Greifenseelauf: Course, Route Profile & Map

Course & Elevation

The route is an open loop of the lake: start at Niederuster (Turicum), then anticlockwise along the shore through Greifensee, Fällanden, Maur and Egg and back to Uster, where the finish sits 1.5 kilometres from the start in the Stadtpark. Around 60 per cent is asphalt, 40 per cent unsurfaced track through woodland, fields and reed beds.

With 146 metres of ascent and 126 of descent over 21.1 kilometres the profile is flat: 57 per cent of the route is level and the rest splits almost evenly between gentle rises and falls of a few metres. All three routes end the same way: after around 20 kilometres on the half marathon, just under nine on the ten and a good five on the 6.3, the path lifts twelve to seventeen metres over 480 metres, averaging 3 to 4 per cent, and carries you from there into the Stadtpark Uster. It is the only rise the profile counts as a climb at all.

The Greifenseelauf has been held since 1980, in 2026 for the 47th time, organised by Markus Ryffel's AG. All adult categories start at Niederuster (Turicum) and finish in the Stadtpark Uster; the village sits in the Landihalle. The half marathon is one of twelve scoring races in the ZKB Zürilauf Cup, and both it and the team relay were sold out by the end of August. It is run on a Saturday in September through the Greifensee nature reserve: woodland, fields, reed beds and lakeshore, around 60 per cent asphalt and 40 per cent unsurfaced track. There are eight aid stations, among them kilometre 2.9 at Greifensee, 7.4 at Fällanden, 11.5 at Maur with bananas, 14.6 at the Badi Egg and 17.8 on the Seefeldstrasse in Riedikon. The cut-off is at the Maur boat landing at kilometre 11.7 and at the finish, and pacemakers cover target times from 1:30 to 2:15.

Pacing Strategy

The start goes off in ten blocks between 10:00 and 10:51, sorted by target time. That takes much of the chaos out of the opening, but it has a flip side: almost everyone in your block runs in the same pace band, and letting yourself be dragged along instead of running your own target time only shows up after halfway.

Because the course is so flat there are no natural recovery points and no places to make time back. Your kilometre pace should therefore sit close to target from the first kilometre. The switch between asphalt and unsurfaced track costs a few seconds per kilometre on the softer sections without the effort changing; steering by the watch rather than by feel means correcting in the wrong direction there.

The critical phase falls between kilometre 14 and 18, on the eastern shore between the Badi Egg and Riedikon. The start momentum has gone, the finish area is not yet in sight, and the terrain supplies no stimulus. Stay even here and you will have enough for the last three kilometres. The race is settled on the short rise from kilometre 19.8: seventeen metres over not quite half a kilometre, right before the Stadtpark. It is no mountain, but after twenty flat kilometres you feel it clearly, and attacking before it rarely ends well.

Training plan for Greifenseelauf: 12-week build

A flat half marathon takes roughly 75 to 150 minutes depending on your level. The demand is a long, even effort just below anaerobic threshold with no recovery phases, because the terrain offers none.

The training core is long tempo work and threshold running: continuous runs of 60 to 90 minutes, tempo blocks of 20 to 40 minutes at goal race pace, and intervals of 2,000 to 4,000 metres. Hill training buys little here; what counts is holding a pace for an hour and a half without structure from outside.

Two things are course-specific. First the surface: 40 per cent unsurfaced track asks for sure footing and a slightly different cadence. Put part of your long runs on field and forest paths rather than asphalt, and pick a shoe that works on both. Second the closing rise: build a short three-to-four-per-cent gradient into the last kilometres of long runs so your body knows how that feels after twenty flat kilometres.

The date is a Saturday morning in mid-September in the Zürcher Oberland: usually mild, often damp by the lake, with sun and rain both possible. With block starts running to 10:51, the wait between bib collection and your gun can be long; plan a warm-up that keeps you warm until then, and expect wind off the lake in the finish area.