MOBILE, Ala. (WKRG) – Training for a marathon or half marathon is serious business.

Planning the marathon course also requires a lot of work.

“We wanted to showcase the entire city, so we’re going from downtown, through a couple of our colleges and through the Avenue of the Oaks. We wanted to showcase the entire city,” said Mobile Marathon course marshal Michael Ryan.

Ryan has been a part of the Mobile Marathon from the beginning, helping get the course ready each year as the course marshal.

Creating a marathon course takes time, and also requires planners to take elevation into account.

“We weren’t looking at hills when we laid out the course,” joked Ryan. “We wanted to keep the course as flat as possible but our city has some hills in it. That surprises some people, they think Mobile is flat.”

Each year the Mobile Marathon attracts racers from all over, and Ryan’s hope is that they fall in love with Mobile one mile at a time.

“The course is more challenging than most out of town racers expect,” said Ryan. “The support and what we put on, those racers think it’s a top quality race. We’re a small, niche market for a marathon and people from out of town love seeing the oaks and seeing our city.”