Dublin Marathon to introduce lottery system for race entries

Such is the now pressing demand and interest for race entries into the KBC Dublin Marathon that the event organisers have moved to a lottery system to deal with the allocation of places for next year's race.

Some of the major city marathons already adopt such a system - namely London, New York and Tokyo - and after demand once again fast outpaced supply for this year’s race, the 40th edition of the event, the organiser felt it was the better option for the future, with next year’s race set for Sunday October 25th, 2020,

Instead of the first-come, first-served online process which has existed up until now, the entry lottery will be open from November 1st to November 30th 2019.

There will be a registration fee of €15 per lottery entry, which will be fully refundable if the applicant is not successful and fully redeemable against entry fee if the applicant is successful. Registrants will learn their entry status via SMS and email between January 3rd to January 10th . Successful entrants will have until January 31st 2020 to redeem the offer.

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Any initial places not redeemed by January 31st 2020 will be re-allocated by lottery to entrants who were not successful. The applicants will learn their entry status via SMS and email between the February 4th to February 7th 2020. These offers must be redeemed by February 14th 2020.

Like this year, a maximum of 22,500 places available for the 2020 KBC Dublin Marathon, with a number of these places allocated to Athletics Ireland membership.

Athletics Ireland members will qualify under the Good For Age standards and can apply on April 1st and must have a valid Athletics Ireland membership.

Jim Aughney Race Director said: “Many races that have more interested runners than they can accommodate have moved to a lottery registration system in recent years,” said Jim Aughney, Race Director for the last 22 years. “Demand for the Dublin Marathon has never been greater, and we believe the lottery is the fairest system to offer all runners the same opportunity to participate.”

First staged in 1980 with an entry of 2,100, Dublin is now the fifth-largest big city marathon in Europe.

The successful lottery applications will be randomly allocated but in a manner to ensure that the current balance of Irish and overseas runners and runners of all abilities is maintained.

If successful in the lottery, Eventmaster will issue SMS to be sent to the successful applicants with a direct link to register for the event. Access link will direct the user to their registration page on the 2020 marathon event with the data from the lottery pre-populated (Name, email, gender, DOB, mobile will not be editable, ensuring that only the selected applicant can use that lottery link).

The fee is €75 to enter (€90 less €15 already paid), plus additional purchases and booking fee (€3) as normal. Successful applicants will have until midnight January 31st to use the link. Email reminders will be issued.

Applicants who have been unsuccessful with will receive an email to inform them. A refund option will also open from June 2nd to June 15th, 2020. A refund of 70 per cent of the entry fee will be returned once your application has been accepted. The refund will be available on “Manage My Bookings” from your entry confirmation link. This will be the only opportunity to avail of a refund for 2020.

Any unallocated numbers to be offered to any unsuccessful lottery applicants on July 1st -July 7th, 2020 with offers needing to be redeemed by July 14th.

In 2016 the event was moved from its traditional Bank Holiday Monday to the Sunday, which Aughney said directly contributed to the first sell-out of runners of 19,500 that year, a 30 per cent increase on 2015. “We’d a few lucky breaks along the way since 1997, and thankfully numbers have been on the increase ever since,” added Aughney.