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☰
Omaha Marathon Runner Comments
Back to Omaha Marathon Information & Reviews
Course 3.3 
Organization 3.7 
Spectators 2.9
Number of comments: 183 [displaying comments 21 to 31]
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J. M. from Ohio
(9/22/2015)
"Very organized and very friendly volunteers!" (about: 2015)
50+ previous marathons
| 1 Omaha Marathon
COURSE: 4 ORGANIZATION: 5 FANS: 3 I'm just not a huge fan of out and back courses, but I knew that's what it was so I was prepared for it. The course was fair, some hills, but they were manageable. There wasn't a lot of entertainment, but the ones that were out were excellent! The gentleman on the causeway was Super! The aid stations were well stocked and I liked the option of oranges and pretzels for the marathoners. Even the grapes were a nice touch. Not a fan of the replacement drink. I would have preferred the more common gatorade or powerade. Shirt and medal are excellent. Near perfect weather. I enjoyed staying and touring for an extra day. The zoo was the best I've ever seen. One big negative for me was that I did not see any clock at the end of the race. It was disappointing not having any idea where I finished since I try not to wear a watch unless I have a time goal, which I did not for this event. | |
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E. F. from Los Altos Hills, CA
(9/21/2015)
"Thoroughly Enjoyable Small Race" (about: 2015)
11-50 previous marathons
| 1 Omaha Marathon
COURSE: 4 ORGANIZATION: 5 FANS: 3 First, I was pleasantly surprised by Omaha and its selection of excellent restaurants and activities. The Joslyn Art Museum was incredible and Nicola's was the perfect pre-marathon dinner venue. (Extra points for gracious service.) The marathon course was an interesting mix of downtown, residential and parklands. The views of the Missouri were gorgeous. I sense that we got lucky with the weather this year. There was some wind, but it was a minor inconvenience. The volunteers were fantastic. Finishing at Ameritrade on the jumbotron was a particular highlight. I would definitely recommend this race. | |
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D. F. from Ralston, NE
(10/22/2014)
"Nice race in my hometown!" (about: 2014)
11-50 previous marathons
| 6+ Omaha Marathons
COURSE: 5 ORGANIZATION: 5 FANS: 4 This was my 10th time running the Omaha marathon. I have enjoyed this race every time. Admittedly, I may be biased as Omaha is my hometown. I really liked the out and back course. It was definitely the flattest version of the Omaha marathon, with minimal hills (although I personally did not mind the hills on the older course versions). On the return, it gave me a sense of where I was and helped me pace my finish. Loved the finish inside the ballpark. Volunteers were kind and helpful at the expo and race. There were plenty of aid stations and post race food. I really liked the red (as in 'Go Big Red') technical shirt and the medal...in addition, I was 2nd in my age group and that plaque was nice. I will be back next year and in years following! | |
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C. S. from Minnesota
(10/7/2014)
"Once is good enough for me." (about: 2014)
50+ previous marathons
| 1 Omaha Marathon
COURSE: 3 ORGANIZATION: 2 FANS: 3 The best part of the race was that the start was extremely easy to get to and the finish was also located near all of the available parking lots which made getting out of town a snap. Also, there were plenty of Biffs, which is always a good thing. The race had a 7:00 AM start and I am a big fan of that. There had been plenty of Omaha Marathons before the 2014 event so you would figure that they had all of the bugs worked out. Not so much. Little things like having the bag drop trailer all alone in a separate parking lot, away from everything and everyone else was a little bit of a nuisance. The people in the aid tent prior to the start of race did not know if they or anyone else had ibuprophen available for the runners. Eventually they did find some. The replacement drink that the volunteers were calling Gatorade was anything but Gatorade. It was clear like water and diluted to the point that it had no more nutritional benefit than water. At mile 10 or 11, the only man working the water stop told us that all of his volunteers had left him as he held up his arms as if to say 'I give up'. Luckily, there was still liquid to be consumed. When we came back past that water stop again as this race is an out and back, there were zero volunteers at the water stop which probably makes sense since there was zero liquid as well. I was toward the front quarter of runners during the race which means that there were plenty of runners behind me that were going to come through that stop and get nothing as well. Bummer. Since the replacement drink was so poor, I resorted to taking in as many orange slices as I could get my hands on as I ran by each stop. With about seven miles to go, they ran out of orange slices as well. The course and pavement were fine. There were the usual potholes and minor obstacles like parked cars but everyone seemed to avoid any accidents. The finish was a bit of a surprise. I may have missed it but we finished with a lap around the baseball field inside the stadium. That would have been great had I known that we still had that still to do. When I made the final turn left to run under the arch, I was directed to make another turn to the right and head into the stadium. Instead of having 30 feet to go, I still had a few hundred yards. I knew that they somehow had to make up a little bit of distance in that last mile but remembering the picture of the map, I couldn't figure out how they were going to do it. Turns out, I was not alone as everyone that had not run the race before that I talked to did not know about the lap around the stadium either. Such is life. | |
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C. Z. from United States
(10/5/2014)
"non-exciting course run on concrete" (about: 2014)
11-50 previous marathons
| 1 Omaha Marathon
COURSE: 2 ORGANIZATION: 3 FANS: 1 The course was run on concrete surfaces and where there was blacktop, the potholes caused me to spend most of my time looking down. The trail shown in dashed lines on the race map was actually a concrete sidewalk on top of levee along the river, with no shade for those miles. The aid stations were well stocked and the highlight of the marathon. No place to sit for the pasta dinner, as the 50 state 1/2 marathoners held their award banquet in the dining area. Downtown Omaha was open and welcoming on a Sunday night after the marathon. | |
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I. D. from Iowa
(9/23/2014)
"Seems Much Improved Over Previous Years" (about: 2014)
6-10 previous marathons
| 1 Omaha Marathon
COURSE: 3 ORGANIZATION: 4 FANS: 2 We ran the half marathon as a tune up during our marathon training. We were a bit worried about the race from all the bad reviews but I think they fixed a lot of the issues from previous years. Not the best race ever but I would recommend to friends. Pros: Finish in TD Ameritrade Park (home of College World Series), fairly flat course that was blocked off very well by Omaha PD, good medal, long sleeve dry-fit shirt. Never running alone but never super crowded outside of the start. Cons: Little to no spectators (though the ones that were out were loud and always cheering), course runs through a rather boring part of town and sometimes very run down part of town. All the gear says 'Omaha Marathon', doesn't differentiate between 5k, 10k, half and full. Knock off Gatorade; I'm not sure what it was but I was in for a surprise when I had some at a water stop, was not a fan. Random thoughts: The pasta party was pretty good for free food, about what you expect out of mass produced pasta. The Expo is exactly what I want out of an expo: Small. I don't want to have to walk through a bunch of vendors trying to sell their junk just to get my packet. | |
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R. M. from Moline, IL
(9/22/2014)
"Nice small race" (about: 2014)
11-50 previous marathons
COURSE: 4 ORGANIZATION: 4 FANS: 3 Pros- good course and protection, nice medal, neat finish inside baseball arena! Cons - Marathoners finishing with 5Kers, Heet recovery drink, expo packet pickup, no runner photos! | |
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D. H. from St Louis, MO
(10/27/2013)
"Bland marathon" (about: 2013)
4-5 previous marathons
| 1 Omaha Marathon
COURSE: 1 ORGANIZATION: 3 FANS: 4 Pro: Nice medal. Volunteers were great & aid stations well stocked. Mile markers nice and obvious. Cons: Expo was tiny. Bland, long-sleeve shirt: Black, text on white shirt. No color. No design. Just city, date, on the front, and lots of other HITS races on the back. Marines weren't there to hand out medals. | |
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C. B. from Iowa
(10/19/2013)
"Missed the mark" (about: 2013)
2 previous marathons
| 1 Omaha Marathon
COURSE: 2 ORGANIZATION: 2 FANS: 4 Course was a little bland, not much in the way of scenery and did not show off Omaha. The organization was sufficient but the finish line amenities were lacking in everything except for snacks. The shirt and medal were boring and pretty generic. On the bright side, the spectators were fantastic until they disappeared at the half-marathon turn around. | |
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T. D. from Chicago, IL
(10/7/2013)
"Sad Showing by Greedy HITS Organizers" (about: 2013)
11-50 previous marathons
| 1 Omaha Marathon
COURSE: 1 ORGANIZATION: 1 FANS: 3 This was my 22nd marathon and would definitely rate as one of the bottom two. HITS obviously did not do their homework on how to organize a running race and understand what runners value (other than aid stations on course). Pros and cons are listed below: PROS * Well stocked aid stations with water, gatorade, gu, and bananas * Unique recycled glass medal * Run through baseball stadium at the end was kind of cool * Supportive volunteers at aid stations CONS * Start line was chaos. Even the Pace Leaders had no clue where to position themselves. * Cheap and ugly shirt shamelessly self promoting HITS. No reference to the marathon on the shirt. This will be used as my throwaway shirt for my next race. * Where were the Marines?? False advertising! * Course was relatively flat but very ugly. Give me a few hills with better scenery. * Abrupt stop at finish line with only bottles of water. No easy access to any post race food and no directions on whether food was even available. Should have had a chute for runners to walk through after finish line to allow runners to bring heart rate down and grab some food. * No reference on bib to Omaha or the marathon. I save my bibs and this is the only one that is completely generic. Other than your race number, HITS is the only printing on the bib. Once again, shameless self promotion. * Small expo in outdoor parking lot. Good thing the weather was decent. * Turnaround not well marked for 10K and half marathoners. I ran the full marathon so this was not an issue for me. * Port-O-Potty capacity too low. Unfortunately, I cannot recommend this race until many improvements are made (like dumping HITS). Given the cost of registration, this marathon is not a good value. Omaha is a nice city with friendly people, too bad we didn't get a chance to see the nicer parts of Omaha during the race. Thank you to all of the volunteers! |
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