Dublin marathon has been cancelled for a second successive year due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Announcing the decision race director Jim Aughney said that despite rigorous evaluations, there are still too many unknowns to be confident that we could provide a safe event given the pure scale of the marathon.

The organizers of the KBC sponsored event had hoped that the event could go ahead on October 24 but postponed making a final call for as long as possible.

But they have now dropped the bombshell news that the event which celebrated its 40th anniversary in 2019 has been cancelled.

“It is with great regret that we are cancelling the KBC Dublin Marathon for the second year in a row," Aughney said.

"Despite vigorous evaluations, there are still too many unknowns to be confident that we could provide a safe event given the pure scale of the marathon. We have a duty of care to the runners, volunteers, suppliers and supporters. This will be extremely disappointing news for all participants entered. We want to thank them for their continued support.”

“We have come to a critical point in our event planning when a final decision needed to be made. We took into consideration the recent updates on modeling around Covid-19 and the immense challenges of creating a controlled, safe environment for the KBC Dublin Marathon which has a footprint of 26.2 miles with 25,000 runners and 200,000 supporters who line the streets to cheer them on.”

All entries for the 2021 KBC Dublin Marathon will be valid for the 2022 race. For those who do not wish to avail of this, a full refund option will be available. Last year’s race had attracted a sell-out field of 25,000

Runners can still enter and take part in the KBC Virtual Dublin Marathon over the October Bank Holiday weekend; Saturday 23rd, Sunday 24th and Monday the 25th.

While the news is not a surprise, it will be a major disappointment to the thousands of runners who were hoping to take part in the race. It will also be a significant economic blow to both the race organizers and the business community in Dublin.

posted Wednesday July 7th
by Sean McGoldrick