Matthew Luby's Staging Area

Very solid event overall. Parking wasn’t too difficult if you arrived 40+ minutes before the first start and the NDSU campus seemed to have plenty of parking at a reasonable distance.

I wish there were more porta-potties at the starting line; this was a bit of a bottleneck before the race began.

The course itself had plenty of hydration and nutrition support and an amount of on-course porta-potties that was more than the average marathon.

The post race celebration and food was perhaps a bit less than the average city marathon, but given the amount of on-course support and the quality of schwag, I didn’t mind at all that there weren’t fancy/delicious food options in addition to staples like fruit, juice, etc. right in the vicinity of the finish line.

Overall, I felt like this was a high-value marathon in the sense of what you got for what you paid for. The course had very solid support and was a good one for pursuing a personal best pace. The entire experience went very smoothly for me, and it would be hard to go into each little detail, but I felt like the process from registration to crossing the finish line was executed smoothly by the race organizers.

If you are looking for a marathon to check North Dakota off of your 50 states, this race is a very solid choice in my opinion.