With assaults on record times promised by world-class athletes, plus local athletes keen for a slice of the winning action, all in all this is expected to make for a truly gripping occasion. A total of 11,500 men and women runners will be taking part in the Sportisimo Prague Half Marathon, drawn here every year by its reputation as a fast course with a fantastic race atmosphere. Whether taking part as a runner, volunteer, fan on the course or simply watching the Česká televise live broadcast, don’t miss out on the biggest running race in the Czech Republic.

Key information

• The 19^th event year
• The Sportisimo Prague Half marathon will be broadcast live on ČT Sport. The broadcast will commence at 9.50 on Saturday 1^st An online live broadcast will also be held abroad - on the Flotrack.com platform in the USA
• The Sportisimo Prague Half Marathon is the first RunCzech Running League race of the season. The League is comprised of a total of seven races in five cities around the Czech Republic. Along with last year’s new race feature, the O2 4x5 Prague Relay, a total of 82 840 runners took part in RunCzech races in 2016, almost eight thousand more than in 2015
• For the eighth year in a row, the race has been awarded the Gold Quality Label by the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF). Seven RunCzech Running League races hold a total of seven gold labels which places the Czech Republic at the helm of the world rankings of countries organising long-distance runs. No other country boasts such a status
• The half marathon kicks off at 10 m. from Jan Palach Square. The race has earned its reputation owing to the beautiful course which cuts through the heart of historical Prague, taking runners around the Vltava and across five Prague bridges. The long-distance runners also get to admire views of Prague Castle, Charles Bridge and countless other sites
• The race will be started by Prague City Mayor Adriana Krnáčová
• The Sportisimo Prague Half Marathon is really fast, with five men completing it in under an hour last year
• Only four men the world over have managed to beat the race record of 58:47 recorded by Atsedu Tsegay in 2012, which just goes to show how fast the course is. Tsegay’s time also ranks as the world’s sixth fastest half marathon ever run.
• A total of 11 500 half marathon runners will stand at the start line while the O2 4x5 Prague Relay is reserved for relay runners
• This year’s women’s field is especially strong – spectators can look forward to welcoming back last year’s winner Violah Jepchumba whose time of 1:05:51 smashed the race record. Others sure to leave their mark include emerging RunCzech Racing Team star Joyciline Jepkosgei, Gladys Chesir and the American Jordan Hasay
• In terms of the men, the Prague race will also play host to a world record holder in the 10 kilometres Leonard Komon, not to mention Barselius Kipyego, Geoffrey Yegon and Vincent Yator, all of whom are capable of completing the course in under one hour. Meanwhile Olympic medallists from last year in Rio - the Ethiopian Tamirat Tola and American Galen Rupp - will surely also want to make an impression
• Czech fans will be keen to follow the national number one Eva Vrabcová along with the elite men where we expect a duel to play out between Jiří Homoláč, Vít Pavlišta and Jan Kreisinger
• A number of well-known personalities will also be taking part alongside elite athletes. These include Olympic Gold medallist in the decathlon Roman Šebrle, the cardiologist Jan Pirk, actor and presenter Dalibor Gondík (pacemaker for the Johnson & Johnson Women’s Challenge), fitness trainer and Skyline singer Jacob, the surgeon Tomáš Šebek, presenter Vojtěch Bernatský, journalist Tomáš Poláček, economist and former CNB governor Zdeněk Tůma, Mayor of Karlovy Vary Petr Kulhánek, former politician Kateřina Jacques, virtuoso pianist Michal Rezek, the mental coach Jiří Kastner, running trainer Miloš Škorpil as well as profoundly visually impaired runners Ondřej Zmeškal and Jan Hegr
• The Sportisimo Prague Half Marathon not only offers fans an interesting sporting spectacle, but also a rich accompanying programme. The Prague Running Expo will be held on Thursday, Friday and now also all day on Saturday! After the race, runners can also look forward to attending a Post-race Party held at the Výstaviště exhibition grounds, the programme for which includes announcing the best Czechs to emerge from the race and a concert by Prague Conspiracy.
• The accompanying programme of the Prague Running Expo will feature a session during which elite athletes will hand out start numbers to runners (at 16.30 on Thursday) a discussion with children (at 10.30 on Friday), while Jiří Homoláč will also be talking about his experiences in Kenya and there’ll be a chance to meet the pacemakers. Former badminton star Petr Koukal will also be in attendance at the EXPO presenting his charity STK pro chlapy
• As part of the Marathon Music Festival, a total of 25 bands and DJs will perform along the course
• A number of new features will also be added to the top healthcare services offered along the course. Four mobile “AED cycle guards” furnished with an automatic external defibrillator which links up to professionals from the Prague Rescue Services will also be operation. The race course will also feature 26 Ibalgin Medical Point stations staffed by healthcare workers,
• RunCzech collaborates with fifty charity organisations. A total of 5,287 runners generated almost ten million Czech Crowns for Run for a Good Cause last year. The Salvation Army is the main charity partner for the Sportisimo Prague Half Marathon
• The majority of the foreign runners at the half marathon hail from Slovakia, Italy, Germany, Sweden, Great Britain, France, Spain, The Netherlands, Russia, the United States and Poland
• The official race hashtag is #PragueHalf

Interesting figures

• Capacity for the Sportisimo Prague Half Marathon is 11 500 runners
• A total of 57 nationalities will be appearing at the start line
• 67 % of runners comprise men, 33 % comprise women
• The average age of women competing at the half marathon is 37, the average age of men is 40
• Women on average manage to complete the Sportisimo Prague Half Marathon in a time of 2:05:22, men in 1:49:12
• A total of 25 men and 13 women runners will be celebrating their birthdays on race day
• Jan is the most common name at the start line, followed by Petr and Martin. The most frequent names among women are Jana, Petra and Lucie
• The oldest male runner is 79 years of age (Jiří Engliš, CZE), the oldest female runner is 68 (Sigrid Korte, GER)
• The vast majority of long-distance runners comprise university educated people (58%), with 34% made up by those educated up to the age of eighteen and the remaining 8% with basic education
• 1 210 volunteers help out at the race
• On race day over sixty thousand visitors from all over the world visit the www.runczech.com page (64 713 in 2016)
• More than thirty hundred thousand users (322 894 in 2016) receive messages from RunCzech channels on social media

The following is used during the race

• 382 traffic signs
• 46 240 safety pins
• 120 000 cups
• 60 000 freshening up sponges
• 12 500 thermal insulation sheets
• 11 500 medals
• 2 917 metres of fence
• 217 mobile toilets

Drunk:

• 28 724 l of Mattoni water
• 6 125 litres of hypotonic drinks

Eaten:

• 2 914 kg bananas
• 1 876 kg oranges
• 1356 baguettes
• 21 kg salt
• 17 kg sugar 

Records

• World record – men: 0:58:23 (2010) Zersenay Tadese (ERI), Lisbon
• World record – women: 1:05:06 (2017) Peres Jepchirchir (KEN), Ras Al Khaimah

• Race record – men: 0:58:47 (2012), Atsedu Tsegay (ETH)
• Race record – women: 1:05:51 (2016), Violah Jepchumba (KEN)

• Fastest Czech man: 1:03:34 (2005), Róbert Štefko
• Fastest Czech woman: 1:11:06 (2016), Eva Vrabcová