First Heartlands Athlone running event confirmed for 2027

The inaugural Heartlands Athlone running event will take place in the town on Sunday, April 11, 2027.

Heartlands Athlone will see runners participate in three separate race events - a 10km, half marathon and marathon - along the ‘streets of Athlone’ and incorporating all of the “iconic landmarks of the town”.

Running enthusiast and race organiser Alan Coffey said Heartlands Athlone is certain to draw a large participation with pre-event interest levels “extremely positive”.

Former Tubberclair footballer Coffey is one of the race event’s three main organisers, the others being Matthew Kilmartin and Johnny Dolan.

Heartlands Athlone has been “almost a year” in the pipeline, when Coffey said, the trio “put out feelers” with a number of relevant groups to gauge interest levels in hosting such an event. In the intervening time, he said the response has been “unbelievably supportive” of the event.

“Both Mullingar and Longford have running events which start and finish in the heart of the towns. It creates a great buzz, a great atmosphere in their towns and we thought why couldn’t Athlone host a similar running event?,” Coffey said.

Coffey said he and Kilmartin, with whom he runs on a regular basis, first harvested the idea, and then called on the race organisation expertise of Dolan to ensure the first edition of Heartlands Athlone will run smoothly.

“Johnny has previous experience organising the Ros Run in Roscommon. He’s a long time friend of Matt so hopefully as a trio we will be able to put on event that we can then replicate year after year,” Coffey added.

Alan said numerous local bodies have given “their full backing” to Heartlands Athlone.

“We have had conversations with the local Gardaí, Athlone Town FC, John Henson of the Athlone Festivals and Events committee and the Athlone Chamber of Commerce, all of whom are incredibly positive and they are all on board for the event next year,” Coffey stated.

While event organisation remains a work in progress, Coffey confirmed that the Athlone Town stadium at Lissywollen will serve as the race headquarters on April 11. He said the organisers are extremely grateful to the club for the use of their facilities for this inaugural event.

The three race distances will cover a similar initial 10km route, starting and returning to Lissywollen on a town centre focused course, incorporating the Mary O’Rourke pedestrian bridge and a number of Athlone landmarks both east and west of the river Shannon.

The complete routes for both the half marathon and marathon distances have yet to be confirmed, but Coffey said imminent talks with the Gardaí will determine the course outcomes for both races.

A date for online race registration has yet to be confirmed, but Coffey is hoping that entry to all three distances will open to participants at the end of October or in early November.

He is calling on the Athlone and wider Midlands community to “come out in full support” of the three race distances when the event takes place on April 11 next year.

“As an organising committee, we would love to see a mini Dublin marathon atmosphere on the streets of Athlone, with live music along the route and spectators lining the town’s streets in support of all the participants,” Coffey said.

Coffey is expecting all three races to sell out given the pre-registration interest.

From a logistics perspective, the trio are hopeful that the inaugural event will “runs smoothly” and that Heartlands Athlone can then become a regular event on the Midlands running calendar.