Comrades Marathon 2027 is a 91 km race on 13 June 2027, starting at 05:00 at Pietermaritzburg City Hall, Durban. The course climbs about 1265 m in total.
From Pietermaritzburg City Hall over Polly Shortts, Umlaas Road, Inchanga, Drummond, Botha's Hill, Field's Hill and Cowies Hill, down to a new finish at Kings Park in Durban. About 91 km, and 106 years of stories, told in order along the road.
05:00, Pietermaritzburg City Hall. Start groups and seeding are announced early in 2027. Sunrise is about 06:50
Kings Park Rugby Precinct, Durban, new for 2027. Sunset is about 17:05
It climbs about 1265 m in total. The highest point is 822 m above sea level, at km 20.
km 1.8 · 3.6 · 5.5 · 7.3 · 9.1 · 10.9 · 12.7 · 14.6 · 16.4 · 18.2 · 20 · 21.8 · 23.7 · 25.5 · 27.3 · 29.1 · 30.9 · 32.8 · 34.6 · 36.4 · 38.2 · 40 · 41.9 · 43.7 · 45.5 · 47.3 · 49.1 · 51 · 52.8 · 54.6 · 56.4 · 58.2 · 60.1 · 61.9 · 63.7 · 65.5 · 67.3 · 69.2 · 71 · 72.8 · 74.6 · 76.4 · 78.3 · 80.1 · 81.9 · 83.7 · 85.5 · 87.4 · 89.2
The 2027 refreshment stations are not published. There were 49 in 2026, so the 49 cups here are evenly spaced, not exact
12 hours from your group's gun. Cut-offs on the road are not out yet. On the 2025 Down Run: Cato Ridge 5:10, Drummond 6:40, Winston Park 8:30, Pinetown 10:05, 45th Cutting 11:30
Closed: 56,283 applied and 28,070 got in. Substitutions are announced in 2027. Qualify by 3 May 2027 with an official marathon under 5 hours
About 91 km, measured once roadworks finish, so it may change. The 2027 map is not out: this is the 2025 Down Run with the finish moved to Kings Park
49 stations in 2026, with water, Thirsti Sport and Coca-Cola, and at selected stations potatoes, oranges, bananas, 32Gi and Orange Grove Amahewu. 2027 stations are not published
Gold: first 10 men and women. Wally Hayward: men 11th to 5:59:59. Isavel Roche-Kelly: women 11th to 6:59:59. Silver: to 7:29:59. Bill Rowan: to 8:59:59. Robert Mtshali: to 9:59:59. Bronze: to 10:59:59. Vic Clapham: to 11:59:59
Athletics South Africa said in August 2026 that it has not sanctioned this race. The Comrades Marathon Association and the Sports Minister say it goes ahead on 13 June 2027. Check comrades.com
Major sponsors: Cell C, Mr Price Sport and Thirsti. Sponsors: GEMS, Toyota, Brand South Africa, Biddulphs, Coca-Cola, Castle Lite, Formscaff, DP World, Netcare, Orange Grove, Southern Sun, Visit Durban, Tourism KwaZulu-Natal, World Sports Betting, OMO, 32Gi, Woodford, Premier, Flora Strongheart, iTOO, Interflora, Rexona, Vaseline, Netstar, KZN Department of Health, Planet Fitness. Partner: IAU Golden Label
05:00 · km 0
Five o'clock, and the sun is nearly two hours away. Then the same order as ever: the national anthem, Shosholoza from the whole field, Chariots of Fire, Max Trimborn's rooster crow and the gun. Trimborn, a runner, first crowed in 1948, and it has been a recording since his death. Formscaff builds the start arch, Toyota supplies the race vehicles, and DP World's trucks carry the press out in front.
km 1.7 · Alexandra Road
Vic Clapham, a veteran of the First World War, wanted a race to remember the friends who did not come home, a test as hard as what they had been through. He asked for four years before the Comrades of the Great War said yes, and lent him a little money. On 24 May 1921, 34 men started outside this City Hall, on a road still made of dirt. 16 reached Durban. Bill Rowan won in 8:59:00, still the slowest winning time, and his name is on the medal for going under nine hours.
km 8.7 to 10.6 · C.B. Downes Road
The climb out of the city has already taken you from 630 m to 755 m. This is the top of the first of the Big Five, and on the Down Run you go down it: about 120 m in 2 km. Portland Bentinck Shortts, a farmer, gave the hill its name, and on the Up Run it comes after 80 km and breaks hearts. Today it is nothing but a warning. Keep your warm layers on, the valley at the bottom is the coldest place of the day.
km 10.7 to 13.7 · Little Polly's
Eyebrows were raised, says the race's own history, at the sight of a woman among the 68 on the start line in 1923. Frances Hayward had no official entry and could not have one. She ran anyway and finished in 11:35. In 1932 Geraldine Watson became the first woman to finish both directions, also unofficially. Women would wait 52 years from Frances Hayward's run for a medal.
km 13.7 to 20 · Umlaas Road
Six kilometres and about 185 m up through the cold, to the highest point of the course, around 820 m on our map, near the Umlaas Road interchange. It is not one of the Big Five, because nothing about it is sudden. For most of the field the sun comes up somewhere on this climb. And in 1930, 21-year-old Wally Hayward won by just 37 seconds. Remember the name: he came back 20 years later, and again at 80.
km 24 to 29 · Camperdown
In 1935, on this road in this direction, Robert Mtshali ran from Pietermaritzburg to Durban in about 9:30. He was the first Black runner on record to do it, and he could not enter: his run counted for nothing officially, and little else is known of him. Black runners were not admitted for another 40 years. In 2019 the race named a medal after him, for finishing between nine and ten hours.
km 30.5 · Cato Ridge
The race that began as a memorial to one war stopped for the next. From 1941 to 1945 there was no Comrades. When the guns fell silent, two former winners had not survived: Phil Masterton-Smith, the 1931 winner, fell in the Western Desert in 1941, and Frank Sutton, winner in 1928, drowned when his troopship was torpedoed off Durban in 1944. In 1946 only 22 entered. Cato Ridge carries the first cut-off of the day: on the 2025 Down Run, 5:10.
km 33 to 37 · Harrison Flats
The flats are not flat: they roll for kilometres at 1 to 2%, and people who were told to expect a rest get cross here. In 1953 Wally Hayward, 23 years after his first win, ran the first Down Run under six hours: 5:52:30, on a very cold July morning, with 34 starters. It was the fourth of his five wins.
km 37.4 · Old Main Road
A school for children with physical disabilities and visual impairments, and one of the race's favourite places. Its pupils come down to the roadside, and plenty of runners cross over to greet them. Steven Maliszewski, one runner, has raised R1.5 million for the school since 2012.
km 39 to 41.7 · Inchanga
The second of the Big Five, and the first properly big hill of the day: about 95 m up in under 3 km, from 698 m to 794 m. The name comes from the isiZulu Ntshangwe, a long-bladed knife, or a ridge. From the top the road falls about 140 m to Drummond, and it is a trap: many runners go far too fast here. Hold back.
km 45 · Drummond, halfway
Halfway on the road and halfway through the story. In 1975, the 50th race, the Comrades finally opened to all, regardless of race or gender. Two women entered, and Elizabeth Cavanagh, 44, finished in 10:08 to become the first woman to earn a medal. Vincent Rakabaele came 20th, the first Black runner to be given one. It had taken 54 years. Drummond, named after Lord Drummond of the Natal Land and Colonisation Company, looks out over the Valley of a Thousand Hills.
km 46 · Old Main Road
Just past halfway, a niche cut into the rock, with a sign and a small brick monument. Arthur Newton, five times a winner in the 1920s, is said to have rested here on training runs. Runners throw a flower, doff their caps and say "Good morning, Arthur", and skipping it is said to bring trouble in the second half. Bruce Fordyce says he never tested it and never had a bad run. Beside it is the Wall of Honour, where finishers buy a plaque: yellow under 10 Comrades, green for 10 or more.
km 44 to 51.8 · Botha's Hill
The third of the Big Five, about 8 km from the bottom at Drummond to the top at Kearsney, in three parts: steep first past Arthur's Seat, then a long drag past the Alverstone mast, then a last kicker. In 1980 a Cape Town student called Isavel Roche-Kelly ran her first Comrades, won it in 7:18, a Down Run record, and led the first women ever home under seven and a half hours. The medal for women from 11th to under seven hours has her name on it.
km 52 · Old Main Road
The top of Botha's Hill, and the first real wall of noise of the day. Kearsney, a boys' school, moved here in 1939, and its boys line the road to shout runners over the top. Botha's Hill itself is named either after the settler Philip Rudolph Botha or the harbour master Cornelis Botha: people still argue.
km 55 · Hillcrest
Hillcrest, founded in 1895 as a weekend village on the road from Durban to Pietermaritzburg. Here someone always shouts that it is all downhill from now on, and it nearly is. In 1981 the organisers tied the race to the apartheid republic's 20th anniversary. A University of the Witwatersrand student, Bruce Fordyce, ran in a black armband to protest, was booed for it, and won. He won the next seven as well, and a ninth in 1990. He has called the armband one of the proudest moments of his life.
km 58 · Winston Park
Major sponsors, sponsors and partners of the Comrades Marathon, as listed by the Comrades Marathon Association.
km 61 to 63.6 · Kloof
Three of the race's biggest moments came on one Down Run, on 31 May 1989. Sam Tshabalala became the first Black man to win, in 5:35:51. Frith van der Merwe ran 5:54:43, a women's record that stood for 34 years, and came 15th overall. And with 1 minute 57 seconds left before the 11-hour gun, Wally Hayward, 59 years after his first win and days short of his 81st birthday, crossed the line to a roar at Kingsmead. Kloof, by the way, is Afrikaans for gorge.
km 63.6 to 67.4 · M13
The fourth of the Big Five, and it goes down: about 190 m in under 4 km, on the M13. Named after William Swan "Paddy" Field, a local farmer and former magistrate. It looks like a gift. It is where runners who felt good at Hillcrest break their quads for the rest of the day.
km 69 · Pinetown
Hot, loud and festive, and most of the field arrives around lunchtime. In 2000, the 75th race, 23,961 started, the biggest field to that point, and 2027 passes it. In 2026 the race ran 49 refreshment stations, and about 5,000 volunteers handed out 2.2 million sachets of Thirsti water, 600,000 of Thirsti Sport, 30,350 litres of Coca-Cola, 45,000 Amahewu, 2 tons of baby potatoes, 4.5 tons of oranges and 600 boxes of bananas. Pinetown's underpass carried a 10:05 cut-off in 2025.
km 70.5 to 71.8 · Cowies Hill
The last of the Big Five, short and cruel at this stage: about 55 m up in 1.3 km on legs that have run 70 km. It was the farm of William Cowie in the late 1800s. In 2010, more than 14,000 people finished this race on one day, 14,343 by Guinness World Records' count, the most finishers of any ultramarathon. From 2003 to 2013, the Russian twins Elena and Olesya Nurgalieva won ten titles between them.
km 74 to 80 · Westville and the M13
Westville, settled by German immigrants and named after Martin West, Natal's first Lieutenant-Governor. From here the race takes the open M13. In 2020 and 2021 nobody ran it at all: Covid stopped the Comrades for the first time since the war. It came back in August 2022, a Down Run, with 13,213 on the start line, and Tete Dijana won it, the first of his three titles.
km 80 to 81 · 45th Cutting
A cutting through a hill near Mayville, dug by the British 45th Regiment of Foot, the Sherwood Foresters, stationed in Natal from 1843 to 1859. It is the last recognised climb, about 40 m, and the 2025 Down Run's last cut-off, 11:30. Both Down Run records still stand from 2023, on this road: Tete Dijana in 5:13:58, the fastest Comrades ever, and Gerda Steyn in 5:44:54, breaking Frith van der Merwe's 34-year-old mark.
km 83 · Tollgate and the N3
The Tollgate, where a toll paid for the building of Berea Road from 1866 to 1901, and where the 1922 race started. The last Down Run, on 8 June 2025: Tete Dijana and Piet Wiersma of the Netherlands ran close for most of the way, and Dijana won by five seconds, 5:25:28 to 5:25:33. Gerda Steyn won the women's race in 5:51:19. In 2026, going the other way, George Kusche ran an Up Run record of 5:15:56, and Steyn took her fifth title in 5:44:53.
km 87 to 90 · Durban
Flat now, and loud. Soldiers Way, Samora Machel Street and Masabalala Yengwa Avenue, past Kingsmead, the cricket ground where the Down Run finished for 40 years, from 1976 to 2016, and again in 2023. Moses Mabhida Stadium had it in 2018 and 2022. The organisers are planning for hundreds of thousands along the road and at the finish, working with the host cities on traffic, transport and crowds.
km 90 · People's Park
People's Park, outside Moses Mabhida Stadium, where the 2025 Down Run stopped at 89.98 km. The 100th goes on to Kings Park, which is why it is about 91 km, close to the longest race ever, 92 km in 1971. Time Out Durban reports that 34 legends in 1921-era kit will run the last 3.4 km down a Centenary Tunnel and light an Eternal Flame, and that the finish straight will be lined with the race's history. The organisers have not yet published the details.
km 90.5 · Twelve hours
Every runner has 12 hours from their group's gun, and not a second more. When the time runs out a gun fires, the line closes, and anyone short of it gets no medal and no result, however close, while a lone bugler plays The Last Post. Sunset in Durban is about 17:05, so the last finishers run in the dusk. Every medal on the way there has a name from this story: Wally Hayward, Isavel Roche-Kelly, Bill Rowan, Robert Mtshali, Vic Clapham.
km 91 · Kings Park
The Kings Park Rugby Precinct gives the 100th Comrades room for its finish and race village, and it is a return. The Down Run finished at Kings Park in 1957, when 81 men started, and in 1959, when 103 did. 2027 has 28,070 entered. Formscaff builds the finish gantry, Netcare runs the ambulances, and Castle Lite pours the beer. Winners get R1 million, the first 10 men and women a gold medal and a red rose.
Route: not yet published for 2027. This line is a public GPS track of the 2025 Down Run (Ride with GPS), checked against a second one and matched to OpenStreetMap, plus our estimate of the last kilometre from People's Park to Kings Park. History and race facts: comrades.com. Field numbers: Daily Maverick and Time Out Durban. Independent preview, not affiliated with the Comrades Marathon Association