Valencia is preparing to host this Sunday, December 3, the 43rd edition of the Trinidad Alfonso Valencia Marathon, with a record number of 33,000 participants from 134 countries.

The organizers have revealed impressive figures for this Valencia Marathon 2023. The international presence and diversity are strong points of this edition, with a significant increase in the number of non-Spanish participants compared to previous years.

The Valencia Marathon, a race without borders

In total, 57% of the registered runners come from outside Spain; a percentage higher than the previous year that attests to the internationalization of the race, which this year will have participants from 134 different countries (compared to 124 in 2022).

France is positioned as the second supplier of athletes with 4,662 participants, only behind Spain, which leads the pack with 13,536 runners. The United Kingdom and Italy follow with 2,463 and 2,174 participants respectively. Beyond its status as a benchmark sports competition, the Valencia Marathon has established itself as an important economic and tourist catalyst for the region.

A golden weekend for local hotels and tourism

As expected, the event has a very strong impact on local tourism this year, with hotel occupancy of 87% in Valencia during the weekend, reaching 91% the night before the race.

Paula Llobet, delegate councilor for Tourism, Innovation and Investments of the Valencia City Council, highlighted the important impact of the marathon on the city’s tourism sector, highlighting that the participants, often accompanied by friends or family, take the opportunity to get to know Valencia. Juan Miguel Gómez, director of the Trinidad Alfonso Foundation, estimates that the event should generate around 27 million euros in direct tourist spending.

The Trinidad Alfonso Valencia Marathon also enjoys exceptional television coverage: as in 2022, more than 175 countries will have access to the event through 324 television channels, ensuring live or delayed broadcast of this international competition.

2011, the year in which everything changed

As the director of the Trinidad Alfonso Foundation, Juan Miguel Gómez, recalls, the Valencia Marathon underwent a great transformation in 2011, marked by the entry of Juan Roig, president of Mercadona, as a collaborator of this event.

Roig’s attraction to the marathon crystallized when he attended the start of that year’s race, which had been moved to the Monteolivete bridge. Impressed by the scene that reminded him of the start of the New York marathon, the Valencian billionaire grasped all the potential that a competition of this type represented and decided to participate in the birth of the Trinidad Alfonso foundation.

Juan Roig, fourth fortune in Spain with 3.4 billion euros

A strategic collaboration with La Ciutat de les Arts i les Ciències

Since this first edition, which brought together only 3,000 runners, the marathon has experienced exponential growth, with an increase in indicators of around 2,300%. According to Gómez, the objective is to continue this growth in a sustainable way, focusing on the development of hotel infrastructure and capabilities, rather than rapid and unbalanced expansion.

The renewal of the collaboration with La Ciutat de les Arts i les Ciències, inseparable from this event, goes in this direction and already confirms that the marathon will be held in this emblematic place every first Sunday in December for the next four years.