NYC Bakery Run returns Oct. 25 with 10 pastry stops and a free lottery for 100 spots

On Sunday, Oct. 25, 100 runners will cover 13.1 miles of Manhattan and Brooklyn and eat their way through some of New York’s most sought-after bakeries. The NYC Bakery Run is free to join, but spots are handed out by lottery.

Demand is steep. When the run made its debut last year, more than 17,000 people applied for a place.

Which NYC bakeries are on the half-marathon route

The route has 10 food stops. At most of them, runners grab a quick bite and keep moving. The exception is Eleven Madison Park, the three-Michelin-star restaurant. There, participants will sit down in the dining room facing Madison Square Park, and the pastry team will serve them a course before lunch service starts.

Chef de cuisine Dominique Roy said hosting the runners “gives us an opportunity to share the work of our pastry team” outside the usual tasting menu.

Along the way, the group will also refuel at Saison Bakery, Hani’s Bakery, Radio Bakery, Elbow Bread, L’Appartement 4F, From Lucie and La Cabra. Librae Bakery rounds out the list. It is one of the returning stops from the first edition, and its pastries combine Scandinavian baking methods with Middle Eastern flavors.

Altbau Bakery joins the lineup for the first time, before its doors have even opened. Baker Pam Yung is behind the project together with Chad Robertson, who cofounded Tartine. Their plans put a bakery counter downstairs and a mill on the floor above, along with a teaching studio and a residency program. For the runners, the stop offers a preview of a bakery that plenty of New Yorkers are already waiting on.

How to enter the NYC Bakery Run lottery

Don’t expect a race. Participants are picked at random, and once on the course they move as a group, split by pace, pausing at each stop to eat. Crossing the line first earns nothing.

Entries close at 11:59 p.m. ET on Oct. 14, and the chosen runners get word on Oct. 15.