Updated April 20, 2026 at 8:22 PM EDT
More than 30,000 athletes made the historic trek from Hopkinton to Boston on a chilly Marathon Monday.
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Familiar names took all of the top awards: Wheelchair racer Marcel Hug won his ninth Boston title and wheelchair racer Eden Rainbow-Cooper, runner John Korir and runner Sharon Lodeki all claimed their second Boston victory. Korir also set a course record.
Spectators were out in full force along the 26.2 miles of the course, cheering on friends, family members and strangers.
Here’s a look at how the day unfolded:
4:30 p.m.
The vast majority of the runners have passed the finish line on Boylston Street in Boston. The race course officially closes at 5:30 p.m.
There were “no major incidents,” according to the Massachusetts Department of Health. There were 18 EMS transports so far, fewer than this time last year.
Race co-medical director Dr. Kristin Whitney said that with chilly temperatures today, there’s been some incidents of hypothermia the medical teams have treated. But there’s also been a few people who needed ice baths to cool down from dangerously high body temperatures.
“When we are running and it’s colder conditions, our muscles can cramp up, so mild cramping has been a trend,” Whitney said. Otherwise, it’s “really mixed bag, a typical mix of what we’d expect here on race day.”
Once the elite runners had all passed, more participants made it to the finish line in colorful costumes.
Miki Jameson, from Chicago, and her mother Charmaine Jameson, from Virginia, have run 54 marathons together. This is their second one in a costume.
They ran in New York as cows. They weren’t trying for a personal best so they’ve decided to just have fun.
Emily Huff, from Seattle, set an intention for her run in Boston this year to be about joy.
She wrote a letter of gratitude to someone in her life who brings her joy every week for 26 weeks — people like her mother, neighbors and former teachers. And for race day, she dressed up like the character Joy from “Inside Out.”
“Life’s too short to not be a little silly and whimsical, and also to have some depth to it and let people know how wonderful they are,” she said.
This is her third time running the Boston Marathon. Her first was in 2013; she crossed the finish line about 20 minutes before the bombs went off.
After finishing the race today, she said she was grateful to get to this point. She said it’s important to “recognize that joy is a gift that people gave along the course, but it’s also a practice and such a gift that we get to embody joy and gratitude on a day like today.”
This morning, Justine Medic’s 8-year-old daughter decked her out in glitter for the race. She said it was a good luck sign because her daughter always wears glitter to big events.
— With reporting by WBUR’s Martha Bebinger
2:30 p.m.
In Newton, Mark Proctor and Charlotte McKee cheered on the runners tackling Heartbreak Hill from their front yard. Alongside them was a statue of a runner they commissioned.
This isn’t like the other statues made of bronze or pewter along the marathon route. This one was carved out of a 100-year-old maple tree.
In 2020 when the dying tree needed to get cut down, Proctor convinced his wife that they should make it into a statue of a runner. They found Ken Packie, a sculptor from the Berkshires, who came out “with all of his chainsaws and made that that tree stump into this gorgeous statue of a runner,” McKee said.
It seems to bring joy to people.
“Sometimes people will even come off of the marathon route as they’re running and come up and take a quick selfie,” she said.
She hopes it’s something that runners could look at and have a laugh as they pass.
“It has made me appreciate how doing something a little unusual, but yet lovely can bring joy and that has made us very happy,” she said.
Elliot Frank, of Newton, was wearing a tricorn hat as a nod to the historical significance of Patriots’ Day. He said he’s part of the Jamaica Pond Park Run group and came out to cheer on his teammates.
“We’re so happy to see everybody here, even if we have the worst hills and everybody really hates us,” he said.
Neven Bertocci, of Virginia, was visiting her girlfriend at Wellesley and came to cheer at her first Boston Marathon.
“I love the energy. I’m so proud of these random people,” she said over the roar of cheers at the infamous Wellesley scream tunnel.
Bertocci said she’s training for the New York City marathon next year.
“To see these people go by, in the wheelchairs and all that, I get so emotional,” she said. “It takes so much mental control to be able to do this.”
And now that they have, she said, they get “bragging rights for life.”
Allison Berger, a senior at Wellesley from Florida, was also cheering in the scream tunnel. She’s gone every year she’s been in school here.
She says it’s the “one moment a year that feels like a Wellesley moment. It brings everyone together.”
New Yorker Jason Harris was dressed in a pickle costume, handing out pickles to runners in Brookline’s Coolidge Corner.
“Who doesn’t like it? A lot of people don’t like pickles. But helps the runners. [With] three miles left, they’ll take anything.”
He’s lived in Boston for seven years now, and said he loves the energy of the marathon.
Elizabeth Pears, of Boston, was also set up in Coolidge Corner with her family.
“I’ve been coming here since I was a baby,” she said. “My parents always set up in the same spot and give out water and oranges and sponges.”
And now she’s brought her husband into the family tradition.
She remembers running out of water to give the runners during a marathon when she was 9 years old. She and a friend ran back and forth to the apartment buildings nearby to get water from residents’ taps to bring back out to the route.
“I always say to people not from Massachusetts, this is the nicest Bostonians will ever be,” she said. “If you want to meet some friendly Bostonians, be here on Patriots’ Day.”
— With reporting by WBUR’s Artemesia Luk, Kevin Vu and Anna Rubenstein
12:10 p.m.
Sharon Lokedi of Kenya won the women’s race with an unofficial time of 2:18:51 on Monday.
Lodeki told WCVB after the race that a young spectator helped give her the push she needed to win today.
“There was a little girl somewhere that said, ‘You got this, ladies!” And it was so cute,” she said. “I was like, that is what I needed. It gave me so much to look forward to and, you know, to run as fast as I could to get here.”
She won last year’s race with a time of 2:17:22 — breaking the course record by more than two and a half minutes.
11:40 a.m.
Kenyan John Korir won his second consecutive Boston Marathon on Monday with an unofficial time of 2:01:52, breaking the course record. The previous course record, 2:03:02, was set by Geoffrey Mutai in 2011.
11:20 a.m.
1966: Bobbi Gibb hid out in the bushes in Hopkinton after she was denied a bib to run officially as a woman. She jumped onto the course and became the first woman to unofficially finish the race. This year, the 26.2 Foundation installed a statue of her in Hopkinton to honor her contribution to the sport. Gibb, who is an artist, created the sculpture herself.
1975: Bob Hall was the first recognized wheelchair winner of the Boston Marathon when he crossed the finish line. He passed away earlier this month. Hall survived polio as a child, and became an advocate for people with disabilities. Read more about his legacy in this essay from WBUR’s Cognoscenti.
1976: The year the Boston Marathon became known as the “Run for the Hoses.” With temperatures nearing 100 degrees, volunteers and neighbors turned on garden hoses to help racers stay cool on their way to the finish line. Jack Fultz won the race that year, and is serving as the grand marshal today. Read more and hear from Fultz about that race, here.
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10:42 a.m.
Eden Rainbow-Cooper, a racer from Great Britain, finished in 1:30:51. She beat second place (Catherine Debrunner of Switzerland) by more than two minutes.
Rainbow-Cooper also won Boston in 2024. American Susannah Scaroni won Boston last year, but did not compete today.
10:24 a.m.
The Swiss athlete nicknamed “The Silver Bullet” won the Boston Marathon for the ninth time. Marcel Hug’s unofficial finish was 1:16:06.
9:47 a.m.
Reigning champion Sharon Lokedi is back to see if she could set another record. She shattered the women’s course record by more than 2 1/2 minutes.
9:37 a.m.
The winner of last year’s men’s professional division, John Korir, is back to defend his title.
Korir’s personal best was 2:02:24 in Valencia last year.
He’s facing Benson Kipruto, of Kenya, who ran the Tokyo Marathon in 2:02:16, and Alphonce Felix Simbu, of Tanzania, who finished second in Boston last year after an intense three-way sprint to the finish.
9:10 a.m.
The men’s and women’s wheelchair racers have taken off from Hopkinton.
In the men’s wheelchair division, eight-time winner Marcel Hug, of Switzerland, is back at it. American Daniel Romanchuk, who won in 2022 and 2019, will also be on the field.
The women’s wheelchair division is leading with past Boston winners including Switzerland’s Manuela Schär, the U.S.’s Tatyana McFadden and Great Britain’s Eden Rainbow-Cooper. Last year’s victor, the U.S.’s Susannah Scaroni, announced she’s expecting a baby this summer and is not racing in today’s marathon.
8:45 a.m.
This year’s roster of elite marathon runners is being called the strongest field in race history.
A year after shattering the women’s mark by more than 2 1/2 minutes, Sharon Lokedi is fit and could push for a second straight course record — if she decides to go for it.
Reigning men’s champion and fellow Kenyan John Korir also is back to lead a field of more than 30,000 on the 26.2-mile race to Boston’s Copley Square.
Cool weather and an expected tailwind will greet them in Hopkinton — perhaps the ideal conditions for more fast times like last year, when Lokedi finished in 2 hours, 17 minutes, 22 seconds to break the 11-year-old course record and deprive runner-up Hellen Obiri of a third straight win. Korir’s 2:04:45 was the third-fastest ever as he joined his brother to become a Boston Marathon champion.
“Last year was crazy fast, so I don’t know if it will be the same thing this year. But whichever one, I’m excited for,” Lokedi said this week as she prepared to defend her title. “You never know. I feel like that is always determined by when you get to the start line.”
The entire men’s podium and seven of the top 10 finishers from last year are back, including runners with three of the top eight times in race history. Eight women in the field have run a sub-2:20 marathon — times that would have been a course record in Boston until a year ago.
“Yeah, it’s stacked,” American competitor Alex Maier said.
The Americans are showing their strength as well.
There are 12 U.S. men with personal bests below 2:10. Four — including 2017 Boston runner-up Galen Rupp and last year’s seventh-place finisher, Clayton Young — have run 2:08 or faster; those would be Boston bests until Geoffrey Mutai’s then-world best of 2:03:02 in 2011.
Two of the three American women who competed in the 2024 Paris Olympics and last year’s world championships are in the field. (Fiona O’Keeffe dropped out on Sunday with a hamstring issue). In all, seven U.S. women have beaten 2:25 and three have personal bests below 2:22 — Emily Sisson, Sara Hall and Susanna Sullivan.
“I am just so honored to be a part of this growth in women’s U.S. distance running, especially in the marathon,” said Jess McClain, who was the top American woman last year, running the fourth-fastest time ever for a U.S. woman in Boston. “It just makes us all so much better. So yeah, it’s a very special moment.”
— Jimmy Golen, The Associated Press
Here’s the full schedule of race start times:
- 9:06 a.m.: Men’s Wheelchair
- 9:09 a.m: Women’s Wheelchair
- 9:30 a.m.: Handcycles and Duos
- 9:37 a.m.: Professional Men
- 9:47 a.m.: Professional Women
- 9:50 a.m.: Para Athletics Division
- 10 a.m.: Wave 1
- 10:15 a.m.: Wave 2
- 10:28 a.m.: Wave 3
- 10:41 a.m.: Wave 4
- 11:01 a.m.: Wave 5
- 11:21 a.m.: Wave 6
The wheelchair racers will start to cross the finish line around 10:15 a.m.; the pro runners will start to reach Boylston Street after 11:30 a.m.
To find a loved one or a favorite athlete, head to the Boston Athletic Association’s website and enter their name, bib number or other info. You could then track their live progress during the race on the BAA’s mobile app.
Today is a state holiday — Patriots’ Day — marking the start of the Revolutionary War with the battles of Lexington and Concord. Here’s what’s open and closed on the holiday.
The Red Sox play the Detroit Tigers at Fenway at 11:10 a.m. today.
This article was originally published on WBUR.org.
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