calendar icon Apr 27, 2024

Marathon Details - Vienna City Marathon

International Marathons > Austria > Vienna > Vienna City Marathon

Vienna City Marathon & Half Marathon, Relay, 10K

location icon Vienna, Austria    calendar icon  April 21, 2024    calendar icon http://www.vienna-marathon.com




Name: Wolfgang Konrad
Address: Enterprise Sport Promotion
Ges.m.b.H.
A-1100 Wien, Postfach 145
Phone Number:  43(0)6504219500
Fax Number: (+43-1)6069540
Email: Email the organizers
 
 
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Reviews

Course Rating Course 4.3 
 
Oranization Rating Organization 4.1 
 
Spectator Rating Spectators 3.9 
 
 
Number of comments: 67 [displaying comments 1 to 11]
More Comments: [ < 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 > ]

 

Ü. B. from Turkey (5/11/2022)
"Marvellous City, so-so organization" (about: 2022)

4-5 previous marathons | 1 Vienna City Marathon
COURSE: 4  ORGANIZATION: 3  FANS: 5


Vienna provides participants spectacular views from the city. Volunteers and audience were perfect and expo was satisfying to meet runners' demands. However, there are some points must be improved: There was no blue sign along the route to follow best/optimum line which was highly confusing. Block 4 is for those who target to finish 3:50 (5:25-5:30 min/km)- 4:30 marathon (6:20 min/km) was really irrelevant and also for those to finish 1:50-2 hours half marathon. Thus, it was really crowded and making zig-zags among slower runners was annoying. Additionally, start times of marathon and half should be separated to avoid such things.
 

Adrian Rodriguez from Santiago, Chile (9/23/2021)
"First massive marathon post pandemic" (about: 2021)

11-50 previous marathons | 1 Vienna City Marathon
COURSE: 4  ORGANIZATION: 5  FANS: 4


This was the first marathon with over 10.000 participants (in 42K; 21K and relay). The sanitation measurements were excellent, everybody has to get a negative antigen test 24 hours previous the start to get its bib number. The wide start has plenty of room.

The race itself is flat, gorgeous scenery, with water and isotonic stations every 5km or so, they offered you bananas, but no gels, so you must carry yours!

The weather was hot (20º-26ºC / 68ª-79ºF) but you get a big glass of non alcoholic wheat beer at the finish line. The medal pretty and golden star with a Swarovski crystal.

Not that much crowd as a Major marathon, but there is enough support during the course.
 

M. S. from Germany (2/20/2019)
"No race number pick up on the day of the race" (about: 2019)

2 previous marathons
COURSE: 1  ORGANIZATION: 1  FANS: 1


Unfortunately, I just found out that its not possible to pick up your race documents on the day itself. I was planning to travel to Vienna for one day to run the marathon. Unfortunately I will arrive too late to pick up my race documents. I contacted the organisation if they could help me, but they were very unfriendly and unwilling to help. Yes, they can bring the documents to my hotel for an extra charge of 40 euro! They simply forgot that I already payed 100 euro during my registration.
 

ArchDuke Kenneth Khanh Du from California (7/9/2018)
"Flat scenic course with 9:00AM start time." (about: 2017)

11-50 previous marathons | 1 Vienna City Marathon
COURSE: 5  ORGANIZATION: 5  FANS: 5


Review for the 34th Vienna City Marathon 4/23/17
42.195km Finisher!

Ah Vienna, The City of Light! Home to Mozart, wiener, and the once powerful capital of all of Europe! The Vienna City Marathon is truly a Gold Label IAAF Road Race. Well-organized! 2017 saw 12,000 full marathon runners, 15,000 for the half marathon, and 14,000 for the total number of relay runners divided into teams of four - held on Sunday. On Saturday, there's also the National Championships 10K, Vienna 10K, and for young children - Get active 4.2 and Get active 2.0

PROS: Flat scenic course with 9:00AM start time. Well-stocked & well-spaced hydration stations with mineral water, Powerade and there's even an official Coca Cola sponsored refreshment station. Great crowd support, with every sponsored stations making you feel like you've just crossed a sub finish line! And since the start time for full marathoners, half marathoners, and relay runners are divided within the same time blocks, there will always be fresh legs to compete against!

Everywhere in Vienna is accessible by train, which are affordable! The CAT Train takes 16 minutes from Vienna International Airport to Wien Mitte Center. From here you can reach your hotel, starting point, or sightseeing destination via their safe fast/efficient, 24/7 subway trains.

Viennese are friendly & polite when it comes to asking for direction. Most women, that I've walked pass on the streets, appear model thin and sophisticated, yet approachable.

CONS: On VCM Race Day Sunday, April 23, 2017 @ 8:45AM. Cold temperature 41F with light drizzle & an 18mph wind making the weather feels more like 35F. More porta potty: I saw a few peeing in the wood.

Other than these points, the 2017 VCM was a huge success! Vienna Sports World Expo, though smaller on scale, had all the making of a top rated venue from sponsors like Adidas whom I'd purchased the great fitting 'Theater of Emotion' tech shirt from and got my photo taken inside the cockpit of a custom BMW Laufsport VCM turbo with a chance to enter & win the actual car.

The VCM Carbo Loading Party was also amazing! When & where can you dine on gourmet pasta or Viennese pancakes inside a fancy place like the Vienna City Hall wearing spandex jumpsuit? My one complaint, I wish they offer second serving for the price.

RACE DAY: I couldn't be more excited, or concern. At the lineup, a group from Switzerland doing relay asked me to take their photos which lighten the mood. After 4km, someone from the crowd yelled aloud 'Khan! We support you in Vienna!' I had my mp3 headphone cranked too and can still hear the support. Near 19km, an announcer was standing in the middle of the street speaking in German. As I sprint toward them, both the crowd & announcer went dead silent. I didn't want to lose focus and kept running. As I passed them, I heard the announcer called out to me on his microphone 'ARCHDUKE!' and the crowd started applauding. All of the sudden my fatigue, hunger & jet leg left me and I felt empowered, running even faster.

Coming from a proud yet humble beginning with entitlement, I didn't know what to expect and was hesitant to run in Vienna - the dynastic capital of the former Habsburg Monarchy. The Habsburg rule ended in 1918 with the abdication of Emperor Karl. The current government of Austria is fearful of uprising and does NOT allow entitlement such as 'archduke' to be use! All members of the Habsburg living in Austria are only allowed the distinction of Habsburg-Lothringen or Habsburg-Lorraine to their name. I had even written in advance to VCM road race director & staff, asking whether it is okay for me to use my title. I am pleased that they accepted me with open arm as an archduke & an athlete in Austria.
 

M. M. from Bournemouth,UK. (4/26/2017)
"A great city with a special marathon" (about: 2017)

11-50 previous marathons | 1 Vienna City Marathon
COURSE: 4  ORGANIZATION: 4  FANS: 3


A good mix of city, park and riverside sections in the marathon.The starts were well thought out, with different paces being started at intervals, but lack of 'policing' and poor self-control meant that there were still many slower runners getting in the way. The drinks stations were adequate but being positioned opposite each other made it difficult to get through the middle on some of the narrower parts.(And why is it so difficult to throw a plastic cup to the side of the road?) With Relay runners, half-marathon runners and full marathon runners all setting off together there were some busy stretches, but it did get simpler, eventually. Vienna takes great pride in its marathon, and goes out of its way to stage a major event. However, from the runners' perspective there are many small details that could be improved.e.g. Clearer signs and directions for the pasta party, registration, and start areas. Instructions on how to secure the timing chip, and there was nobody to help collect them at the end. There was some misunderstanding about the different medals, for Full, Half and Team events.

Baggage drop and pick-up were good, and there was plenty of fruit and drink at the finish.

This was marathon #30 for me, so I have seen better and worse organisation. But with a bit more attention to detail this special marathon could become great, and fitting for such a city.
 

J. Q. from Nuremberg, Germany (4/24/2017)
"A very poorly organised marathon" (about: 2017)

1 previous marathon | 1 Vienna City Marathon
COURSE: 4  ORGANIZATION: 2  FANS: 3


This is not a marathon for beating your best time.
- It is totally packed with people since you will run together with half-marathon and relay marathon. There was no space for running my pace (5:20 per km) in the first 15 kms. I guess (I don´t have statitics for proving this) there are a lot of people lying about their time.
- In the info of the marathon says that there will be water and iso every 5 kms. This is NOT ACCURATE. The first refreshment point was at km 4.8, the second one was at around km 9.4!!! Others were 400 meters after the km point. So you never know exactly where the next refreshment point is. You have to guess when to take the energy gel. Ok ok.. there were some shields saying 'water in 200m'. I saw them after km 20 when the crowd was gone.
- As one can imagine, refreshment points in km 5, 10 and 15 were a chaos.
- Between kms 30 and 35 one runs a big U which has no public and demotivate since you know after 5 kms you will come back at the same point. You will hit the wall in an isolated place with no support from people.
- The app for cell phones is terribly bad. Your family and friends cannot follow your race properly.
- It is mainly a half-marathon race. After the km 20 one can see that 70% of the crowd is no longer running.
- In the places where the 'relay' takes place, runners stop for chatting or walk further on the track after finishing the relay. People waiting for the relay use place of the track for looking if the previous relay is coming.

Positive: the scenery of Vienna is beautiful (when you can see it)
 

Jens Sudmeier (German/American) from Rotterdam, Netherlands (5/1/2016)
"Beautiful city, great organization, atmosphere" (about: 2016)

1 previous marathon | 1 Vienna City Marathon
COURSE: 5  ORGANIZATION: 5  FANS: 4


The marathon is superb. Vienna is a beautiful city with all the stunning buildings and sights. This helps while running. The running EXPO the day before was well organized and the chip transfer was really smooth. This whole trip was amazing and I would recommend everyone to run the VIENNA CITY MARATHON! <3
 

P. T. from Portugal (4/13/2016)
"Nice atmosphere but not for racing" (about: 2016)

First Marathon
COURSE: 4  ORGANIZATION: 3  FANS: 4


I participated for the first time in Vienna this year for the half-marathon and I had my expectations high as it was advertised as a major event with more than 40000 runners in all events combined. Unfortunately what annoyed me the most was lack of enforcement in the starting corrals. I was assigned to corral 2 based on my current time and I was attempting to at least challenge my PR. From very early on, I saw that as impossible as everyone around me was running at a slower pace and several times I was blocked to run forward. I understand everyone wants to participate and be part of the event but please do the rest of us a favour, respect the corral order and don't lie on the registration about your time. And a note to the organization - please scroll through the results and call out this people. Perhaps they will think twice about cheating on corral placement if you take action.
 

R. S. from Switzerland (4/13/2015)
"Can be a great marathon but ruined by poor org." (about: 2015)

3 previous marathons | 1 Vienna City Marathon
COURSE: 3  ORGANIZATION: 1  FANS: 3


Vienna is a beautiful city and I signed up for the half marathon as it had all the signs of a good, enjoyable experience, however, I was a bit disappointed by the event organization.
1. If you rely on water booths, then you will be late by 2-3 minutes. At the first water booth, I literally had to walk for around 50m because of the congestion. Almost the same (maybe a bit better) happened with other water booths as well.
2. There were just too many runners, leading to people jostling against each other. Maybe the half marathoners and full marathoners should have been separated out.
3. If one hasn't participated in Vienna before, then he/she might be bumped towards the back of starting blocks. I was bumped into the second last starting block.
4. At one particular location, there was a slight bump on the path because of which I saw 3 runners falling down including me. My wife standing at that very spot saw around 15 runners falling down in a span of 15 minutes.
5. Despite organizers selling the event as an international one, there were hardly good English speaking helpdesks/information centers. In my case, when I asked them about pacemakers, they told me that there are none. Again, as I said there were all the good signs of a great city marathon experience but it was ruined for me. Of course, there were certain good things as well, like bib collection was one of the easiest I ever experienced, course was quite beautiful/rich in history, weather was great etc.
 

n. c. from Wellington, New Zealand (4/17/2014)
"A great run in a historic city - thank you Vienna" (about: 2014)

6-10 previous marathons | 3 Vienna City Marathons
COURSE: 5  ORGANIZATION: 5  FANS: 4


This was my third time running the Vienna half-marathon. I really love this race. The route crosses the Danube river, circles the historic city centre, runs through the famous Prater park - where the spring blossom and historic ferris wheel provide a great backdrop. Around the 17 km mark you reach Schonbrunn, the summer palace of the emperors, and then for the grand finale you run down towards the old city centre crossing the finish line in the grounds of the Hofburg imperial palace.

As usual the hospitality of the Austrian capital city was outstanding, with an amazing package of pre-marathon events - including a sponsored concert of waltzes and polkas in the grand hall where Johann Strauss once conducted, and an international party in the townhall (Rathaus), in my opinion one of the most beautiful buildings in the world.

Picking up the race number, T-shirt and time-chip was really quick and fun...no queues and lots of discounts on running gear, inteviews with top runners, and a nice cold pint of beer (alcohol-free of course!)
The race organisers provided an excellent website http://www.vienna-marathon.com/?lang=en which made everything easy for me, a non-German speaker, and many thanks to the sponsors for all the free goodies, drinks and food in the post race bag.

I've started planning for my 4th attempt next year! And if my personal enthusiasm for this event has persuaded you to give it a go in 2015 I look forward to seeing you there :)
 

More Comments: [ < 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 > ]

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