Houston Marathon
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The Houston Marathon is a qualifying marathon for the prestigious Boston Marathon. It is run annually the second Sunday of January. With thousands of runners and spectators, it is the largest single day sporting event in the city. It is run concurrently with a half marathon and a 5K race.
The first marathon, run in December 1972, featured 113 runners and a crowd of approximately 200 people. Today, as many as 15,000 take part in front of a far larger crowd of 200,000.
The race time limit is 6 hours and a limit of 15,000 entries is enforced. The course both starts and finishes outside the George R. Brown Convention Center. The 2006 prize fund was $172,900.
The current corporate sponsor of the marathon is Chevron Corporation. Aramco sponsors the half marathon and the Houston Press and Smart Financial sponsor the concurrent 5K run.
The event supports many charities, including the American Red Cross, the Texas Children's Hospital and the American Cancer Society.
The 2006 overall winner was David Cheruiyot (Kenya) in a time of 2:12:02. The female winner that year was Firaya Sultanova-Zhdanova (Russia), who achieved a time of 2:32:25.
