Thames Path Challenge 2026

20-24 weeks is the realistic window for a first 62.1-mile ultra, assuming you already have a marathon's worth of base behind you. The block that matters is back-to-back long weekends — a long run on Saturday followed by a second, slower one on Sunday — which builds time on feet and teaches you to run on tired legs without the recovery cost of one enormous day. Practise your race-day nutrition on every one of them; at this distance the stomach fails before the legs do.

This course has real climbs — rise near hurleyford farm around mile 55 — so include some hill-repeat sessions midweek rather than relying only on flat long runs.

Drop volume hard across the final three to four weeks — further out and steeper than a marathon taper, because a 30-mile training day costs weeks of recovery, not days. Keep some easy running and a little terrain-specific work in, but the goal is to reach Bishop's Park, Fulham, west London (by Putney Bridge) with fresh feet and a rested gut rather than one more long run in the bank.

Lock in your target pace using the interactive splits calculator below — no official pacers are confirmed for this event, so a pace band on your watch is the more reliable option.

Test your race-day fuel and hydration plan on your long training runs, not for the first time on race day — check the Race Day Checklist below for what's actually on this course.

A modest carbohydrate increase over the two or three days before is the standard approach — more relevant here than usual, since a continuous 100km with an overnight stretch draws far more on glycogen stores than a single-day event.

Eat two to three hours before your wave, and stick to something already tested on a long training day — early waves start as early as 6:45am for competitive Trailblazerz entrants.

Free food scales with distance and comes at fixed points — a picnic lunch at 28km, a hot meal at 50km, brunch at 78km and a cooked breakfast or hot meal for full-100km finishers — so carry your own gels or bars to bridge the gaps between rest stops rather than relying on them alone.

Every finisher gets a glass of fizz and a finisher's meal at the end, whichever distance and finish point that turns out to be — useful, since post-ultra appetite can be unpredictable after hours on the towpath.

Fulham / Putney (near the start)

Runnymede / Egham (halfway)

Henley-on-Thames (the finish)

No advance shuttle to the start — Putney Bridge (District line) is the nearest tube station to Bishop's Park, and there's no parking there. Getting back from wherever you finish needs its own plan too, since this is a point-to-point route with paid transfer options rather than free shuttles.

No organiser Park & Ride. Local Pay & Display parking is available directly at Hurst Park (28km), Runnymede (50km), Cookham (78km) and Henley (100km/finish) for anyone starting or finishing at one of those points, and Ultra Challenge sells one-way transfers to join the course partway — Henley to Runnymede (£20, Sunday 5am, for 2nd Half starters) and Henley to Cookham (£15, Sunday 7am, for 4th Quarter starters).

None — the whole route runs on the Thames Path towpath and other public rights of way, not closed roads.

The named rest stops are the practical viewing points — Runnymede at halfway is the best single spot, since it also doubles as the overnight basecamp for two-day entrants and has facilities. Henley, at the finish, is the obvious place for the loudest reception.

A 100km point-to-point route along the river means no single vantage point sees more than one pass — pick a rest stop plus the finish, both reachable by train (Staines for Runnymede, Henley-on-Thames station for the finish), rather than trying to follow the whole course by car.

An electronic scan at every rest stop feeds a 24-hour event Control Room, and the organiser's own Challenge App adds GPS tracking with live location-sharing for friends and family. A route GPX file is released to entrants in the app about a week before the event — it isn't published publicly in advance.