Jacksonville Bank Marathon
Jacksonville, Florida
Sunday, December 21, 2008

Sunday, December 21, 2008 was a nice day to race-walk the Jacksonville Bank Marathon in Jacksonville Florida. The race started at 7:00 AM with a temperature of 58 degrees, a gentle breezy, and overcast skies. The course is as flat as any course and has enthusiastic volunteers maintaining the water/Powerade stations which were located every two miles and numerous police controlling traffic at the intersections. Many of the roads are open to traffic and most drivers yielded to the competitors. The sun began breaking through the clouds after 10:00 AM and it became noticably hot. The only thing I did not like was that after 4.5 hours, I was forced to the sidewalks to finish the race as the roads were openned only to traffic. This did not seem fair as the race course was supposed to be open for 6 hours and caused my time to be at least 5 minutes slower. I finished under 5 hours and 30 minutes nevertheless.