Traveling to Marathons

tkillion810

I am looking to sign up for a winter marathon. I find that when I have a race on my calendar, I do better. It will mean traveling somewhere warmer since I'm in Nebraska. My hubby has asked that I keep the cost down, understandably. I'd love to hear how others manage the running budget with out of town runs. I was thinking of New Orleans, Houston, or Galveston areas. I'm not into camping or sharing rooms with strangers What's the best way to get good deals on hotels and flights?

davemunger

Cheapest is if you can convince a running friend to join you and share rooms. Otherwise you might consider a hostel; some of them offer private rooms.

The trick with the marathon is to find a room that will work for you as you start / finish the race. I like to find a place that is within a mile or so of the finish -- then I can just walk back after the race. In Minneapolis they had bike sharing which was an awesome way to get to the start from my hotel 2 miles away. Looks like Houston has a similar program.

DavidMartinez2

Travel is the biggest expense for racing. I suggest checking Air BnB, you can find some pretty good deals there.

Curtruns

I have done the camping a couple of times with decent results. With one, I slept in the back of my van on a futon mattress. The other one I slept in a hammock. I have also stayed at a friend's houses, it helps having friends located around the country. The difficult part is that sometimes your friends live a "loud" lifestyle that makes resting the night before a race difficult. The best solution I have found is to go to a race with a friend so that you can split the costs associated with traveling, and you are both on the same sheet of music as far as what you are there for!

pobalita

Some of the airlines and travel sites (travelocity is one) send out frequent emails with sales, but it's really a gamble because many are last minute with restricted travel rates. Some of the travel site newsletters or the Entertainment book will give you good hotel discounts - 15% for some of them. AAA membership can get you some good hotel rates. If you book a combo airfare and hotel package through travel sites (expedia, travelocity, etc.) you can save a little. If you destination marathons often, you might consider a credit card with a good mileage plan. I generally get about one free airline ticket per year this way.

I can sympathize - I'm doing Chicago in a few weeks and hotel and air cost me more than the same for my recent trip to an all-inclusive sun-filled vacation in Mexico. Hmmm, glorious sun and endless margaritas, or fighting 45,000 other runners for a porta potty, getting up at 4 am, and really sore feet??? It all costs the same. Considering the costs of a destination run, I think your best bet is to consider it a vacation and add some other fun things to do to get more value from your travel expenses.

For Chicago, I'm sharing a hotel room and using public transportation when I get there to save costs.

saskie78

I travel a lot and rely on hostels and air bnb. I do the shared rooms in hostels, but private rooms are available and cheaper than hotels. Air bnb is awesome. You can save a lot of money using both of these because you have a place to prep meals--in addition to saving on the cost of the room itself. Saved money = more race entries

tkillion810

Okay, I have no idea what a hostel is... originally I thought it was a typo! I've also never heard of air bnb. Off to google to edumacate myself

GillianMcK

Just a thought, but maybe post on here, see if anyone else on the forum is looking at the same marathons that could share accommodation costs with you??

sammyneb

like some of the above posters..find running friends or family I have ran races in Minnesota, KC, Des Moines, San Antonio (also from Nebraska) and most of those I had someone with me to share cost. But my sister is an active runner too, so it is fairly easy for me to find company But I like cold weather running so much better. I ran the San Antonio race in January and it was actually really hard because I had been training in the cold winter then went down there and it was 75 and humid to start the race...wasn't at all what I was used to!