Marathon Guide Race Review

This marathon is clearly going through some growing pains as it tries to compete with other big-city marathons. After reading comments from the 2006 edition, I was initially wary of the concurrent half marathon. Miami does the same thing and it's a brain drain when you hit the half marathon and half of the field disappears. However, I was persuaded by the fast course and positive course reviews from friends that had run it.

CONS:
Pre-race organization was passable at best. The worst offender was the expo. The venue itself was a poor choice. In previous years, it was held at the Eakins Oval in front of the start line, which makes sense. This year, they moved it to The Liacouras Center at Temple University. Traffic getting there was heavy, and that was just the beginning. Once inside, we were greeted with a line that extended halfway around the interior of the stadium. It was ~45 minute wait for number pick up; I have never waited that long. We were also handed a photocopy of the course, but not told what it was. Only after running the race did I realize they had made significant changes to the course (more on this later). After getting our numbers, there was yet another line to pick up our T-shirts. The number pick-up gauntlet left me with little desire to peruse the expo. The whole process, including the round trip from downtown Philly was ~2.5 hours. We arrived at around 2:30, and it looked even worse on our way out.
The only other pre-race snafu that comes to mind was the sheer gridlock at the port-a-potties. We arrived at 6:15 a.m. and waited almost 40 min. Also, not sure why a late fall marathon needs to start 7 a.m.

PROS:
I loved the race T-shirts. Probably the highest quality wicking shirt I've received from a race with the entire course printed on the back. Very cool.

I personally liked the course. The 1st 7 miles take you through the historic part of the city and allows you to enjoy the sights while you're still fresh. The next 7-8 take you through the zoo and other parks. This is the hilliest part of the course and the steep declines were a surprise for me. The final 11-12 are out and back along Schuykill river to Manayunk, with great views of the foliage. Although it's not truly flat, my most consistent splits of the day were here. After you make the turnaround in Manayunk, you know exactly how far you have to go and how to dose your effort to the finish.

Spectators were great, even though the weather was lousy. There were a couple dead spots (16-18, 22-24) where the crowd support was spotty but overall, spectators were very enthusiastic.

COURSE CHANGE:
This I would rate as needing improvement, but neither a pro or con. When I was running, I had no idea they had changed the course. The only thing I remember was being surprised by the hill between 13.5-14.5 mile. As it turns out, the race officials knocked off a huge section of the course in the zoo, especially the Japanese Gardens. So they had make up distance by adding an extra section after 13.5 miles. Presumably this was to standardize the route for the marathon and half-marathon. In 2006, the half marathon split off at 9.5 miles and rejoined later, which confused some people. I'm ambivalent about this because I didn't run the old course, but it does seem odd that the newly added half marathon would dictate a change in the marathon course... tail wagging the dog?

Overall, I would do this marathon again just for the course. The actual race organization (splits, water stations) was excellent and having the hills at the beginning makes for relatively easy cruising at the end of the race. I ran a huge PR, so that in itself made the experience worthwhile. However, race officials really need to take a close look at the expo, which was a huge mess. If I were a first-time marathoner, I think it would be very nerve-racking.