The Great Wall Marathon, in which runners will tackle more than 5,000 steps and slopes of 70 degrees in parts, will return on Saturday – as will 67-year-old Henrik Brandt, the only runner to have completed all 22 previous editions of the race.

Brandt from Denmark, who has travelled to China each year specifically for the marathon, will join more than 2,000 runners from 61 countries and regions in a race billed as China’s most expensive marathon and one of its toughest.

“Because it was here that I finished my first marathon, I fell in love with it and decided to come back,” Brandt said after last year’s race, when he finished in seven hours, 12 minutes and 40 seconds. “I’m not able to stop and I intend to at least come here 25 times.”

Taking place on the Huangyaguan section of the Great Wall, which lies about 120km northeast of Beijing in Jizhou, Tianjin, the full marathon starts and finishes at Yingyang Plaza.

The event features three distances: a full marathon, a half-marathon and an 8.5km fun run, a non-competitive race that also includes sections on the Great Wall. The full marathon has an eight-hour cut-off time.