Comrades Marathon, live.

The Ultimate Human Race: 86 km from sea to high veld

From the cock crow and Shosholoza at Durban City Hall to the final gun at Scottsville Racecourse: 99 editions of pure grit.

The Comrades Marathon is the world’s oldest and fiercest road ultramarathon, founded in 1921. At dawn outside Durban City Hall, 20,000 runners stand shoulder-to-shoulder as the recorded cockerel crows and the strains of Shosholoza rise into the dark. The 2026 race takes on the brutal 85.8-kilometre "Up Run", climbing out of the coastal humidity toward the high veld. The course grinds through the infamous "Big Five" hills — Cowies Hill, Fields Hill, Bothas Hill, Inchanga, and the heartbreaking torment of Polly Shortts with just ten kilometres to go.

The cutoff at Scottsville Racecourse in Pietermaritzburg is absolute: at precisely twelve hours, the chief judge turns his back to the track and fires the final starter’s pistol, shutting the gate in the face of runners collapsing yards away. Livebib turns this immense emotional drama into real-time tracking: live course location, gradient updates, and projected split times across every timing mat keep supporters glued to every step toward the finish.