is obv fast but has trouble matching a surer bet in Berlin

Because Dubai is a literal craphole when it comes to pollution.

Boston302 wrote:

Dubai has exactly four turns and zero gain over the entire course. Good prize money, too, but the Kenyans tend to shy away from it.

Chicago is obv fast but has trouble matching a surer bet in Berlin

I was going to mention Dubai, but is it often too hot, even in January?

I heard Pyongyang is flat too

Boston with a 20mph tail wind => 1:55 marathon.

The guy who paced Shalane at Berlin a few years ago wrote a blog post about the race, he made Berlin sound like the perfect marathon course.

http://leblogdurob.com/blog-115-tales-of-rabbithood/

Dubai is the fastest course layout with few turns and perfectly flat. But Dubai is generally just too warm and humid. It can also be smoggy. It is pretty rare to get the lows down under 60 deg in January. They have to start before the sun comes up to keep conditions manageable.

Also, I think Kipchoge is a bit of a showman and feeds off of the crowds. There are almost no spectators on the course in Dubai, except for the grandstands at the finish that are mostly filled with Ethiopian ex-pats.

Frankfurt and Chicago are very fast courses. The weather in Chicago just isn't reliable for WR attempts. If it isn't hot it is windy. Frankfurt is in late October and has conditions that are usually as good as Berlin but seem to get a little more rain/wind as they are later in the fall. So, if all the money went to one race for a WR attempt, Frankfurt might arguably be slightly better than Berlin.

Fukuoka

NewtotheSouthSide wrote:

Just looking at the Strava on some of my mates that ran the race and the gain is almost 1000 feet throughout the course of the marathon. There don't appear to be any major climbs but the course looks like it moves slightly up and down throughout the race? Can anyone confirm their experience on the course? I know World Records go to die in Berlin but race organizers also invest in that with a small field and pacers versus paying out a bunch of runners for good competition.

What if Chicago only invited 5 big names on each side and brought pacers back? I know Chicago has a bunch of turns but it only gains 200 or 300 ft per Strava. Would that not be a better place to run fast? Might London or Rotterdam be faster?

Yeah, like on a track in Monza, Italy maybe? Watching the race you can see that the course is flat, but there are some slight rollers along the way.

too windy in chicago, due to the lakefront and all the open space

Dubai is too damn hot

Berlin is the fastest course for a reason.

I have run Chicago twice, and Frankfurt 4 times. Yes they are fast. But the fastest course I have ever run was Houston, back in 1995. I am not sure if they changed the course since then, but it was pretty much a giant loop, much like Berlin, with few turns, and it was flat as cam pancake . It remains my PB course.

He could have run faster on the same course if it was cooler.

A rab wrote:

Because Dubai is a literal craphole when it comes to pollution.

A literal craphole? Seriously? idk man, I've seen pictures of Dubai and watched the marathon and it was neither a hole nor was it filled with crap.

What about Rotterdam?

Rotterdam is about as fast as Berlin (there's one bridge early on but perfectly flat otherwise), but wind can be an issue.

I would say Dubai is faster. Of course you don't have the crowds like Berlin, but strictly from a course perspective Dubai is definitley faster.