La Filippide Marathon
Where
Chiaramonte Gulfi → Montalbano, Italy
Date
2 August 2026
Distances
Registration cost
€5–30
What runners say
When you take off your watch and stop checking the GPS, you realise something: you're finally just running. Not monitoring, not optimising. Just running. La Filippide reminds you of that.
Why it's special
A marathon in Sicily with no watch, no GPS, no kilometre markers. Starting at dawn from Chiaramonte Gulfi station, finishing at the House of Montalbano. Like Pheidippides — but through the Iblean hills.
What's around
La Filippide is one of the most original and radical races on the Italian running calendar. It takes place in the Iblean hills of Sicily — from Chiaramonte Gulfi to the House of Montalbano — on a point-to-point course through landscapes of rare beauty. Start time: dawn. The fundamental rule is "momentary space-time isolation": no watch, no GPS, no heart rate monitor, no phone. Not even headphones. Aid stations are placed randomly along the route, to avoid giving distance references. There are no kilometre markers. You run like Pheidippides in 490 BC — with the sun, the sea and the mountains as your only reference points. No commercial sponsors, no prize money, no age categories. One symbolic trophy for the first man and first woman. For everyone else: the same medal, the same diploma, the same experience. It's one of the least known races in Italy — and probably one of the most honest.