Tel Aviv, Israel
http://www.tlvmarathon.co.il/
Apr 19, 2024
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Marathon Details - Tel Aviv Marathon
International Marathons > Israel > Tel Aviv > Tel Aviv MarathonTel Aviv Marathon & Half Marathon, 10K, 5K
| More Info: | News |
| Results: | Top 3 Finishers by Year |
Contact
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| Phone Number: | 073-2100540 | |
| Email: | Email the organizers | |
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Reviews
Course 3.9 
Organization 3.0 
Spectators 2.4
Number of comments: 9
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G. E. from New York
(3/6/2019)
 "They Use Whole 20 oz Bottles in Water Stops!!!" (about: 2019)
11-50 previous marathons
| 1 Tel Aviv Marathon
COURSE: 1 ORGANIZATION: 2 FANS: 1 There is no local transportation to the Start, you have to walk over 6 km or you can rent a bike and figure out how to get there. They do not mention that on the website. At least they should provide a shuttle bus since all local transportation is canceled on race day and non-locals have to worry about how they will get to the start. They use 20 oz. water bottles in every water stop. Very environmentally unfriendly. They never thought of using water cups. I would not recommend this race until they get their act together. | |
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S. H. from Bonn, Germany
(3/4/2019)
"Poor orgnaization - exciting city" (about: 2019)
11-50 previous marathons
| 1 Tel Aviv Marathon
COURSE: 3 ORGANIZATION: 1 FANS: 1 The organization is really poor: Even when you use the 'English' website you ave to read Hebrew in between. Bill in Hebrew, the official brochure... The idea to offer you starter kits in a shopping center (Bauhaus style) is quite good, but nobody was really aware where in the mall (official description announced 1st floor, but is was in the cellar). No information in English, the person handing over wasn't familiar with Tel Aviv and the shirt has to be picked up in the Nike shop in basement. On the running day: no buses were available and taxis were not able to get close to the start: 6km on foot before the run (same afterwords). Course is fine, but nearly no spectators. 'Special atmosphere' was announced, but I expected something different. Now: two weeks later back an home I'm not able to see photos or results: Everything for 2020 ;-) . I'm happy that I spent some days in Tel Aviv. Excellent city, but I can't recommend the marathon. | |
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M. I. from London UK
(2/27/2017)
 "Fast Flat and free ( photographs!)" (about: 2017)
11-50 previous marathons
| 3 Tel Aviv Marathons
COURSE: 5 ORGANIZATION: 4 FANS: 3 A big improvement on previous years It is a massive race with the marathon a bit of a side show as only 3,000 of the 40,000 run the full distance but at least you get lots of Kudos! A 7 am start half hour after the halfers meant that the hordes who ran the half marathon never got in the way ( though it also meant their supporters had left the streets by the time we got there ) The course is great . Ok the first 10k are through the northern suberbs but then you hit the sea. Running along the beach front with the stunning blue med alongside is a real boost and you follow it all the way down to the ancient port of Jaffa. There you run alongside the fishing boats and through to the half way mark with the sound of the waves breaking against the rosks. Then through the heart of the city along the verdent Rothchild Boulevard and German Templar district. This is very much a city centre marathon and that keeps you at thge heart of Tel Aviv. It is pretty flat and fast too. The start and finish were well organised but the one important piece of advice is to take the train . Tel Aviv University station is right by the start / finish and the railways lay on a special service. Mind you once you are back in the centre it is walk or cycle hire. Taking a cab or trying to drive to the start is a nightmare. New this year is posting all the marathon phootos that are taken by the professionals on your facebook page. That means you come away with a whole visual record of your race and you can share them or keep them- they are all free. A few irritations such as the fact the expo shuts down the day before the race and a poorly functioning website. However this is a good marathon and has the wide flat streets to make it a really fast one | |
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F. D. from Jersey, Channel Islands
(3/2/2016)
"Generally well-organised" (about: 2016)
4-5 previous marathons
| 1 Tel Aviv Marathon
COURSE: 4 ORGANIZATION: 4 FANS: 4 Forget the seasonal average of temperatures in the high teens in Tel Aviv in February. 'Unseasonably warm' temperatures now seem to be the norm based on the past few years. However, traveling from the UK in cold, damp February to run alongside the Mediterranean in the sunshine and temperatures in the 20s is a treat. As others note, the Expo and registration pick-up closes at 9pm on the Wednesday before the Friday event. The course is well marked, but be aware that of the 40,000 runners registered, only about 2,000 run the actual 42.195. And as others mention, you share the course with half marathoners for the last km or so - while they get all the glory going through a much larger finish gate (for obvious reasons) full marathoners get funneled down a long relatively narrow chain link fence chute, where there are almost no spectators apart from those who have finished before you and already in the finishers' tent. It's slightly odd that the headline event is treated as a sideshow. But that said, it is well-run with easy bag check on the day, music and plenty of water stations, with iso, gels and food appearing with increasing regularity as you get past the halfway mark. Jaffa orange slices and amazingly sweet dates are a nice touch (oh so much tastier than gels, although the Gu flavours available were better than some of the awful combos at other races). At least one local cafe put out slices of cakes. There are fire hoses at a couple of points to cool you off if you wish - if not, you just move to the far side of the road. Being a modern city, not all of it is scenic, but hey, you've got the Mediterranean to gaze upon for a fair stretch of the race. Be warned, there are hills - not Athens Marathon hills, but in the heat, more hill than you'd wish for, particularly in the latter half. Crowd support is decent, especially groups of boisterous schoolkids, however it falls far short of some races where local pride is on display. I got some insight from locals - apparently there's a 'marathon' (by which they meant a race) practically every other week, with the attendant road closures on Friday making travel across the city nearly impossible. As a result there is a certain palpable 'race fatigue' among locals. That said, Tel Aviv residents are friendly and relaxed, the city goes all night long, it's a great place to walk around and explore, so definitely worth a visit. My only real criticisms - and ones I heard echoed by other visiting runners from abroad post-race - pertain to information about the race and signage at the Expo mostly being in Hebrew and only Hebrew, and the aforementioned road closures. This year the marathon started at 7AM, but roads throughout the centre of the city were closed by 4AM. As a result if you were a foreign runner staying in the centre, finding your way to and from the start / finish line was a pain. I wound up walking 2K to the start because my cab driver didn't know of any way to get closer, and I decided that as a first-time visitor I didn't want to try out the public rental bikes at the risk of getting lost. Getting home was more of the same, and I wound up walking 5K back to my hotel after the race. The organisers could make this an incredibly friendly event for runners visiting from abroad by simply arranging to have coaches depart from a central meeting point starting at 5.30AM to ferry runners from somewhere like Rabin Place to the starting line. I used this race as an excuse to visit Israel for the first time and am glad I did. | |
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m. i. from hertfordshire GB
(3/31/2015)
 "Getting Better- (and a wonderful T shirt)" (about: 2015)
11-50 previous marathons
| 2 Tel Aviv Marathons
COURSE: 4 ORGANIZATION: 3 FANS: 2 It could never has happened in Britain. In spite of some criticisms of the organization the very fact that a last minute decision to react to a forecast freak heatwave was to put the start back from 06:30 to 05:45 ( yes that really is quarter to six in the morning) was accompanied by Israel Railways running trains to the start from all over the country in the early hours deserves a lot of praise. The only pity was that there were none from Tel Aviv itself so my journey to the start was by Boris Bike (rented bike) The change in start time led to disorder and there was no time to get all the runners into the pens before the race set off -and so a loss of atmospheric build up. It also led to a dearth of spectators and support as who wants to get up that early on their day off? Once running all was forgiven. Water (in sports cap bottles - hooray) and iso aplenty and copious quantities of Gel available - and, of course, oranges! I had forgotten the lift you get at 9Km as you hit the sea and the view all along the shore to distant Jaffa. 11Km alongside the Med is really the highlight of the route. A big and vital improvement was the segregation of the marathon runners from the hordes of others. From 34 Km you have your own section of the road and plenty of room at this vital stage of the race. The only pity is that the segregation ends at 41Km when you hit the crowds of the shorter distances and a fellow Brit ended up running through the half marathon finish. That really needs to be bettered marked and marshalled. Not only was the course totally traffic free but the whole city was pretty much blocked off - locals knew it was bike or walk. Weather, as I mentioned was unexpectedly hot. A week before it had been snowing in Israel and gale force winds and rain lashed Tel Aviv. A week later and the temperatures hit the high 20's. Lots of fire hoses brought out for that oh so necessary heat dump. Finish was efficient and ice lollies really welcome, as well as all the other snacks. Though the start /finish was really well served by the trains by now I took a Boris bike back along the sea front. That early start mean that by late morning was refreshed and showered and spent the afternoon sunbathing on the beach - quite an unusual way to rest post marathon! Great T shirt that I am proud to wear. Just one unanswered question. Why is this the ONLY marathon where the expo shuts the day before the race?....... | |
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M. I. from hertfordshire GB
(3/22/2015)
 "Getting Better- and a wonderful T shirt" (about: 2015)
11-50 previous marathons
| 2 Tel Aviv Marathons
COURSE: 4 ORGANIZATION: 4 FANS: 2 There is one mystery about this marathon that I have yet to fathom - why is the expo closed the day before the marathon? Luckily overseas runners can still pick up their kit but miss the expo. A few years ago an unexpected heatwave cause cancellation of a mid March date. They moved the marathon to the last Friday of Feb. A wise decision as another freak heat wave struck but the temperatures were still ok though adjustment of the start time to 05:45 at the last minute did cause a lot of logistic problems. To their credit the organizers managed to get Israel Railways to reschedule trains from all over the country to get to the start in time. The only problem was that none of them stopped in Tel Aviv so I took a Boris Bike instead. The early start made corralling difficult and there was in build up and a start beefier everyone was in their pen. Once under way the course was well marched this year and thank heavens the shorter distance runners were separated making the last few kilometers so much easier. Excellent water and copious gels and Isotonic mitigated the heat and that fantastic 9-21Km stretch along the sea from is stunning. Support-well as Friday is a day off for many, they were all lying in I think. One advantage. by 10:00 I had finished and efficient processing and an overflowing Boric bike stand meant I was on the beach basking in that unseasonable heat by noon. Not many marathons where you can do that (and have a whole weekend to get the calories back). | |
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D. B. from Israel
(3/2/2015)
 "Excellent Race" (about: 2015)
6-10 previous marathons
| 1 Tel Aviv Marathon
COURSE: 5 ORGANIZATION: 5 FANS: 3 The Tel Aviv Marathon is a big city event that, because of its 2,300 runners (in 2015), runs like Grandma's Marathon in Duluth. The other 33,000 people wearing running shoes are there for the half-marathon, 10K and other races, which makes for a very fun finishing area. The race is well organized from bag drop to start line, and during the race with many water stations, several Gu stations and a finishers tent with chairs of three heights for marathon participants (sorry half-marathoners and 10Kers!). The course is mostly flat. Issues are the cobble-stone-type streets as one runs through Jaffa and one of the roads (Allenby?) on which the pavement was chewed up because of construction. Crowd support was light for much off the race, perhaps due to the very early start time, but improves significantly during the second half of the race. There is a great challenge at 18.5 miles, when Dizengoff has the course's 'heartbreak hill.' | |
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R. E. from Jerusalem,Israel
(8/9/2014)
 "Appalling organization" (about: 2011)
11-50 previous marathons
| 4-5 Tel Aviv Marathons
COURSE: 5 ORGANIZATION: 1 FANS: 2 Runners fought over limited supplies of drinking water,despite weather forecasts that predicted uncommonly hot weather. | |
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Michael Ingram from Radlett Herts UK
(3/1/2014)
"Fabulous potential- poor organisation" (about: 2014)
11-50 previous marathons
| 1 Tel Aviv Marathon
COURSE: 4 ORGANIZATION: 3 FANS: 4 Truly magnificent moment at 10 km on a gentle beachfront descent with the Mediterranean a glorious blue under sunny skies and the ancient city of Jaffa another 10km ahead of us. This marathon could be superb; flat and fast with enormously wide well laid out streets and a city that comes to a complete halt to allow runners to have their day. A start brilliantly accessible by rail and over 10 km of stunning shoreline this is a wonderful sensual experience in the bright but mild February sun. The problems then:- Firstly the expo is shut the day before the race so international entrants are deprived of it - why? Who knows? Secondly the marshalling. After running 40 Km the last thing you want is to get lost and finding yourself sharing a pavement with pedestrians and cyclists uncertain where to go is a pain beyond description and a terrible indictment of the organisers. Intense irritation for the want of a few hundred meters of red tape to demarcate the course. The third is sharing. 3,000 marathon runners were sharing a lot of the course with the other 27,000 ( yes it was a magnificent sea of bright green vested running humanity) half marathon and 10 km runners and when you get to the last part of the course tripping over or pushing through the sedate tail of the shorter distances can be very frustrating. The enormous numbers mean there is a great atmosphere and whilst spectators can be thin on the ground that it probably because everyone is running. Water is a mixture of cups and bottles ( if the former is for environmental reasons why give bottles just as we giver over the river bridge so they an all fall in and pollute?) good gel and fruit supply though isotonic is always in cups. Finish is a bit tame but you are glad that you have , at least, found it amongst the crowds. Good Running shirt and really good medal With the enthusiasm that exists this could be huge- it just needs much better planning , organisation but above all marshalling |
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