Fastest Marathons in the United States – 2026 edition now live

Built from verified 2025 results, this new regional edition of Sub-3’s rankings turns the spotlight on the United States’ standout marathons for serious amateur performance.

The Fastest Marathons in the United States list represents the first dedicated national cut of the Sub-3 World Marathon Rankings, drawing exclusively on US races included in the global dataset. Using the same verified results and scoring framework, the rankings offer a clearer picture of where sub-3 running is most consistently supported across the US marathon calendar – from mass-participation destination races to tightly focused regional events with unusually dense competitive fields.

The United States occupies a distinctive position in the sub-3 landscape, not because fast marathon running is concentrated in one region, but because of how widely it is distributed across the country. Within the Sub-3 dataset, 39 states hosted marathons with more than 1,000 finishers, and 16 states contributed two or more ranked races. California alone accounted for 13 ranked marathons – a level of concentration that exceeds the national contribution of most individual countries included in the global rankings. Alongside California, a second tier of states including Texas, Utah, Pennsylvania, New York, Michigan, Virginia and Ohio underlines the depth and geographical spread of serious marathon running in the US.

That breadth is reflected at the top end of the rankings. Established performers such as Boston, Chicago and California International Marathon continue to set the benchmark for depth of sub-3 fields, while races like Indianapolis Monumental, Erie and Baystate demonstrate how consistently strong conditions can be created outside the biggest global stages. For serious amateur runners, this translates into something more valuable than prestige alone – genuine choice. Not just between famous races, but between different state-level marathon environments where fast running is structurally supported through course design, seasonality, field composition and pacing culture.

As with the global rankings, all data has been manually collected from official 2025 results. No scraping tools or automated feeds have been used. This United States edition is not a separate ranking exercise but a focused cut of the Sub-3 World Marathon Rankings dataset, applying the same standards of verification and consistency to ensure that comparisons between races remain meaningful and fair.

Each marathon is assessed using Sub-3’s 45:45:10 scoring model, weighting three factors: the proportion of sub-3 finishers, the absolute number of runners breaking three hours, and the fastest winning time. This approach reflects a simple reality for experienced runners. A marathon’s reputation alone tells only part of the story. What matters more is whether a race consistently produces dense, competitive sub-3 fields and conditions that allow serious amateurs to execute their best performances.

The result is a US rankings table that both confirms and challenges expectations. Some familiar names appear where runners would expect them. Others rise higher than their profile might suggest, not because of scale or marketing, but because the data shows they deliver for sub-3 athletes year after year.

The Fastest Marathons in the United States – 2026 edition is now live as part of the wider Sub-3 Marathon Rankings project, sitting alongside the global World Marathon Rankings, monthly tables and detailed marathon profiles. Together, they offer runners a more precise, evidence-based way to choose where to race – not on reputation alone, but on what actually supports fast marathon running.

View the Fastest Marathons in the United States 2026 here.