Forget the PR. Miami Marathon is a fun long run without any snow. Let's face it. Its aweful up north. Fly down, have a great dinner in Miami, wake up and run. Then fly home and envy all those who remained behind.

My 6th Miami Marathon is done. See you next year for my 7th!

First, the good, the course was really great. It was relatively flat and there was a lot of shade towards the end. It was a lot of fun running through south beach while people were still partying from the night before.
Now, the bad:
- The organization was awful. It felt like nobody in the city knew about this race and the people that knew about it felt like it was a big headache, not an amazing event.
- Almost everyone is doing the half. I love half-marathons. I respect the distance and know it takes training and effort. However, it would have been nice to have some acknowledgement that I was doing the full. The full and half should have different t-shirts and different medals (not just different colored ribbons). I know other half/full marathons that give separate shirts and medals.
- Because everyone was running the half, the crowd support after 13.1 is pretty minimal, although I appreciated the folks that were out there.
- Some parts of the race can get very cramped, especially when the half-marathoners are still around.
- I know it is hard to be a volunteer at these events. I totally appreciate them and thank them for saying my name every time. However, they should have been better trained. When I finished, there were no volunteers handing out food or asking if you needed to go the medic or podiatry tent.
- That brings me to the finish. The finish was poorly organized. The volunteers did not know where the family meetup section was, the food was kind of gross and left out there, I could not find a podiatry tent (MASSIVE blister), etc...
I sound like a brat, but Miami really needs to step up the organization, or just have it be a half marathon.

Course:

Let's face it, it's MIAMI... so it is gorgeous for the most part, naturally a nice course with views of nice neighborhoods, ocean, palm trees, etc. Hard to have much bad to say about the course itself.

Organization:
WORST I have seen of any of the 30+ races I have ever run in my life. At one point, I felt like I was running a race full of runners who have never run a single race in their lives. No semblance of order in terms of fast runners veer left, slow runners and walkers stay right. That was an absolute joke, very amateurish. Runners would literally run and stop dead in their tracks on the LEFT side and slowly walk, shoulder-to-shoulder with others... if you ran the Marathon, you likely ran 27-28 miles just trying to jump sidewalks and swerve around idiots who apparently know nothing about common first grade race etiquite. If ran a PR on this course, God Bless you for doing so because you ran much further than usual for it. Also, the ENTIRE race was one giant bottle-neck clusterf**k, narrow roads for tens of thousands of people...great idea, let the 10K and 1/2 Marathon runners clog the streets so you can barely move for 13-14 miles until it clears up a little. Oh, and the 'split' for Half/Full runners was basically 2 signs side-by-side of identical font, color and size, separated by a couple staggered rails and a Mexican girl holding a miniture crossing guard flag. MANY people took the wrong split and their races were ruined...this should NEVER happen to ANY runner in ANY race. If it happens to ONE runner, it's one idiotic runner. If it happens to DOZENS of runners, it is an issue that clearly was not well constructed in advance. As far as actual race-day Logistics/Organzization goes, worst...race...ever.

Spectators: Plentiful, enthusiastic, helpful, energetic. No issues at all here.

Just ran the Miami Marathon last week. The Expo picking up the bag is a nightmare to find parking. The metro is the easiest way to get to the race in the morning. The race was huge (35,000 people) so it was very crowded. I forgot my breakfast, and they did not have any food on hand ( they did have water though). You are assigned corrals by estimated time, but no one was following the assignment.

3 hour marathoners and 5 hours people were side by side. It is a simultaneous start, so it took about 2 miles to get some breathing room. After that, the race is great. South Beach is pretty, and there are still drunks out from the night prior.

Almost everyone in the race is doing the 1/2 marathon, so after the half way mark, you get some space. The crowd support was OK, but nothing special. The medal is awesome, and the hospitality tent afterword is great. If you are looking to do the 'Big Marathon experience' this is an easy marathon to do it with. The course is very flat.

Great course and great organization. It was depressing once the half marathon runners split. I wish there was better crowd support in last half. Well-stocked aid stations and enthusiastic volunteers. Best of any race I have run. Great work, Miami!

This was my third time running the full and I've done several halves at Miami. The only bad part of the race in my opinion is the start. With 30k people you need a wave start. Maybe 3 waves - first 2 require qualifying times and the last for beginners. I registered late and could only get in the C corral. I looked around and there were Gs next to me. People were walking in mile one. That needs to be more organized.

Other than that the race is great. Beautiful course and awesome volunteers! Easy and flat except for a couple small bridges.

This race was personally disappointing as I was shooting for a BQ but wasn't very close. This was my second marathon. So much more of an experience at this than the prior smaller race. Crowd support was super through miami beach, again before the half broke off back in downtown, out at biscayne and through the last two miles to the finish. I had never experienced anything like that and I found it great and a huge help. But I had trained hard for a possible BQ and the heat and humidity really did me in even though I have lived in fl for a year. Warning, when it is 70 degrees at the start, you need to adjust your goal accordingly. I didn't and suffered for it. Even my buddies who did adjust missed still their BQ times. But the scene at the start was pretty cool. I took off with the 3:25 pace group in the c coral but spent two miles dodging slower runners and traffic cones in the road. wtf on the cones? Notwithstanding my poor result, I would do this race again.

One other thing I should mention, after hitting the potty at 11 mile mark, I was a bit behind my pace group. As I was pushing to catch up I saw my pacer going back the other way. Not really sure what that meant. Did she quit? Did all her runners drop out or off pace? Kinda weird. I'm sort of hoping someone else chimes in with the answer here.

Nice view, but way too many slow people who work there way to the front and then walk 3 across; blocking the way for people who actually put in the correct information for the corral.

Miami marathon is a great race. The course is scenic and well-stocked with aid stations. Volunteers were enthusiastic and supportive. The only negative was the way in which the half marathoners were integrated with the full. At mile 13 (after miles of enthusiastic support including a raucous 'fan zone' at mile 10) the half runners left, and then it was a sad and lonely journey for the last half. Miles 17-21 are tough in any race, and to endure it after fans leave is worse.
That said, it was still a good race. I will return!

First off, I really liked the course for the Miami marathon. There were only a few miles that were not scenic but few cities can be continuously scenic for 26.2 miles. I thought there were enough port-o-potties at the start, bag check was really efficient (once you found it) and the aid stations were good (everyone crowded at the first table so I ran past to the 2nd or 3rd tables and had lots of room). The tshirts were great and gender specific and the medal was unique.

But I think the organization could improve. The expo was in south beach (not convenient for us staying near the start line) and finding parking anywhere near the venue was a nightmare. The expo was jam packed with people (I didn't even want to shop, just got my stuff and left). They need a bigger venue for the expo.

On the morning of the race, I had trouble finding the bag check. Then, I was assigned to a corral that didn't exist. I tried to find it by asking volunteers (no one knew where my corral 'AA' was) and I walked around for 15 minutes before the race but I couldn't find it. So as the gun went off I tucked behind Corral F and went with the flow. For the next 3 miles I was stuck behind a wall of people doing 11-12 minute miles, when my goal pace was 9 m.m. I can't tell you how happy I was when the half marathoners peeled off just before mile 13, I finally had room to run!

The finisher's area was disorganized. I wanted to walk around to stretch and I didn't realize that I couldn't get back into the food tent as I had left the area. I begged the security guard to let me back in but when I finally got to the food, I was disappointed because there was almost nothing to eat.

I don't think I will do this marathon again. It was not well organized and way too crowded. There are many early year marathons in Florida. I'd rather forego some of the hype and run a better organized, quieter race.