Royal Mile
The Women’s 10K Edinburgh starts right in the historic city centre. People have been living on Castlehill for the last 7000 years. The castle area has been a hillfort for over 2000 years. The name Edinburgh comes from the ancient Gaelic “Dun Eidyn” which means ’hill fort on the sloping ridge’. The Royal Mile runs down the East shoulder of this once active volcano and this is what gives the Royal mile its distinguishable geographical location. It was 325 million years ago during an ice age that the immense pressure of moving glaciers carved out its profile.
HOLYROOD PALACE
The Palace of Holyroodhouse, commonly referred to as Holyrood Palace, is the official residence of the British monarch in Scotland. The Queen is in residence at the Palace of Holyroodhouse during Holyrood week, which usually takes place from the end of June to the beginning of July, be sure to give her a wave as you run past.
HOLYROOD PARK
Holyrood Park is a unique historic landscape in the heart of the city, whose dramatic crags and hills give Edinburgh part of its distinctive skyline. The park contains a wealth of history and archaeology spanning thousands of years.
GRASSMARKET
First womentioned in the Registrum Magni Sigilii Regum Scotorum (1363) as “the street called Newbygging [new buildings] under the castle”, the Grassmarket was, from 1477, one of Edinburgh’s main market places, a part of which was given over to the sale of horse and cattle (the name apparently deriving from livestock grazing in pens beyond its western end). The view to the north, dominated by the castle, has long been a favourite subject of painters and photographers, making it one of the iconic views of the city.
The finish line!
Get ready for a stadium finish at the iconic BT Murrayfield Stadium. In 1897, the Scottish Football Union, as it was then called, bought land at Inverleith. This was the home of rugby in Scotland until the first Murrayfield Stadium was built in 1925, on ground bought from the Edinburgh Polo Club.
