London Marathon Good For Age 2027: race dates confirmed ahead of applications opening

London Marathon organisers have confirmed which day Good For Age runners will compete at the one-off Double TCS London Marathon in 2027.

The male Good For Age and Championship races will take place on Saturday 24 April 2027, alongside the elite men and elite men's wheelchair races. The female Good For Age and Championship fields will race on Sunday 25 April, together with the elite women and elite women's wheelchair races.

The mass events will remain mixed on both days, with male, female and non-binary runners taking part. Good For Age and Championship applications will open on Thursday 1 October, when runners can apply for a place in the 2027 race.

Good For Age takes on added importance for 2027

Good For Age has long provided faster UK runners with an alternative route into London, but its importance has grown as the ballot has become increasingly difficult to get through. A record 1,338,544 people applied for the 2027 London Marathon ballot, including more than one million applicants from the UK.

For runners capable of achieving the required marathon time, GFA offers another chance. You can read our full guide to how to qualify for the London Marathon through Good For Age, including how the qualifying system works, which races count and the evidence you need when applying.

There is an important catch: running the published Good For Age time does not necessarily guarantee you a place. For the 2026 London Marathon there were 6,000 GFA places, split equally between men and women, with places allocated on a "fastest first" basis relative to each runner's age-group standard if the number of eligible applicants exceeded the available places.

That makes the qualifying standard a minimum requirement to apply rather than necessarily the time required to get in. If, for example, your age-group standard is 3:02, running 3:01:59 may make you eligible to submit an application, but it does not give you the same security as being comfortably inside the standard.

Why is the 2027 London Marathon taking place over two days?

The 2027 London Marathon is a one-off event spread across an entire weekend, rather than the traditional single Sunday. The new format creates a second day of racing and allows London to accommodate a much larger overall field.

Organisers have now confirmed that the elite and faster age-group fields will be divided by sex between the two days, while the mass participation races remain mixed. For GFA runners, the practical consequence is simple: men race on Saturday and women race on Sunday.

The decision about which elite races would take which day was settled in rather less conventional fashion. Reigning London champions Sabastian Sawe and Catherine Debrunner played a game of Rock, Paper, Scissors, with Debrunner's victory securing the Sunday slot for the women's races.

It was presented as the "Double Decider" and even earned Sawe and Debrunner a Guinness World Records title for the first elite marathon race start decided by Rock, Paper, Scissors. The gimmick may have settled the schedule, but for thousands of runners hoping to qualify for London, tomorrow's announcement will matter rather more.