Virgin London Marathon ballot closes in record time

15 days sooner than previous years

30 April 2009 12:24 GMT / By Amy-Mae Elliott

The Virgin London Marathon 2010 entry ballot has been completed after 2 days and 16 hours - beating the previous record by over 15 days, despite access problems reported by many as the site went live.

Virgin Money says there was "unprecedented demand" for places for the 2010 race, so the online ballot entry was temporarily closed on Monday 27 April to allow the London Marathon team to add extra website capacity to meet the overwhelming demand.

"After the success of last Sunday's race and the beginning of a new dawn with Virgin we were expecting a massive response for next year's race but even we were surprised by such a fantastic reaction to the opening of the entry ballot", said race director David Bedford.

"As we run a ballot and don't allocate spaces on a first come first served basis, no-one will be disadvantaged because of the temporary issue on Monday. We do of course apologise for the inconvenience caused and thank people for their patience".

In total, over 120,000 runners have been accepted as the ballot closes, but people wishing to run for a charity may still be able to do so as major charities will have a set number of entry places that they may offer to those agreeing to raise a certain amount of money.

Full tags

Sports Fitness, Websites, Running, Online, Virgin Money