Okay, I liked the race itself. 5 peaks does a great job of setting up a course and making sure everything is clearly marked and each runner knows which way to go. For the non-race components, it seemed otherwise a wee bit...shall we say...flat. I'd run two of these events two years ago and something changed.
Okay, sign up for all 5 events, you get a nice technical shirt (lt blue for the guys, pinkish for the women). All participants on race day get a pair of nice Wigwam trail socks. Not a lot of bling otherwise. I seemed to recall getting a little packet with some kicking horse coffee and a couple of other things last time around. Food seemed sparse to me. The ever popular bagels were there but they were snipped into tiny little pieces, maybe quarter sized or less. There was some peanut butter (maybe nutella? wasn't sure), some humus, slices of melon and oranges. But everything seemed tiny little bite sized. Since I ran 12k enduro, and the 5k sports had long since finished, it seemed as though it was all picked over and not replenished or something. I dunno.
Now, for me I really like the race itself to be done well and that's where the priorities need to be. Course should be well done and safe and good start / finish. All of this was done very well. The staggered starts they did were fine, since it's chip time that determines finishing time and position, they don't use gun time. That's good and keeps the course from being overcrowded, especially at the start. The course wasn't closed, we encountered other runners and the occasional cyclists, but at least for me this didn't pose any problems.
This course is relatively easy by 5 peaks standards. Not a highly technical course, with runnable climbs and descents, footing that you didn't need to concern yourself with (only one short section had any real tree roots to get in your way) and the conditions were good and dry. I wore regular light cushioned trainers figuring it was all I'd need on this course and that did work out. It's fun to hit a trail race without knowing the course as you need to somehow adapt to what lurks around the next corner and you're never quite sure how long any particular hill will be.
Prizes were in the form of medals, top 3 overall (m/f) and top 3 in ages groups (basically 10yr groupings) and I was fortunate (or fast) enough to get one. A few draw prizes were given out. Instead of drawing from box the organizers opted to do some goofy challenges. Fun, but a bit hokey and not many bothered to hang around for them.
It's a good race and race series, but there was something that seemed lacking, certainly in relation to the last time I did these. Maybe it was just because it's the first one of the year and a few kinks are being worked out or something. I think the food issue needs to be addressed, especially for a late morning race that extends into noon. I was happy to get home and get something proper beyond a corner of a bagel. There was only 5 or 6 porta potties available which meant a lengthy wait over the final half hour before race start. Not being a gun timed race, this wasn't catastrophic for the runners since they could start after others left and still get a proper time.
Nonetheless, I'm looking forward to the next event on June 12 in Durham regional forest. I did run this course before so I know what to expect.
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