The China Marathon Majors (CMM) has announced its four founding members and two strategic partners on Wednesday.
For the 2017-2018 season, Beijing Marathon, Guangzhou Marathon, Chongqing International Marathon and Wuhan Marathon will be included in the CMM.
The first season will start from the 2017 Beijing Marathon and also end with it in 2018. Under a point-based system, both professional athletes and amateur runners have the chance to share in the large prize money of 2.6 million Yuan (US $390,390) in total.
Meanwhile, a Chinese leading geographic magazine, Chinese National Geography and a Shanghai-based marketing company Arcade have become the strategic partners of the CMM. The former will help promote the CMM via its large platform and abundant resources while the latter will work with the brand and image design team of the CMM to provide professional marketing support.
Founded by the Chinese Athletics Association (CAA), the CMM is the highest level marathon games in China. It aims to integrate high-quality marathons throughout the country, promote the internationalisation and marketing of Chinese marathons with the highest standard, build a high-level exchange platform for runners and marathon organisers and encourage more Chinese to participate in Marathons.
Marathons have developed rapidly throughout China in recent years. During 2016 alone, 2.8 million runners participated in marathons and the number of CAA registered marathon events more than doubled from 134 last year.
Proofread by William Logsdon