Yaukwan Yeung's Staging Area

I am a couch to marathon runner over the last 18 months. I ran my first half marathon here last year and enjoyed it so much that i decided to train and do the full marathon this year.

This year’s race was a nightmare compared to last year.

Last year there was ample support, excellent crowds, great weather, good music, free organized parking and nice expo. This year was the opposite. In addition the race route was changed on race day to add an additional third of a mile. May not sound like a lot, but when you’re running 26.5 instead of 26.2 that last part makes a huge difference.

1. Water and aid stations not staffed well or placed where it was stated on route map. There was no water or Gatorade available for most of the first half of the race. You had to stop and wait for the volunteers to fill cups of water.

The poor volunteer, single person at each table, had to lay out cups and fill them one at a time as runners got to the table. There were only 3 tables available at each station for over 20k participants.

They changed electrolytes providers without communicating to the runners. Previous year was Gatorade endurance which I trained with. Race route map touted Mortal hydration at every other station. Actual race day had SIS Electrolyte Go. The lack of communication and availability at stations plus hot weather cause many of the runners to cramp up and bonk.

2. This year there was much less crowd support. I would believe it was due to the weather being warmer than expected. The ones that were there was actually amazing and provided additional water and Gatorade that race organizer missed. In additional many that saw the heat, had setup garden hoses to help cool down runners.

3. Weather was much hotter than expected and hit 82 degrees. Expected was 75 degrees and most training was done from 50-70 degrees. Race coordinators doesn’t control weather. Just unlucky this year.

4. Previous year music was provided by live bands. This year was music buses that you see downtown Nashville with speakers. There were some live music but for music CITY run recorded music in a bus is a sad representation of Nashville.

5. Parking last year was at the finished line at Nissan stadium. That was awesome, post race and recovery, can go to your car and drive home. This year no parking at Nissan stadium. Many roads to available parking around the area was closed for the marathon. This reduced availability and increased demand. Parking lots and garages saw this as an opportunity to price gouge and did so accordingly.

6. Expo was terrible. Did not have that excitement we had previous year. In addition this is about st Jude’s mission to help fundraiser for kids with cancer. The message was totally missed this year replaced with targeted upsell for future races.

Overall this will be my last race in Nashville. I expected and trained for the hills, but was disappointed by the downhill slide of the race.