Liverpool Half Marathon: All you need to know

The Liverpool Half Marathon is a highlight of the city's sporting calendar, but this year and it is set to be the biggest one to date.

About 15,000 runners are preparing to take part in the event on Sunday 15 March, with 500 of those signed up for the Ten Mile Road Race, and they will experience a brand new route.

The race will now start at the Hill Dickinson Stadium - the new home ground of Everton Football Club - and finish in its usual place of Pier Head Liverpool.

The new route has enabled organisers to provide an extra 3,000 places which were snapped up in an hour.

As well as the new start line, the first four miles of the route have also been revised to take in more of the city centre and landmarks including Liverpool Town Hall, the Chinese Arch, and Liverpool Cathedral.

The latter part of the course has also been changed.

Runners will no longer head through Otterspool Park and on to The Promenade.

Instead, they will make their way back from Sefton Park and Princes Park along Princes Road and Upper Parliament Street.

Then they will head to Queens Wharf and Halftide Wharf, joining the usual route at King's Dock for the home straight along the waterfront to the finish line.

Both the Liverpool Half Marathon and Ten Mile Road Race will now start at the slightly later time of 09:30 GMT.

Organisers said that was due to transport logistics, to support runners with extra time to get to the new start line.

While the new route will accommodate the expansion of the event, it will mean the waterfront, Strand, and Upper Parliament Street North-bound route will be closed a little longer than previous years until 13:30.

An event of this magnitude will require a closure of several roads and junctions across the city between 04:00 and 15:00.

All will reopen on a rolling basis as the run passes through.

An interactive road map is now live on the BTR website to assist those needing to move around the city centre on event day and to see specific areas closure times.

For those coming into the city centre – the roads will be busier than normal until 14:00. People are encouraged to use public transport, or arrive a bit later.

Alan Rothwell from Born To Run (BTR) Liverpool said the event took "a huge amount of work and planning".

"To make the course safe we must close roads and have restricted access in places, but these will be lifted as soon as it is safe to do so," he said.

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