This October, the NLB Ljubljana Marathon celebrated its 30th anniversary with over 33,000 runners across different race distances (including the kids races). After extensive research, I landed late last year on Ljubljana as my 2026 ‘A’ Race, thinking it would be a lower-key event than Chicago but a well-timed opportunity to target another marathon PB. Then, surprisingly, I got off the Valencia waitlist in the spring. So I decided to shift my focus to Valencia and transferred from the Ljubljana Marathon to the half marathon, which runs at the same time on the same course. The half marathon is the most popular event of the marathon weekend, with 10,423 finishers this year (the marathon had 4,910 by comparison). There’s also a popular 10k and a range of different kids races that takeover the city center on the Saturday before the marathon and half. Here’s what I think makes the Ljubljana Marathon (and Half Marathon) great and why I think it may be one of Europe’s best value and most underrated marathons.

Mid-October in Slovenia brings gorgeous fall color and brisk morning temps. Though the road was damp, we had nearly perfect racing weather: 50°F, a little mist, clouds, and a little wind. I’d call that 9.5 out of 10 conditions, as compared to the 7-8 out of 10 conditions I had in Chicago and Rotterdam last year due to warm temps and wind (NB Chicago was more like 5-6 out of 10 this year due to, again, warm temps and sun). Of the 6 mornings I spent in Slovenia, five of them would have been 9-10 out of 10 conditions and the 6th would have been a rainy 7 out of 10.

Much of the HM course is quiet on the outskirts of town. Overall, it’s a more suburban than scenic course, but the finish at Congress Square with the Ljubljana Castle looming in the distance is truly epic.

A downside of smaller marathons, particularly for competitive marathoners, is you often end up running alone for much more of the race than if you run a World Major or another well known race like Valencia, Rotterdam, Amsterdam, or Seville. I experienced that in both Lausanne (2017) and Lisbon (2022), though I was slower back then. In Ljubljana, marathon and half marathon runners run the first 20km together, which makes pack running more feasible, especially for the marathoners. It also makes for simpler logistics (9am start for everyone), better spectating, and helps ensure a minimum of runners are still out on the course in the early afternoon heat (unlike Geneva, which relies on a 7:30am HM start in order to get the marathoners out by 9am). I found the field in this race roughly similar in competitiveness to the Geneva Half Marathon and Rotterdam Marathon – overall, there were a good number of folks to run with, but I wasn’t surrounded by other runners the whole way like in Valencia or Chicago.

With the race falling seven weeks before the Valencia Marathon, the Ljubljana HM or 10k are great options for a tune-up race for Valencia runners. Seven weeks out from race-day is solidly deep into a build but gives you ample time to recover before peaking marathon mileage and quality.

Coming off recent injuries and knowing I wasn’t in PB shape, I decided to use the event as a marathon-specific quality long run, rather than fully racing it. I structured it as 17km at marathon effort then 3km at HM effort then a final km at threshold. Final result: 1:22:30, which landed me 113th overall and 13th in the M40-44 age group. While I’m a ways off my 2025 fitness due to time off from this year’s injuries, this was a nice confidence boost that also left me fresh enough to put in a solid week of marathon training after without needing extra race recovery.

Ljubljana Marathon registration costs a mere €55 if you sign up by 30 Nov the year before and, even if you wait, the price only climbs a little. Half Marathon registration starts at €50, which is also great value these days (most runners pay over CHF 70 for the Geneva Half Marathon, the Great North Run costs £70, and many races in the US are climbing over $100). All 2026 runners received this nice sports backpack, a cool Lelosi technical shirt, and a bunch of nice little giveaways and product samples at the expo. Generous post-race snacks offered include hot soup, bottles of Powerade, biscuits, bananas, fruit pouches, and chocolate. I didn’t opt to buy race photos, but they were just €24.95 compared to the robbery photo pricing for Marathon Majors.

Two constructive pre-race logistics points. (1) the bag-drop queue was inexplicably INSANE. Seeing how long it was at 8:15, I decided to warm-up jog with my backpack before changing shoes; then it had grown longer by 8:30 so I tracked down my wife and left my bag with her. (2) Adding to unnecessary pre-race stress, they had already closed the A corral by 8:40 despite plenty of space, leaving 100+ runners needing to climb over the fence to get in. That was just silly – unnecessary risk, energy expenditure, and stress for runners. I hope they improve on these two pieces in the future.