# Running the Gold Coast Marathon from Viscount: the course passes the front door
> The ASICS Gold Coast Marathon returns 3 and 4 July 2027, and both legs have historically passed the beachfront at Viscount. Watch your runner go by twice from the kerb, taper on the Oceanway, and sleep in a cool, ocean-facing room the night before.
- Tag: Travel tips
- Published: 2026-07-09
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The **ASICS Gold Coast Marathon** returns on **3 and 4 July 2027**, dates already confirmed by organisers. By its own long-standing reputation it is the fastest road marathon in Australia: flat, dry winter air, a course that sets up personal bests for a large share of the field most years. Most of that is the course. A little of it is where you sleep the night before. Viscount on the Beach sits at 1 First Avenue, the southern toe of Surfers Paradise, on the line the runners have followed for years, both ways.
## Watch your runner pass from the kerb
Picture race morning. You carry a coffee from your own kitchen down to the end of First Avenue, stand at the beachfront and wait. On past courses, the southbound field has come through in front of you on the way to Broadbeach, with the same runners returning north along the same stretch an hour or so later. That is two clean sightings of your runner without moving the pram, chasing a park, or pushing through a barricaded crowd. When the second wave has passed, it is a six-minute walk to the tram and a short ride up to the Southport finish to meet them.
## The Oceanway is a taper track
The 2 km Oceanway starts at Viscount's front door. It is sealed, lit at night and crosses no roads, which is exactly what a taper wants. Shake-out jogs in race week, an easy loop the morning before, a gentle walk to loosen the legs the day after: all of it on soft-lit beachfront path, no traffic lights, no kerbs to roll an ankle on. Prams and easy-spinning legs share it happily. For the week that matters most, you have a private warm-up lane between the ocean and the high-rises.
## The course, from First Avenue
The 2027 map will publish closer to the event, but the shape has held year to year for a long time: away from Broadwater Parklands on the Sunday morning, south across the Nerang River into Main Beach, on down the coast road through Surfers and Broadbeach, then the return. Both legs have historically run past the beachfront here. Confirm the published map before you pick a spectator spot.
The weekend has traditionally split across two mornings. **Saturday 3 July** would carry the Half Marathon, the 10 km, the shorter distances and the wheelchair races, plus the compulsory race-pack collection at the Broadwater Parklands expo. **Sunday 4 July** would be the **Marathon (42.195 km)** and the **Wheelchair Marathon**, historically starting around **6:15 am** from Broadwater Parklands on Marine Parade in Southport and finishing at the same precinct. Program and pace charts go up at [goldcoastmarathon.com.au](https://goldcoastmarathon.com.au/) as the event approaches.
## Getting to the start
Viscount is **about 6 km north of the start** at Broadwater Parklands. Florida Gardens tram station is **500 m from the door**, six minutes on foot, and a single G:link line runs straight to the race precinct with no transfers. In past years ridetheg.com.au has carried an extended race-morning timetable, so a 5 am departure is a tram, not a taxi hunt. Driving in from Brisbane, about 90 minutes north, there is free on-site parking, one space per apartment, 1.95 m clearance.
## After the finish line
Back at the apartment, the heated pool holds **27°C year-round** for the afternoon soak a marathon earns, and the sauna handles the winter chill in stiff legs. Every apartment has two bathrooms, so a hot shower is never a queue. The kitchen is fully self-contained: the celebration dinner, or the collapse-on-the-couch delivery, both work without leaving the building. Broadbeach is 15 minutes south along the Oceanway when the legs are ready for a slow Sunday lunch.
## Sleep the night before
The part that actually moves a finishing time is the last sleep. Every apartment is air-conditioned and ocean-facing, so you set the room cool, draw it dark and open the balcony to the sound of the surf. Three apartments to a floor across a ten-level building means the pre-dawn alarm wakes your room and no one else's.
## Book for marathon weekend
**3 and 4 July 2027**, confirmed. Check-in 2:00 to 11:00 pm, with a late arrival easily flagged to the team ahead of time; check-out 10:00 am. Viscount lets just twelve holiday apartments and sits directly on the course, so the weekend books out early. Lock the room in as soon as your race entry confirms.
[**Check availability and book your stay**](/broadbeach-accommodation/index.md), or read more about the [Superior 3 Bedroom Ocean View](/broadbeach-accommodation/3-bedroom-superior-ocean-view/index.md) (120 sq m, sleeps six, room for a runner plus four support) and the [2 Bedroom Ocean View](/broadbeach-accommodation/2-bedroom-ocean-view/index.md) (100 sq m, two bathrooms, right for a running couple with one or two extras).
Entry, pricing tiers and the course map, once published, live on the official [ASICS Gold Coast Marathon](https://goldcoastmarathon.com.au/) site; enter there before you book anything else.
