The San Francisco Marathon

Chose this marathon for my BQ, not recommended. First the good - early start so temp is great for most of the race. If you're shooting for anywhere near 3:00 the course will be wide open at the start.. But that changes halfway thorough. More to come on that.. The views out there at the front of the pack are incredible, it was a special moment to cross the golden gate and see the sunrise over the city. The bad... Crazy climbs/decent from miles 6-21 before it mellows out, but thats to be expected with this race. They served this UCaan drink in 2019 which tore up my stomach. Literally no people on the course. Probably due to the early start and general lack of popularity of a race. The medal looked cheap and cheesy. The race entry was NOT worth over $200. However, this race is absolutely ruined by the second half marathon, which starts just as you hit mile 14 in Golden Gardens. You quickly go from an open course to dodge and weave around significantly slower runners. No idea why the Race Director would choose to set the course up this way - staggering the start by 45mins would solve this. Steer clear if you're shooting for a specific time. Hit my time but barely - and that's after hitting one doozy of a wall at mile 25 and struggling home.

It's a shame that such a beautiful city has such a disappointing (and expensive) 42K. Running along the slippery pedestrian walkway of the bridge, start time in the wee hours of the morning although temperatures are low all day long at this time of the year, fast 42K runners merging with slower 21K crowds mid-race, nonexistent spectators etc make this a race I would avoid. SF is beautiful so try visiting it later in autumn and run somewhere else, it's just not worth the effort, especially if you're travelling from afar.

The Expo: The expo was in a good space. Not huge but like most marathons bib pickup was in the back. Plenty of vendors The Race: As far a weather goes it was in the low 50s which is perfect marathoning weather. It begins to get tough when you are running up to golden gate bridge and then doesn't let up until 17ish. A change this year was running on the sidewalk rather than the bridge. I talked to a few people and the said both are not ideal due to the wind and the fog. The sidewalks do have metal pads that were slick in the fog. The worst part of the marathon was catching the half marathon runners around 16. I ran a 3:20 marathon and was zig zaging through lots of slow runners, walkers at water stops, and people that were running probably 2:15-2:30 halfs. Not ideal and lots of wasted energy doing so. Also there was lots of confusion with the alternate routes. Multiple times I had a fully open road to run because they diverted us but the first two times I thought I was going the wrong way. Very confusing initially. Water stops were good but crowded at the end. Also, they used Nuun at this marathon instead of Gatorade/Powerade. I'm a big fan of Nuun outside of races for hydration but it tasted awful during the marathon. I actually had my buddy give me a Gatorade at mile 20 because I couldn't stand the taste. Minus the logistics, this race is tough and full of hills but very scenic and low temps. Would pass on running it again. Post Race: Lack of security..... As far as races go and keeping runners separated from spectators well that was out of the window. There were spectators that had walked up the exit and were almost at the finish line. For a race that cancelled us running on the bridge because of concern, I thought this would be translated to the finish. It was not. I started to stretch on a fork truck right before I left the finish line and as I was stretching some guy came and pulled the keys out. Talk about lack of security. If you were worried about something happening why were there keys in 2 fork trucks in the finish line corral??! It was honestly tougher to get into the beer garden then where the racers finished.....