I ran my 3rd and final race for 2014 in Philadelphia. I grew up outside of Philadelphia, so I looked forward to returning to my roots and seeing some familiar areas.

My friend and I drove up from Virginia and went to straight to the Philadelphia expo.  After figuring out the parking, we finally made it to the expo.  Once we got there, we found out that they ran out of the technical shirts (the shirt that is supposed to be included with registration)! I am still waiting for that to be delivered!

We arrived early race morning. However, parking was a real problem and took a while to find a parking spot due to road closures. Once we arrived, we waited in the port-a-john lines, which were fairly long. We barely had enough time to get to the corral, but others probably did not make it because the lines were still pretty long.

The runners for both the full and half marathon distances started the race together. The crowds were good. I heard there were around 60,000 spectators. However, Chicago had many more – 1 million spectators. And it was obvious by how loud the crowds were at Chicago. The Philly crowds seemed pretty tame compared to Chicago.

The runners were bunched up for much of the course for the half marathon. Eventually the half and full marathon runners split as the half marathoners finish while the full marathon runners continue on. I think that mentally that must have been tough for the full marathon runners.

All in all, I enjoyed the race and would run it again. But Chicago is still the best race atmosphere I’ve experienced.

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars