Wednesday, January 18, 2012

Mississippi Blues Marathon / Half Marathon

Saturday, January 7; Sweet Pea and I earned finisher's medals.

Ten (10) porta potties at the start. Still long lines when the race began. There were ten more beyond the start, but we were unable to find them before the race.

THE HALF MARATHON COURSE

Gated communities and boarded communities

Some marathons begin and end at the capitol building, but Mississippi's magnificent capitol was visible from the race course.. only in the far distance. (dome near the center of the picture)

Access roads, entrance ramps, exit ramps... who knows? Plenty of exhaust to inhale, and usually sharing the road with traffic



Typical residential communities? Abandoned buildings, burned out houses, boarded up homes.
Were the city leaders hoping for donations? Why did they not allow the race course to explore more parks, historic buildings, etc.?




GOOD NEWS

Best marked course we have run: many good signs and a thousand orange cones!

Water stops were fabulous.

Orange shirts... volunteers! ... were everywhere. There was never a question of which way to go at any corner.

Post race food was outstanding. The party was a PARTY!

3 comments:

LesleyM said...

I enjoyed seeing the day go from dreary to sunny in your pictures!

Anne said...

Sounds like this was one very well organized and run race. You don't hear that as much about marathons anymore. Mississippi Blues must be doing something right.

(And sorry I missed you while you were down here in San Diego!)

Beth said...

That's too bad that they didn't pick a course that showed off the town. I wonder why? I'm glad that the race organization was good and the volunteers were plentiful. Looks like you guys had a good time!