Timbercity Red Hill Marathon 2027 is a 42.2 km race on Saturday 30 January, starting at 05:00 at Fish Hoek Sport Fields, Cape Town. The course climbs about 574 m in total and has 6 water points.
Fish Hoek AC's 50th Red Hill: west across the valley to Kommetjie, south along the Atlantic past Misty Cliffs and Scarborough, out towards Cape Point, over Red Hill to Simon's Town and home along False Bay.
05:00 on Kommetjie Road at the Fish Hoek Sport Fields, with the Classic 36 km. The 13 km starts at 06:00 (2026 times)
It climbs about 574 m in total. The highest point is 261 m above sea level, at km 28.
Plastic-free: no sachets and no cups. Carry your own bottle or cup and refill it at the fill table at the start and at Manzi's five Tap 'n Go water points: Misty Cliffs (km 14.5), Scarborough (km 16.3), Cape Farmhouse (km 19.5, and again at km 25.4 on the way back from Cape Point), the top of Red Hill (km 28) and Glencairn (km 35.6)
km 14.5 · 16.3 · 19.5 · 25.4 · 28 · 35.6
6 Manzi Tap 'n Go water points
5 hours at the bottom of Red Hill on the Simon's Town side (km 33), 5 hours 30 at the finish. Prize-giving at 10:30
2026: R250 licensed, plus R105 for a temporary licence; age 20 and up. Medals for the first 2,500 finishers across all the races. No headphones, and no seconding vehicles or bicycles on the route
Saturday 30 January 2027, as listed on the running calendar; Fish Hoek AC has still to confirm it and open entries
Timbercity is the title sponsor; water by Manzi; a #RunClean race, the first in South Africa to go plastic-free
Swap between the marathon and the Classic 36 km at the bottom of Red Hill: hand the tear-off corner of your race number to the race official
05:00 · km 0
You start in the dark on Kommetjie Road beside the Fish Hoek Sport Fields, home of Fish Hoek Athletic Club, an hour before sunrise. The marathon and the Classic 36 km start together. The club was founded in 1977 and runs in old gold and black. Its race began almost half a century ago as a training run for the Peninsula Marathon, and it was set at 36 km because nobody could find a suitable short cut.
km 0.6 to 5 · Kommetjie Road
West along Kommetjie Road, across the flat valley that cuts the peninsula in two: when the sea was higher it was a channel, and the south of the peninsula was an island. In the rocks above the start is Peers Cave, where Victor and Bertie Peers dug up the skeleton known as Fish Hoek Man in 1927. On your right, Sun Valley and then Masiphumelele, whose isiXhosa name means "let us succeed". There is no water until Misty Cliffs at km 14.5, so start with a full bottle.
km 5.3 · Kommetjie Road
On your left, Ocean View. Its first residents arrived in 1968, families moved out of Simon's Town, Glencairn, Fish Hoek, Noordhoek and Kommetjie under the Group Areas Act. The township was first called Slangkop; its people renamed it Ocean View in 1970, remembering the sea views they had lost.
km 7.6 to 8.7 · Kommetjie
Into Kommetjie, Afrikaans for "little basin", after the round cove the village grew up around in the early 1900s. The farm here was granted in 1743 by Baron van Imhoff, on condition that it grew vegetables for the ships at Simon's Town. Then onto Main Road, with Slangkop Lighthouse on your right: a 33 m white iron tower, lit in 1919, and the tallest lighthouse in South Africa.
km 8.1 to 9.5 · Main Road
The first climb: about 95 m up the flank of Slangkop in a kilometre and a half, to 108 m at km 9.5. On your left are the ruins of Cobra Camp, a Second World War radar station that watched the sea for U-boats. Then the whole Atlantic coast opens up ahead, all the way to Cape Point.
km 9.5 to 14 · Soetwater and Witsand
Down to the sea at Soetwater and along past Witsand: about 10 km of coast between Slangkop and Misty Cliffs that has been a conservancy since 2009. African black oystercatchers nest on these rocks, and caracal and otters live along the shore. With a 05:00 start, most of the field reaches the Atlantic around first light.
km 14.5 to 17.2 · Misty Cliffs and Scarborough
Through Misty Cliffs, a strip of houses between the mountain and the surf, and on to Scarborough, declared a conservation village in 1996, on the edge of the Cape Point reserve. Chacma baboons live along this coast: give a troop plenty of room and keep any food out of sight. Manzi's first Tap 'n Go water point is in Misty Cliffs (km 14.5), six taps on one side of the road, and the second is in Scarborough (km 16.3). Refill your own bottle: there are no sachets or cups.
km 17.2 to 19.4 · Red Hill Road
Off the coast onto Red Hill Road, which climbs about 70 m in two kilometres to the Plateau Road junction at the bottom of Red Hill proper. The Classic 36 km carries straight on up the hill; the marathon turns off towards Cape Point first. Runners can swap distances at the bottom of Red Hill by handing the tear-off corner of their number to the race official. Water point 3, Cape Farmhouse, is at the junction (km 19.5), with taps on both sides of the road: marathoners pass it again on the way back from Cape Point.
km 19.4 to 25.4 · Plateau Road
The marathon's extra 6 km: out along Plateau Road towards Cape Point, round at about km 22.4, and back. Beside you is the Cape of Good Hope section of Table Mountain National Park, a reserve since 1939; the park's fynbos holds more kinds of plants than the whole of the United Kingdom. The loop was added in 1984, when the Two Oceans brought in qualifying marathons, so runners could stretch the Classic to a full marathon; it has been part of the race every year since 1992. You refill at Cape Farmhouse again on the way back, at km 25.4.
km 25.4 to 28 · Red Hill Road
Now the hill itself: about 150 m up in two and a half kilometres, an average of 6% and as steep as 14.7%. The zig-zag road over the hill was laid out by about 100 convicts, who started work in January 1913; the old road it replaced climbed at one in four.
km 28 · 261 m
The top, 261 m above the sea, with False Bay and the naval harbour at Simon's Town below. On the plateau to your left are the ruins of Red Hill village: more than 70 families, most of them coloured, were moved off the hill between 1968 and 1973, told it was for a dam that was never built. Just Nuisance, the Great Dane who was the only dog ever enlisted in the Royal Navy, is buried up here at the old Klaver naval camp. Manzi's fourth water point is up here at the top (km 28).
km 28 to 33 · Red Hill Road
Five kilometres down the zig-zags, 250 m of descent to Main Road at the north end of Simon's Town, which is named after the Cape governor Simon van der Stel and is now the headquarters of the South African Navy. The race's cut-off is at the bottom of Red Hill on this side, at 5 hours (10:00).
km 33 to 35.6 · Main Road
North along False Bay on Main Road, past Dido Valley and Glencairn, with the Simon's Town railway beside you on the shore: it arrived in 1890. Above Glencairn is Elsie's Peak, named after the rooiels trees of Elsje's River. The Glencairn wetland is home to the endangered western leopard toad, and R10 from every race T-shirt goes to the toad volunteers of ToadNUTS. The last Manzi water point is at Glencairn, where the Glencairn Expressway joins Main Road (km 35.6).
km 35.6 to 38.3 · Simonstown Road
Simonstown Road squeezes between the mountain, the railway and the sea past Sunny Cove. Below, Jager Walk follows the rocks round to Fish Hoek beach: it was finished in 1933 and named after H. S. Jager, Fish Hoek's first mayor.
km 38.3 to 41.2 · Fish Hoek
Into Fish Hoek and a loop through its back streets. When the governor, Lord Charles Somerset, granted the farm here in 1818, it came with a condition: no liquor was to be sold on it. Fish Hoek stayed a "dry" town for two centuries, until its first bottle store opened in June 2019. The next water is the fill table at the finish.
km 41.2 to 42.2 · Poplar Road
Down Poplar Road, along the footpath and across the sports field to the finish. In 2026 Sibusiso Madikizela of RCS Gugulethu AC won for the fourth year in a row, in 2:28:50, his fastest marathon in ten years; Elmé Middlemost won the women's race in 3:13:41. The first 2,500 finishers across all the races get a medal, with three flames on it for 2008, when a veld fire closed the roads and the committee redrew the route on race morning. Prize-giving at 10:30.
Route: a runner's GPS track of the 2026 race (Ride with GPS), matched to OpenStreetMap; Fish Hoek AC's own GPX of the course and tracks from 2020 and 2023 follow the same roads. Water points: Fish Hoek AC's Tap 'n Go hydration map for 2027 (the spots are approximate). Times and cut-offs: the 2026 race information