I took part in the Seoul International Marathon in South Korea last Sunday.

The Seoul Marathon is the second oldest marathon in the world behind the Boston Marathon in the USA. It also has a cut-off time of five hours and a couple of months prior to the event, all participants are required to submit certificate proof that they can complete a sub 5 marathon. Besides a full marathon, proof of timing can also be in the form of a 10km run (sub 1 hour) or 21.1km (sub 2:10 hours), for those who may be making their marathon debut in Seoul.

Seoul Marathon, due to its cold weather, easy 6-hour flight time from Singapore and one-hour time difference, is a popular choice for Singaporeans like me, who fly into the city for the marathon and take a holiday at the same time.

I took a red eye flight from Singapore and touched down into Seoul on the Thursday prior to the race. I spent the next two to three days acclimating to the cold weather and sorting out what gear to wear on race day. I did a couple of shake-out runs prior to the marathon for this purpose. 

The race pack expo for Seoul Marathon was simple. We picked up our bibs at the Seoul Olympic Stadium. Within the stadium, it was purely for bib collection. Counters were segregated based on assigned starting pens. Mine was C. 

Outside the stadium, there were a few booths by event sponsors such as Shokz and Oatside. The only booth where products could be won was Oatside, where we play a pinball game to win a small packet of their oat milk. 

As well, for those who wanted to buy race merchandise, adidas had a booth outside the stadium for runners to buy stuff. But I didn’t get anything because I was not happy with the service staff, who seemed to not know anything about the pricing of the stuff they were selling. As well, the designs were also disappointing and not extremely eye catching and there were too many unisex apparel that didn’t cater to the female anatomy. 

Runners could also challenge their speed on a treadmill and the fastest runners would walk away with some prizes. This looked fun but I didn’t take part because I felt it was not worth it to perform such crazy stunts before a marathon. 

Race day dawned bright and early. The official flag off time was 8am and we were instructed to arrive by 7am.

It threatened to rain in the early morning and when I left my hotel, the ground was wet. Fortunately it appeared that the rain had already passed and did not return again for the rest of the day.

The race start was at Gwangjang Palace. Runners were already milling around when we arrived just before 7am. It didn’t take long to deposit our bags, but after taking off my warm jacket, the wait in the cold made my teeth chatter. It was about 7 degrees C.

My race attire was a long sleeved top which I wore underneath a Nike singlet. For my bottom, I had a pair of short tights underneath my usual running shorts which I wore together with compression calf sleeves. At the start area, this was not enough to keep me warm, even with extra long sleeved layers which I planned to discard/donate after I began running. 

The first wave was flagged off at 8am sharp and our wave was at 8:12am.

The beginning was extremely crowded and congested. I was running at least 20 sec per km slower than the pace I had been targeting because of the crowds. It took about 3km to break into my target pace (about 5:10 min/km). it didn’t help that sections of the race route were narrow too.

The route was a city route that takes us around Seoul. In terms of the terrain, it is road and tarmac. However it is not flat. Those who say Seoul is flat are definitely mistaken. The first half is good and easily runnable, but in the second half, there are several inclines that you will definitely feel in the legs. The bridge at 39km is the worst, and reminded me of Sheares “Heartbreak” Bridge back home in Singapore.

The sun came out after the halfway point. The first half was cool and cloudy which was perfect for running and I felt great; the second half was warmer when the sun decided to be more hardworking. This was when I began to regret my choice to run in long sleeves as I was feeling slightly warm.

The aid stations were located roughly every 5km. Considering how cold the weather is in Seoul, this is ok. The stations in the first half consisted of both water and Pocari Sweat. In the second half, there were sponge stations, which was a godsend. It was really shiok to squeeze the cold sponge down my neck and back.

I spotted Amino vital gel being provided at one or two points along the course too. I am not familiar with this gel and I don’t know how it would react with my body, so I decided not to take any. I would rather take my own gels which I know works for me.

For the distance markings, I would say they were generally on par with my GPS, so I was more or less able to use my watch to gauge my pace, plus or minus a few seconds per kilometer. I think that the GPS couldn’t be entirely accurate because we were running through Seoul’s urban areas so this would affect the GPS. At most, my watch was around 100 to 200 meters off from the official distance markers.

However I need to comment on the race pacers. The paces which they were going at was not clear. At the expo, there was no indication of the pace groups that this race would have, and on the day itself, the only sign that there were pacers were runners carrying same colour helium balloons. The paces were written on the balloons with markers but the writing was not visible. I think it would have helped tremendously, if the pacers could have bibs with their target timings written and printed on their front and back.

What was good though was that there were medic runners who ran with a white balloon printed with a Red Cross on it. I thought this was a good reassurance for runners’ safety as there would be a medic nearby should anything happen to anybody. I spotted a couple of medics running close to my pace so I felt well taken care of.

The spectators were quite sparse throughout the run. There were a few small groups of people cheering us on, but this was nothing like what I had otherwise experienced at other big scale city marathons such as in Osaka, Nagoya, Chicago or Rotterdam. It was apparently not well supported by the community. Most of the spectators I saw were either family members or friends of the runners, or were members of local based running groups.

At around the 30km mark, I counted several food stations along the course serving bananas and mini Korean chocolate pies. Both were already unwrapped and pre-cut, which was thoughtful because we won’t need to fidget with packaging while running. I helped myself to some chocolate pies, because l I thought the sugar rush would help with energy. However the chocolate pie was quite dry and I struggled to swallow it.

My pace dropped quite a bit somewhere after the halfway point due to the gradual hills and the fact that my legs were tiring. Once I felt that a personal best was already out my reach, I switched my focus to trying to enjoy the sightseeing tour of Seoul and not thinking about the pain and tiredness. But this was much easier said than done. 

The bridge at around 39km was torture to run up. It wasn’t as steep as Sheares in Singapore, but it still felt bad. What kept me going at this point was the members from numerous Seoul running clubs which had lined the bridge. I tried to look out for my friends from the Seoul Flyers but I was unable to spot any familiar faces. I guess it was because there were just too many people along this stretch.

The headwind towards the end of the race was also torturous and made it harder to keep on going. I had to stay strong and grit my teeth in order to fight it. As well, I could really feel my legs wanting to seize up in the last couple of kilometres and it was a struggle to keep going. The only thought I had at this stage was to cross the finish line. 

My watched buzzed 42km and I didn’t see the finish line anywhere in sight yet. 

After what felt like forever, the finish line finally loomed. This was a huge relief. We did not run into the Olympic Stadium as I had originally anticipated. The finish was outside the stadium dome.

I crossed the line in 3 hours 53 minutes 51 seconds. It wasn’t a personal best but it was a good timing under four hours despite the less than perfect race conditions. So I am happy with it. 

The post-race entitlements area was messy. There were no clear signages pointing us to what to collect and where. Stuff given out included a goodie bag full of snacks such as bread and cereal bars, and there were other tables giving out more foodstuffs to replenish our fuel including as Oatside milk, water, isotonic and more.

While there were lots of goodies and I thought this was generous on the part of the organiser, there should have been much clearer markings indicating to runners what to collect and where. It also did not help that there were a lot of runners who finished the marathon in a similar timing as me, making the congestion worse. I had to backtrack a couple of times because I missed out on something that I had wanted to collect.

I also need to comment that I was disappointed with the design of the medal, as well as the sizing/design of the event and finisher shirts. The event shirt design was plain and uneventful and not very well thought out, for the world’s second oldest marathon. The design of the finisher tee was the same – quite bland and too simplistic for my liking. As well, the sizing was unisex and the size did not fit me as a result. I think the organiser should have both male and female cutting in order to cater to all runners. They were also inflexible when I requested to change to a smaller sizing and refused to let me change.

The adidas merchandise stall was still around, as with the other stalls that I had seen when I picked up my pack. So there was nothing new to see. I caught up with friends and took pictures at the race site. Fortunately I had my thick down jacket and my track pants, so I could slip them on to keep myself warm. Now that I had finished the race, my body was losing heat quickly and it was of the essence to ensure that I keep myself warm.

After hanging around for a while, we headed back to the hotel for a warm shower and I slipped into a pair of compression tights to ease the post-marathon muscle aches and help with my recovery. Wearing compression felt really good after running a marathon. 

Overall as a whole, I would say that the Seoul Marathon is good if you are looking for a cold weather race that is not too far away from Singapore. But if you are looking for a great race experience, there are many other better races out there that you can experience. Seoul as a whole is not the best and the overall package pales in comparison to many of the races in Japan or Europe. If I were to pick again, I would recommend Osaka or Nagoya over Seoul Marathon – if you are looking for a cold marathon in Asia. But that said, Seoul is a lovely city to visit for a vacation or holiday and this definitely won’t be the last time I will return here. 

race video