Salt Lake City Marathon Recap

Well marathon #24 is complete.  I didn't run as fast as I wanted due to a couple factors:
1. After my last long run of 23+ miles I came down with a cold and even though I am recovered my nose was running the entire race.
2. The race was at around 4500 feet which is lower altitude than where I live but the elevation map was a bit misleading.  It was very hilly for the first 15 miles and that took the kick out of my legs.  Usually my strongest miles are from 5 - 19 in a marathon I burned out a bit on the hills and my pace slowed substantially.

Overall it is a nice marathon but here are the pros and cons of the race itself:

Pros
1. Nice course in that it goes throughout the city so you see all different parts
2. Lots of well stocked water stations
3. Nice finish in that you can see it from a long way off (I like being able to kick it up at the end when I can see the finish line).
4. Easy to get to in that you can fly in, stay at the sponsor hotel and walk to the expo and take a bus to the start line.  The hotel was only a few blocks from the finish.
5. Nice tech race shirt and medal


Cons
1. The beer at the finish line was Miller Lite (that is just wrong!).
2. They appeared a bit disorganized as far as confirming your entry with the active.com website.  I had to e-mail them to get my confirmation number.
3. They didn't have much food at the finish.  This is a huge half marathon race also so maybe they got most of it before us marathoners finished.


That is about it, now I start training for a couple 10k races I will be running in May.