I'm sure you're right Ironwolf, when you say that Berlin is a great marathon. I'd love to do it one year. But have you done London and NY to be able to compare? This is my point.
Of the 3, I've only run London, and have done only 5 different marathons in total, so I really couldn't make a judgement on which is the best mara in the world, or whatever the question was. I could definitely make a judgement on the best experience I had (in my case, Chicago). I just get a bit annoyed with this sort of question because unless you've done a few dozen of the world's best-known marathons, I can't see how we can be expected to compare them.
I suppose it's a bit like football fans talking about 'the best match ever'. It's all pretty pointless, but it's hard to avoid doing.
The funny thing is, if I did my 5 marathons again over the next couple of years, I bet I would totally change my order of preference. It depends on so many things -- fitness, weather on the day, satisfaction with your performance, the people you met during race weekend, and so on.
