Wes Wang's Staging Area

This event was scheduled on 4/18. Due to predicated thunderstorm, the event was changed to be 5/31. We were lucky to have a pleasant weather on the race day.
The route includes two different loops. We ran with half marathoners for the east side loop. The second loop was on the west side. Many sections were well shaded.
There were plenty of aid stations. All stations were loaded with Gatorade and water. A few of them supplied some food gel.
The expo opened to 9:00pm the day before. This was very helpful, especially for the out of town runners.
The event parking were convenient and not far from the start/finish line.
A well organized event.

A portion of this marathon run on the bike path of the Bay bridge. The scenery is stunning. I was not used to the loud traffic along my side while I am running. For this reason, it is more tiresome than other marathons while running on the bridge.
The route runs through the lake side, commercial area, residential area, harbor, as well as the bridge. It provides a good summary of the city of Oakland. The route is hilly. Fortunately, the steep hills are short in distance.

A few mile markers are missing, include the last three mile markers. I had an accurate alignment with mile 23 mile marker. However, the final distance was 0.3 mile longer than my watch. Something is wrong there.
The start time was delayed by three of promotion talks. That’s annoying.

It can be cold at Rehoboth Beach in winter time. We hot one of the cold days this year. It was snowing heavily the day before. Fortunately, the snow stopped and all snow melted out on the running day.
The route is mixed of street asphalt roads, beach side wood boardwalk, and mostly unpaved bike paths in wetland park.

Good:
A well organized small event.
Plenty of free street parking near the start / finish line.
The aid stations were very helpful and friendly.
All aid stations served with water and aggregator. Two or more served GU gels and cut into half bananas.
Plenty of food and drink were served at the finish area.
Many pacers for different finish goals.
Rehoboth Beach is a nice beach town to visit.

Not so good:
The start were combination of marathoners and half-marathoners together. The route was congested on the boardwalk before the marathoners and half-marathoners broke up the route.
There is no gear check.

Kenai River is known for Salmon run. It is fun to run on the side of the river.
The start and finish area were at Kenai Chamber of Commerce and Visitor Center. The temperature were between 40-50F this year. It was a sunny day with light breeze. The event was enjoyable.

This is a two loop race for 50K. The bulldog trail is a 6 mile long uphill. It is specially tough for the 2nd loop.
We were fortunate that day. The temperature was below 80 all day long. However, it was still very exhausted to climb the hill under the sun. I got a chance to use icy water to wash my head in one of the aid stations.
There were many aid stations along the way. The volunteers were very helpful.
The event advertised to have free pictures for all runners. There were photographers along the way. However, there has been no photos to be found for 2025 event for some reason.

As saying in the organizer’s web: “These Ain’t No Pansy Ass City Races”. This is an unique event.
It is not easy to get to the staging area. You have to drive over 10 miles of dirt uphill mountain road to get there, no matter which way you choose to go.
We ran on the top of mountain ridges. The scenery is beautiful, the road is up and down hills all the time. The route is open gravel road. Some drivers drove fast to bring up dust. Fortunately, there were not many cars on the road and there were not many careless drivers.
There were self-service water supply in many mile markers. The organizer provided a couple of cars running up and down to provide services.
It was a small event. There were less than 100 runners including full and half marathoners.
There were many mosquitos, fliers, horse fliers. Even bug spray were not helpful. Fortunately, there were breeze that day, or I may not be able to survive.
It takes a long time to see the results. It has been 10 days since the event. The results are still not available.

As always, Revel marathons are well organized events.
This is a scenic route mainly along the beautiful Kancamagus Highway in New Hampshire. The route is most down hills with a small section up hills. It was a rainy day in 2025 event. It was cold at the start area. The start time delayed about 20 minutes or so due to road control issues. All were good after the race started.
It is too bad that the event is discontinued.

Louisiana Marathon is a well organized event. This is a medium sized marathon with over a thousand full marathon runners and a couple thousand half marathon runners. The start line and finish line are at the same location in state capitol park. There are plenty of parking not far from the start/finish area. There was no clear start wave. With the full marathon and half marathon started together, it made the first mile running congested.
The full marathon and the half marathon share the same route going through LSU tiger stadium and around University lake. The full marathon goes out to cover the other half at the east side of the city with majority of a back and forth route. A portion of the full marathon route was on a street with tree at the center of the route. The tree roots made the road surface very bumpy.
We were very lucky to have a good weather for 2025 run. The temperature was about 40~50 degrees all day. The day before was a warm day with temperature 70 degrees around noon time. The day after was a cold day with temperature below freeze and snowy day after.
There were good services before, during, and after the run. There were a few flavored free coffee in the morning before the run. There were plenty of aid stations along the way. The intervals were less than 2 miles apart. Quite a few of the aid stations had GU energy gels supply. The volunteers were very helpful. They did a great job in the cold windy weather, specially think about they constantly get their hand wet. I thank the lady at the gear check station who help me put up my hoody after I finished the run. There were variety of drink and food after the run. The capitol park has plenty space to allow the finishers with their friends and family member to sit around. There was a live musical at the finish area. We got our free photo a couple of days after. That’s another plus.
Many spectators cheer at the finish area. Along the way, there are many families sitting outside of their house cheering the runner in the windy chill cold weather.
Baton Rouge is the state capitol of Louisiana. It is also a college town for LSU. It is not far from New Orleans. There are plenty to do there for anyone travel from outside of the area.