Low-Key marathons?

Have you looked into the West Wyoming Marathon?

Perhaps the Half Moon Bar (1/2 + Full) in Sept will fit the bill. I have not run it.

For 1/2-only races, Pescadero/Artichoke last month would have been a good fit and the San Mateo Running with the Jets 1/2 in Oct looks right on spec.

Of course the farther away from the Bay Area you get, the more likely you are to encounter that local feel -- but it makes it harder to travel there on race day.

List of Calif 1/2s:

http://www.halfmarathons.net/race_calendar_california.html

South of Monterey but quite a bit but Malibu Marathon is a low key event that gets the job done. It is like a bunch of guys told the city we are going to put on a race for our friends and the city said go for it.

The course is good too. Really nice second half running along the ocean. I cannot think of another low key marathon that one can run in Southern California that would qualify someone for Boston.

I just wish it were in late September rather than November.

Not that it addresses your question, but I'm struggling with your use of "competitive" vs "low-key". It almost sounds like you're looking for a race where you can place well (whatever that means) without trying very hard. I apologize if I've misread your post. I think of "low-key" as being in contrast to "complicated logistics" in the sense of requiring early registration and dealing with hordes of other participants regardless of the level of competition.

Just ask Chuck Engle where he's running. He's pretty good at finding non-competitive races.

Seriously, you can use this web site -

http://findmymarathon.com/location.php

- to do searches for races around a certain area and filter by race size if you want. You'll have to look elsewhere - mg.com or race website - to see how competitive it is since fmm.com doesn't have race results.

Use the marathon map on Marathonguide.com . You can select the date ranges too and zoom into your area.

http://www.marathonguide.com/races/MarathonsMap.cfm

Tell me which one you choose so I can show up and whip you.

Caudex wrote:

So I've been looking for marathons in my area, but every single one I can find is super competitive. Like Big Sur marathon type. I have no doubt I could finish OK in one of the competitive ones, but for my first one (probably next summer), I want it to be more low-key, just a sort of relaxed one to give me an idea of the times I can do.

Does this type of low-key event exist? My "range" is San Francisco to Monterey on the California coast. Do you know of any marathons (or even half-marathons) in that are that aren't competitive?

Big Sur only had 23 runners go sub-3 last year, granted it's not a fast course. But that's usually not considered very competitive.

A bit North of your range, but the Avenue is super-low key, very well-organized by real runners, could be a moderately fast course, and always has great weather (being that it is in shade most of the way). First weekend of May, not really summer.

You might want to try ultras.

Is your ego that weak that you can't run in a race where you'll get beaten by 50+ people? Or is there another issue?

trello wrote:

Is your ego that weak that you can't run in a race where you'll get beaten by 50+ people? Or is there another issue?

My ego is writing checks that my body can't cash.

check these:

http://marathons.ahotu.com/calendar/marathon/california/2013

http://runinfinity.com/calendar/usa/california/marathon

http://www.marathonguide.com/races/races.cfm