Paris Marathon

The course

It starts on the Champs-Élysées, pointed downhill away from the Arc de Triomphe, and for four kilometres Paris simply hands you its centre: Concorde, Rivoli, Place Vendôme, a lap of the Palais Garnier and down the Avenue de l'Opéra, then the Louvre. Through the Marais and past the Hôtel de Ville the crowd thickens into Bastille, and the road tilts up toward Nation — the first honest effort of the day. The Bois de Vincennes takes the next stretch east: quieter, greener, and less level than it looks, a sequence of small climbs and descents that never lets a rhythm settle. You are still among the trees at halfway. The city returns around twenty-two kilometres, the quays of the Seine at twenty-five — the most beautiful part of the course and the most deceptive, with Notre-Dame, the Orsay, and tunnels whose descents are repaid immediately in climbs. The Eiffel Tower stands opposite the thirty-kilometre mark, which is where Paris tends to decide things. Then the climb toward Exelmans, the long gradual rise through the Bois de Boulogne, and the turn onto Avenue Foch with the Arc de Triomphe back in view.

Start

Avenue des Champs-Élysées, Paris

Finish

Avenue Foch, Paris

Shape

loop

Terrain

Not flat, despite its reputation. Around 290m of cumulative climbing and a similar descent: rolling ground through the Bois de Vincennes, sharp drops and matching climbs through the Seine tunnels, then a sustained rise toward Boulevard Exelmans and a gradual pull through the Bois de Boulogne after 30km.