Emmalouise Brown's Staging Area

+ Excellent organization
+ Beautiful Course
+ Lot’s of hills! Be prepared.
+ Ample Aid stations filled with water and snacks.
+ In true Brazen style – Epic medals.

oah, what a great course! Yes, this course is described as ”Sadistic” but I didn’t get the pet name ”Crazy Runner girl” for nothing! This Run did the infamous Dipsea Trail TWICE – Out and then back where your were running head on to others runners on a single trail, it was indeed a true test of my patience as you have no choice but go with the flow and for the most part that means only running as fast as the person in front of you.

Stats:

-4,500ft elevation
– On the event listing stated 13.7 mile course, my Run tracker registered 14.22 (Many other peole I spoke to also got very similar distance between 14.10 and 14.25)
– 441 flights of stairs as measured by my FitBit

This event started wuth various “handicaps” with older and slower tunners leaving first and a new group starting off every 2-4 minutes.

This is not a course you do to get a good finish time, I was prepared for this but what I was not prepared for was how backed up the first 5-6 miles would be. Pretty much all uphill this was my dream part of the course and uphill running being something I excel at but I couldn’t Run the speed I wanted to because I was stuck behind other runners that are not as fast as me.. I was warned before sign up and the pre race email though.
The course was indeed VERY narrow for the most part and making passing people almost impossible in some parts but you got to know the people around you pretty well and the view from the top of the peak was amazing!

The volunteers and aid stations were great! Everyone was very encouraging and each aid station was filled with goodies in true Brazen style – Water, electrolite drink, candies, chips, pretzels, fruit and of course Aid…basically everything you needed.

Post race was one big party and re-feed with all the same food plus Bagels and treat Brazen is well known for – It’s It Ice Cream Cookie Sandwiches. This is one thing I actually partook in for the first time of any Brazen event, I totally earned it!

The goodies bags, Tech shirt, medal and transfer are pretty sweet too.

Personal:

So happy to have knocked this off of my bucket list! Yes, I did have quite a spectacular wipeout 5 miles from the finish line where on some downhill steps I tripped, twisted my Ankle and landed on where I then proceeded to slide down another step (must have looked hilarious to the guy behind me) it meaning I had to limp cursing my way to the Finish (I’m no quitter!) But call me insane… I would also love to run this event again!

– Crazy Runner Girl

Half Marathon Time: 1:37:21
1st in Age group (by 12 minutes!)
3rd overall (Men and Women)

Thank you Yelp for the free entry!!
This event was kinda big for me after Surgery 2 weeks before and what an event to be my first real workout after somewhat recovering. I found the event well organized and bib pick up on the morning of the event a huge bonus. There were a few vendors still setting up and offering free samples – Luna Bars, Sanbazon Acai drinks and little samples of Acai Bowls.

The run itself started on time with each distance starting 30 minutes apart. The 18 miler started first followed by the Half Marathon then the 10k then 5k. This meant that everyone was coming across the finish line at roughly the same time.

The course itself was nice – some gravel and some pavement and for the first few miles well marked out but after about mile 6 is saw very few signs for the Half Marathon and was questioning whether or not I was still on the right course and not Running the 18 miler. It probably didn’t help that I was front of the pack of runners and when I got to mile 6 saw volunteers still setting up signs..this is mind I think more signage for future years is s must. I was so glad to see the volunteers at 8.5mi and ask ”Is this the turnaround for the Half”.Thank goodness they knew where I was supposed to be going!

Post Race was a little chaotic with medals and necklaces being given out and a huge line for the fenced off food area. Food was basic – Bagels, Banana’s, Orange and Juice.

Awards were given for overall 1st, 2nd and 3rd place in each distance as well as age group awards which took place around 10:15am which was quite some wait after many of the winners finished. For 3rd overall Half I was awarded a plaque and a box of Luna bars with age group win being a hat. Nice awards but kind of wish there were extra medals because it’s all about the bling.

Every finishers also got a medal which was the same for every distance.

Doing this event there is one thing I must stress to other Runners – Please be more courteous to other Runners. There was a part of the course with a turn around and runners to be coming along both directions of the course.. after the turnaround I was keeping as far left as possible but oncoming runners either thought the ”keep left” rules didn’t apply to them or were completely oblivious and were running head on into me. Then some Runners getting made at ME when I shouted to ”please keep left”. Also when someone calls ”On your Left” it means they are coming up behind you and would like to pass (ever seen Captain America?) so please move over. Basic Runner etiquette.

Overall pretty good event and I’ll probably do it again next year.

195.9 miles, 30+ hours, 6 people crammed onto one van and very little sleep. We must be freaking crazy! Yeah, I’m pretty darn excited!

Sign up for our team was easy (Mountain House Running Club) and we got regular emails. A few changes to the legs were made last minute but we were kept well informed. I can’t wait to run along the beach, over Golden Gate Bridge again and through Napa Valley to finish in Calistoga sometime Saturday (not loving getting up at 3:30am to be in San Francisco to start at 7:30am though. lol)

Pray I don’t get lost while Running solo in the dark please! 🙂 Updates later and throughout the course on my IG (42Kcookie)

OMG, so much freaking fun! Who would have thought? We had a couple of issues with being misinformed in regards to the legs of the race but other than that it ran pretty smoothly.
We were all given information on each of our legs before starting and found most of the distances listed to be incorrect, some were longer, some were shorter and they definitely got the difficulty messed up.
Example: my first leg was supposed to be 5.5 miles (actually 6) and listed as ”hard”, it was the second leg of the race and the one that goes over Golden Gate Bridge. The course was up and down sand covered steps (very slippery!), through a wooded area where you had to physically climb over fallen tree’s and giant rocks then down onto the beach to run on the sand and then back up and across the bridge. I LOVED this! Even ran in the ocean for a bit (by accident mind) but had me thinking ”wtf? if that is listed as ”hard” then what on earth is my final leg listed as”very hard” going to be like?”. Turned out that it was actually EASIER as it was all just road running up and down hill. Maybe they rated it as harder due to the fact that it was 50% longer and dark for part of it (don’t worry, I had a headlamp and NoxGear).

Volunteers were good, exchanges went faurly smoothly and everyone was in high spirits. You would never actually think that 34hrs spent running or in a van with no flushing toilets, running water or even sleep would be so much fun.
The big exchanges (every 6) had massage, first aid and a couple had snacks and vendors selling Running merchandise. The Finish Line was much the same with the addition of the Beer tent, it would have been nice to have a few more vendors though. One thing I would also like to see in future years is the Ragnar gear they sell at the event to be customized. All of the gear was just standard and I would have loved to have got one of the zip jackets with ”Ragnar Napa 2015” instead of the standard ”Ragnar”.

Personal:

Running with part of my Running Club was a great experience, very supportive! My 1st leg went without any hicups but a big downhill on my 2nd leg had me injure my Knee somehow, I got a stabbing pain just under my Kneecap which shot up my thigh every so often when my foot hit the ground so I was KT taped up ti the nines (by a lovely team mate) for my last leg and those first 20-25 minutes hurt like hell but with a slower pace and once warmed up all was fine. I actually woke up the following morning not hurting at all! The importance of Stretching and Foam Rolling y’all!

TIPS:

– Get a good team together.It helps if you all know each other.
– Plan who is the strongest Runners and give then the longer / harder legs
– Train
– You WILL need water changes of clothes, wet wipes, light up vests, tail lights and some basic first aid kit.
– Plan your refuel (scope out restaurants along the way before you leave) and take snacks.
– Don’t take it too seriously.
– Have fun.

Let’s just call Bay to Breakers what is really is shall we? That is a freaking huge moving street party through San Francisco.

This is not a race, hell it’s barely even a run. If you are a serious runner then register as Elite, otherwise this is one to do for fun.

Sign Up:

Easy and relatively cheap if you get in early. I paid the lowest price of $39 which includes finishers medal and Shirt.

Packet Pick Up:

If you’re not willing to pay the extortionate amount of $20 to just have your bib (not your T Shirt) mailed to you then you’ll pick up Fort Mason either the Friday or Saturday before the event at the Expo. The Expo had a lot going on with lot’s of vendors and samples. Pick up was easy, all I needed to do was show my confirmation email with the bib number and D and I was on my way. The t shirt pick up just wanted the strip from the bottom of my bib and I got a choice of 2 colors for the shirt.

*NOTE* The security are very serious about the closing time of the expo. I arrived at 6:40pm on the Friday and upon leaving at 7:03 (expo closed at 7pm) they were not letting anybody in to get their bib even if they didn’t want to browse the expo so if you’re not going to make it before the cut off don’t even bother rushing there to try, you’ll be sorely disappointed.

Day of:

Mildly organized chaos. With tens of thousands of people flooding to the start line is was understandable. The start line Corrals were nothing short of a mess. Checks were being made that you were in the right Corral which is one thing but honestly, I think only about 5% of people put their right pace in anyway so it really made no difference, especially when you consider the amount of non registered people that join the course later on.

I was initially in Corral A for my averaging a 7 minute mile pace but moved back in order to do it with a friend. Sadly she left her bib at my house and didn’t think she would get into the corral but managed to slip through anyway.

The course was indeed fun, lot’s of crazy costumes and a few things I really wish I could unsee (official nude count = 11. This was fairly low as I started early on. Later Corrals had numbers in the 30’s). Lot’s of random people joined in the festivities, there were water stations which was a plus and of course restrooms but were not for Runners only but the entire general public.

Hayes Hill Challenge:
The addition of this sounded promising. Basically the fastest Male and Female up that section of the course won $2,500 and I was prepared to take part as if there’s one thing I excel at it’s Running uphill at speed. Sadly the organization left a lot to be desired as you had to run among everybody else and zig zag your way through drunk people to the top of the hill. It’s because of this I didn’t even bother trying to get a good time. If this is going to be a regular thing they really need to fence a section off.

Post Run:

This wasn’t even organized chaos but just plain chaos. The food section consisted of Chips, Clif Bars, Water, Sambazon, Nuts and Coconut Water. People were literally going crazy shoving, pushing and grabbing everything they possibly could and filling bags and boxes with it. No Banana’s were available. Boo.

The medal pick up was not being checked either which worked out in my friends advantage as she didn’t have her bib but the volunteers were literally just giving medals out to anybody. I’m sure there were hundreds of people crossing the finish line that hadn’t registered and ended up walking away with a free medal.

Sure, this was a fun event but I get impression that Zappos really are just trying to make as much money as possible with the silly rules. If a bag was over a certain size it had to be the clear pre approved one they were selling at the expo. Bull***t. People had backpacks and all kinds of bags on the course and there’s absolutely no way they can monitor the tens of thousands of people like the emails said they would.
I had a fun time and may considering doing it in future years as it’s a nice change from my serious running events but I don’t even think i’ll need to register if this year was anything to go by.

I signed up really early for this event and was excited at all of the goodies I was going to get, the arm sleeves in particular. Sadly on the day of pick up they had ran out of the sleeves which was really irritating as I was one of the first few hundred to sign up and was hoping to wear them on the day. We were told they would be mailed to us, 16 days later I’m still waiting.

Packet pick up ran smoothly with different color shirts for each distance and nice little expo. Race day also ran smoothly, starting on time and with some great volunteers along the course. What I really wasn’t a fan of was the course itself. I ran the Half after Running Livermore Half the day before and after about mile 2 there was NO signage for the Half itself until the split at around mile 8. I spent those 6 miles thinking I was going to end up Running the Full. The course was also incredibly boring, there was not really anything to look at and the majority was just long boring roads that stretched for miles ahead.

Post race had lot’s going on with food and drinks galore (Sports water, Chocolate Milk, Coffee, Fruit, Chips, Candy ect) I didn’t find the Bagels that were advertised though which was a shame.

Overall a nice enough event, won’t be in a hurry to do it again though.

Registration:

Super easy. I got the $39 opening special. Email updates get a little tedious after a while and I ended up getting 2 or 3 of the same thing in the 2 weeks before the event.

Packet Pick up:

I really wish they had day of pick up as I live over an hours drive away and had to make the trek to San Jose twice in one weekend. That said it was really easy to get my packet, you just needed to know your bib number and they check it against your name. The TShirts are pretty cool and something I will actually wear.

Course:

Nice and flat. Nice addition to have the different ”miles” (Veteran / Mariachi). The mile markers were not completely accurate though (yup.. the serious Runner in me notices these things). Mile 2 was actually 1.1mi and mile 3 was just 0.9mi.

The event started right on time as planned and without any hitches however I do think that some kind of enforcement of the waves has to be done. Upon coming to the start line there was no one checking bibs. I was put in wave 1 for my sub 8 min mile pace and standing at the start with about a dozen people deep in front of me I noticed a lot of the people around me were wearing bibs marked waves 2, 3 and even 4. Once we started it was also made clear that some people placed in wave 1 really should not have been there. I had to zig zag around people that were not going the correct pace for the wave. Had I been out to PR I would have been really pissed off.

Post Race:

I didn’t experience the ”hearding” that people had mentioned in previous years but I guess that could have been down to the fact I was one of the first 90 people to finish. There was some walk to the end to get our bibs but nothing major.

The post race food was really lame and looking at the pictures from previous years I was expecting to get more than what I did – a bottle of Water, Apple and some Fruit chews. NO BANANA! Really? That gives me the sads. It’s common knowledge that Runners eat Banana’s. The occasional Orange slice, yes. Apples No. Unless they’re in some form of Pastry (Mmmm, Carbs).

The medal is also pretty cool, it can be removed from the lanyard and used as a bottle opener and overall I am glad I can now mark this event off of my Running Bucket List but I doubt I will do it again. Way too far to come for what it is.

Additional:

This event is 1 or 3 of the ”Run the Bay” series challenge where if you complete all 3 events you get an additional medal.Other 2 events are the Across The Bay (12k or 5k) in San Francisco and Let’s Go 510 in Berkeley.

I wanted to do this event last year but had to rethink due to a severe Knee injury so I was really looking forward to the fact that it was returning this year I signed up almost as soon as registration opened which then prompted friends too also.

Distance:
– 5k (3.1 miles)
– 15k (9.3 miles)

Expo:
The Expo was better located from those who do not live in The City, still a long way for me to come from The Valley yet still much more easily accessible.
The parking situation on the Saturday before was crazy! There didn’t appear to be enough spaces but then just driving around the parking lot turned out that actually there was, it was just that people were too lazy and wanted to park right near the entrance so that they didn’t have to walk too far. Uuurmm.. you’re picking up a packet for a distance Run people. Lol.

The expo was packed with so many people and a few vendors but not much in the way of Chocolate, I only saw one table giving out Chocolate dipped Marshmallows and was disappointed I didn’t get my little Chocolate they had the previous year.
The pick up itself was easy yet my Corral was not printed properly do I had to manually color it on with a pen.

Swag:
I love the cool Hoody which came in really useful on the cold San Francisco morning of the Run. I requested an XS yet it still felt a little on the large side though. I also bagged myself a Hat as one of my Running Club was an Ambassador and gave me a code to use. The Hat was big too (Boo)

Course:
Somewhat scenic though the Golden Gate Park and along the bay, the little Waterfall not even a mile into the course was killer though, I heard that water from far off and made me need the rest room for the next 4 miles. Darn it!
Most of the course was flat with a few hills mainly towards the end. I seem to excel at hill Running so they were a breeze for me but if you’re unprepared these hills will slow you.

Post Run:
Lot’s of picture opportunities and as this was a Chocolate Run we got a Bowl of Chocolate Goodies = Hot Chocolate, liquid dipping Chocolate and a few bits to dip (Banana, Marshmallow, Krispy Treat, Pretzels and a Wafer) . I skipped the Wafer and Pretzels but did end up scooping out about 70% of the melted Chocolate with my finger before feeling really sick. I know a lot of Runners (myself included) swear by Chocolate Milk after a Run for recovery but this was something else. Great concept but not a good idea to even try consume that much Chocolate at 9:30am.
I would have liked some more savory food options and only as we were about to leave I noticed a couple of food trucks that were not advertised as being there – Sam’s Chowdermobile, an Indian food truck and a stall selling Baked goods and Coffee. The location however left a lot to be desired, hidden behind the row of tree’s where the portable restrooms were. The smell coming from that area left a lot to be desired so even if I had seen the trucks sooner I doubt I would have got anything from there.

I did the first 5k of this course with a friend and the last 10k solo, definitely more fun with friends if you all keep the same pace. I would definitely do it again as the swag alone is worth it

Since I ran my first official race last February (Niles Half Marathon) I’ve become very aware of other local races and this event peeked my interested when fellow members of my Running Club told me they had heard good things about both the race and the course. Better yet, it excited me a little as friend and fellow Yelper Tram lives in Santa Cruz and this would be the perfect opportunity to Run together again and hang out.

Sign up for me was very easy, I entered my average pace, personal details, paid and then a few weeks before the event I received my bib in the mail. Tram didn’t have quite the same good luck although got charged never received her bib! Luckily she has a great boyfriend and when I found out the local Fleet Feet had a limited number of bibs sold back by Runners who could no longer attend he went and picked one up for her just so that we could run together.

Race day comes and Santa Cruz gets crazy busy!! 16,000 people attend this event every year and is sold out in no time. Corals are given based on your average pace which is supposed to alleviate road blocks but people clearly do not understand this as people that should have been in coral 3 or 4 were in 1 and 2 and vice versa. Once given your coral you can move back but not forward and being placed in Coral 1 I moved back to run with Tram as her Coral had already been set by the person who originally had the bib.

The course is beautiful, yes but really not the sort of event serious Runners like myself should attend unless registered as an Elite Runner or are right at the front of Coral 1. walkers were all over the place and people zigzagging left right and center throughout the entire 6 miles, it was mildly organized chaos.
The course was littered with numerous bands and spectators cheering or on hand with hosepipes spraying people with water, not something I appreciated but some people seemed to enjoy it.

Post race festivities were on the Capitola beach, I didn’t see much festiveness going on as we just picked up or goodie bags before heading out. The bags were pretty cool – Drawstring bag containing a T-Shirt, Bottled Water, Prickly Passion Lemonade, Power Bar Wafers, Trail Mix, a Fruit Chew Bar and a Chapstick. NO Banana’s! Which kind of sucks. That’s one of my favorite parts of a Run.

Not a Race I would do again unless I’m registered as Elite.