Martha Sterne's Staging Area

The Banff marathon is a beautiful “holiday destination” marathon. It is an out and back course that starts in the town of Banff at ~4500ft and runners gain 900+ft of elevation over the course. There were enough hydration stations on the course if you also carried some of your own water (which I always do). Volunteers were great. Course was well marked, tho I hated the double loop runners had to do at the 11-13mile mark (painful!). The course wasn’t quite as scenic as I had hoped; yes it’s all out in the Banff National Park but much of it is going through forested areas with not as many views of lakes as I had hoped. This is nit picking as I’m comparing to the Big Sur Marathon. Compared to so many marathons, Banff is a gem. Oh and I had a bear sighting crossing the road ahead of me so there was a bit of walking which slowed my time.

The race shirt was fine; I will certainly wear it. I have 3 fundamental criticisms of the production. One is the medal is the same whether you ran the 10k, 1/2 marathon, or marathon. The second is that the after-race nutrition was the weakest I’ve ever encountered in my 17 marathons to date. They offered the tiny cups of water or gatorade that you got on the course (of course could be refilled), a granola bar, a small cookie, half banana, and a juice box. That’s it. Given the price of admission, offering pizza, or chocolate milk, or (non-alc) beer, or chips, or hot dogs, or some things of more substance would have been better. The other thing is there were few porta potties out on the course so you had to be lucky to not have to wait to use one. Doubling up porta potties would be a help.

The Rock n Roll Nashville marathon was (like all Rock n Roll events) a well-organized race. Bib and t-shirt pick up were a breeze. The expo had the usual vendors selling whatever you might have forgotten to pack. There were lots of porta potties en route. There were lots of musicians and good music along the course. Mile markers were clearly marked (though Rock n Roll miles seem to be longer than what my Garmin records which can be agonizing as the race goes on). The split-offs between the half and full marathoners were not well marked however; fortunately I saw them all and didn’t make any mistakes but wondered at the time how many people might have missed them…Seeing reports here, unfortunately a few did.

The marathon route was also one of the more interesting ones for Rock n Roll in the US. It was much more interesting than the Rock n Roll Arizona and San Antonio marathons. The marathon and half marathon started on Broadway and 8th Ave South. We ran a few blocks west and then south past Belmont University, north past the Tennessee State Capitol. We got to run around the outer field of the First Horizon Park which is the official stadium of the Nashville Sounds Baseball Club and got to see our image projected on the guitar-shaped scoreboard. The kicker was during miles 20 to almost 24 we ran two loops around Sevier Lake which had a long hill to run up twice, and at that point I wanted it to be over. We finished at Nissan Stadium, the home field of the Tennessee Titans.

For someone who trains in Northern California and on moderate hills with some regularity, the Nashville course should have seemed flat and fast. The race director warned about the first 8 miles; “take it easy on the first 8”. So while running I didn’t think the hills were terribly challenging. But the heat quickly rose and by mile 11 it was already 73 degrees with 38% humidity. I was starting to perspire at mile 1 and I don’t perspire normally that quickly. By mile 14 I knew this was not going to be a PR; in fact I was reframing the race in terms of just finishing. About mile 10, I started taking a water for me and pouring a water over my head. I took ice cold wet rags 3 times over the last half. I drank whenever water was offered and I took both offerings of pickle juice. It was all about trying to keep my body temperature down as much as possible. By the end, the temperature was 83 degrees, and I think we were within a couple degrees of the race director having to close the race. Fortunately, I don’t think anyone suffered any serious heat related ramifications (at least I checked online afterwards and I saw none reported).

My time should have been under 5 hours for this race, but the heat was a killer. Nevertheless, I enjoyed the experience (as much as one can while undergoing the pain of a marathon) and enjoyed visiting Nashville. Beside the obvious tourist draws like the Country Music Hall of Fame and Johnny Cash Museum, check out the Tennessee State Museum; it’s free and worth a visit.