John Aaron Howell's Staging Area

This was my first marathon, and I really enjoyed it! The expo, start, and finish were all well organized. There were plenty of aid stations well equipped with Gatorade or water throughout the course. The first ~9 miles were run with the half marathon participants before we split off. Crowd support waned a bit after we split, but it was pretty strong overall. The toughest part for me was a 3mi double loop in Overton Park. It was more of a mental struggle than a physical struggle, but I would recommend that you be prepared for that.

Overall, this was a great race for a great cause! Be prepared to get a bit teary eyed throughout the race.

The Madison Station Half Marathon was a great, local race! The route was challenging, with rolling hills throughout, and while there isn’t much scenery in Mississippi, there was lots of long stretches along the Natchez Trace and Historic Downtown Madison. Crowd support along the route was low, but there was a nice after party that made up for it!

I was nervous going into this race because the forecast predicted thunderstorms, but thankfully it only rained for ~30 seconds total!

The course was a fairly scenic loop through downtown Little Rock and North Little Rock. There were many cute streets and parks that we ran by with lots of art.

The crowd support was incredible! There were tons of people lining the streets for nearly the whole race, and that really helped with motivation.

The race expo was fairly good, and the post race activities were nice as well (although they were all indoors in the convention center).

Also, as all the other reviews say, this medal is HUGE — even for the half marathon! My first response when the volunteer put it around my neck was, “Wow! This is heavy!”

I highly recommend running in Little Rock, and I’ll definitely go back some day.

The Louisiana Half Marathon was pretty great! The Expo was good with lots of vendors. The morning of the race, it was very cold (~34°F, but with the wind it felt much colder). The course was mostly flat, but there were a few long inclines that came out of nowhere. There were lots of locals on the course cheering, even some with mimosas and beer for runners.

After the race, there was hot gumbo and jambalaya (great for warming up after such a cold run). There was also beer and protein shakes. I got a special medal for running the Mississippi Gulf Coast Half Marathon as well, thereby completing the Beach to Bayou Challenge.

This was my first half marathon, and I was very excited to run it in Jackson! Overall, I thought the race was good, but there are definitely areas for improvement. Lots of the route was down and back, with many U-turns along the way. Also, the 5K and 10K runners turned off at different points, and signage wasn’t always large enough/clear about who should turn where. At one point, a large group of runners came onto the route from a side street and asked me where to go for the half/full. They’d obviously missed a turn and gone off course. There were some long hills, but they weren’t too steep. Altogether, I’m glad I did this race, and I’ll definitely check it out again in the future.