Athletics at the 1952 Summer Olympics – Men's marathon

This was the 12th appearance of the event, which is one of 12 athletics events to have been held at every Summer Olympics. Returning runners from the 1948 marathon included defending champion Delfo Cabrera of Argentina and sixth- through eighth-place finishers Syd Luyt of South Africa, Gustav Östling of Sweden, and John Systad of Norway. The favorite was Jim Peters of Great Britain, the 1951 and 1952 Polytechnic Marathon winner who had broken the world record at the 1952 race. Emil Zátopek of Czechoslovakia had never run a marathon before, but had won the 5000 metres and 10000 metres earlier in the Games and decided to enter the marathon.[2]

Egypt, Guatemala, Pakistan, and the Soviet Union each made their first appearance in Olympic marathons. The United States made its 12th appearance, the only nation to have competed in each Olympic marathon to that point.

As all Olympic marathons, the competition was a single race. The marathon distance of 26 miles, 385 yards) was run over a "straight out-and-back course, starting and finishing at the Olympic Stadium" and going to Korso.[2] The full length of the road was hard-surfaced.[3]

These were the standing world and Olympic records prior to the 1952 Summer Olympics.

World record	Jim Peters (GBR)	2:18:40.4	London, United Kingdom	13 June 1953
Olympic record	Sohn Kee-chung (JPN)	2:29:19.2	Berlin, Germany	9 August 1936

Emil Zátopek set a new Olympic best at 2:23:03.2.

The day was "fairly cool."[2]

All times are Eastern European Summer Time (UTC+3)