Photo by K’s Clicks.

The 2011 National Marathon, the only marathon to take place completely within the confines of the District of Columbia, is scheduled for Saturday. The Marathon always causes major issues for drivers — add in the fact that Saturday is also the first day of the National Cherry Blossom Festival, and we’re expecting a full blown trafficpocalypse around the District on Saturday.

But aside from the general vehicular delays along the marathon route, some marathoners are very upset with Metro’s decision to open at 6 a.m. this year. Why? Well, participants in the race are supposed to be at the starting line near the Stadium-Armory station at 6:20 a.m. Obviously, this means that taking Metro is a non-starter for a rather large majority of racers. (For its part, WMATA explained that “ridership is not high enough during [the 5 a.m. to 6 a.m. hour] to support the opening of the entire transit system for a full two hours.”) More participants and spectators ostensibly driving to the starting line could conceivably cause additional traffic trouble before and after the race.

TBD put together this handy Google map of the route — we’d recommend that, unless you’re a fan of large crowds and gridlock, to mind yourself around the following locations and avoid the roads listed in this PDF.