Scotiabank Toronto Waterfront Marathon
My first Marathon!
| Length: | 42 km |
| Elevation: | 144 m |
| Route type: | Loop |
| Pavement: | Road |
| How to get there: | The race starts in the city center of Toronto, next to city hall. Public transport is available to get there, so are public garages. |
| How to shorten/extend run: | Shorten: A half marathon option is available, and the course is the same for the first 20 km. So you could decide to cut it short. Extent: Not really an option... as this is the longest distance offered. |
| Water stops: | The organizers did a great job, offering water and an electrolyte drink every 2.5 to 5 km. |
After all the training this year, I was finally ready to run my first Marathon. I had picked the Scotiabank Toronto Marathon for a number of reasons, the top 3 being location, race temperatures and time of year. The official Toronto Marathon is in May, but that didn’t align with my training plan, so I went for the other Marathon in Toronto, the Scotiabank Waterfront Marathon in the fall.
The race was well organized. Packet pickup was located in the convention center, with plenty of room for the expo and areas where one could take pictures. The race itself started and ended right in downtown Toronto, next to City Hall. There were only about four thousand Marathon participants but plenty of half marathon and 5K runners. The course for the marathon and half marathon are the same for the first 20km, while the course for the 5K is totally different. The 5K is a one way course, so the marathon and half marathon participants never actually see the 5K runners during the race.
The marathon course is mostly a loop, with a few sections of out and back sprinkled in. The longest out and back section came after 26km, and stretched for 6km. This section also included a few turns, so as a runner not intimately familiar with the course, I was always hoping that the turns were actually turn around points. Only to be disappointed as I came closer.
The weather ended up perfect for a race, with temperatures around 7C at the start and a bit warmer at the finish. The sun only came out half way through the run, and made it even better.
The race started at 8:45 for the full and half marathon participants, and I was at the finish line slightly after 11:05, for a time of a bit over 3 hours and 22 minutes, not bad for my first marathon.
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