It takes place during the week of St. Ilya's Day, the patron saint of Omsk, in early August.

The race date was moved forward a week in 2012 so that the start time exactly coincided with that of the 2012 Olympic men's marathon held in London.

[1] It was delayed until September in 2013 due to the 2013 World Championships in Athletics being held in Moscow during that period.

The foreign participation was headed by Claude Fisicaro, an Australian living in London, through a running club called World Runners, who ran in aid of ending hunger.

[2] In spite of its international nature, only one foreign athlete (Cosmas Musyoka of Kenya) topped the podium at the competition between 1990 and 2010.