Tuesday, February 16, 2010

Myrtle Beach Fiasco

Zac had prepared and trained for the Myrtle Beach BiLo Half Marathon, and he was one of about 6000 people who had each paid between $60 and $100 to enter the Half Marathon and the Marathon.

The weather reports said there would be snow moving through the Myrtle Beach area on Friday evening. We worried and waited and kept wondering whether to drive the 4 hours down. Finally, we went.

We had to drive through some pretty thick blowing snow for more than an hour of the drive. We got to our hotel, with Adam's and Isaac's families, and then the 10:00 news came on and said that both marathons were cancelled. The race organizers wanted to hold it, but the city of Myrtle Beach said no. We were bummed!

Saturday morning Zac slept in (the race was supposed to start at 7 am). The snow had stopped, the roads were clear, and the sun was out. By the time several of us went various places, we saw runners everywhere. Many of those 6000 people were running the marathon anyway.

The website said that everyone that entered could go to a certain location and pick up their medals. So Wayne went and got the medal for Zac. It is a beautiful medal, but pretty meaningless.

I am very angry at the town of Myrtle Beach. They should have postponed the race until 9 am, not cancelled it. The whole thing makes me want to hit somebody.

1 comment:

  1. Amy, you have to remember that they completely close down several of the major roads for these races. The reason why they are so early in the morning is because not that many people are out and about yet, and so it doesn't disrupt things as much. If they had delayed until 9 am, and you were just a regular person at Myrtle Beach who wanted to go somewhere and couldn't get there, you would be mad about that too. Not only do they block the roads, but each road is blocked for a long time (I'm guessing about 4 hrs.)

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