Cologne Skate Marathon : what a feeling! New course and finish area for inline skaters

Modified course with finish at Cologne Cathedral

After detailled planning in the previous years the organization is now proud to announce that we will have a new finish area for our K2 Cologne Skate Marathon: From now on you will not finish in boring Deutz in the long curve or directly in front of the sad tunnel tube any longer, but you will cross the finish line celebrated duly at the city’s landmark – Cologne Cathedral!

Other than in pre-2004 years we will set up the finish area on Komödienstraße with the silhouette of the UNESCO world cultural heritage site in the background! This new location will be very interesting for spectators and become an emotional experience for all inline skaters. The last kilometre through Cologne’s city centre will even upgrade the K2 Cologne Skate Marathon and make it more attractive.
The course will indeed lose a selective component with the Deutzer Brücke (bridge) in front of the finish, but will win a city centre portion with spectator popularity. The last curve may be a bit challenging, however, due to barriers and tarring at the pavement it will be easily skateable.

The organization is also very happy to present familiar and popular course sections again. These modifications will make the event to what it always was and how it is promoted: a city marathon.

By omitting the long passages along the river Rhine the course will become more winding and this will not have positive impact on the inline skaters’ finish times. However, the course will again lead through several picturesque quarters of Cologne where a lot of people live and are in the streets – Severinsstraße in the Severins Quarter, Venloer Straße in Ehrenfeld, Neusser Straße in Nippes etc. They will cheer for you!

Here are further modifications on the “five finger course”:

• The skate marathon course will be 100% congruent with the running marathon course.
• The curve along the Maritim Hotel directly after the Deutzer Brücke (bridge) will be eased in 2013 and prolongated to Filzengraben in order to make it easily skateable, particularly for recreational skaters.
• Due to the omission of the northern Rhine riverside section and the finish after the Deutzer Brücke a total of 10 downhills and uphills will be eliminated.
• One u-turn will be omitted and the remaining one in the northernmost course area will be easily overbearable from 2 lanes over a wide track bed to a 2-lane street.
• Directly after the Severinstorburg there will be a short, uncritical cobble stone passage. The cobble stone part in front of Cologne Cathedral and the finish curve will be tarred.
• All potentially critical course sections will secured with marshals and material and marked as usual.

Detailed information, the new course including an animation and the online registration at www.cologne-marathon.com/skate-marathon.