Indy Wants 40,000 People at Inagural Marathon

Well, it looks as if they've changed the course. Now, most of the course is on Meridian:

Start on Meridian at Washington St. go

North on Meridian around Monument Circle continue

North on Meridian to 86th St. go

West on 86th St. to Michigan Rd. go

South to Kessler Blvd. turn

East on Kessler Blvd to Meridian go

South on Meridian to Michigan St. turn

East on to Michigan St. to Pennsylvania go

North on to Pennsylvania to

The Finish Line at North St.

Nothing like running up and down Meridian street for 20 miles...

In regards to the prize purse, the site now says:

"The Indy Classic Marathon will offer a total of 15% of the amount received from paid entrants to be used for first place winners. Men and Women winners considered separately, in all marathons. Prize money to cap at $500,00.00."

Didn't they say $750,000 in prize money before? It's tough for me to tell from what is written above...are they capping prize money at $500,000 -- and they missed a zero -- or are they saying $50,000 -- and they've misplaced a comma? With all the other typos on the site -- including "marathin" a few times -- who really knows WHAT the prize purse is now?

Well, I will say that from a logistics standpoint, the course change is an improvement. Not sure how people will enjoy running up Meridian and back on Michigan so much though...

Ahem - and it is spelled "Maraton" by the way (in addition to Marathin). :)

Still can't believe how TERRIBLE the course maps are - you can't see the route at all! You would think it wouldn't be that hard to go to the USATF website and use their mapping tool - but of course you would have to be a runner to know that a tool like that exists....

The entertainment continues...

Hey, that outta be a real fast course though, only has like 6 turns in 26.2 miles...!

Well you know for sure they will not be stopping traffic in either direction on Meridian, 86th, Michigan Rd., and Kessler, so hopefully it will be well-coned and well-policed. That is, if this event ever even comes off.

Does anyone really think that they are going to divert traffic on 4 of the busiest streets in the city for 5+ hours? There is no way that the city will approve that route. Plus...As mentioned before, It will be really boring to run that straight for that long.

The article said they had 4 mil in sponsorship money. There are non mentioned on the website.. Someone is getting shafted!

Doug E. wrote:

Does anyone really think that they are going to divert traffic on 4 of the busiest streets in the city for 5+ hours? There is no way that the city will approve that route. Plus...As mentioned before, It will be really boring to run that straight for that long.

Well, Meridian, Michigan, 86th street are all two lanes each way, so you could cone one lane of the four and still have lanes open for traffic either way. But, Kessler....is only one lane each way most of the way from Michigan to Meridian...only goes four lanes just a few blocks before Meridian..so that would be problematic.

The worst part of this course would probably when you turn onto Michigan and head southeast, from 86th to Kessler south on Michigan is really not very interesting, and the traffic is downright horrific around 75th (?) or so, that will be a tough intersection for them to police.

Yeah, not many turns, but you also have the rolling hills on Meridian between Holliday Park & 80th Street to contend with. I wouldn't label this as an "easy" course and do think it is somewhat managable from a logistics perspective, but agree with Monon Runner about the tougher spots to police...

Their city permit is still "in process" on the Indygov website, but that doesn't tell us much because most of the permits listed (including some events that are just 2-3 weeks away) are in the same status....

I'm gonna go ahead and call this out as a giant scam.

Step 1) Announce glorious plans for race. Big $$$ available.

Step 2) Put up website to collect entries, payable via Paypal?!

Step 3) Collect some money. It doesn't take many entries for this to be worthwhile.

Step 4) Declare race approval by indygov 'pending' for months.

Step 5) Never show up race morning. Leave town (or Nigeria, wherever they're operating from).

What was the deal with DC marathon back in 2003? There was some similar thing where they collected a lot of entries, then never held the race. Didn't they cite "security concerns" or something? They never gave back any money or gave people t-shirts and as far as I know were never seen again. Anyone remember the details more accurately?

Let's just compare the website of the Indy Classic Marathon to the Georgia Marathon (also an inaugural event)

http://www.georgiamarathon.com/

Georgia's even got a Runner-Cam, a video that takes through the entire course!

Your Mom wrote:

I'm gonna go ahead and call this out as a giant scam.

I am not so sure I would be ready to call it a scam, but it seems to be done in a very unprofessional way. The website has had misspelled words (they even spelled "marathon" wrong) and uses phrases that runners would not use (like the "5k marathon" which was then switched to the "5k mile race" and then finally corrected). This tells me that the people putting on the race do not know much about running, or at least those in charge of the website do not.

Combine this with the fact that people in Indy seem to have no idea who these people are and there is no info that these people have ever put on a race before makes me wonder about it.

I also wonder about the claim to get 40,000 runners. NY does not have that many people in it. Boston does not. But a 1st year race in Indy will? Not a chance.

If the organizers actually believe this they are out of their minds and that tells me they will have other problems and may not be able to pull off this race. If they are smart enough to know there is no chance of 40,000 runners then they are lying or "puffing" a lot. Either way it causes me to wonder either about their truthfulness OR their knowledge/ability to pull this off. Either scenario is a bad sign.

Combine all that with the fact there are NO sponsors listed on the website. Not one. They have apparently not been able to line up any, yet they promise $500,000 in prize money. I may be remembering this wrong, but I thought the original offer of prize money was $750,000, what happened there? That seems lik a lot of money. I do not recall what Chicago was last year, but a google search found that it was $650,000 in 2004 and NY was about 750,000 last year. Indy will have 1/2 million with NO sponsors lined up? I don't think so.

There is a local blog/message board of Indy people many of whom are questioning this race as well.

I think I would wait a long time before I gave these people my money to enter this race. I seriously wonder if this race will come off.

Well, I mean, just my point. Think of every scam email you've ever read. Bad spelling. Promises of something for nothing. No proof of actual corporate backing. Nothing, just a website. Pulling on people's emotions stating that a 'portion of proceeds' go to support fallen military personnel. Great if true, but call me a skeptic on this. SCAM SCAM SCAM SCAM Don't waste your money.

Monon Runner wrote:

Well, Meridian, Michigan, 86th street are all two lanes each way, so you could cone one lane of the four and still have lanes open for traffic either way.

I know you are not supporting these clowns, but just think about coning off one lane for 40,000 runners. The biggest marathon I've run was about 10,000, started on a four-lane street, and the congestion was tough to deal with (and I was in the first corral).

Ak Med wrote:

I know you are not supporting these clowns, but just think about coning off one lane for 40,000 runners. The biggest marathon I've run was about 10,000, started on a four-lane street, and the congestion was tough to deal with (and I was in the first corral).

So true...I was thinking more of after the first couple miles when things thinned out....that one lane would be enough.

I don't suspect they'll have anywhere near 40,000 runners, either..

Big John wrote:

What was the deal with DC marathon back in 2003? There was some similar thing where they collected a lot of entries, then never held the race. Didn't they cite "security concerns" or something? They never gave back any money or gave people t-shirts and as far as I know were never seen again. Anyone remember the details more accurately?

I was not there, but I seem to recall that they got around this by holding an unofficial DC Marathon run without traffic control/police/water/etc.

Somebody needs to email these crackers and play along by pretending they're interested in volunteering/working/donating. I'd do it if I had more time but I'm currently too occupied. This has to be a big scam and someone needs to start jerking their chain a little.

why does it say 2007 Europa Technologies at the bottom of the maps?

Is there a grammar error in this sentence?

The Inaugural Indy Classic Marathon has already received the attention of world class professional athletes for the opportunity to participate in a marathon to be ran in what is known as "the racing capital of the world".