Beautiful course; pitiful city. Ogden is the armpit of Utah. The course was great and had good support. It was way too hot on the day of the race.

The Ogden Marathon is run, along a Utah trail,
The runners come from all around, determined not to fail.

The expo starts the whole thing off the day before the treat,
But don't expect a pasta feed, unless you hit the street.

An early morning start they say, complete with morning chill,
The school bus finds its way up to the top of some far hill.

I've heard the course is beautiful, but it's too dark to know,
But soon I'll know just for myself, as daylight starts to glow.

The lines up to the porta-pots, are not too bad today,
And bonfires line the starting pits to keep us warm they say.

The starting cannon catches many runners by surprise,
It happened after some delays, beneath the morning skies.

The shuffle of the feet you hear, as runners start to move,
While early in the marathon, with something yet to prove.

The beauty of the course by now is plainly in my view,
With trees, and bees, and animals, there's always something new.

They said it is a downhill run, of this you can be sure,
And if you harm your quadriceps, there is no easy cure.

The miles come, the miles go, the sun now climbing high,
And now that I am in my zone, I think that I can fly.

There was a lake along the way, mid miles of road and timber,
And now and then a runner stops to work on getting limber.

By now my quadriceps tell me that they would like a rest,
I know by now that I'm about to take the greatest test.

The miles ahead begin to look a little bit more rough,
As I prepare for mental tasks that make a runner tough.

It's through the park and into town, as houses do appear,
I wonder if the finish line could anywhere be near.

I finally see the families who now line the final blocks,
And up ahead I long to see the finish line and clocks.

But wait, the clock now in my view no longer tells the time,
They say a breeze while passing smashed it to the finish line.

Now when I see my children, I'm still standing on my feet,
And wondering if the finish line has something I can eat.

The food was claimed by others who were faster in the drama,
The kids say that's no problem dad, let's go to Chuck o Rama.

I am blown away at the comments. Some people act like $50 buys you a pampered stay at the Marriott in Hawaii. Its a marathon!!! Who cares about all the hoopla and extras. It's a sad day when the reason you do a marathon for a race t-shirt and medal. This was a great race. Well organized and fun! All you big shots that require so much admiration need to go somewhere else and leave this "down home" marathon the way it is.

New RD did a great job with this race. More than ample porta-potties at the start and on-course. GU at all aid station. Beautiful course, with a gentle decline and flat finish. I ran this in 2002 under the old RD and the new one did a much better job. Highly recommend this race!!!

This is a great course generally rolling downhill. I actually like the sceenery better than the St. George. I think the St. George course is faster, but this is a generally fast course. If you are going to try for Boston this is probably as good as any course. I especially liked the section around the reservoir and down the canyon. They had more aid stations than any marathon I have ever run, and great finisher's medal and shirt. They needed more buses at the start. The race started about 5 minutes after I got to the start.

This was my first marathon and was a great event (of course I have nothing to compare it to). The fans were great and the aid stations were well organized, although once in the canyon they seemed to be haphazardly placed. The only drawback was that they started the race 30 minutes late due to buses arriving late. Waiting in the cold with no bathrooms available for 30 minutes sucked.

The course is spectacularly pretty. It would be hard to find one better. The hills are mostly mild and the downhill comes at the right time (in the last 10K).

Organization was very good except for not having enough busses to the start which caused a half-hour late start. The late start contributed to standing around (more wear on the legs), too long in the cold (it was chilly at the start), and missing out on shade in the canyon (it was too hot by then).

Not many spectators, but that is not why you run this race. It is for the pretty course.

If the bus problem is fixed I'll run this race again.

This was my 17th marathon and the second time that I have run the Ogden Marathon. This is the most beautiful course of all of the marathons that I have run. The course follows along a river and then aroud a lake. The support along the course was the best. Having all of the groups compete for the best refreshment/aid stations was also a great idea. Plenty of GU (two brands and lots of flavors). The high-tech long sleeve t-shirts are also a great addition. There was also plenty of porta-potties. The medal this year and last year were also well done. The Ogden Marathon is well organized and I will recommend this to others as my favorite marathon.

Everyone will probably address the late start issue; it's frustrating to wait when you're ready to run. But there were some good things I saw at this race. At the start there were kids going around offering gel packs to everyone, which was nice. I hadn't seen that before. The rest stops were more frequent then at many other marathons, which I enjoyed even though some of them only had water and no PowerAde. The race took all I had, so I was appreciative when the "medics" came out and helped me off the course. They were busy, and there were lots of people in the tent. The weather was fabulous - after the nightmare in 2004 it was nice to have good weather at Ogden. I'll be back next year.

This was the most beautiful course I have ever run and the volunteers were great. However, the organization of the race was not great. Detailed information on the race was not available until the final week and the race itself was delayed 30 minutes and handled poorly. In addition, while chips were used, they apparently were only used at the finish, not at the start. So my time was nearly a minute slower than my watch time. I also underestimated the effects of the altitude on a flat-lander like me, which had a far greater impact on my time than either the late start or the chip.