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GO! St. Louis Marathon Runner Comments
Back to GO! St. Louis Marathon Information & Reviews
Course 3.9 
Organization 3.9 
Spectators 3.5
Number of comments: 357 [displaying comments 331 to 341]
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A. B. from Midwest runner
(4/8/2003)
 "Lots of potential - Lots of glitches" (about: 2003)
COURSE: 4 ORGANIZATION: 2 FANS: 4 First up - yes, the weather was awful. That's not St. Louis' fault, and definately detracted from the event. It's clear that this event wants to be big, but I think it needs to concentrate on embracing (and seriously improving) itself as a small marathon before presenting itself as something bigger than it is. T-shirts: this problem is not unique to St. Louis, but get SMALL shirts, runners, especially women, are smaller people, not XXL. Drop bags: Race instructions state that you may ONLY drop the Runner's World clear plastic bag as your bag drop, and that a label is included. But there is no label. And there is no indication as to whether you are to label with name or number. Small problem, yes, but not something you want to be worried about on the eve of a bad weather race. COURSE MAPS ON THE WEBSITE WRONG, causing major confusion at expo where different map is posted. PASTA PARTY: Halfway across town and difficult to get to if you didn't know ahead of time to rent a car. As I've said, the organizers are not to be blamed for the weather - however, running out of mylar wraps around the 4:45 time frame (on a course with a 6 hour limit) is a HUGE problem when you have people running in the cold rain. Water stops: Early water stops were a JOKE. They were set up on card tables, with very few volunteers, and you had to stop and wait in line to get water. At one point, a volunteer actually yelled at me. He said 'God, I can't even keep up with you people.' Well, it wasn't his fault that there weren't enough volunteers, but that was kind of a downer. The later stops (after the half marathon split) were covered quite well. STOPPING FOR TRAFFIC: Again, if you are going to expect your runners to STOP in the middle of a race for traffic to cross an intersection, you are very much a local race. We pay our entry fee to have right of first refusal on the roads - stopping people running for a time goal for up to 30 seconds is bad news. PUSHING 5 hour + marathoners to the sidewalks when your course has a 5:30 closing time. Perhaps that was because of the 10 minute delay at the start - but this is NOT the runners' fault. JUMPING CURBS - in several places, the 'ramps' that were to lead up to the curbs sat by the curbs, apparently forgotten, causing runners to have to 'jump curbs' in the 20+ miles of the race. MISSING MILE MARKERS - No mile 6, no mile 18, mile 16 plastered to the ground. Not acceptable. Miles also mismarked late in the race, with 22 way too long and 23 short. Now here's the suprise - I would do this race again, but with far different expectations. I enjoy small marathons, with many of them among my 40+ marathon runs. St. Louis was a unique city, the majority of the course was stunningly beautiful in spite of the weather, the crowd support was far better than expected, attractive shirt, classy medal, and they had a great pace team. I ran with one leader, my daughter ran with another and we both had wonderful (on time) experiences. GREAT small town event. Go to St. Louis for a small, local marathon experience and you won't be disappointed. St. Louis is definately a diamond in the rough - a real gem, with all the makings of a fantastic race. Just needs some cleaning up to get there, and I hope organizers do that before trying to grow it any larger. | |
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J. D. from St. Charles, MO
(4/8/2003)
 "Challenging and well run" (about: 2003)
COURSE: 5 ORGANIZATION: 5 FANS: 5 The first half of the marathon was fairly flat, but the second half had fairly frequent hills. If you plan on running this marathon, it would be a good idea to make certain to do your hill training. The weather was terrible, but the sparse number of spectators were totally positive and enthusiastic. The organization and the work of the many volunteers were excellent. Water, sports drinks, and gels were offered plenty of times. I highly recommend this marathon. | |
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D. D. from Concord, OH
(4/7/2003)
 "CHILLY and HILLY, but a great experience!" (about: 2003)
COURSE: 4 ORGANIZATION: 4 FANS: 4 The weather conditions could have been better with temperatures in the 30's, wind, and rain for the first 3 hours, but the runners, volunteers, and cheering fans took it in stide. Yes, the course seemed to be more ups than downs, but the last 2 miles of downhill to the finish gave the runners the opportunity to finish strong. Not a tough course as I ran my typical time just under 4:00 despite the elements. Special thanks to the Cliff-Shot folks who did a great job leading the pace teams and specifically Sue who lead the 4:00 folks. As I am a soon to be 50 stater, with 24 states to date, I will probably not get down this way again, but would recommend it for others to experience. A well organized event with an excellent finishers medal and plenty of refreshments at the end of the race. | |
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K. D. from Illinois
(4/7/2003)
"Challenging , thus rewarding" (about: 2003)
COURSE: 4 ORGANIZATION: 3 FANS: 3 The course was a real challenge even for a good hill runner. The worst hills are in the last 6 miles. You feel like you have accomplished something after this one. Beautiful city. | |
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Powers Ben from Carbondale, IL
(4/7/2003)
"Great Marathon!" (about: 2003)
COURSE: 4 ORGANIZATION: 2 FANS: 4 1 minute before the start of the race it started raining. It was wet and cold, but a great race. Saint Louis is a beautiful city and the course was well designed. Some inclines, but nothing too steep. Organization was great and people were friendly. | |
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J. M. from St. Louis, Missouri
(4/7/2003)
 "A nice effort to provide a high quality marathon" (about: 2003)
COURSE: 3 ORGANIZATION: 4 FANS: 2 Despite very unpleasant weather, I think the 2003 Spirit of St. Louis Marathon was a success. The weather was beautiful the week before, but the day of the marathon had a pretty nasty mix of rain, wind, and temperatures in the thirties. April in the midwest is like that, so that's nothing to blame on the organizers. In prior years, enthusiastic spectators could be found at many points on the course, but the race does not run through many of those neighborhoods anymore and the foul weather kept new spectators from coming out. I believe that there will be many more cheering fans the next time this race is run in good weather. The many volunteers who stood in the cold rain for hours were absolute troopers. There was a much larger field than I expected, which was nice. I think there were about 6,000 people in the marathon and 2,000 in the half. I was running with people throughout almost the entire race. A couple of the early water stations seemed a little overwhelmed by the crowd, but the rest were just fine. It would be pretty hard to lay out a marathon course in St. Louis without hills, and I think the organizers selected a nice route. The course was interesting in that it took the runners to many different areas of the city, including some lovely residential areas. Other than the four-mile stretch between the start/finish and Forest Park (which the runners encounter twice--once on the way out and once on the way back), there were not many substantial hills. On the whole, I'd say that the St. Louis course was a little more hilly than the one for the Dallas White Rock Marathon, but not as bad as the Motorola Marathon in Houston. This is a nice event, and it is getting better. I look forward to running it again next year. | |
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M. R. from Missouri
(4/7/2003)
"Bad weather!" (about: 2003)
COURSE: 3 ORGANIZATION: 4 FANS: 4 It was raining and sleeting and cold. The course was nice, especially running through Anheuser Busch and St. Louis University campuses. Not many spectators because of the weather. I would rather have a fall marathon in St. Louis, you can never depend on dry weather in April. | |
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S. H. from Oshkosh, WI
(4/7/2003)
"Nice Race...but Hilly" (about: 2003)
COURSE: 3 ORGANIZATION: 3 FANS: 3 I ran the half marathon. Not a lot of flat miles on the 2003 course. There were some very long inclines and the declines never seemed to be as long as the incline. I did run my best time ever-I'm not sure how. The weather was miserable - about 40 degrees and raining. | |
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C. H. from St. Louis, MO
(1/21/2003)
"Take two cups of water at the Aid Stations." (about: 2000)
COURSE: 4 ORGANIZATION: 3 FANS: 3 I ran this in October 2000 as my first marathon. The course is ok. You see so many different parts of St. Louis. It is mostly flat, with an incline in the last couple of miles (which seems like a monster hill~but isn't that bad). They definitely need more aid stations~like Chicago. My family only saw me 2 times on the course. I finished and that's all that counts! | |
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A Runner from Quad Cities, Iowa
(12/7/2001)
 "Pretty good race" (about: 2001)
COURSE: 5 ORGANIZATION: 5 FANS: 4 I think overall the race was great! I was impressed with the course (a little bit hilly but nothing that just completely psyched you out) and you got to see a lot of different areas of St. Louis which was neat. The crowd was sparse in some areas, but definitely always encouraging, and really for this size race, I wasn't expecting crowds all along the way. One of things that should be reviewed for next year is the use of the army jeeps, especially in the residential areas around miles 16-18. While I realize they were trying to help, they also idled their vehicle right next to the runners so we had to breathe the exhaust for half a mile. The residential section also had too narrow of streets to have these vehicles moving right alongside the runners course. This size of a race has its cons (a biker decided to zig-zag through the cones right in front of a group of runners) and its pros (my daughter got to cross the finishline with me which could not have happened in a larger marathon). Overall, a good marathon. |
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