Melissa Gardel's Staging Area

This was my third major after Chicago and Berlin. The crowd was amazing–both Chicago and Berlin were cold and rainy, so the crowds were sparse. The course was well organized with aid stations (medical, port-a-pottys, water and gatorade every mile), but I have 2 big gripes:
1. They say no running vests/backpacks, but plenty of people used them and were allowed to. I wish I hadn’t read the rules, because I can’t drink gatorade without puking, but it was really hot and humid.
2. I was really unimpressed with NYRR’s organization of the pre-race logistics. If you can, definitely take a bus from mid-town or use your own transportation to the start; it can’t be worse than the ferry. It took me 3 hours to get from my hotel at Grand Central Station to the race start. Getting to and on the ferry was about as simple as expected. However, after we got off the ferry, it was a mad rush to about 15 buses. It took me an hour and 15 minutes to get on one, and that was only because a cop finally escorted me on after watching me get crushed/nearly trampled 3 times. There was no crowd control/organized lines, and it was pretty dangerous with people surging and shoving to get on buses. There were wave 2 runners who were going to miss their start and wave 5 runners shoving onto buses because they just wanted to get to the start. There were no metal barriers to direct runners onto buses, and buses weren’t stopping in consistent spots, so the front part of the pack would be shoved in multiple directions depending on where buses stopped in that round. No better way to spend the morning of a marathon than standing and being pushed around for over an hour! Once on the bus, it was another 20 minutes to the race start area (the roads were shockingly not closed) and another 10-15 minutes to get to the corrals.