World Athletics Gives Road Running Its Own Department

World Athletics has created a department devoted to road running and mass participation, putting Jakob Larsen, the Danish executive behind its new Ultimate Championship, in charge of the races most runners actually enter. The federation announced the change on Wednesday, four days before the New York City Marathon.

More than 320 road races hold a World Athletics label, and every one of them pays a fee for it. Under the label regulations for 2027, a Platinum marathon pays $75,000 next year, up from $50,000 in 2026, and a Gold marathon pays $35,000. That money funds road racing’s anti-doping program, along with a 2 percent levy on the prize money of the top eight finishers at Elite, Gold and Platinum races. World Athletics says the program brings in $3 million a year, and a Platinum race also has to pay for at least 12 in-competition drug tests on top of its fee.

Who Runs the New Department

Larsen spent 12 years as chief executive of Denmark’s athletics federation, a period in which Copenhagen staged the 2014 World Half Marathon Championships and Aarhus hosted the 2019 World Cross Country Championships with Larsen leading the organizing committee. He joined World Athletics in Monaco in 2020 as director of competition and events, and his latest project was the first World Athletics Ultimate Championship, held in Budapest in September.

Alessio Punzi, who was already the IAAF’s head of marathons back in 2017 and now carries the title of head of road running and mass participation, will work alongside him. Their team takes on the marathon and every other road distance, plus cross-country, mountain and trail running, and the RUN X World Treadmill Championship, the 5K treadmill race World Athletics launched with Technogym and a $100,000 prize pool. The rulebook, the support work the federation does for race organizers, and commercial deals with tech and data companies also land on their desk.

“World Athletics’ research informs us that at least 1 billion people worldwide are runners in some shape or form, making athletics the most-participated sport in the world,” said Jon Ridgeon, the federation’s chief executive. He described the job ahead in three parts: keeping races safe and properly regulated, putting on global championships that carry real prestige for the winners, and growing the sport through World Athletics’ own events as well as other people’s.

The Championships Ahead

Copenhagen hosted the World Road Running Championships in September, with elite and mass races over the mile, 5K and half-marathon on the same weekend. Andreas Almgren won the men’s half-marathon in 58:06, a European record pending ratification, and makes his marathon debut in New York on Sunday. Agnes Ngetich took the women’s title in 1:05:15, a world record for a women-only race. The city’s half-marathon lottery then drew 188,522 entries for just 45,000 places in 2027.

From 2030, the marathon gets a world championships of its own, held every year with men and women racing in alternate years, and Athens is in talks to host the first edition. World Athletics has pointed to late-summer heat and the commercial appeal of championships that welcome recreational runners as reasons for the split, and the marathon stays on the World Athletics Championships program through 2029. Before then, Cape Town hosts the World Mountain and Trail Running Championships in 2027, the same year the higher label fees take effect.