The Richmond marathon has been on my marathon wish list since I ran the half marathon back in the early 90's. As with most late fall New England marathons, the fall foliage is gorgeous, although the weather can be somewhat temperamental (especially these days)!
The course is quite scenic, starting in historic downtown Richmond, traveling through historic neighborhoods, along Monument Avenue, the James River, and finishing on Brown's Island. It's touted as "America's Friendliest Marathon". I've ran a lot of friendly southern marathons, so I consider this a challenge!
The general stats are good: great expo, easy race day logistics, well organized, no issues with the corresponding half marathon and 8K races, a relatively flat course, great tech apparel available, and it's a decent sized marathon, with approximately 5,000 marathoners. Also, it's a Saturday marathon, which I prefer over Sunday.
The cons? I touched on one, the weather. Come to think of it, it was pouring rain the year I ran the half, and there's been a few really warm years as well. Being later in November, they seemed to miss the wrath of the now somewhat famous storms Ivan, Irene and Sandy, and last year's weather was perfect, so as with all marathons, weather is a hit or miss. As for other cons, seriously, I scoured the submissions on marathonquide.com and their facebook page and couldn't find much of anything to complain about. One person complained that the colors of the bibs were boring! FOR REAL! The only legitimate complaint was that there were a few boring and lonely stretches.
Reviews raved about the downhill finish into the park on Brown's Island. This is a new addition since I ran the half. Apparently it's a beautiful park and the organizers had plenty of food and beer for the finishers. This appears to be a great improvement over the downtown finish I experienced, which wasn't bad--just not as scenic and possibly a little too congested.
I'd love to finally make it back to Richmond. Maybe next year? Who's with me?
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