October 5th, 2025
As in every year, a marathon was again on my to-do list for 2025. After managing to "align" the year with the number of marathons I did run in previous years, this year's marathon was number 25. I ran my first marathon in Cologne in 1998. The original plan to run the 20th anniversary marathon in Cologne again in 2020 couldn't be realized due to the coronavirus. But this year, nothing was stopping me to plan running Marathon number 25 in Cologne in October.
Since family members live in Bonn, it was clear that I would arrive a few days earlier, spend some nights in Bonn, and then take the regional train to Cologne on Sunday morning. The Cologne Marathon is the fourth-largest marathon in Germany after Berlin, Hamburg, and Frankfurt. This was clearly visible and noticeable on the train to Cologne on Sunday morning. The train was completely overcrowded, and I was reminded of my time in China.
To be continued with pictures ...
Funny:
I had arranged meeting points with my family members, including roughly the time when they could see me. While waiting, my family members were approached by a journalist from the newspaper "Kölnische Rundschau". Some information from this conversation subsequently found its way into the Kölnische Rundschau's online article about the Cologne Marathon. Here is the link to this freely accessible article (in German only).
And also interesting:
During the run, I was wearing a shirt with the words "Guangzhou Marathon 2019" on the backside. A runner running behind me approached me, and we chatted briefly. After taking a photo, he told me that all the photos he took along the way would be featured on the marathon4you website. Here's the link to the article about the 2025 Cologne Marathon, with many great pictures (in German only).
In 2025, around 8,000 runners reached the finish line of the marathon distance.
- Great, almost carneval atmosphere along the route (with a few exceptions in the very south and very north of the route)
- Enough refreshment stations along the route (with water and later also with coke and isotonic drinks)
- Sufficient food and drinks after the finish (at least for the faster runners), less choices for the slower ones
- unconventional medal by of wood
Not so good:
- For mailing the bib number and the clothing drop off bag 25€ were charged. (in comparison: Munich Marathon 2025: 15€)
- Inside and around the Cologne Central Station there were no "signposts" like signs or people indicating the way to the clothing drop-off stations. The navigation with Google Maps, which some people tried, was of course not successful, because the shortest way shown by Google was closed by gates around the finish area.
- The way from the clothing drop-off stations to the start was marked with "To the Start" signs, but participants had to cross the running course on the way there. The volunteers who organized this crossing with barriers (due to half marathon finishers) were visibly overstretched, and long queues formed. A temporary bridge like the one set up a bit further up the course would have alleviated this bottleneck.
- There were no signs in the starting area indicating where to dispose clothing. There were no boxes or cartons like I've seen at other marathons. The result was that clothing was lying around everywhere.
- Kilometer markings were small and not always easily visible
- Since the refreshment stations weren't set up exactly every 5km, signs at the refreshment stations indicating the distance to the next station would have been helpful. Furthermore, the refreshment stations were sometimes only visible very late.