Daisuke Matsuo's Staging Area

I highly recommend taking the metro to the Expo. The stadium-armory station puts you literally at the doorstep of expo. Decent expo got lots of free swags, no line at all! I parked at the fashion city mall, which is 1/2 mile from start. Beware of road closures, the main road to the pentagon is blocked for traffic so get there early. Decent course, no real hills. Overall, a decent race but tough logistics. Worth doing once, not sure if i will do it again.

My second year in a row, always hot and humid. For $35, it’s the best way to start your July 4th holiday! I am going to keep running this race every July 4th!

I was stationed in Ft Sill, OK for 3 week training. Just so happens that there was a 5k while I was there. The MWR for Ft Sill did a phenomenal job, I have ran a few 5k in my local base and it is nowhere near quality of this one. The shirt is good quality, the medal is awesome, raising money to support the family of the fallen. The course is loop around the golf course on post. Some minor hills, not a killer.

We flew into CDG airport on Friday morning, and went straight to the expo with our luggage and all. Please keep in mind the CDG airport is actually pretty far from Paris city center, it will take you an hour by train at least. Download the Paris Taxi app, they use that instead of Uber and it’s pretty easy to use as well. The expo had a luggage check which was awesome, so we didn’t have to walk around the expo with our luggage. BIB pickup was smooth, they had booth set up, just look up your bib number and go to the assigned booth, maybe 1 or 2 people in line, breeze. Then we walked around, the usual massive wall with all the names of the participants, other pictures opportunities, massive vendors area. We are from the USA and we saw runnning brands that we don’t see in the USA. I guess the European brand doesn’t market the USA region. So it was pretty neat to see new brands. My 5 year old son ran the Maratoons 400 meter run the next day. It was cute, pretty well organized.
Race report: The start and finish line are close to one another but it is not exactly the same. This is a huge marathon, I think 2024 had 52,000 finishers. We just followed the crowd off the train to the bag drop, which is at the finish line NOT the start line. Then get into your assigned corral. The scenery and crowd were awesome! Only a small patch of area that I would say were boring, other than that people yelling “ Allez Allez” from both sides of the street at all times. A few areas with cobblestone. It’s not as bad as I thought it was going to be but when I was exhausted towards the finish and had to run the last few km on cobblestone, it added a new dimension to the experience. Cross the finish line, pickup the medal and finisher T shirt. I really really love the simplicity of the medal and T shirt design. The medal was a ring design, designed to commemorate the Paris 2024 Olympic. T shirt had no adds or sponsorship on them, high quality shirt from ASICS. We got or baggage and headed back to our Air Bnb. Please keep in mind that many businesses our closed on Sunday. Including grocery stores, restaurants and cafes. I highly recommend planning a head and making a reservation for a place to eat after the race a head of time as this race on a Sunday and it could be challenging if you are traveling with a large group.

Over all awesome awesome race! A few very minor details to work on for future.
1. Need more volunteers in the race morning. I wish there were more volunteers that could help direct us to bag check, start line, etc. 52,000 runners all roaming around not knowing which way to go was not a plus.
2. The Km markers were patchy. It was every 2 km in the beginning, then I swear it disappeared. There were only markers for major km like 20, 30, etc. my family planned to meet me around km 16, I had no way of seeing them.
3. There were few area closer to the finish where the crowd were into the street. They were separated by a single rope from the runners. We really appreciate the crowd support but it caused an already narrow street to become congested and bottleneck situation. Runners had to slow down.

I have lived and gone to school right down the street from Arbutus for many years and for some reason never ran this race until 2023. Great organization, for the price you get your money’s worth. I think the fee was $35, you get a t-shirt and a very hilly and humid 10k course! It is a loop course, takes you around Arbutus neighborhood and main business district. I am already registered again for the next year! This might become my new July 4th tradition!

Much of the race is on a trail, most of it was packed gravel surface. Out and back a long a river. Scenery doesn’t change for 90% of the course which can get a bit boring. The packet pick up and start was breeze. Overall just an average experience.

I went to grad school in Cincinnati, I always wanted to return to the city and run a race. The expo was average, they gave a bunch of freebies which I wasn’t expecting so it kinda made up. They gave me a poster as well as foldable cooler with marathon logo. The race shirt was awesome quality, course was very scenic! I would like to run the full next time!