TheMarathon Clinic
Course pacing

How to pace the Melbourne Marathon

The Nike Melbourne Marathon is a largely flat but gently rolling marathon, with about 135 m of climbing and 132 m of descent (a near-level net change). Pace it by even effort: ease back on the few rises and let the descents run, rather than forcing an identical pace on every kilometre.

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Guide reviewed July 2026
Next Melbourne Marathon

Sunday 11 October 2026

About 7 weeks away · 52 days · projected from the usual race weekend

Plan your race with Jason

Elevation gain

135m

Elevation loss

132m

Net change

+3m

Terrain

Rolling

Typical race-day conditions

October

At the gun

10°C

~7:00am start

By the finish

16°C

warms through the morning

Humidity

71%

morning average

Conditions

Good

close to ideal, a small cost at most

A thirty-year average for October, not a prediction. The real forecast appears here inside the last nine days.

Goal finish timeYour time on a cool day, with no heat allowance in it. Say whether it is a target for this course or what you are good for on flat ground, and the plan below shows what the terrain and the weather each do to it.
::
Your goal time isTwo ways to say what your number means. A TARGET FOR THIS RACE is what most runners have: the plan finishes on your time, and the hills decide how you spend it rather than how much there is. WHAT YOU RUN ON FLAT is the other way round: tell us your flat-course ability and we add what this course costs, which is how you find out what the hills are worth to you.
StrategyEven effort keeps your effort steady and lets pace drift with the terrain, slower up the climbs and faster down. Even pace holds one pace the whole way and ignores the hills. Either way the total stays the goal time you entered, so this changes where your time goes rather than how much of it there is.
Race conditionsPace for an ideal cool day, a typical race-day, or a warm-outlier year. Once race week arrives and you have a forecast, choose Set °C and enter the actual start-time temperature. Warmer conditions slow your realistic finish, and the splits below adjust to match. These figures assume shade, so a clear morning on an exposed course runs a degree or two hotter than the reading here.
AcclimatisedAcclimatised: you already train and race in conditions like these, so your body has adapted. You sweat sooner and more, hold a lower heart rate and core temperature, and barely lose time to the heat.Not yet: you mostly train in cooler weather, so a warm race hits harder, a higher heart rate, an earlier fade, and roughly twice the slowdown an adapted runner sees. It comes good after about two weeks of training in the heat.
Your race plan

3:32:36

The same effort as 3:29:25 on flat ground

Target pace

5:02/km

3:30:00 Melbourne +2:36 typical October = 3:32:36

▸Where that comes from
Your goal for Melbourne
3:30:00
Melbourne’s terrainshapes the splits, not the total
—
↑ climbs +3:59 (135 m)↓ descents -3:24 (132 m)

About 35 seconds more than flat ground at the same effort.

Typical October
+2:36

10°C at the gun, 16°C by the finish. +1.2% adapted.

On the day
3:32:36
Nike Melbourne Marathon

Melbourne, VIC

Hover the map or the profile, the other follows.

This one is won on the back half.

5 m10 m15 m20 m25 m30 mhalf 1:46:080 km510152025303540
km 35–37 climbs 14 m, right where most runners fade.
plan slows (give time) plan runs (take it back)each block ≈ 500 m of the course
Your race-day splits
Every
Units
MarkerTarget paceClock
1 km5:20/km5:20
2 km5:01/km10:21
3 km5:07/km15:28
4 km5:03/km20:31
5 km5:04/km25:35
6 km4:57/km30:32
7 km4:50/km35:22
8 km4:58/km40:19
9 km5:06/km45:26
10 km4:59/km50:25
11 km4:58/km55:22
12 km5:02/km1:00:24
13 km5:03/km1:05:27
14 km5:19/km1:10:46
15 km4:52/km1:15:38
16 km4:56/km1:20:35
17 km5:00/km1:25:35
18 km4:56/km1:30:31
19 km5:00/km1:35:31
20 km5:05/km1:40:36
21 km5:02/km1:45:38
22 km5:09/km1:50:47
23 km4:56/km1:55:43
24 km4:58/km2:00:41
25 km5:06/km2:05:48
26 km5:00/km2:10:48
27 km5:00/km2:15:48
28 km5:01/km2:20:49
29 km5:06/km2:25:55
30 km5:16/km2:31:11
31 km5:05/km2:36:16
32 km5:03/km2:41:20
33 km5:00/km2:46:20
34 km4:56/km2:51:16
35 km5:06/km2:56:22
36 km5:08/km3:01:30
37 km5:15/km3:06:44
38 km4:49/km3:11:34
39 km4:53/km3:16:27
40 km5:00/km3:21:26
41 km5:05/km3:26:31
42 km4:59/km3:31:31
Finish5:37/km3:32:36

Even-effort splits distribute your goal time by the energy cost of each gradient (the Minetti grade-cost model), not an even pace. Wind, heat, turns, and your own downhill tolerance still apply, so run the climbs by feel and stay relaxed on the descents. Heat builds as you go, so treat the closing 10 km as a feel check rather than a pace target.

Take it to your watch

These exact splits as a structured workout: one step per kilometre, each with its target pace band (±10 s/km). Your watch prompts every step, so on race day you run the terrain, not the arithmetic.

Garmin needs a cable and a computer. In this file: 43 steps · every km · 3:30:00 goal · even effort · typical October conditions · per-km paces. Change anything above and download again.

Getting it onto your watch

You will need a USB cable and a computer. There is no way around that: Garmin has never built a way to send a workout to a watch from a phone, from Garmin Connect, or from any file you can email yourself. Everyone who makes these files, us included, has the same constraint.

  1. Download the file above on a computer.
  2. Plug the watch in by USB and wait for it to appear.
  3. Copy the file into GARMIN/NewFiles. If your watch has no NewFiles folder, use GARMIN/Workouts instead.
  4. Eject the watch and unplug it.
  5. On the watch, go to Training, then Workouts. It will be there under the name of this race.

On a Mac the watch mounts as a media device rather than a drive, so you will need a transfer app such as Android File Transfer to see those folders. Windows shows them in Explorer.

Dragging it into Garmin Connect or TrainingPeaks will not work, and it is worth knowing why. .fit is a container that holds several different kinds of file. A recorded run uploads to both of them happily, which is what those drop zones are built for. A workout is a different file type inside the same extension, and neither platform will import one.

You have the splits. The question is whether they are the right ones for you.

In a Race Strategy Session, Jason reads your last twelve weeks and spends 60 minutes going through the Melbourne Marathon with you: what you are fit for, how to pace it, fuelling and the conditions. A$180.

Plan it with a coachGet a coach
Where Melbourne is decided

Hardest km

Finish at 5:37/km

Fastest km

38 km at 4:49/km

The coach's read

A fast, largely flat city course that finishes with a lap inside the MCG. A few gentle rises and bridge ramps are the only real interruptions, so hold an even effort and keep something back for the stadium finish.

WHY  Allowing for a typical October day, that's about 5:01/km of effort the whole way, the splits below shift with the gradient, not your pace.

Ease the climbs, let the descents run, and stay relaxed through the second half.
JHJason HuntFounder & Head Coach
Take it furtherAdjust for the heatPlan your splits
·Race-day guide

Pacing the Melbourne Marathon

A coach's read on how the Nike Melbourne Marathon runs, and how to spend your effort across it.

01The course

Kilometre by kilometre

  • The climbing that matters: 35.3–36.6 km (+14 m at 1.1%), 28.5–30.2 km (+12 m at 0.7%), 13.2–14.0 km (+11 m at 1.4%). Run these by effort; your pace will and should slow.
  • Where you get it back: 36.6–38.3 km (-14 m down), 40.6–41.4 km (-10 m down), 5.9–6.7 km (-10 m down). Let these run without braking or hammering: relaxed, quick feet.
  • Albert Park Lake (~10.4 km): A flat lap past the lake and the Grand Prix circuit.
02The plan

How to pace the Melbourne Marathon

  1. Read the course before race day. Largely flat, MCG finish. A fast, largely flat city course that finishes with a lap inside the MCG.
  2. Pace by effort, not just the watch. Set the effort you can hold for the whole marathon, then let the pace flex with the ground: a little slower up, a little faster down, the same effort throughout.
  3. Give the climbs effort, not pace. Let your pace slow on the climbs while holding effort steady; chasing your flat pace uphill is the classic way to blow up. The biggest is around 35–37 km (+14 m).
  4. Protect your quads on the descents. Stay relaxed and let the descents come to you. Hammering downhill banks a few seconds now and wrecks your legs for the closing kilometres; the model deliberately caps the downhill benefit for this reason.
  5. Plan your finish. A few gentle rises and bridge ramps are the only real interruptions, so hold an even effort and keep something back for the stadium finish.
03Questions

Melbourne Marathon, answered

Is the Melbourne Marathon hilly?
It's largely flat but gently rolling, with around 135 m of total climbing over the 42.2 km and a biggest single climb of about 14 m. None of it is severe, but the rises add up.
How should I pace the Melbourne Marathon?
The Nike Melbourne Marathon is a largely flat but gently rolling marathon, with about 135 m of climbing and 132 m of descent (a near-level net change). Pace it by even effort: ease back on the few rises and let the descents run, rather than forcing an identical pace on every kilometre.
What is the hardest part of the Melbourne Marathon?
The toughest climb runs roughly 35–37 km, gaining about 14 m at an average 1.1%. A fast, largely flat city course that finishes with a lap inside the MCG.
Is the Melbourne Marathon a good course for a PB?
It can be. It's fast enough for a personal best if you pace by effort and don't fight the rolling sections; just don't expect a dead-flat racetrack.
How much elevation gain does the Melbourne Marathon have?
About 135 m of total gain and 132 m of loss over the 42.2 km, in line with the organiser's published figures.
Race Strategy Session

The pacing above is free. The judgement is the part worth paying for.

This page knows the Nike Melbourne Marathon. It does not know you. Two or three weeks out, Jason reads your last twelve weeks and spends 60 minutes going through the day with you, then writes it down so you are not running on memory.

  • An honest read on what your training says you can hold
  • How to spend your effort across this course, and where it is won
  • Fuelling and conditions, decided before you are standing on the line

A$180

One session, one race. Video call, or in person in Sydney.

Plan your race

From the journal

2026-07-13 · 8 min

Pace the TCS Sydney Marathon: Don't Trust the Downhill Start

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