Bank of America Chicago Marathon

Convenient to be in the Downtown Hilton right near the start and finish lines and they had arranged shuttles to the Expo and that was helpful. Being the official Marathon hotel though I thought they could have rolled out the carpet more to the runners given the prices of the rooms. Expo was large as expected and efficient in terms of getting the bibs although I thought the long walk through the vendors to get a mediocre quality shirt was unnecessary. The Nike made Chicago marathon running garb featured at the expo and the online store after the race including the finisher shirts seemed to be significantly better quality and more fashionable. I suppose it would be too much to ask and $$ lost to expect those shirts for an event with 45,000 runners. It would be nice if they stepped up their game for the basic participant free shirt nonetheless (at least the design and color). The morning of the race was well organized with many volunteers to help guide you through the chain linked fence maze of Grant Park. Despite the early morning drizzle there was palpable excitement at the start with the announcement of the elites, signing of the national anthem by a soprano from the Lyric Opera followed by the countdown. Better than that though was crossing the starting line to the loudspeakers blasting “Sweet Home Chicago” the Blues Brothers version-nice homage to the host city. My advice is to get in your desired pace zone early and park it there for the first 13 miles trying not to better you preordained first split. It’s easy to go out fast here and end up with the first 10K a PR rather than an eventual marathon PR. We had a little wind coming at us at times heading west out of the downtown after the 1/2 marathon mark and there seemed to be a general slow down for 5k after that by the masses so it was important to stay on one’s own pace. This seemed to be a race that if you didn’t waste your reserves early you could really benefit by the flat profile at the end put the hammer down for the last 5k and psychologically get that boost of passing the struggling stragglers (unfortunately I only had enough in the tank to put a small hammer down for the last mile). The course is great for spectators and even my 70+ year old country mice parents managed to see me at 3 different points along the course so there is no excuse for your crew not to be out there cheering you on to a PR(although access to last bit of course to finish line is restricted). 2018 was unusual in terms of precipitation as this race historically has had dry weather since 2006 although for this Pacific NW based runner it was not a deterrent. What was a deterrent was the viral syndrome and low grade fever in the 48 hours before the race. Not a fan of vitamin ibu before or during races given potential kidney issues but 400mg ibuprofen at 4am given my malaise prior to the race probably salvaged my race. Added note: the Chicago Art Museum is super close to Grant Park and worth your while to visit and if you used a bank of america debit or credit card the day of race we received a free entrance ticket with purchase of another. I’m not sure though if the marathon tired me more or walking on those museum marble floors for 2 hours that afternoon.