Milo Marathon: Getting Ready for July 4

Less than 10 days to go until the 34th Milo Marathon!

I attended the Milo Marathon press briefing this afternoon at Bayview Hotel, a sea of green press people and guests filled the entire room, a preview of the runners clad in green on July 4, 2010 at Roxas Boulevard.

– Good thing they gave me this so I can blend in with the crowd next time –

As I’ve said, this 34th Milo Marathon is unlike any other marathon Milo has staged in the past. The way I see it, they managed to maintain their image as the premier race in the country (Milo Marathon is almost an institution, really), while proving that they can compete with the newer, world-class urban races.

As they plan to provide runners with all the perks of a contemporary race—bananas, portalets, timing chips, Gatorade, bands, and even gels—they were careful to remind us that their focus is still their new advocacy: to give shoes to public school children in every city where a Milo race is held.

We learned that the 4,000 school children who will benefit from Milo Marathon will actually be running 3k on race day with their brand new shoes! How cool is that?

After the presscon, I had the pleasure of chatting with Nestle executives Afnan Ahsan, Andrew Neri, and Lester Castillo.  We discussed the new route along Macapagal-Roxas Blvd. and the feedback from most runners concerned about the convergence of the various race distances. It was nice to know that the 3k and 5k will be in an entirely separate route from the other distances. I do hope they can do their best to keep the 10k, half marathon, and marathon runners’ course free from traffic upon the inevitable merging on the road. Having to weave through a crowd of runners during a road race can be exasperating (flashback: my Singapore Half Marathon 2008)

– with Nestle execs Afnan Ashan, Pat Goc-Ong, myself, Bald Runner, Andrew Neri, and Lester Castillo –

– with Mr. Ashan and Cris Sabal, defending champion of Milo Marathon with a time of 2:32:56 last year –

Mr. Ahsan also shared with me his dream of making Milo Marathon as big as Boston Marathon some day. “If we do that,” he said, “we’ll make our mark.” Well, nothing is impossible, really. As they say, “great things start from small beginnings.”

See you at Milo on July 4, 2010.

For more info, click HERE to visit the Milo website.