The New York City Marathon will be shown on live national television in 2012 for the first time in almost 20 years as the cornerstone of a new comprehensive year-round national and local five-year television package jointly announced today by WABC-TV/ESPN and NYRR officials. The Marathon will be televised live nationally on ESPN2 and available through WatchESPN from 9:00 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. ET/6:00 to 9:30 a.m. PT, and in New York on WABC-TV and 7online.com from 9:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. That same afternoon, ABC will broadcast nationally a two-hour Marathon highlight show. The agreement begins with this year’s event on Sunday, November 4. The unprecedented partnership will also feature coverage of New York City Marathon weekend events and other marquee NYRR races throughout the year, as well as quarterly public service announcements on WABC-TV that highlight NYRR’s efforts to encourage running as part of a child’s healthy lifestyle. The deal reunites NYRR with ABC, which carried the first live national broadcast of the Marathon in 1981 and where it aired until 1993. The ESPN2 telecast will be the centerpiece of a robust schedule of programming. The 26.2-mile race annually draws the world’s top professional runners, a field of more than 45,000 participants from all 50 states and more than 125 countries, and 2.5 million spectators against the backdrop of all five boroughs of New York City, while raising tens of millions of dollars for charity and having an economic impact of more than $340 million. In addition to the telecast, the event will be available online at WatchESPN.com and on smartphones and tablets via the WatchESPN app. Programming will begin with a two-hour pre-race show from 7:00–9:00 a.m. on WABC-TV. All of WABC-TV’s local coverage will be streamed on its website, 7online.com, and on authenticated mobile devices.