With 59,830 finishers, the 46th TCS London Marathon 2026 was officially the largest ever marathon, having regained the participation record from the 2025 TCS New York Marathon (59,226), with which event the title has been changing hands over the past few years.

The athletics world is still agog at the unprecedented finishing speed of the top three men, whose pace almost caught out experienced commentators Steve Cram and Paula Radcliffe, who didn't call the first ever sub-two-hour marathon until the final yards.

Sabastian Sawe (Kenya) ran the second half 88 seconds faster than the first half to smash the world record in 1:59:30. Yomif Kejelcha (Ethiopia) can claim to have never run a marathon slower than two hours, as he ran 1:59:41 on his debut! Jacob Kiplimo (Uganda) was almost overlooked, as he also went under the existing world record with 2:00:28 in third place.

The barrier-breaking elite men's race overshadowed the women's equivalent. However, this was the first time that three women had ever beaten 2:16:00 in the same marathon. Tigst Assefa (Ethiopia, 2:15:41) took nine seconds off her own women's only world record in a competitive race with Hellen Obiri (Kenya, 2:15:53) and Joyciline Jepkosgei (Kenya, 2:15:55). How good it was to see these great athletes pushing each other to new levels in a close race.

According to the running app Strava, around 60% of participants uploaded their data to the popular stats platform. This showed a median finishing time of 3:59:06 for men, and 4:39:28 for women – times mere mortals can more easily identify with – which was around three minutes faster than last year for either sex when conditions were considerably warmer.

Among the faster masters were two over-50 British age group record breakers. Alice Braham (Ealing Eagles, 2:36:25) took nearly nine minutes off the W50 best, and Will Green (Serpentine RC, 2:23:07) was two minutes quicker than the previous M50 record.

TCS London Marathon continues to celebrate its ever-presents – the dwindling number of runners who have finished every London Marathon to date. This year's ever-presents who completed their 46th London Marathons were Chris Finill (67yrs; 3:15:16), Mike Peace (76; 4:51:37), Bill O'Connor (80; 8:39:55) and Jeff Aston (78; 8:45:26). David Walker (80) ran a virtual 9:29:58 marathon to also qualify as an ever-present for next year.

On the lighter side of the TCS London Marathon, 38 new Guinness World Records were set or broken out of 75 official attempts among the mass entry – click here for a full review by GWR. Many of these attempts helped raise a record £87.5 million for charity, with organisers expecting the figure to rise above £90 million when the final total for 2026 is announced in September.

TCS London Marathon results and reports are available at the runABC race listing here

Photo of Jordan Adams carrying a 25kg fridge for charity courtesy of London Marathon Events