scrumhalfgirl wrote:My guess from knowing the course is that people made a mistake at the turn off unrelated to heat.
Gimp wrote:I was working just past the finish line and had 2 or 3 marathoners cross the line and ask me where the rest of their course was. The first guy crossed at 3 hours (10am), so not at all impacted by the later decision to shut off 10K. I was wondering whether some folks got confused with the merging and followed the wrong crowd? Especially, with the start time being moved, there may have been more marathoners and halfers mingling and therefore more chance for creating confusion.
I have never seen so many people being transported from the finish line by the medics, nor seen so many people absolutely "glowing" as they shuffled past. Tough day for all concerned and even more for those who were out there past 10.30 or so when the sun came out.
Good points - most seasoned runners would prepare themselves enough ahead of time to know how to follow course markers for the race they're running. In this case, the last-minute decision to start the Half 45 minutes earlier meant that the marathoner/half-marathoners were on the course at the same time a lot sooner, so those turn-offs that are only applicable to one course could get confusing if people are just blindly following the runners in front of them.
scrumhalfgirl wrote:That being said - I think we forget about the crowd we deal with on here who are pretty well prepared for races, understand the logistics etc. My DH had a former colleague who had wanted to run the full, but hadn't trained enough so signed up for the half. She started with the half, but at the split around 17 km, decided she felt good and took the marathon cut off to "run the marathon instead". Well, the 17k mark for the half is actually the 24 or 25 k mark for the marathon because they make up more distance in the first half. So she's bragging all over FB about running the marathon, when she really ran a 30 ish k run with a half marathon bib!
Nothing surprises me anymore...