The Boise Marathon was a mess

I ran the marathon too. I would agree that the course was not very well marked, you definitely had to be concentrating on some of the turns to make sure you went the correct way (following the small orange arrows on the floor), especially as it was a small race so not as easy as just following the runner in front of you, as sometimes there were large gaps between runners. I didn't get lost/go off course, but I did see several other runners re-joining the course close to me where they'd obviously gone wrong somewhere. I've no idea if some turn signs were perhaps blown away given the weather (as most of the mile markers were). It did seem obvious that there was also an issue with turnaround points for the shorter races because I saw a few confused runners at various points (at least the turnaround for the marathon was marked relatively clearly)!

On the water stations, I thought there were plenty out there, but I was a little disappointed that they were only stocked with water. I managed to get an electrolyte drink once and it was very strong because it hadn't been mixed properly. I was given two electrolyte/recovery drinks at the finish line when I received my medal.

Finally, on t-shirts, when I got my medal the lady told me they weren't handing t-shirts out at finish line because they would've been ruined in the weather. She said they'll be organizing a pick-up for local runners and shipping shirts to non-local runners (hope that happens because I'm from Washington DC so will need it to be shipped).

I saw one of the small orange arrows on the Boise Greenbelt while out for a run Saturday. Totally inadequate. I do know the city has restrictions for race marking on the Greenbelt and city streets.

Smoke weed, talk sh!t like Lane Kiffin wrote:

If not for the 50 States crowd, marathons like Boise or Bismarck would probably have gone belly-up.

I don't think so. If you're trying to get a marathon in ND, you don't run Bismarck, you run Fargo. If you live in Bismarck or close to it and don't want to drive 3 hours to run a road race, you run Bismarck. The numbers in Bismarck from previous years seem pretty typical of small-town marathons (100-150, around 400 in the HM).

Boise is a much larger metro area and can support a viable racing ecosystem on its own. Just because it can, doesn't mean it does or will - it takes knowledgeable and competent RDs, and I don't know the Boise racing scene at all. If you're a 50 stater, I don't know which Idaho marathon is your default choice.

But I quite like Idaho and its citizens. A lot of good people (plus more than its fair share of whackjobs, unfortunately). I've raced a marathon in Idaho and the event was reasonably well done.

The Boise area is religiously mixed (LDS, a large Nazarene community, others). Scheduling a race on Sunday, though, suggests the RD doesn't understand the market.

Flagpole wrote:

Now, I just made another assumption...that a person named "John" couldn't be a woman. Man, what is wrong with me?

You're a arsehole, that's what's wrong with you

You echo my thoughts in many ways. It is not just the participants you need to account for, you need probably a minimum of 50-100 volunteers to do it right. Personally if I was working (now retired), last thing I would do on a Sunday is race or volunteer. I would be relaxing before the work week.

Ghost of Igloi wrote:

I saw one of the small orange arrows on the Boise Greenbelt while out for a run Saturday. Totally inadequate. I do know the city has restrictions for race marking on the Greenbelt and city streets.

I looked up the course and saw it was exclusively on the green belt.

All the cool stuff you could map a course around in boise and all you do is stick it on the green belt

I wonder if they were restricted to the Greenbelt. The last marathon I ran this year had to deviate from their normal course to a Greenbelt. The start and finish were off the Greenbelt, but only by 3-4 blocks.

I live in Boise and I would not touch that marathon. My first clue is the director charging destination prices for a race on our bike path, which means they’re cutting security and permitting costs. Not to mention it probably means they’re expecting to be short on volunteers This is such a great running city, I don’t know why someone hasn’t figured out how to host a fantastic half marathon and marathon with a fast, memorable course. Until then, I’ll do local 5Ks & 10s and run my marathons elsewhere 🤷🏼‍♀️

As a Cincinnati resident I am curious what race this was

Ghost of Igloi wrote:

In one Cincinnati suburb you have to race in a mask and register as Binary It. 😷

As a Cincinnati resident I am curious what race this was.

I was just messing with my friend Flagpole.