I don’t know if you’ve heard or not. It’s going to be super hot for the LA Marathon this Sunday. Like record-breaking high temperatures. So, on Tuesday, the race organizers took to action.

The first thing they did was to send out a weather advisory early in the week. Then, on Tuesday evening, we got an email letting us know that they were moving the start time up by 30 minutes! This news was met with a lot of joy from the runners. After all, the earlier start time means we will be finishing in cooler weather than we normally would have. It will still be really hot. However, it won’t be as hot because of the earlier start.

The organizers didn’t just make the decision to start the race earlier, they also announced that they will be making sure that there is more water and Gatorade than they originally have planned. I’m pretty stoked to see them take this action. There is simply no excuse to dehydrate now.

Additionally, they will have “cooling buses” along the course and at the finish line. Since I don’t have a clue what  “cooling bus” is, I put the Magic Express bus up above. I think that “cooling buses” are just regular buses with the air conditioning going to cool us off if we get overheated on the course. I’ve never heard of such a thing. However, it sounds totally awesome! I’ll be on the lookout for these buses during the race and get a picture for y’all. From my point of view, this is the LA Marathon Organizers going over and above to keep us runners safe! Bravo!

The organizers will also be providing misting stations along the course! Okay, I’m really excited to see this! Since I’ve never run in a race that had them, I’m interested in seeing what they will look like. I will definitely make sure to run through them! Again…above and beyond!

Another thing we will have to look forward to in efforts to beat the heat are cold towels and ice along the race course. They gave us towels that were soaked in ice-cold water during the Walt Disney World Marathon and they were heaven! It wasn’t as hot during that race as it will be this Sunday. So, I can only imagine how much better it will feel with the hotter temps!

Lastly, they are extending the amount of time the finish line services will be available. This one I’m not entirely clear about. When they issued the changes, it still mentioned the course would be open for 6 hours, 30 minutes from the time the last runner starts. That doesn’t indicate a change. However, I’m thinking that the email might not have been accurate here. I’m thinking that what they mean in the email is that, because the race starts a half hour earlier, we will have a half hour longer to finish. I mean, they already were planning on keeping the finish line open until 2:30pm. So, it wouldn’t make any sense for them to close the finish line earlier. If what I think is going to happen ends up what happens, it will give us slower runners incentive to not push ourselves too hard and risk things like dehydration and other heat related problems.

Overall, I’ve really got to applaud the efforts the race organizers are taking to help us runners make it through a very hot race. When you think of the extra expense of extra water and Gatorade….the buses…the mist stations…the ice towels…I think they’re doing everything they can and deserve loud applause for their efforts. I also applaud them for being able to start the race early. There are many runners who wold have liked it to start even earlier. However, when you think of all the cities we will be running through and what it would take to shut roads down earlier on such short notice, a 30 minute earlier start is pretty good.

All I can say is a big, huge THANK YOU LA MARATHON race organizers!