Forums >Racing>Best Spring Marathons?
Interval Junkie --Nobby
Most of big city marathons seem to be in the Fall: Chicago, NYC, Marine Corps, etc. What are the highlights of the Spring marathon season?
Specifically I'd be interested in recommendations for a wonderful first marathon experience on the east coast, USA.
2021 Goals: 50mpw 'cause there's nothing else to do
Yea.. East Coast... otherwise Carlsbad, LA, etc...
Dunno.. I'm sure someone will chime in.
I'm hoping for insight on this as well. I want to do the Flying Pig but the Country Music Marathon or the Derby Festival in Louisville are much more practical. I need some ammo information to help convince my husband.
I don't half-ass anything
"I have several close friends who have run marathons, a word that is actually derived from two Swahili words: mara, which means 'to die a horrible death' and thon, which means 'for a stupid T-shirt.' Look it up." - Celia Rivenbark, You Can't Drink All Day if You Don't Start in the Morning
FTFY
Sulphur Springs 50km-- Ancaster, ON-- May 28, 2022
Tally in the Valley 12 hours-- Dundas, ON -- July 30, 2022 (Support SickKids Toronto)
Stokely Creek-- 56km-- Sault Ste. Marie, ON-- Sept. 24, 2022
Check out theVermont CIty Marathon, held on Memorial Day weekend. If you go with family they get to see you 5 times without moving, the course is a cloverleaf pattern that keeps passing thru the city. Burlington is a fun place, lots for the family to see and do. Not a huge marathon, but definitely worth doing.
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Rock & Roll bought the National marathon in DC, so it will probably be bad... Unless you like crowded, highly commercialized events.
Which brings up a particularly relevant question -- what do *you* mean by "good" ?
It's a 5k. It hurt like hell...then I tried to pick it up. The end.
an amazing likeness
Sugarloaf marathon, Eustis Maine in May. You can get useless in Eustis. Or, there is that little marathon in Boston in April.
Acceptable at a dance, invaluable in a shipwreck.
Rock & Roll bought the National marathon in DC, so it will probably be bad... Unless you like crowded, highly commercialized events. Which brings up a particularly relevant question -- what do *you* mean by "good" ?
That was my thought too. I live at the beach, so to me, "good" means flat. To that end, we have a marathon here in March that is flat and early enough in the year to virtually guarantee cool weather. http://www.wrightsvillebeachmarathon.com/. At this point it is 19 weeks from now, so plenty of time to get ready. It's flat, well-supported, and not too big. I am signed up for it, but I haven't decided whether I can be ready in time coming off of Chicago, so I may switch to the half marathon and do Grandmas in June. Vermont looks nice, but I don't know that I like those hills....
Somehow this reminded me of what I originally wanted to suggest.. Shamrock
#2867
For races that I have run, I think that the Vermont City Marathon is probably one of the best for a first timer, especially if you'll have anybody there to spectate, for the reasons stated above. My wife moved about a quarter mile and saw me 6 times the year I ran. Best part is that despite going through town so much, there's only one 2 mile out and back stretch early in the race and everything else you only cross paths for a short distance (usually in a different direction) before hitting a new loop. There's a great ice cream shop right near the finish too, if I recall.
Other Spring Marathons on the East Coast that I've run and could recommend as a first marathon:
NJ Ultra Distance Festival - if you are looking for a well organized but low key event without any crowding, this is a great race. The course will be different in 2012 than it was this year, but I'm sure that it will be just as well organized as when I ran it.
Delaware Marathon - This is a 2 loop course, larger crowds than you'll see in any of my other suggestions, also well organized (although there were a few spots that a few more traffic marshals would have been nice) and they have a good spread after the race.
Pineland Farms - This is also memorial day weekend, it's a 50k trail race, so you'd be skipping over the marathon. There are no big hills that you have to run up, and the trails are very easy without a lot of roots or rocks and are quite wide all the way through. The fields are actually a little more difficult footing than the trails on this course. It's still a good challenge, though, because there's nothing but hills - you are almost always going up or down with very few flat sections. Very well supported, plenty of well stocked aid stations, plus there is a 50 mile and 25k option (each race starts 2 hours apart) and if you go with your family you can make a weekend of it with a 5k, 5k canicross, 5k barefoot, and 10k race option the day before (plus potato sack races and egg tosses etc.)
For a 1st marathon on the east coast, though, I'd have to recommend Vermont City Marathon in Burlington as the best option (unless you want to provide more details for what you think you'd like.) At least among the races I've personally run.
Run to Win25 Marathons, 17 Ultras, 16 States (Full List)
I'm doing the Myrtle Beach Marathon as my first: http://www.mbmarathon.com/site3.aspx
It's maybe a little too early to call Spring, but sometimes we have spring like temps here in February. Then again, last year it got snowed out, so I guess you never know. All I know is the course is as flat as can be and the after party sounds pretty good too!!
Well, if you get a chance to venture a little further, you can't beat Big Sur for jaw dropping beauty, hills, and headwinds.
http://www.bsim.org/Photos_Media___More/Marathon_Tour_Video.htm
Of course, there's that little run that starts in Hopkinton MA on the third Monday in April.....
There are quite a few good big city marathons in the spring:
Boston
L.A.
Eugene (Not the biggest race in the world but finish on the track where Pre used to run)
Providence
Green Bay (Again not a giant city but I'm a Packers fan so I figured I'd include this one).
London
Paris
Rotterdam
Rome
Madrid
Good Bad & The Monkey
If you are into big big crowds, a rolling-to-hilly, mostly uninspired course with a high registration fee, a typical sweltering hot and humid day, an overloaded half marathon that totally eclipses the marathon, a forgettable finish line and a real honest-to-goodness for-profit race management mentality, you may want to consider the Country Music Marathon in Nashville, late April.
I'm running somewhere tomorrow. It's going to be beautiful. I can't wait.
Poor baby