Anyway, my full review is up at Newcity.com so I'll just hit some high points here.
- I thought everything was super well-organized.
- I was able to drop off my gear-check bag within 5 seconds of approaching the gear check station. And I was also able to pick it up within the same amount of time, though I think this had to do with the fact that my number put me in Wave F and I finished faster than most people in that wave. When I was getting my gear check bag, the people with numbers from 1-500 had formed a pretty lengthy line. And I'd assume my line would have been that long a few minutes after I arrived.
- Same thing with the food and beer lines. Very well-organized... but maybe they didn't have enough staff to support these. When I finished things were moving quickly.... but within about ten minutes the lines were incredibly long, especially for beer. I think they needed about twice as many staff for these booths.
- The waves were released twice as fast as expected. Rather than releasing Wave A, Wave B, etc, they released Waves A & B together, followed by Waves C&D. This even took the announcer a little time to figure out. I think it wasn't until my wave (Waves E&F) that he really figured out that they were releasing two waves at once. Still, the waves were small enough that this made sense. And it meant I got onto the course in 4 minutes instead of 10 minutes, so that's a plus.
- The music was really good. There were seven bands so there was music playing when I showed up at 6:30 and there was music playing when I crossed the finish line and there was music playing up until I left at 9:30. That's a good event.
- The post-race party is a great place to hang out. I saw Cindy, Erica, Fuzzy and Natalie after the race and got to hang out and eat food off of a frisbee while listening to music on the grass. That's a pretty good post-race party.
So, anyway, I felt good about calling the Terrapin 5K one of the top 5 5Ks in Chicago last year. I think it might make that list again for 2013.
In conclusion, here are some people waiting for the race to start and then some food on a frisbee:
Man! those are some grumpy faces behind you! You think it was a punishment!
ReplyDeleteSounds like a good time. Surprised at the lower turnout vs. 2012, although my neighbors and I skipped it this year so that accounts for about five less people! :)
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