Can sub‑3 Shanghai Marathon runners earn ¥10,000? Brand teams are…

There are just over three months until the 2026 Shanghai Marathon, but the battle lines have already been drawn: at least eight brands have opened team recruitment so far. Compared with the past few years’ recruitment activity, there are some intriguing new changes and trends — and there’s a lot of information behind those shifts. Today we’ll take a closer look.

The "rally call" has been sounded much earlier.

This year’s Shanghai Marathon team mobilization arrived far earlier than usual.In previous years launching in September was considered fast, but this year many brands had completed team line-ups by late July.There are several reasons for this.

The primary reason is that the Shanghai Marathon’s lottery results were announced much earlier. As the Shanghai Marathon pushes to become a World Marathon Majors event, it is aligning its registration practices with top global races — releasing ballot results earlier so runners can better prepare. That change has naturally pushed team recruitment to start sooner.

As the prospect of Majors status approaches, attention on the Shanghai Marathon has intensified,with both domestic and international eyes increasingly focused on this course.That heightened focus naturally brings greater commercial value, so if a brand team performs well at the Shanghai Marathon its cachet increases, and brands will naturally pay more attention.

At the same time, the brand war around the Shanghai Marathon has become increasingly fierce over the past few years. After that baptism, any brand hoping to make an impact at the race has learned that seizing the initiative is key. If brands also add pre-race training camps, they need longer lead times to let team members accumulate breakthroughs through training.

Recruitment superlatives

Based on the information collected so far, eight brands have taken action on Shanghai Marathon teams. If we were to hand out "most" awards for team recruitment, which brands would make the list?

The "fastest" recruitment award goes, unsurprisingly, to Salomon.On June 25, before the Shanghai Marathon ballot results had been announced, Salomon had already issued a team recruitment call.This "early-bird" stance shows how much the brand values the event and that it has done its homework in market planning.

The largest recruitment scale was claimed by bmai. According to the official registration mini-program,for elite runners,the "Jingtan" team and an open-entry mass experience groupboth had registration caps of 1,000 people,and although the final number selected will very likely differ considerably from those caps, the brand’s "no one turned away" posture is already plain to see.

At other domestic races we've often seen the 必迈 team arrive in force; this cap of 1,000 participants is in keeping with that tradition. Compared with most brands that need to limit scale, 必迈 is indeed considerably more "generous" in its team-recruitment investment.

Speaking of generosity, 必迈 went on to lead the next category as well—the highest cash reward—Wearing a full set of 必迈 kit, men who run in the 220–230 bracket and women in the 240–245 bracket will receive a 5,000 yuan reward.

At the same timethere are also"a two-men-one-woman" team award (top three: 9,000, 6,000, 3,000 yuan) anda biggest-improvement PB award (one man and one woman, 2,000 yuan each)。By comparison, teams offering a sub-3 cash bonus generally give 1,500 yuan. 必迈's rich prize tiers and high top amounts put it in a league of its own on this dimension. If you're lucky enough to take all three awards, a runner could earn up to 11,000 yuan!

Besides cash rewards, some brands choose to offer vouchers for their brand e-commerce stores as prizes.The brand offering the largest voucher is 特步: running inside 230 will earn a 6,000-yuan voucher for 特步's Running Selection online store.

With the "rewards" section completed, there's also a superlative on runners' "expenses"—the deposit, which every program inevitably requires,and in recent years deposits across brand teams have generally trended upward.This year the highest deposit was Salomon's 3,000 yuan.

A big reason for that is the high-value kit the brand provides: according to the recruitment page, 萨洛蒙 supplies team members with equipment worth 4,000 yuan, so charging a 3,000-yuan deposit is reasonable. At the same time this further reduces the risk of runners backing out and avoids the headaches caused by team dropouts.

Beyond the "I pay, you run" model,

these new changes are a very welcome touch.

People often say "cold, hard cash is the most tangible"—past team recruitments followed the model of brands providing kit and prize money, but this year a Team-Recruitment 2.0 has begun to appear.

We see that, beyond the "standard operations",ASICS additionally offered star-rated hotel accommodation the night before the race, plus race-day breakfast packs and event-day transport; newcomer brand SEPTEM, although its kit and prize levels still lag the leading brands, also provides runners with hotel accommodation within 2.8 km of the start.

Anyone who’s run the Shanghai Marathon (上马) knows that booking hotels and pre-race commuting are real headaches — steep hotel prices and unfamiliar transport add hassle to the trip. These thoughtful steps from brands genuinely spare runners many inconveniences.

For a brand, the conventional approach would be to roll hotel costs into prize money — bigger purses attract more attention and avoid the effort of arranging hotels and transport. But brands didn’t take that easier route; instead they added more “serve the runner” thinking, bringing warmth beyond pure commercial activity — and that’s very welcome.

From team recruitment

A look at the current state of running-brand development in the Chinese market

Although many brands have yet to announce team-recruitment details, from the situation so far,you can already glimpse some of the latest developments among running brands in China.

ASICS and Salomon have both gone all out this year — you can clearly feel both brands continuing to ramp up on the road-running front, which ties closely to their strong growth momentum.

Over the past two years ASICS has shown strong commercial momentum: in Q1 this year Greater China revenue rose 20% year-on-year, becoming an important growth point. On the product side, the METASPEED series and models like SUPERBLAST and NOVABLAST have steadily improved. Recently ASICS China carried out a new round of executive reshuffles, making its intent to keep pushing very clear.

Salomon has become a new growth engine for the AMER Sports Group, with footwear and apparel revenue jumping 42% in Q1 2026. Previously Salomon had built strengths in trail and fashion, but in road running the brand hadn’t made a big splash since the “little red shoe” about ten years ago.

Last year’s launch of the S/PRO team and the debut of the S/LAB PHANTASM 3 sounded the brand’s road-running offensive. Salomon’s move to be first off the mark in this year’s recruitment shows its aggressive focus — when road running becomes a new growth pole, the brand can grow much stronger, and Salomon is determined to win this battle.

Domestic running-shoe pioneers Xtep and Li‑Ning both chose e-store vouchers as team rewards this time. That move is not only clever but also reflects the development of China’s running-shoe market.

If an ordinary brand offered vouchers, their appeal would inevitably be limited. But Xtep and Li‑Ning have the confidence because their product performance already ranks among the industry leaders and has wide recognition. In that case vouchers are no longer symbolic perks you won’t use but valuable “hard currency.”

For brands, once vouchers become a viable reward option they not only convert into reduced product inventory but also increase product–user connection and stickiness. When product performance is strong, this helps expand positive word-of-mouth among target audiences — and that word-of-mouth is a truly scarce asset in brand competition.

Another domestic brand, BMAI, stands out as a company putting real money on the table — and that’s easy to understand. In early June reports surfaced that BMAI is attempting to list on the A-share market.

For brands seeking access to the capital markets, delivering an impressive scoreboard at major events to build brand momentum is unquestionably a necessary strategic move.Moreover, while BMAI’s financials look eye-catching, its own-brand BMAI contributes less than 40% of revenue; driven by IPO expectations, growing and strengthening the BMAI brand has become a top priority.

For smaller or less-famous brands, the Shanghai Marathon is likewise an opportunity not to be missed.

Macondo opened its first offline store this year, showing expansion momentum; years of fielding a Shanghai Marathon team have also given it experience. This year they supplied team members with their top-tier gear, and their selection was “strict to enter, lenient to exit” — only sub‑3 runners could be selected, and simply finishing the race counted as completing the task.

PB RUNNER’s “women-runner friendly” approach, with a SUB345 cutoff, lets more female runners participate. The brand’s Kenyan roots are also reflected in the detail of gifting Kenyan bracelets, which became a defining feature of the team.

BIG K ran a community-scaling play with “10-person teams + a team fund”: no deposit, no individual performance pressure, ranking calculated from number of finishers and average times, embedding the brand’s reputation within running groups.

Although these brands have limited capital and other resources and can't "go big" like top-tier names, they've entered this scramble to capture Shanghai in their own way, leveraging their particular strengths.

Going forward, more brands will likely announce team recruitment news. On this smokeless battlefield they display their latest development status and strategic direction, competing in financial muscle, product strength, and marketing power. In the back-and-forth of brand maneuvers there are wins and losses, rises and falls in ranking, but runners remain the beneficiaries—witnessing the sport's development and enjoying ever more rewarding running experiences.

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Text/Editor: HP

Image source: Paoye Dabaozha

Visual: Max

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Can sub‑3 Shanghai Marathon runners earn ¥10,000? Brand teams are starting to poach them