The Perth Running Festival sends all four of its distances, 4km, 10km, half and full, onto the turf inside a single stadium on Sunday 11 October 2026. Everything ends in one place, on one side of the river. Plan the weekend outward from that and the city does most of the work for you. Ignore it and you will spend race morning on a train instead of a warm-up.
The one fixed point in the whole weekend
Optus Stadium (Burswood) is where every distance ends, and the parkland around it is free and open to walk at any hour. That matters more than it sounds. Supporters who have never been here tend to arrive on Sunday morning with no idea where the course threads through the precinct, and they see a runner once, from behind.
Fix that on the Saturday. The HALO rooftop walk runs as 90-minute guided groups on the stadium roof, roughly A$85 to A$100 per person, with a minimum age of 8 and hard limits of 1.2m and 30kg, so it is not a plan for a party with small children in it. Block bookings are taken, but reserve well before race weekend rather than hoping on the day. From up there you can see the bridge, the jetty and the last kilometre in one sweep, which is the cheapest way to brief your family on where to stand the next morning.
If you are racing, walk the parkland instead and save your legs. You will cover that last stretch yourself soon enough.
Sleep close enough that race morning is a walk
Crown Towers Perth (Burswood) sits about 1.4km from the stadium on the same side of the river, which is the most useful thing about it. A 1.4km walk at dawn is a warm-up. A train with a few thousand other runners on it is not. Rooms run from roughly A$300 to A$500 a night and go higher over event weekends. The property takes block bookings and multi-room parties, so a mixed group of runners and non-runners can share a base without sharing a schedule, and there is a spa, a pool and several restaurants for the people who are not racing.
Book early. Burswood rooms fill whenever the stadium has a big date, and race weekend is one of the biggest. If the price is above your line, work outward from the same principle rather than the same postcode: anything within a comfortable walk or one short ferry hop of the stadium beats a cheaper room that costs you an hour and a nervous transfer. Start with a Perth hotel search and filter on distance to Burswood before you filter on anything else. For everything beyond the race weekend, the wider Perth guide covers the city in more detail.
Friday belongs to Fremantle
Arrive Friday and give the day to the port. Fremantle Markets (Fremantle) open Friday to Sunday, with the Yard from 8am and the Hall from 9am to 6pm, entry free and most food between A$10 and A$20. Go before 11am. By midday the aisles are shoulder to shoulder and you will be standing still in a crowd, which is a poor use of legs you need on Sunday.
A short walk away, Gage Roads Freo Brewery (Fremantle) is a cargo shed the size of a hangar with a working brewery inside it, open daily from 11am until late, capacity about 1,500, no bookings required for general entry. This is the rare Perth room where a group of twenty can turn up unannounced and still sit together. Guided tours with tastings run at around A$30, beers are A$12 to A$15, food A$20 to A$32, and there is a kids' play area and free live music, so nobody in the party is stranded.
A full day on hard floors two days out from a marathon is a cost you pay on Sunday. Eat, drink one, sit down, and take the train back mid-afternoon.
Saturday starts in Kings Park
Kings Park and Botanic Garden (West Perth) is 400 hectares of free public parkland with no restriction on group size, and it is the best shakeout run in the city. There is bitumen for anyone who wants a clean surface, bush trail if you want something softer, and the river-and-skyline view that most first-time visitors remember longer than anything else they do here. The Federation Walkway is open 9am to 5pm daily.
There is a proper hill on the Law Walk. Leave it alone if you are racing on Sunday. Take it if you are here to support and want your own workout. Twenty easy minutes and a few strides is the whole job the day before a race, and this is a pleasant place to do the least.
The shop that saves a race
The Running Centre (inner suburbs) has been Perth's specialist running shop since 2009, open seven days with an hour of free street parking outside. It solves the two classic travel disasters: gels confiscated at the airport, and a shoe that quietly died on your last long run at home. Gels run A$4 to A$8, shoes A$220 to A$330.
Buy the gels. Buy the shoes only if you are not racing in them. Racing on something you bought two days ago is how people end up limping.
The shop also runs a free weekly club run at 5.30pm with several pace groups, and visitors are welcome to join. If your timing lines up, it is the easiest way to meet local runners without arranging anything, and the slower groups are genuinely slow.
What the supporters do while you taper
Matagarup Zip+Climb (the bridge between East Perth and Burswood) takes scheduled group slots up a 45-degree arch: 314 steps, roughly A$65 for the climb and around A$125 for climb plus zip. It is physically demanding, age and weight limits apply, and not everyone in a party will want it, so book for the people who actually will.
This is the same bridge runners cross on foot to reach the stadium, which makes it a good Saturday for supporters and a bad one for anyone racing. Three hundred and fourteen steps down is not a taper.
Little Ferry Co (Elizabeth Quay) is the quiet answer to race-day transport. Eleven-seat boats run scheduled hops daily 9am to 5pm between Elizabeth Quay, On The Point, Optus Stadium and Claisebrook, at roughly A$12 to A$20 a hop, with full charters after 5pm priced per boat. A party of ten effectively books the whole vessel.
They land at the stadium jetty rather than a station five minutes' walk away, and they move supporters along the riverside without queueing for a packed train. Check the timetable against the start waves before you commit, because the boats keep their own hours, not the race's.
Booking the night-before table
Lulu La Delizia (Subiaco) makes Friulian pasta fresh daily and is the obvious answer to the night-before question, provided you have planned like an adult. The main room is small and takes reservations weeks out; the newer Cantina next door is walk-in overflow and takes function bookings. Pasta runs A$28 to A$40, around A$80 to A$100 a head with wine. A group of eight will not walk in. This is one of the hardest tables in the city and no amount of charm changes that.
Long Chim (CBD) is David Thompson's Thai canteen and the best big-table meal in the centre, a large room built for shared eating, group bookings taken, a courtyard for bigger parties, dishes A$25 to A$45 and about A$70 to A$90 a head. Two warnings, both serious for this weekend. The food is genuinely hot, not restaurant-polite hot, which is a real consideration twelve hours before a marathon. And it is closed Sunday and Monday, so it is a Saturday plan or nothing.
The Rechabite (Northbridge) is four venues stacked in one building: a 240-seat Korean-inspired restaurant built for shared tables, a rooftop bar, a basement club and a gig hall. Dishes at Double Rainbow run A$25 to A$38 and gigs are free to about A$60. It handles groups easily and it is the most versatile night in Northbridge, because a mixed party can eat, drink upstairs and see a band without leaving the building. Check the gig calendar before you commit, and let the racers go home at nine without a debate.
Race morning and the hour after the finish
Petition (CBD) is one of very few genuinely good city rooms open early on a Sunday. The kitchen runs from 8am, the beer corner from noon, and the three connected spaces mean a group can spread out. Mains are A$25 to A$40 and beers A$12 to A$16, with bookings taken for the dining room.
If you are running an early wave you will be on the course before the kitchen opens, so treat this as the supporters' breakfast or your own late one. It works as both, and the beer corner opening at noon means you can hold one table through the whole middle of the day.
The Camfield (Burswood) is the default post-race meeting point, 400m from the finish line and impossible to miss: five bars, 175 taps, share plates A$15 to A$25, beers A$12 to A$15 and more than a thousand outdoor seats. Walk-ins from 11am daily.
The function team takes large bookings on ordinary days, but no bookings at all are taken on Optus Stadium event days, and race Sunday is an event day. There is no reservation to fall back on. Send one person ahead from the finish area to claim lawn space, agree the spot by name before the race rather than by text after it, and accept that phones and crowds do not mix.
Sunday evening when nobody wants a beer garden
Löyly Recovery (inner city) opened in early 2026 and is the right call for legs that have stopped cooperating. Communal sauna sessions and aufguss rituals run to a timetable and suit a group, and a private room with its own sauna and plunge takes up to four. Sessions run roughly A$40 to A$60, more for the private room, and capacity is capped. Book before you travel, because the good slots after a race weekend go first.
Wines of While (Highgate) is Perth's benchmark natural wine bar and, usefully, open on the Sunday. Glasses are A$14 to A$18, plates A$25 to A$35, lunch runs Friday to Sunday and dinner Thursday to Monday. The room is small and best for two to six, so walk in for a glass, but book ahead if you want to eat, and do not turn up ten deep expecting a miracle. This is the quiet celebration for the people who cannot face a beer hall, and it beats the crowded alternative.
Give yourself the Monday
Fly out Tuesday if you can. Rottnest Express (sailings from Perth, Fremantle and Hillarys) runs year-round with group fares and bike or e-bike hire bundled in, around A$70 to A$130 return depending on where you board, plus hire and the island admission fee. Book seats and bikes together for a party, because they sell separately and run out separately.
The island is the best possible use of the day after a race. Flat roads, a swim at every beach, and an easy spin that loosens legs far better than lying still. Take the slower Barrack Street sailing down for the river commentary and the faster option back when everyone is tired.
Practical notes for the weekend
Everything in this piece sits on the train and ferry network or within a walk of it. The riverside hops solve race-day congestion better than any road plan, and the trains solve Fremantle. Do not hire a car for the weekend, because parking around Burswood on an event day is a problem you are inventing for yourself.
Cards are fine everywhere here. Carry a little cash for market stalls and nothing more.
Book in this order, as far ahead as you can: accommodation near Burswood, the Saturday night table, the HALO walk, and the sauna. All four sell out on the same weekend for the same reason. Everything else on this list either takes walk-ins or is free.
A realistic weekend for two, excluding flights and race entry, lands around A$1,200 to A$1,800 with a Burswood hotel, or well under A$800 if you stay further out and keep the big spend to one restaurant and the island day. The free things here, the stadium parkland, Kings Park and the finish-line atmosphere, are the parts you will actually talk about afterwards.
