Lincoln (Half) Marathon

The support from the spectators is awesome.And it seems to be growing,just like the participants.Was my eleventh Lincoln,going for an even dozen next year.

 
I've run it twice, and really enjoyed it. Maybe I'll get back again next year, depending on how I bounce back from a torn ACL. I'm also running Boston, but I think they are 3 weeks apart again next year, so I might try both.

 
The half is a great event. I've run it once, last year, out here in CA but I don't plan on doing it again for a while. I like that it's a pretty taxing race without the total craziness of a full. That just seems like a monster of an endurance test and it requires a lot of dedicated training.

This looks like a good event and a pretty nice average time. 4381 women to 2387 men, wow! I feel like the ratio when I ran it was more even but I could be wrong.

 
I will admit that there were some good "sights". The 20-30 year old female age group was well represented!!!

An article out tonight claims they estimate that they turned 4,000 runners down. It also mentioned that they are looking at uping the limit to 15,000 next year. If true, would mean the race would nearly double in a span of two years....quite impressive.

 
Nobody gets "turned down". Once the race fills, they turn just off registration, so they have no idea whether I wanted to get in after it closed. They wouldn't know the potential size unless they do some kind of lottery like NYC where they keep registration open and then later select who gets in and who doesn't. Certainly there is a lot more demand than they let in, and the directors may have some way to guess that 4000 is that number, but it's not by counting the number that they turned down.

The main thing holding them back on size is the highway 2 bike path. I guess they are looking to widen it. I don't see why they just can't get a lane of highway 2 closed from 7-9. I'd like to see them increase by 2K at a time as the LJS article says they are considering. You need to see where things like the expo, aid station, whatever get stressed with a larger size rather than completely break it with a big increase.

http://journalstar.com/lifestyles/health-med-fit/marathon/marathon-may-expand-field-next-year/article_5f3ff35f-29e7-5588-877f-192db984f553.html is a lot better article on the topic than the OWH article.

 
VA Husker Fan said:
The main thing holding them back on size is the highway 2 bike path. I guess they are looking to widen it. I don't see why they just can't get a lane of highway 2 closed from 7-9.
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That's weird that they don't do that. They've shut down half of downtown for this thing before. I wonder why they wouldn't give up a lane on HWY 2?

 
knapplc said:
VA Husker Fan said:
The main thing holding them back on size is the highway 2 bike path. I guess they are looking to widen it. I don't see why they just can't get a lane of highway 2 closed from 7-9.
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That's weird that they don't do that. They've shut down half of downtown for this thing before. I wonder why they wouldn't give up a lane on HWY 2?
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My only guess is that it's probably a lot harder to get a permit for a US highway. I was thinking that a lot of races are on highway, but nearly all I've run are on state roads. But the New York marathon uses the Verrazano Bridge, which is interstate, and I think Marine Corps in Washington uses an interstate bridge over the Potomac too, so it's not impossible.

 
VA Husker Fan said:
Nobody gets "turned down". Once the race fills, they turn just off registration, so they have no idea whether I wanted to get in after it closed.
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Well the truth of the matter is that registration was full by the 1st of the year. Last year, I registered well into Feburary. I understand there won't be a hard number, but I believe a few more wanted to run.

While on the subject of expansion.....

1. The expo was a NIGHTMARE! Not sure if it was just when I was there (5 PM on Sat), but there was a billizion (not actual number) people there. It will be something that will need to be altered in the future if the event is to grow.

2. HWY 2-I have always wondered why they can't use it, but it makes sense given the possible reasons above. The trail at times can be very crowded. I heard a lot of complaints from people in the 2:00 hr time frame finishers. The problem was that some people over-estimated their fitness, went out to hard, and by mile 7 were walking. On the trail they would run into people who would be running at a 9-10 Mile pace---you can't run 4 abreast on that trail very easily. I've wondered if they could use the residental neighborhood north of HWY 2 to cut across to the West? Just a thought.

 
They could eliminate Hwy 2 from the route entirely if they kept the runners on Calvert and went east to 56th, down to Pioneers and then back over to 20th. It seems like something easily done.

Also, the LJS article today says they're thinking about expanding the field. That's good.

 
husker_hurdler said:
I will admit that there were some good "sights". The 20-30 year old female age group was well represented!!!

An article out tonight claims they estimate that they turned 4,000 runners down. It also mentioned that they are looking at uping the limit to 15,000 next year. If true, would mean the race would nearly double in a span of two years....quite impressive.
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:lol:

The Lincoln race was a lot bigger than what we had here last year. I looked up the results and we had 1418 F, 1055 M, so I wasn't totally crazy abotu the ratio being really different. You guys also outgunned us in the average time department - by nearly 9 minutes! we had 2:28 as the overall average. All that California speed is overrated, there are some faast people in Big 10 country.

 
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Oh I have no doubt whatsoever that demand is considerably higher than the cap they have on the race. It's got a decent reputation in the running community, not just locally. The OWH article is just poorly written in that it claims people were turned away, and talks about the jump to 15,000 with no mention that the director seems to be leaning towards bumping it up more slowly.

 
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