That's an interesting point you make, as I am actually one who currently prefers hard over normal route since I am way more consistent there. However, I think, while you can't objectively say which route is "harder" than the other, it appears to me, that it was the intention of the developer to make this alternate route a challenging and hard part of the game. Also, the important bit is not about which route is harder but that runners understand which route is referred to and I think, nobody as of yet mixed the routes up because they think, the hard route is actually easier.

I think it's called the hard route because of the lack of chapters to load, Just my thought