This weekend, on 27th April, the London Marathon once again takes place. Over the last 44 years, the event has grown into a global icon, creating positive waves of impact for both participants, charities, and those around the world who watch the event and are inspired. This Sport Impact article analyses how the event makes an impact by getting participants ‘on the pitch’, before assessing some of the sustainability initiatives at the event.
About the London Marathon
The London Marathon began in 1981, and has become an internationally recognised sporting event, with more than 1.3m participants and £1.3 billion raised for charity since its first event. The London Marathon is now the world’s biggest annual one-day fundraising event, and most runners competing doing so for charity, with the London Marathon having a bigger focus on charity running than other marathons. With a record 53,000 runners finishing last year, and an equally impressive number set to run in the 2025 edition, it is a hugely impactful event, as well as gruelling for the participants.
A Growing Movement
The donations raised by participants are helping to change the global scoreboard, particularly around funding for healthcare and social causes. In this way, participants are ‘getting on the pitch’ by completing the race themselves, and are bringing others with them through asking friends, families, and colleagues for donations for impactful causes. The energy created by this event has spearheaded a global running movement, with recreational running experiencing a strong growth in recent years. However, with a record 578,000 applicants in 2024 (with an estimated 3% success rate from the general ballot), which was beaten by an even larger 840,000 applicants in 2025, this growth is resulting in incredible demand, and lots of disappointed applicants.
To combat this, organisers have made changes to online applications and removed the multi-ballot entry guarantee. There are even three separate starting points which converge later in the course, to allow as many people as possible to participate. Going forwards, it will be interesting to see if and how the London Marathon can further leverage the appetite for running to have an even larger impact if the popularity remains.
Sustainability at the London Marathon
With the eyes of the world on London during Sunday’s race, progress has been made over recent years to address the large environmental impact from the event.
Sustainability efforts begin before the event, where runners can choose to not take a medal, and/or plant a tree instead of receiving a finisher’s t-shirt, through a partnership with Trees Not Tees. Regarding travel, a partnership with You.Smart.Thing travel planning tool highlights the lowest carbon travel methods for participants, and international ballot participants must pay a carbon levy to remove carbon generated by overseas travel. Going forwards, perhaps organisers could further improve on this by prioritising a % of entrants who are located geographically close to London, or who commit to using sustainable modes of transport.
On race day, there are several sustainability initiatives (shown in the table below), which have made the London Marathon the first mass participation organiser globally to be awarded the Evergreen level certification from the Council for Responsible Sport (which is the world’s leading sustainability certification programme dedicated to sports events and organisations).
Sustainability Initiatives at the London Marathon
- Clothing discarded at the start is collected by Salvation Army for re-use and recycling
- Medals are made from recycled zinc
Kit bags are made from bioplastic and recyclable sugarcane - Five water refill stations along the course for runners carrying their own container
- Special 250ml bottles are produced by Buxton for the London Marathon to reduce water and plastic use. They are made from 100% recycled plastic (excluding the cap and label), and collected for recycling by Buxton into new bottles
- Lucozade bottles are made from 100% recycled plastic (excluding the cap and label)
- Generators use HVO
- The lead vehicles are Electric Free public transport is available for participants and volunteers on the underground and DLR Recycling Zones and Keep Clean Zones encourage runners to discard waste in a given place, making it easier for recycling
- There is a Finish Selfie Station so those who have opted out of a medal can get a special finisher’s photo opportunity
Perhaps the most important initiative is the free public transport for participants on the underground and the DLR, addressing issues of last mile transport. Free event-day public transport has been seen at other events, including Euro 2024 in Germany, and this is crucial as fan travel usually makes up the vast majority of emissions at sporting events.
Another key initiative is through their partnerships with Buxton and Lucozade, who use 100% recycled plastic in their bottles, with Buxton produced limited-edition 250ml bottles to reduce water and plastic waste. As technology innovates and solutions such as dissolvable packaging become more readily available, it would be great to see the London Marathon and their partners pioneer these to further reduce waste from the event.
At the Sport Impact Summit, McLaren and Deloitte, alongside ATP and Nitto, shared exclusive insights into leveraging their strategic partnerships to drive sustainability in sports. These collaborations highlight innovative approaches to environmental responsibility. Similarly, the London Marathon is collaborating with its partners to create a more sustainable event, reflecting this growing commitment to sustainability in sports.
Finally, the partnership with The Salvation Army, whereby volunteers collect the plethora of discarded clothing at the start for re-use and recycling, shows how sports events can also work with not-for-profit partners to solve environmental challenges posed by events.
Other Events
The London Marathon is not the only sports event prioritising sustainability, with athletics a sport leading the way in the sustainability in sport space, through the guidance of governing body, World Athletics. Guidelines issued on how to run events more sustainability, and how to adapt events to ensure safe conditions for participants and athletes enable individual events to play their part for people and the planet.
It is clear that this weekend’s London Marathon will make a positive splash for participants and their charities, and efforts have been made to minimise the negative environmental impact from the event. At Sport Impact, we applaud the efforts from London Marathon in using the power of sport to create a movement, as it aligns with our mission to get a billion players on the pitch.
Sport Impact offers guidance on how to run events more sustainably as part of the Sport Impact Membership. Enquire today about joining, and we would be delighted to assist your organisation on its journey to make a bigger impact.