More than 28,000 people have signed up for Saturday's 2012 Sundown Marathon, and many have taken to the event's Facebook page to voice their anger and frustration after being informed only two weeks ago of last-minute changes to the race route and start times.
The fifth edition of the marathon was initially expected to debut a new route that would take runners in the 42km marathon from the start point at Nicoll Highway to the West Coast before heading back to the city.
But at the Sundown Race Expo on May 11, event organisers HiVelocity announced that the full marathon participants will now start at Nicoll Highway and head towards East Coast Park via the Marina Barrage before making their way back to the start point.
Race start times for all three events have also been pushed back by an hour to 10.30pm for the 10km category, and 12.30am for the 21km and 42km race.
At last year's marathon, participants from all three categories started and ended their races at the Changi Exhibition Centre.
"This must be the worst Sundown Marathon ever ... (they) decided to change the time as and when they like. And now, the route itself is changed," said Eugene Tan in a posted comment.
Added Hilary Francis: "Changing the start time so significantly (two) weeks before the race is irresponsible and shows a lack of planning."
Runner Cindy S E Peh also posted a comment which said: "With the half and full marathon flagging off together ... Human jam everywhere! Just that it's happening in the middle of the night this time round. Thumbs down."
But HiVelocity director Jeffrey Foo told Today that they had been working on the issue with the Traffic Police, the Land Transport Authority (LTA), the Singapore Sports Council (SSC) and other relevant parties since December, and had to consider factors like the event's impact on businesses and stakeholders along the race route during peak hours and disruption to traffic. A solution was only reached two weeks ago.
"We understand that (the changes were late) but we were hoping to push till the last minute. We will continue to work on getting the route to the West Coast for next year," said Foo.
"The learning lesson is we want to engage authorities at a much earlier time (in future)."
Foo also acknowledged participants' concerns over the decision to flag off the 21km and 42km race together at 12.30am at the start point.
To help deal with that, runners will be segregated by the different time pens - where runners will stand in their estimated completion time zone - to mimimise congestion at the Nicoll Highway flag-off point.
With the races expected to finish later on Sunday morning, transport arrangements have also been made for a late night bus service (S$5) from 12am to 6am to ferry participants from the race village to designated MRT stations islandwide.
"We want to give half and full marathon runners, especially the fast runners a chance of breaking away and avoid them bunching together. There will also be bicycles to clear the way for runners leading the pack," said Foo.
"One reason for delaying the races by an hour was because of the Saturday night traffic and safety. This is to give participants an undisrupted and better race experience."
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