I ran the half marathon which sets off before the full marathon although due to having both events on the same day there were lots of people at the event village and start area which made things quite crowded. Parking can be an issue due to road closures and so I parked on the edge of the city centre and had about a 20 minute walk in. The route goes through various local parks and up Penny Lane which is nice, the stretch at the end along the Mersey path was a killer due to the head wind. Crowd support was great and having various bands playing around the route was good fun. There were plenty of freebies at the finish but no bag, I assume due to environmental reasons, so if you didn't use the bag drop you needed big hands or large pockets. The medal was nice but quite small for such a large well backed event.