2023 Sydney Marathon review

While I typically like to blog in chronological order about my travels related to my marathoning, I wanted to post about my Sydney Marathon experience while it was still fresh, now that I've recovered from the return trip, prior to giving a travelogue about my time in New Zealand (which was truly wonderful).

I arrived in Sydney in the early evening of Friday, Sept 15. I was staying in Chinatown, and the place was HOPPING -- incredibly busy. Hell, I kinda felt like I was in New York City, to be honest. It was late enough, though, that all I did after checking in was get some dinner and return back to the hotel.

After a leisurely wake-up and breakfast on Saturday, I made my way to the expo to get my bib. It was a nice long walk to get to the shuttle bus stop from where I was staying, and then a reasonably quick drive to The Venue. Apparently, the location of the expo was changed to this supposedly larger spot because of the large increase in number of attendees. (After all, there were 17k entrants just for the marathon itself, and a total of nearly 42k between that, the half marathon, and the 10k.) When we arrived, there was no visible signage from the drop-off point as to precisely which way to go, nor anyone outside pointing the way. I wound up turning the wrong way, and quickly recognized the error and doubled back. Alas, others on the bus thought I knew where I was going, and they had followed me the wrong way.

Having gotten to the right spot, it was very quick in terms of getting inside, going to one of the spots where they were checking us in for bib pick-up, and getting my bib. All I needed to do was present the e-mail with the QR code on it -- I didn't need to provide any semblance of ID, which seems very lax.

Just past that area, there were a couple of computer stations where you could wave your bib over a sensor to verify the chip worked properly -- mine did. And beyond that, there was very little. Beyond the Asics race merchandise store, it seemed like there were maybe a dozen vendors total. It was a very small space, so I can't imagine what the prior venue looked like. There was no participant shirt at all (what hadn't clicked for me previously was the fact that the shirts they give out are finisher shirts, essentially with the finisher medals), and the "stage" was where Scholl's was hawking their wares -- unclear if they had any non-vendor programming at all. So, in and out in less than five minutes. It took me longer to walk to or from the shuttle stop. The rest of the day, I didn't really do much, so as to save my legs for the race.

Finally race day arrived! I got out plenty early and walked up to the Town Hall train station, to take the subway two stops north to get to Milson Point, where the race starts. I knew from prior communications that their transportation was free to all participants on race day, so never bought any pass. When I got to the station, there was no obvious way of getting in without payment -- there was no one who worked for the train line nor for the race holding open a gate nor pointing us to where we needed to go, nor any signage advising us what to do. How to get in? Someone who had already gotten inside pointed us down the hall to a different set of gates where they are low and separate enough where you can shimmy through the closed gate. It felt totally wrong "fare-hopping" like that without having someone officially give us that green light. Down to the platform and the eventually pack train, once it arrived. Two stops later, and we were at our destination, very slowly making our way of the crazy-packed platform and down the staircase. Again, there was no one there assisting those of us who didn't have a regular pass get out, but there was a gate that someone had pushed open that the rest of us kept flowing through and holding for those behind us. Very poor organization.

Finally outside the station, I followed the stream of lemmings and electronic signs pointing us towards the water's edge, where we had a pre-dawn view of both the Sydney Harbour Bridge (which we were soon to run over) and the Sydney Opera House (our finish line).

                        

Those sights never get old. I actually managed to get a selfie with both of them.

And, yes, as is quite evident, I was NOT dressed in my costume to make a GWR attempt - it was starting out too warm (low 60s) and going to climb to at least 75 by the time I was planning on finishing. With three extra layers of clothing that I would be wearing, that would have been untenable, unbearable, and downright dangerous to try.

So, following the signage got me to this point, and there was no real good indication as to where the corral was going to be. After I checked my bag (which only contained my selfie stick, which I had determined I wouldn't be able to run with and manage the water bottles that I can), I asked one of the volunteers if the one marked area was the only way to get to the corrals. Apparently, yes. (Though that turned out to not be correct.) People were lining up there for the 10k and it was IMMENSELY crowded, so I didn't go down it. After availing my self of the porta-potty, I meandered, trying to figure out what the deal was. The signs sucked, so I didn't know that there was anything else for the starting area. (Sure, we had been sent the map previously, but it didn't really mean anything to me at the time, and I wasn't about to try to re-find it and match up with my surroundings. They should have sufficient signs pointing the way, but they were nonexistent.)

I finally stumbled onto a clearing closer up the street towards the train station where I emerged, and lo and behold, found various tents, some static print signage (that was not visible from the street we were coming down), a decent number of people milling about, and the A and B start corrals (where the one I had pointed out earlier was the C corral). Announcements were being made for the 10k, which was the first race to be started? (What the hell? Why are they sending off the runners for the shortest race first, as opposed to those who will have the most time battling the highest heat of the day -- the marathoners? This made no sense.) Very poorly organized, there were dozens, if not hundreds, of people running the 10k who had no clue where to go and, despite the continued announcements of getting into the corrals to get underway, likely eventually were not permitted to run, since they missed the final cutoff for their start. I never heard any announcement for the half marathon, though the impression I eventually got was that they had a separate start from the marathon -- a bit earlier than ours. The marathon finally kicked off without a hitch at 7:10am.

After going up a couple of brief hills and making several turns, we were onto and across the Sydney Harbour Bridge, and off to deal with the ordeal of the rest of the course. There were very few times along the course where I had any clue where I was. There was SO much of it that was out-and-back along the side of parks (maybe through some of them - who could tell), and every single time it was a psychological toll, because we ran DOWN hill before returning up the very same hill. 

The water stops left much to be desired:

1) The first stop, ostensibly at 2.5km, wasn't there. They totally didn't have it set up. That didn't bode well for a very hot day.

2) Many of the stations were a decent bit off the mark distance-wise from what was expected -- anywhere from 500m to a full km late. On such a hot day, this was a vital detail to get a bit closer.

3) The order of what was being provided (electrolyte and water) was inconsistent from stop to stop. Regardless of the order, make it one order at EVERY stop so people know when to shift over and get  their cups -- it makes the traffic flow, hustle and bustle much easier to manage.

4) The water cups were filled to the brim -- an enormous waste of water. They should really only be about half-filled, to make it easier to drink from (for those who do), and not splash out of the cup prematurely for those of us who are using the water simply to douse ourselves to keep cool.

5) While some of the early water stops had people handing out the cups, many of the later ones didn't. They could barely keep up with putting out cups on the table, and far to the back side (where they were standing). Another reason why the cups should have only been half full -- less time to pour the water for the number of cups needed.

A small number of times, there was something that caught my eye enough to make sure I stopped to take the photo. The first of these was at 14km.

Shame the closest I came to seeing an ostrich during this trip was this sign I passed in one of the parks. I can't exactly blame that on the race.

In addition to the course having far to many out-and-back portions and too many hills, a huge portion of it was very narrow. If I recall correctly, the pack didn't seem to thin out until about 8 miles in. The streets never really opened up, mostly because they had one direction occupied for the "out" portion, and the other direction occupied for the "and back" portion, so there were few times where we had the entire width of the roadway for one direction of running.

After a grueling 3:54:48, I finally crossed the finish line. Definitely a glorious finish line at the Opera House.

After collecting my medal and finisher's shirt, I went in search of post-race refreshment, my checked bag, and the recovery area. Given the park we were at, we were pointed in two directions simultaneously for the same things (since the path was a loop). I chose to go to the left, and quickly got a bottle of water, a cup of electrolyte, and a banana. (Kinda surprised they even had any bananas, as there were absolutely none on the course.) There was nothing else for refreshments provided by the race. What the heck?  While I certainly don't expect a smorgasbord, it's not too much to expect to have some sort of chips/pretzels/bread product, and some sort of protein product (be it a protein bar, boxed chocolate milk, or protein drink) to go with these. Nope! 

I got my bag -- very efficient set-up for that. Granted, had it been a rainy day, the open-air set-up for all the bags would have been less than ideal. But it took less than a minute from my getting to the area to have my bag, despite the warning that race-day check-in might not have their bags quickly upon getting to the finish.

I finally made my way to the recovery area. Mercifully, it was only a few minutes on line before a table opened up for me to get a brief massage. Once that was one, it was over to the area where they had Normatec boots. The batteries were mostly drained, so they had fewer devices for inflating the boots than they had sets of boots. C'est la vie. I was done running, and enjoying a chat with a Frenchman who was also waiting to get a pair of the Normatecs.

At that point, it was off I went to walk back to the hotel, shower, change, and begin my recovery. (I made sure to get a meat pie and Gatorade at my earliest possibility to get SOMETHING into my system, as I had no food back in the hotel room.)

One last thing that was remarkable (and not in a good way) was how low-key the spectators were. Is this just because of who Aussies are, or because there were literally ZERO banners advertising the race anywhere in the city, apart from on any physical barriers along the course itself. There were many volunteers who were holding up a few pre-printed signs. Very infrequently were there any cheers whatsoever from anyone, at least to any appreciable and recognizable extent, until we got to the final turn at the finish line. When I finally made my way out of the recovery zone and started my walk back, as I am wont to do when my return route can coincide with the racecourse, I walked along the course, clapping as loudly as possible and shouting out encouragements. Absolutely no one else sitting or standing nearby (even those clearly watching the race) joined in. Just a typical loud American being loud. The runners clearly appreciated the encouragement during their last km of the race, but no one else said boo. And once I veered off course to walk the rest of the way to my hotel, I was amazed that, despite my wearing the medal, not a single person gave any "congrats" while walking past. In so many other cities, that abounds. But in Sydney, no one acknowledged it at all. Did they even know that the race was happening if they weren't trying to drive anywhere near the closed off roads?

As much as I've loved Sydney during my two prior vacations down to Australia are concerned, in the context of marathons and the Abbott World Marathon Majors, Sydney is certainly not on par with what I think is needed to become a major. It needs vast improvements in many areas before it should be given that status. Hopefully they will incorporate the feedback they get from many of the racers this year and improve the experience for next year's participants.

While the finisher video is no great shakes, I can't complain too much about getting a free video of my marathon: