Connemara Marathon 2026

Back on the Connemara Roads - Photographing the Connemara Marathon 2026

This year's Connemara Marathon was the seventh time I've photographed it, and it's an event I look forward to all year.

What do I love about it? Honestly, everything. The atmosphere. The runners who come from all over the world to take on this corner of the west of Ireland. The scenery, which never stops giving you something to work with. The challenge of making good pictures when the weather can turn on you in the space of a few miles. 

This year, conditions were as good as they get: clean light, dramatic skies, the Twelve Bens looking like they'd been put there specifically for the photographs.

There's something about being out on that road surrounded by thousands of people who are simply there for a good day. You feel it on the start line, at the water stations, at the finish. The drive out through Connemara on a spring morning is an experience in itself, long before the first runner crosses a start line, the day has already given you something worth being there for.

A small tradition I started a few years ago: a group photo with the Ultra Marathon runners around the monument in Recess.  It's become one of my favourite moments of race day, a bit of ceremony before forty miles of hard road.

Eight hours on the course, then about twelve hours at the desk. The edit is its own marathon, but a day like this makes every minute of it worthwhile.

If you ran the Ultra and would like a full-size copy of the group photo at the monument, please get in touch,I’d be glad to send it on.

I hope to see you all next year…8:45 at the monument in Recess…don’t be late:)

Grab some jelly beans and have a look at some of my favourites from the day