The event was the first Marathon for Birmingham and is part of the Simply Health series and as such it's not as polished as other more long standing events, but it has potential.

It is a city centre event and Birmingham doesn't have that many idyllic sites that wouldn't involve large scale disruption to the road network.

It is essentially two laps with some hard hills for midway through a marathon and these have been commented on by a few runners I know. That said, who likes pan cake flat marathons? Yes, they are great for a PB but then I obtained a PB at this one today and I've done London twice before.

I would run this event again as it is my home town event and also because it has potential for runners and for the organisers to make this even better. They are missing out on the potential to expand into an Expo prior to the event.

There was in my opinion sufficient water stations with small bottled water but no energy drinks, they did, however, have gel stations.

Teal potential to be better and ultimately GREAT!

Good medal and great technical T shirt too.