Results of the Cork City Marathon & Relay - Mon 2nd June 2008
The sun held off long enough today so that the Marathon was a small bit cooler than the event last year. The fog at the start was very welcome and even though it looked like it might get too sunny, the clouds rolled in again.......for a while anyway ;o)
So far, it looks as if they got about 1,300 finishers.

Congratulations to Roy Fahy on winning the event, it's great to have someone local winning the event again. I don't know about you but I'd prefer to see the Cork City Marathon remain as it is with modest entry fees for entries and the winners getting modest prizes. Contrast that with the Dublin Marathon where someone just flies in for the event, wins it and flies off again with cheque in hand. The vast majority of Marathon runners enter for personal reasons, not for prizes. It's something all race organisers could keep in mind, big prizes do not equal big entries.

Quick review...
Water stations.....I thought these were very good. Plenty of volunteers, I saw plenty of bottles of water, even bottles of Gatorade which was not advertised. I did however think that the bottles at the 2 and 3 mile mark were a complete waste. The road was covered with nearly full bottles where people had just taken a quick drink and got rid of the bottle. Surely, all of these bottles would have had more of an impact around the 15 mile mark where they were giving out cups of water instead? As for the Gatorade in the cup....I did'nt even try it. It's impossible to drink from a cup while you are running. I managed to pick up 2 bottles of Gatorade which I could drink from. The last one was at 22 miles which is really a bit too late. I could see plenty of discarded nearly full Gatorade bottles around 22 miles while I'm sure that there were plenty of people around the 13 mile mark who would have loved to get one.
Well, that was my experience of the water stations but then again, I finished in 60th position and probably had nearly first choice of a lot of what was on offer. What about those at the rear of the field? How did they get on?
Leave a comment and let us know.

Traffic...
It seemed to me anyway to be very good. The traffic on the Model Farm road was very light. Was it worse later?

Relay Event...
There seemed to be a mighty buzz as I went through each relay changeover point. Did you do the relay event? What did you think of it???

Overall...
I got the impression that it was a very successful event. So, what did everyone else think of the Marathon yesterday? Click on the comment button at the bottom of this post and leave your comment.

Results...
Anyway, on to the results. Excellent work by the way by the organisers in getting them up so fast. By the way, the results have now been updated to show your half way split!
The link for the Marathon results is HERE.
The link for the Relay event is HERE.
A summary of the Marathon results i.e. category winners is available HERE.

There is a report by the Irish Examiner HERE.

Photos...
As I find any photos, I'll put the links up here. If anyone has photos of the event and has no place to put them on the net, send me an e-mail and I can put them up. Full credits of course to the person who took the photos. My e-mail address is shown near the bottom of the right hand column.

There is a set of 64 photos available on this website...http://www.flickr.com/photos/docaoimh/sets/72157605386948410/

Over 150 photos are now up on the Eagle AC website.....http://www.eagleac.net/component/option,com_gallery2/Itemid,86/?g2_itemId=13485

Paudie Birmingham of Mallow AC has a gallery of 205 pictures up on his gallery. They can be found at http://picasaweb.google.co.uk/padraicbirmingham/CorkMarathon2008

Because of memory constraints, he had to reduce the quality of the pictures so if anybody wants the original quality picture, they can just e-mail me with the web address or number of the picture they want and I’ll send your details on to Paudie.

ASI Photo now have photos up on their website. Just enter your surname or bib number.The link is http://asiphoto.net/recent_events+M5b7bae03553.html

Comments..."Hi John. This was my second marathon ( both Cork) and as such have nothing to compare it with but I thought it was a great success. I mostly agree with your points about the water stops but i suppose they are trying to cater for the inexperienced relay runners i.e. the water at 2/3 mile mark is half way in some peoples entire race!! Same at 23 miles. I think the relay is great because the course would be a lot more lonely in lots of places without all the extra bodies and the extra support they bring with them. OK some of them seem to have no consideration whatsoever for the people slogging out the 26+ miles but the positives far outweigh the negatives I think. I find the course tough with all the drags (dont know how it compares to others). Tried a different approach this year by trying to hold back in the early stages(not easy) but still hit a very big wall with 1.5 miles to go(had to stop for about 90 secs). I went too fast last year and really struggled from 17 miles to finish (lots of stopping). Ended up beating last years time by a few mins but find it interesting that 2 totally different runs brought such similar results!!.......Cheers AJ"
"Hey John, I agree with all your comments on the race. It was well organised and the relays helped make the run more fun. Agree with the bottled water situation - would be much better to have them more spread out and more towards the middle/end of the race. Personally, I really dislike the gatorade taste and would have much preferred Club Energiser/Lucozade Sport but I guess Gatorade were the company putting up the bobs! Course wasn't as bad as I expected (I ran Newry last week and thought that was much tougher). Finally, thanks for the detailed previews of the individual relay stages during last week - They were most useful!........John C"
"John, thank you for the updates over the last weeks. I just completed my first marathon in 4 hrs 30 and I’m now looking for a good club to join in the Cork area. I'm in my 20's and would like to get into a club that has younger members. I was wondering if you or anyone reading the blog had any suggestions..........Anonymous"
"Well done on your first Marathon!! As for a club, have a look at the list on this website...http://www.corkathletics.org/Clubs.htm Have a look around first, see what it costs to join, go to some of the non-BHAA races that will be previewed on this blog here and see what the other clubs are up to. Talk to them and see which one suits your needs. Remember, you do not need to be a member of a club to run in the local races........John Desmond"
"Hi John, This was my first marathon and loved it. I did find the water situation strange, people were taking a two sips from 500ml bottles and chucking them away. I think next year they should use 250ml bottles as so much was wasted. I found from mile 17 on a sheer slog, I used Model Farm Road on training runs but nothing really compares to hitting it so late in a marathon. Any ideas on if they would consider changing the course so it's hit earlier? Keep up the great blog........Sean O'Mahony"
"Sean...I doubt if they will change the route. One priority that they have is to get all of the runners through the tunnel early so that they can open it for traffic again. And, no matter where the route goes around Cork, it's hard to avoid the hills. Well done on the Marathon by the way, sub 4hr is excellent......John Desmond"
"I thought it was a very well organised event - it catered for all abilities and distances. On the water front I had a race strategy and I knew where and when I'd need water or energy drinks. I thought it was a bit short sighted of people to take a few sips and then fling the bottle away - I only saw one other runner (a guy who came in at 3:29 and passed me at the Lough) fully re-load with bottles etc between the water stations. I had a few energy drinks in hedges at miles 16, 20 & 25 (the last one was only in case I had completely blown up! - in the end I didn't need it). I did this because I hadn't trained with gatorade. I use Nuun electrolyte tablets as well. I used the sponge at mile 13 until the end to keep myself cool with the cups of water. This all resulted in not hitting the wall and a PB by 25 mins (3:35 finish). That said, I ran closer to my potential in this marathon than the last one where I had a completely novice approach to hydration and the real race from miles 20 - 26.2! As was said earlier, the review of the route last week was excellent. Great job! - and a great run yourself............Richard"
"Hi John, let's put our hands together for everybody involved in bringing the marathon to cork. Special thanks to the BHAA, AAI, cork city council, all the sponsors, the Garda and the medics and the people of this beautiful City.
There are some things that need tweaking but that is up to us seasoned runners to suggest these changes. There was plenty of fluid stations and I guess that the organizers deem it necessary to have these in place considering it been a Summer marathon. I would like to get a cup of tea in the City hall after the race like we do with the BHAA races. Runners could relax after the race and have a chat etc. Finally, Thanks to you for your pre-race info and in particular to the local races. Roll on Grandons......Anonymous"
"Very true, have to agree 100% with you. Other than a few quibbles about water stations, the event was very well organised. And what about all those volunteers doing the stewarding and giving out the water at the many stations?? Some of them were probably there most of the day. Brilliant. A really great event for Cork City. It would be great to see bigger numbers attending next year. Just as a reminder, this LINK shows who were the sponsors behind the Cork City Marathon.......John Desmond"
"Hi,There's a thread going on the Cork marathon at:http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055301195. Really enjoyed it and PBed so delighted! Regards..........Mick "
Hi John, Just wondering do you think an official batch of photos will be published in Marathon-Photos.com This link is up on the results page but it doesn't seem to have the Cork Marathon as one of its chosen events. I thought the event was fantastic. Well done to all the organisers. I wish they would remove the County Hall though for next year. Just for one day!! Well done yourself with a great time. You will beat 3hrs next year.........Anonymous
"I don't think there will be any photos on that particular website but they should be up on another one soon, same as last year. I guess they need to set up their database of photos with the various bib numbers present in each shot.........John Desmond"
"Full photo set available now on asiphoto.net They are a bit steep though whether you want individual photos or a full set. 60 quid for the latter! ..........Mick"
"The professional photos are now out. Go to this link http://asiphoto.net/recent_events+M5b7bae03553.html . Thanks to Mick and the anonymous poster for the tip off..........John Desmond"