I have heard about the Ottawa marathon many times since I moved to Montreal, often as “there is much bigger atmosphere than in Montreal”, “it’s a cool race” usually followed by “and it’s always super hot”. I was warned.

Car-sharing the day before with a four co-runners from the Courcelle Run Club wich happens to be a running club I joined two years ago.

During the race

The marathon start early, 7am and earlier than the half-marathon.

I feel good and did the usual mistake of starting way too fast.

The first 25km are a dream and I’m on my way to do my PRs around 3h30min, but…

…I hit the wall right at 25k, meeting Michelle a fellow runner around that distance I try to follow her, without sucess. Next is my speed decreasing from 5min10 per km to 6min per km for about 10k. My dream of PR is vanishing and the temperature is rising up. It was true was they said about the weather for the marathon in Ottawa.

Passed km 39 I re-gain some energy, pass the cheer station, got a beer and ran fast to the finish line.

I complete the race in less than 4h which is great regarding my slope to hell in the second part of the race.

After the race

I got a a real beer a few meters after the arrival, later join the after party organized by Ciele et local runner group and got more beers and food. They did a pretty cool job, nice way to relax after that extravaganza of a race.

Map of the race

Using folium I managed to overlay the gps run traces on the top of a map, and you can interactively zoom in and out.