Two Rivers Marathon
I was quite disappointed with this event. In fact I don't really wish to write it up. Instead, I've copied the comments I posted about it on Marathonguide.com.
1. The course is supposed to be certified, but the finish area in a park was frozen over, which is no excuse since it has been that way for weeks and they could have gotten their own ice melt. So it finished a block away, not on the certified course.
2. So, at least you would expect an accurate course. Instead, the 1/2 marathon was 3/4 of a mile short and the marathon was 9/10 of a mile short. They blamed the problem on their signs, put out the day before, being stolen. But a certified course should have the miles painted on the road and they should have had that for reference to place signs. I ended up walking around in order to accumulate 26.2 miles on my GPS.
3. Despite the promises, the lack of hydration was as bad as the first year. A friend who was walking the half, had only one place to hydrate half-way through. Sometimes a station was out of fluids, sometimes cups. Very little Gatorade on the course.
4. No hot food as promised at the end. No water by the time I finished.
5. No place to change (other than your car), even though it finished at the fire station that was being benefited.
6. For some reason there were four races, marathon, half, 10K and 5K and the next day they were all going on again. It would be better to focus on one day, less races and get it right.
I would not run any race directed by this race director ever again. He obviously disrespects runners, just going through the motions to make money.
A note on the course: It's pretty. The early downhill miles are tough on the quads I was conservative, race walking down the hills (and also up some). That helped my to run fairly strongly to the turn-around, which is supposed to be about 19 miles. The section along the Lackawaxen River is slightly uphill going out and downhill coming back. When I turned around and started downhill, I could feel it in my quads. I went slower each mile. At 24 miles (by my GPS), knowing that the course was off, I walked to the finish. There was no point in suffering through to the finish of a poorly measured "marathon".
