This run was really disorganized. My mom and I were preregistered and arrived in plenty of time to do packet pickup. We were in line by about 8:30 and at 9:00 we had barely moved. I could have registered brand new and been registered, gear checked, and at the front of the corrals WAY faster. They didn't let the 150-200 or so of us pre-registered runners STILL standing in line waiting for our stuff stop them though. They went ahead and started shortly after 9:00 as we all stood there watching them. At some point they finally sent a woman around with our chip numbers so we could at least pick that up and get going. That's when I confirmed that I could have started with everyone else because I was wearing my own chip.

My mom, the saint, took the backpack and sent me off to run while she gear checked it. However at that point I was stuck in the bottle neck of others who were also stuck in the packet pickup line who were trying to join in several minutes after the gun went off and I got stuck behind the majority of runners. Due to my mom's sacrifice, the poor woman got stuck behind the walkers. As you read my comments on the race, think how much more of a pain it must have been for her.

I spent the first two miles either jogging quite slowly behind someone else or sprinting by hoards of people in the grass along side the quite narrow and poorly suited for a race of thousands lakefront path. I didn't know what my splits for those first two miles were, I just knew the miles were quite stressful. After that I spent most of the race running in the grass. You couldn't pass anyone on the path and the wet slippery grass was actually much faster. It wasn't until about the third mile that I finally felt like I reached a place where the runners near me were running a similar pace and even then I ran on the grass for most of it to get around people. At least it had thinned out enough by that point I didn't feel like I was in an obstacle course anymore. I knew by the fourth mile that there was absolutely no way I was going to hit the time I was shooting for. I was aiming for a sub-38, but after the first two miles there was no way that was going to happen. I ran the best I could, but a PR wasn't in the cards. Ahh well. Another day, another race.

Not do this race. Not try to save time by pre-registering since that was clearly a terrible idea. Find a race in the suburbs that would be better organized and at a better venue for the number of participants.

Walked back and looked for my mom. Saw her about 300 yards from the finish and ran about 200 of them with her before I let her go through the shoot and headed off to get our bag out of gear check. My mom and I stopped off to get our shirts since we never actually got to do packet pickup, and then were so cold we left right away. We got to the car and sat in the parking lot for probably forty five minutes or so, moving a total of 10 feet, before a cop finally showed up to make things get moving.


A completely disorganized race. Getting stuck at the back of the pack of runners.


This race benefits the food depository in Chicago, which is a very worthy cause, but due to the overall disorganization I wouldn't do this race again.