While I loved the swag....
I thought the rest of the event was meh.
I won't do it again, nor would I recommend it.
The announcer at the start was the worst. She was talking down to everyone and Annette and I were put off immediately.
Not enough port o potties... It's a women's event, there should have been double the amount.
Way too many walkers. My exact words to Annette after we're "I want to run with the boys". Meaning, I want the motivation to run fast, with fast people instead of constantly weaving around people the whole time. So fucking annoying.
What's so hard with starting in the back if you are going to walk? The runners will pass you anyways, so if you are afraid of finishing as one of the last ones you are out of luck.
The finish line was a total cluster fuck. So bad.
The finish was along the beach. Instead of just dumping people onto the vast amounts of beach, they wanted people to squish their way through a too small chute.
Oh... The reason for that, so the volunteers could cut off the antiquated timing chip they used. Seriously? Get the B tags.
BUT since there was such a cluster fuck, they ended up cutting open the chute so people could exit faster, and as a result no one cut of my tag and I didn't realize it until I got to my car.
No big deal really, but I am annoyed I had to bother to mail it back this week.
To end on a few positives:
Annette's husband, Brian, said packet pick up was really organized. He picked up our stuff and he actually registered me for the race since I missed online sign up - thanks Brian!
Parking was easy in downtown Clearwater.
The course was pretty along the water.
The post race cafe was set up on the beach and looked really nice. We jumped in a trolley/shuttle right away to get back to our car since it looked like it was going to rain.
The trolley/shuttle was super organized and worked out perfectly.
There was also a half marathon going on at the same. I am not sure how that was.
All I can tell you was that Annette and I were super happy we were not running 13.1 that day.
P.S. It's Annette's birthday today - happy birthday!
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Ug, it's hard when people who are slower don't just get in the back where they belong. It really slows down the faster people and makes for a jumble.
ReplyDeleteAt least you got cool swag! And Clearwater is beautiful. Wasn't it hot though?
I'm from Clearwater!! (Well, Safety Harbor, right next door).
ReplyDeleteSo, I ran the SoCal Iron Girl 5K, and it was great - super well organized, the course was fine, plenty of space at the end... such a bummer yours sounds like it kind of sucked. That's super weird, because Iron Girl is based out of Tampa, you'd think they could get it right in their home town??