Today is the running of the National Marathon & Half Marathon here in DC.
They only set the date for today’s races last November. I never really saw much in the way of any press for the event, and they limited it to 5,000 runners in total. You had to have a qualifying time to enter, ranging from a 9m6s pace for a previous 10K to a 10m18s pace for a full marathon.
I heard on the radio this week that the city is losing an estimated $60,000 on the event. The race started at 7AM, Metro opens at 7AM - they made no arrangements with Metro at all, because of the free parking at RFK. OK, fair enough on that, but at the same time, how easy is it to drive to RFK when there are going to be detours and such already getting started before the gun goes off? And yet, they encouraged spectators to use Metro - well, if the runners can’t get there via Metro for the start, how are the spectators going to get there on time?
The time and participant limits were imposed due to “permit issues”. I know they were very desperate to get this race on after the DC Marathon debacle in 2003, where it ended up being canceled right at the last minute, so I am sure they bent over backwards on any permit requirements just to make this happen. But I’m honestly not sure how they can continue this as an annual event right now if they truly want it to be a successful event. With only 5,000 slots, tight qualifying times, very little press and not much in the way of making it easy for folks to be at the start, I’m just not sure how you really can attract people to it.
Just a quick comparison to some other distance races in the area:
– Cherry Blossom 10 miler - 10,000 runners, 14 minute pace limit, Metro opens early.
– Army 10 Miler - 24,000 runners, 15 minute pace limit, Metro opens early
– Marine Corps Marathon - 30,000 runners, 14 minute pace limit, Metro opens gawdawful early.
In one of the press releases, they stated “The local running community has been asking for a spring marathon, the National Marathon will provide this outlet” - and how many in the local running community has a 4:30 marathon under their belt to be able to participate? Of the 18,846 runners that finished the MCM, only 7,184 had under a 4:30 time. The DC area is ranked as the third largest region for runners, and yet, they’re keeping a lot of them out on this one.
The three races above all have to get permits, they all go through DC, they all require road closures and such - and yet they’ve managed to make them open to more runners for a longer period of time. I’d say the folks at the National Marathon need to talk with the other local race directors and find out what the big secret is to putting on a race that can be enjoyed by a lot more people. Granted, the comment that the race director “is working to ensure that the National Marathon is a ‘runners race’” may just be his way of saying “We only want the Boston qualifiers coming to our race, so stuff it.”
And as it turns out, they only got ~2,000 runners in total for the races. OK, so they only had from November to promote it, but that is still four and a half months that you can put out a BIG blitz and let people know about it. They say they want this to expand, but they’ve got to make some changes - get the word out, get more people to run, work with Metro, and change the course - running through Anacostia and the Navy Yards isn’t “scenic”…
It will be interesting to see if they can get it together for next year - I’d probably give the half a go if I could get a qualifying time between now and then.
