The Finish Line - All Comments

re: What's doing at the Expo

LarryZ — Fri, 01 May 2009 21:12:59 GMT

If marathon officials know that the timing strip device is easily susceptible to damage and may not record a runner's time - a runner who has trained for months and months - why oh why Lord Jesus Christ are they using it ????

I sense that this marathon is going to be a disorganized mess.

FYI, the Great Race in 2008 used the same exact timing strip device and guess what? Mine did not work and did not record my finish time.

My calls to race officials about this have still not been returned.

re: There will be hills (but you knew that)

c-bus exile — Fri, 17 Apr 2009 15:48:11 GMT

I looked at the profile back in October and knew it would require some preparation, but not nearly as much as it could. Living in Ohio, it isn't exactly easy to find hills but they are around. I have a few near my house and I've made it a point to get at least one of them into my route even on easy days. I've also used the treadmill extensively to do hill intervals and sets of hills with the incline as high as 7%. Finally, I've done two of my long runs over the hilliest places I could find. One run in south east Ohio was 22 miles of long steep climbs and descents.

I'm most worried about the downhill to the finish. I've cramped up towards the end of previous marathons and I don't like to imagine that combined with the extra downhill pounding!

re: Newbies at Pittsburgh?

PghRunner — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 20:18:13 GMT

c-bus..the hills aren't bad (even the big 150' Forbes Ave incline is over pretty quickly). There are some small grades that last longer than you'd think & sorta sneak up on you, but no monsters. Good luck!

re: Newbies at Pittsburgh?

c-bus exile — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 16:07:32 GMT

Anybody have any insight on how the hills effect the course. I have the elevation chart sitting in front of me. I can see the big climb from mile 11 to 13.5. That looks like about 150 feet which averages out to a 1% grade. But there are lots of small bumps on the profile that could be shorter steeper hills.

Are there any monsters out there to plan for?

re: Newbies at Pittsburgh?

Beagles Rock — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 16:00:40 GMT

As the wife of an experienced runner, I can attest to the practice of not eating anything 'new'. My husand also practices 'safe food' for about a week before a big race -nothing too spicy or rich. He does the traditional carbo-loading the night before and gets to bed early.

re: Welcome back, Pittsburgh Marathon!

c-bus exile — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 11:33:11 GMT

Cool, a place to blog about the Marathon.

I've been waiting for this race to come back for years. I just started marathoning a few years ago, and really wanted Pittsburgh to come back. When they opened registration I was one of the first 50 people.

I'm really looking forward to finding out how runners and spectators are attacking the course.