Queensland runs on a sharper seasonal split than any state outside the tropics, and the whole calendar is organised around it. Summer is survived; winter is the best racing weather in Australia.
Verus currently lists 244 running races in Queensland — 24 marathons, 34 half marathons, 39 10Ks, 38 5Ks, 27 ultras and 82 at other distances — alongside 139 weekly parkruns and 49 multisport events. Those counts come from the data on this site rather than from a claim about it, and they move as the calendar does.
The Gold Coast
The ASICS Gold Coast Marathon in the first week of July is the biggest running event in the state and the fastest big marathon in the country: flat coastal tarmac at close to sea level, in dry, mild winter conditions. The 2026 weekend drew 43,000 registered participants from nearly 50 countries, and the organiser reports that 60% of participants achieve a personal best.
The strip itself is available to run on any day of the year, and the G:link tram runs its whole length — which makes the Gold Coast one of the easiest places in Australia to train without a car.
Brisbane
The river paths are the running network: the Bicentennial Bikeway on the north bank, the New Farm Riverwalk floating boardwalk, and South Bank opposite. Four bridges mean you can build a loop of almost any distance by choosing where to cross. The Kangaroo Point cliffs give a stair climb inside the city, and Mt Coot-tha to the west gives both a road climb and a real forest trail network.
The Bridge to Brisbane in September is the city's mass-participation event, and the Brisbane Marathon Festival runs in June.
The hinterland
Behind the Gold and Sunshine Coasts, the ranges — Springbrook, Lamington, the Blackall Range, the Glass House Mountains — carry subtropical rainforest trail. It is a genuinely different surface from the sandstone of New South Wales: wet, rooty, slippery and, crucially, shaded, which matters enormously in a state where heat is the limiting factor.
The Blackall 100 in October and the Kokoda Challenge — a team event over 48km or 96km in the Gold Coast hinterland — are the signature races, with the Noosa Ultra-Trail in March adding distances to 100km.
The Sunshine Coast and Noosa
The Sunshine Coast Marathon runs in August, and Noosa carries the largest triathlon festival in the country every November — the Noosa Triathlon is by participation one of the biggest Olympic-distance races in the world, and it sits inside a four-day programme of swims, rides and runs.
The tropical north
North of about Rockhampton the state stops having a winter and starts having a Dry. Cairns and Townsville race between May and August: Ironman Cairns in June, the Cairns Marathon Festival in July, and a Townsville club calendar that runs almost weekly through the cool months. Outside that window the honest advice is to run before dawn or not at all.
parkrun
Queensland has more parkruns than any other state, which is not an accident — parkrun arrived in Australia at Main Beach on the Gold Coast in 2011 and spread outwards from here. They start at 7:00am rather than 8:00, because the state does not observe daylight saving and the heat arrives early. Visitors from Victoria or New South Wales miss the start regularly.
When to run
May to September, without qualification. A Brisbane July dawn is 10.6°C at an 8.1° dew point — the best racing conditions in the country. January at the same hour is 21.6°C at 19.9°, which is a 2-3% pace penalty before the sun is up, and January and March both average 15.8 rain days.