This paper analyzes the cultural connotation of marathon sports. The marathon has a long history，with its origin dating back to the Battle of Marathon in 490 BC. Marathon culture is human spiritual activities and its product formed with the development of marathon. The components of marathon culture system include marathon material culture，institutional culture and spiritual culture. Urban marathons have been popular in recent years. This paper studies the characteristics of urban marathon culture，including injecting urban culture into the marathon，promoting the development of urban culture through marathon，and integrating the development of marathon culture and urban culture. This paper provides suggestions for the development of the sponsors with the help of the cultural power of the marathon，including the strategies of adding marathon cultural elements and urban cultural elements into the sponsorship.