It is being reported by the Indianapolis Star that the Indy Classic Marathon has issued full-refunds to participants:

The first Indy Classic Marathon, already postponed once, is all but canceled after spokesman Brian Meyers said today refunds have been given to all runners for the scheduled Nov. 3 race.

Meyers said the marathon lost “several hundred” volunteers within the past week to 10 days.

“Something’s out there, negative,” Meyers said. “Our volunteers are e-mailing or calling and saying they can’t make it.”

Meyers declined to elaborate, except to say organizers will put on the race for free — for runners who didn’t request a refund — if they get enough volunteers by the end of this week. He said 13,000 runners were expected to participate in the marathon, half-marathon and 5K, although for months running experts have scoffed at various claims made by marathon organizers.

The experts characterized the organizers as inexperienced and said administration of the event has been bizarre.

The ICM website says that:

If ICM secures enough volunteers within the next few days the investors have decided to allow all those who have received a refund to run this race for free, 2007 only. (Does not pertain to those who have requested a refund on their own, but only to those who ICM voluntarily issued refunds to).

Given their past history, having already postponed the race once, it seems this could (hopefully?) be a fatal blow for the event. I first wrote about this on August 21 and then again on August 23.

The organization claims that 15,000 people were registered for the event and that they received requests from an additional 10,000 “due to a recent early shutdown of a major marathon.” The same page says they are looking for help with 13,000 runners. This only adds to the earlier speculation about the overall event and its management. With 10 days before the event I say steer clear for a few years and see if they can get the bugs worked out.

Were you planning on doing the Indy Classic Marathon?? Tell us about your experience so far and what you plan to do now.