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ING New York City Marathon 2008/2009
The New York City Marathon is the place to be if you want to be part of something
big. First of all, it’s New York City – and you get to see a lot of it as the course
passes through all five boroughs and shows off some fabulous skyline view along
the way. Moreover, the New York City Marathon is the largest of all marathons in the world.
And of course, this legendary race is an indispensable part of the
World Marathon
Majors series. The World Marathon Majors consist, apart from New York Marathon,
of the city marathons in Chicago, Boston, Berlin and London, and of
the World Championships and Olympic Games marathons, in years when these occur.
The elite runners in these races earn points according to their placing, and when
the winners of the World Marathon Majors
are found, the male and female winner will split a prize of 1 million dollars between
them. The first time this happened was after the NYC Marathon 2007, which concluded
the very first World Marathon Majors competition. The happy winners were Robert K.
Cheruiyot (Kenya) and Gete Wami (Ethiopia). Cheruiyot ran the other participating
races so convincingly that he didn't even have to run New York in order to nail the WMM prize.
The first New York Marathon, which was held in 1970,
looped several times through Central Park, and out of 127 entrants, 55 crossed the
finish line. Since then, the race has grown more and more interesting to runners
worldwide, and now the unique course, the energetic atmosphere and the unbeatable bragging-potential
attract more than 90,000 applicants every year. But thousands of these end up disappointed
as the race has a limit of 38,000 participants. Most of the field is made up of
lucky runners selected in the random lottery drawing. However, you can attain guaranteed
entry if you meet certain qualifying times, have been denied access the last three
years or register through a charity program.
ING New York City Marathon is renowned for its enthusiastic and extremely plentiful
crowds of spectators. Despite the enormousness of the city, the first Sunday of
November is always ‘Marathon Sunday’, and 2 million New Yorkers leave their Sunday
doings and head out to cheer the runners, listen to the 100 live bands and suck
in the ebullient atmosphere. The hailing onlookers line the whole course from the
start on Staten Island, over Verazano-Narrows Bridge to the sound of Frank Sinatra
singing ‘New York, New York’ and into Brooklyn and Queens. Then the route goes over
Queensboro Bridge for a roundtrip on Manhattan and a short stop in the Bronx before
reaching the finish outside the famous restaurant Tavern on the Green in Central
Park. Along the way, runners will witness the cultural diversity of New York’s neighbourhoods
and pass five more or less famous New York bridges. The marathon course makes up
a great sightseeing tour and runs through parts of the city that many tourists
would otherwise never have seen. The bridges on the route provide superb views but
also add some inclines to the course. The Verazano marks the highest point with
just over 80 metres/250 feet, but this bridge is right at the beginning, when energy
is still intact and the field is probably too crowded to get some speed going, anyway.
Queensboro Bridge after 24 kilometres is also known to be pulling some teeth, as
well as the final and rather hilly 4-5 km in Central Park.
The next New York City Marathon will take place on Sunday November 1, 2009. Read much more about registration, guaranteed entry and other necessities
here.
ING New York City Marathon Course
In order to get a good view of the ING New York City Marathon course and
plan your victory over the five bridges, please refer to the official website by following the link above.
More info on next page:
New York City Marathon 2008 Results, Photos and Videos