Revel Rockies Marathon Recap - Marathon #26

This was the inaugural Revel Rockies held west of Denver in the foothills of the Rockies.  The Revel series (http://www.runrevel.com/) are all races that go downhill and they have races in in California, Utah and now Colorado.  The Rockies version of the marathon goes downhill almost 5,000 feet in altitude from start to finish.  This is supposed to make for some fast times and many people traveled here from out of town in the hopes of qualifying for Boston, unfortunately many of them I met did not.  There are several reasons why this should not be considered an easy race:
- The race starts above 10,000 feet in order to have that much downhill.  The effected many people from out of town, I didn't really notice it mostly because I live here.
- You don't run straight downhill but have lots of twists and turns and that takes a heavy toll on your feet and legs.
- The marathon started at 6 A.M. but it is summer here and we had no cloud cover so the last 6 miles had little if any shade and it got a bit warm.

I finished this one over 10 minutes faster than my last marathon which I was fine with but I passed a number of people (most from out of town) who were disappointed in how they did.  Running downhill is more of a leg muscle workout than cardio (IMO) and if you didn't train for it or have good legs you were hurting.  I ended up passing a number of people who were shooting for faster times than me.  There were a number of the Marathon Maniacs in particular who were impacted by the altitude and the twisting, turning roads.

Pros
- Nice shirt and medal and well organized, this organization knows how to put on a race.
- Good logistics, you parked in lots near the finish and they bussed you up to the start.  You have to get started very early to be ready at 6 so the buses started at 3:15.
- They had very good beer at the finish from Upslope Brewing Company.
- Iced towels at the end really came in handy.
- The scenery in the first 15 miles is incredible.

Cons
- The expo was held at a completely out of the way small warehouse in North Denver.  I didn't expect many vendors (and there weren't) but the location was awful.
- They had a hard time finding pacers and many had just completed ultra races so they were erratic.  I wanted to stay between the 3:35 and 3:40 and lost them at the first aid station.  I didn't see one of them again until I was at 20+ miles.  I ended up holding a pace sign for a bit while a replacement for the original pacer needed to get a GU packet and some water.
- I think they would have much faster times overall if they pushed this race back a month because summer is no time to run a marathon out here.

Overall I would recommend this race but you do have to train for it by doing some downhill running.