Average marathon times in Ireland in 2022

Average marathon times in Ireland:

I analysed the results of 12 mararhons in Ireland. The Dublin marathon with 14,836 finishers represent 67% of the marathon runners in Ireland. I included as well 2 marathons with big climbs that are much slower (Connemarathon : 250m and Lap of the Gap : 750m). In total 22,000 runners concluded a marathon in Ireland in 2022.

List of the marathons:

I looked at the data from these marathons :

City	Finisher	Date	size percentage	comments
Dublin	14836	30/10/2022	67%
Belfast	3075	01/05/2022	14%
Cork	1721	04/06/2022	8%
Limerick	880	01/05/2022	4%
Dingle	388	03/09/2022	2%
Connemarathon	355	24/04/2022	2%	245m ascent
Galway	335	01/10/2022	2%
Medieval Marathon	178	17/09/2022	1%	no category
Lap of the Gap	126	21/05/2022	1%	751m ascent
Tralee	110	24/09/2022	0%
Roscommon	47	10/09/2022	0%
Portumna	45	11/06/2022	0%	no category

Average marathon time in Ireland

The average time to finish a marathon in Ireland in 2022 was 4h16.
– Women were running in average 4h36.
– Men were running in average 4h07.

In Ireland the slowest finisher was in Roscommon with 11h20, and in Dublin with 8h31.

In fact, the fastest Irish runners did not compete in Ireland in 2022:
– Fionnuala MCCORMACK ran in 2:29’25” in the European Championship in Munich (she ran 2:23:58 in Valencia in Dec 2021).
– Kevin SEAWARD ran 2:11’54” in Manchester.

But looking back at the marathons ran in Ireland in 2022, the fastest runners were :

TOP FEMALE
1	Nigist Muluneh	2:28’31’’	Dublin
2	Hawi Alemu Negeri	2:29’33’’	Dublin
3	Courtney Mc Guire	2:32’50’’	Dublin
4	Ann-Marie Mc Glynn	2:33’46’’	Dublin
5	Nataliya Lehonkova	2:35’30’’	Dublin
6	Caitriona Jennings	2:41’07’’	Limerick #1
7	Gladys Ganiel	2:42’15’’	Dublin
8	Gladys Ganiel	2:43’47’’	Belfast
9	Lizzie Lee	2:44’53’’	Cork
10	Sorcha Loughnane	2:45’09’’	Cork
29	Neasa De Burca	2:58’43’’	Limerick #2 Fastest GCH athlete
36	Siobhan Lee	2:59’43”	Limerick #3

TOP MALE
1	Taoufik Allam	2:11’30’’	Dublin
2	Ashenafi Boja	2:13’58’’	Dublin
3	Birhanu Teshome	2:14’25’’	Dublin
4	Gelgelo Outoya	2:16’02’’	Dublin
5	Paul Pollock	2:16’15’’	Belfast
6	Tim O’Donoghue	2:18’37’’	Cork
7	Craig Curley	2:18’49’’	Dublin
8	Adam Bowden	2:20’15’’	Dublin
9	Martin Hoare	2:20’21’’	Dublin
10	Sergiu Ciobanu	2:21’20’’	Limerick
173	James Elgar	2:45’05’’	Limerick Fastest GCH athlete

Both Neasa and James ran their Marathon in Limerick with a strong field.

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Analysis by Time

Looking at the women results (6,518 women), only 0.55% were able to finish an Irish marathon sub 3hours.

Time	number of women runner	percentage
sub 2h30	2	0.03%
sub 3h00	36	0.55%
sub 3h30	396	6%
sub 4h00	1622	25%
sub 4h30	3355	51%
sub 5h00	4822	74%
sub 5h30	5595	86%
sub 6h00	6086	93%

For men (15,429 men), 6% finished the marathon sub 3hours in Ireland.

Time	number of male runner	percentage
sub 2h30	29	0.19%
sub 3h00	859	6%
sub 3h30	3488	23%
sub 4h00	7795	51%
sub 4h30	11322	73%
sub 5h00	13551	88%
sub 5h30	14553	94%
sub 6h00	15017	97%

It may be easier to visualyse the finishing times on this chart:

Analysis by Age group

This analysis is very interesting for older runners like me and is looking at the times by age group. Starting with the women :

Category	min	average	MAX	nr of finisher
FS	02:28:31	04:30:07	07:42:46	1257
F35	02:35:30	04:26:25	07:57:42	818
F40	02:33:46	04:28:40	07:26:51	1429
F45	02:42:15	04:33:49	08:31:41	1372
F50	02:56:14	04:45:42	07:49:20	893
F55	03:13:33	04:56:50	07:10:38	442
F60	03:12:11	05:16:07	07:49:18	179
F65	03:44:47	05:38:33	07:21:44	41
F70	03:42:39	05:46:13	07:22:47	25
F75	05:41:44	06:16:54	06:45:47	7

Looking now at the results by age group, men results in 2022 were :

Category	min	average	MAX	nr of finisher
MS	02:11:30	04:07:58	11:20:00	3296
M35	02:16:15	03:58:37	07:57:59	2448
M40	02:20:15	03:58:24	07:41:58	3155
M45	02:25:15	04:02:12	07:42:52	2831
M50	02:35:20	04:15:51	07:57:39	1852
M55	02:45:23	04:24:40	07:50:00	1007
M60	02:49:37	04:42:10	07:49:45	438
M65	03:06:11	04:59:01	08:07:38	142
M70	03:08:23	05:32:13	07:50:55	69
M75	04:28:34	05:56:06	08:08:11	13
M80	05:19:12	06:07:24	07:18:25	4

My own 2022 marathon

In 2022, I was concentrated on ultra-marathons. I raced one marathon, in Wicklow: The lap of the Gap marathon. It was a challenging marathon with 750m of altitude climb. I ran this marathon in 3h07’52”. With this result I placed in the top 10%:
– It was the 1,132th time overall (top 5%)
– 3h07’52” was the 1,057th male time overall (top 7%)
– It was the 184th time in the M45 category (top 6%)

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Average pace worldwide

The average speed in Ireland is much faster than the worldwide average marathon times of 4:29’53” (source World Athletics). Worldwide times were:
– Women ran in average 4h48.
– Men ran in average 4h21.

Looking at the average pace, there is a big difference between the countries and it can be linked to the time limit given by the organizers to conclude the marathons. For example, in 2022, the average time by countries were :
– Switzerland 3h50
– Germany 4h11
– USA 4h41
– India 5h05
– Philippines 5h25

In the world the fastest Marathon runners in 2022 were :
– Ruth CHEPNGETICH ran 2:14’18” (second-fastest marathon in history, the world record was recorded by Brigid Kosgei’s with 2:14:04, set in 2019 in Chicago).
– Kenyan Eliud Kipchoge set a world record for men of 2:01’09” on September 25, 2022, at the 2022 Berlin Marathon.

More details from World Athletics on their article.

Half-marathon

In the study from World Athletics, the average time to complete an half marathon is just 2hours:
– The half marathon average time for women worldwide is 2:09:45 hours.
– The half marathon average time for men worldwide is 01:53:52 hours.

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Conclusion

If you want to improve your marathon performance, run your first marathon or change your training plan, contact me and I can prepare your dedicated training plan.

What was your marathon time in 2022, was it faster than my 3h07’52”? Was it faster than the average marathon time in Ireland (4h16′)?

I will train for a faster marathon in 2023, I hope to see you on the finih line…