Shanghai Larisons: The Great Wall Marathon, May 19th, 2012

Today Mark ran The Great Wall Marathon. This was held in Huangyaguan, Tianjin Province. Which is about 2 hours out of Beijing, China. While every marathon (26.2 miles) is difficult this is considered one of the toughest running events in the world. With 5164 steps and several hills and today's hot temps in the mid 80's it did prove to be tough for all. Most years they have runners from about 50 countries in the world but today they said they had people from 100 different countries running. This marathon was founded in 1998, This of course was a big under taking I'm sure getting clearance from the Chinese government and Great Wall authorities. They do not close The Wall to any during the race so the runners did have some challenges of running around tourists not really staying out of the way at times.
They inform you that you should add about 50% of your usual time to your race. I know some of the runners were planning on being out there for about 8 hours. Fun?! They had different race lengths today varying from a 5K, 10K, 1/2 marathon and of course the full marathon. The full marathon runners had to "cross" The Wall twice during their run. They also ran through the village, through fields etc. but the hardest part had to be running The Wall. The steps themselves, uneven and steep. They really did "HIT THE WALL" as they entered The Wall again at MILE 20!!!!! If you look back at our pictures from yesterday you can see how steep the elevation is and to do this again at mile 20 is insane.
The race began at 7:30 and they would close the course of people entering The Wall at 6 hours. The biggest group of racers were the 1/2 marathoners but there were about 900 marathon runners ready to take the challenge. They did have frequent water stops along the run and they say they carry 15,000 bottles of water on foot to help hydrate those hot and thirsty runners.
We met so many interesting people on this trip. It is also so fun to hear every one's stories. So many people in the world being Expats and so many serious marathon runners traveling the world to the next interesting race.

Fresh and ready to run! See in the middle of the picture on the top...the little building on the top of the hill? Mark had to run up to there on the wall...Twice!