Sir, please change the route.

I was in Manila for 6 weeks in 2004. Three weeks before the marathon I twisted my right ankle. I spoke to a lady from the Milo Marathon and asked, "If I cannot run the marathon due to injury, can I do the shorter race like the 10K instead on race day?" She said, "Yes!" On marathon day, I went to pick up my bib a little past 4 a.m. They gave me a 10K bib. I explained the whole thing to them and asked to speak to the race director. They said he's busy. So I wound up doing the 10K race. The 10K race was mixed with the 5K race. There were no 10k and 5K corrals that I saw. It was impossible to get a PR since several 5K participants were high school walkers. These walkers were blocking the path. Some were holding hands, forming a human chain. Don't get me wrong - I think having young people participate in this kind of event is awesome for the sport - BUT you need A LOT of volunteers. You need volunteers to tell walkers/runners to move to the rightside or whatever. You need volunteers to tell runners where to turn.

I was impressed with the turn out. Would I recommend this marathon based on my 10K experience? No, but I'll run this marathon next year and see if there are any improvements done. If there are improvements done, I would not hestitate on recommending this marathon. I believe that in life you should give second chances.

By the way, I am a Filipino and marathon runner. I belong to a running club in New York. The people in my club travel to different states and countries just to run marathons. Of course, if the marathon is far away, we make a vacation out of it. Some of my running friends are race directors also.

p.s. The race results from the website were not updated until I emailed the director in Jan 2004. Now, if you look at the race results again, it only has the results from 2003 before. I cannot even check how I did in the 10K race. I gave the course 2 stars because you have to run around the walkers. I gave the spectators 3 and the organization 1 star.

I ran the 2002 version of this race. First off, let me say that at a cost of 150 peso ($3 U.S.) it is a very well organized race. There was plenty of water available throughout the course, although there was no gatorade or similar products. There are no finishers medals but there is a finisher Tshirt and certificate.
The course passes most of the major sites in Manila, (including the U.S. embassy). The first few miles, the race runs (literally) in the middle lanes of an 8 lane highway, and traffic is all around you. Air quality is very poor in Manila. The roads in Manila are primarily concrete, so it can get tough on your legs.
The course closes promptly in 6 hours, so slower runners shouldn't try this course, as the roads open back up to normal traffic.
I know this sounds like a negative view, but it was a fairly nice race. The filipino people are very friendly, and there was plenty of support (ambulance, traffic control, etc.) along the route. A couple of the local running clubs had people on bicycles handing out fruit and candy to restock glycogen supplies.
If you can handle the smog, then this is a bargain at 3 bucks.