Virginia Wine Country Half Marathon
Purcellville, VA
- Half Marathon, 10K, 5K
- Road (Paved), Trail (Unpaved)
- Official race website
The Virginia Wine Country Half Marathon is not just a running race, it’s a destination lifestyle experience. Loudoun County plays host to this popular event located in and around historic Leesburg, VA, one hour west of Washington DC. This is the only event in the series held in the eastern … MORE
Local Historical Weather (May 30):
| 2026 | 2025 | 2024 | 2023 | 2022 | |
| H (°F) | 72 | 77 | 73 | 77 | 89 |
| L (°F) | 59 | 60 | 56 | 55 | 61 |
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No net time / course too long
Please don’t run this unless you care about the wine afterwards. Event is poorly run taking 45 mins to sign in (causing most runners to start late - I got … MORE
Please don’t run this unless you care about the wine afterwards. Event is poorly run taking 45 mins to sign in (causing most runners to start late – I got there 40 mins before and still didn’t start on time because of the poor setup. I was actually towards the middle of the crowd so feel bad for any half marathoners that were towards the race time limit of 3:30 hours. There were also no t-shirts left when I finally checked in around 7am – not sure how that happens.
The race is also long for the 10k (clocked total mileage at 6.82 after a .1 mile walk after the finish line), but I’ve heard others complain that it is too short for the half. I feel like the one prerequisite to running an official 5k, 10k, etc. is to have the mileage marked accurately. I’m just going off my app time for the 10k as I can’t use the gun time (the race started late) and the net time doesn’t exist (despite the waiting for a bib for 45 mins).
Lastly, the wine festival after was fine, but you can’t grab any wine until 9am. I had somewhere to be at noon, so when I finished around 8, I had to wait an hour to just get a couple glasses. Not worth it in my opinion.
Nice scenery. Awful event production.
Goodness, where to start? I've run this venue with this company at least once before years ago and I remember everything being pretty much ok. Something must have happened to … MORE
Goodness, where to start? I’ve run this venue with this company at least once before years ago and I remember everything being pretty much ok. Something must have happened to the company in recent years because this time around the event was an epic train wreck. Dumpster fire.
Honestly, the leadership of the company should be ashamed and embarrassed.
The weather was perfect – blue sky, 60 degrees at 6am. Should be a perfect race day, right? Well, let me just run down the list of how everything a race company could mess up … they seemed to mess up.
Let’s start with the first issue – parking. It’s 0.6 miles away (we measured it). If you’re doing packet pickup and want to run your shirt and wine glass back to your car instead of doing bag check? Yeah, you’ve got 1.2 miles of distance ahead of you, and you haven’t even gotten to the starting line yet!
And let’s talk timing. 7am start – for everyone? What? Every other race with multiple distances runs staggered starts. Especially given that the wine festival doesn’t start until 9am. So you have a good 5k runner who finishes by 7:20 and they just have to sit on their ass for an hour and 40 minutes and stare at the geese in the pond? No, you stagger the starts! It’s not hard at all – Half marathoners leave at 7, 10k’ers at 7:30, 5k’ers at 8 – and basically everyone is back just in time for the festival.
But wait, it gets even dumber!
Early packet pickup is for like 4 hours – 2-6pm the day before the event on Friday. This winery location is about an hour west out of DC, and most of the runners will be coming from DC, and not everyone can just take a half a day off of work to drive out for packet pickup. More competent race companies in the area partner up with local running shoe or sporting goods stores to have packet pickup in multiple areas – what store wouldn’t want to have a bunch of athletes come through their store? So packet pickup for a single 4 hour window at a single location during a work day where most people probably are a 30-60 minute drive away … not ideal.
So, packet pickup the day of? Absolute shitshow! I don’t have exact numbers of course, but visually I’m guessing maybe half of the field of runners didn’t actually cross the starting line at the gun – they were waiting forever for their bib! They had 2, maybe 3 people running the packet pickup desk and the line crawled. Absolutely no excuse for it.
But wait, it gets even worse!
So there I am, I dunno – 7:25, first race ever where I wasn’t in the pack at the start, running along. The course is fine enough, I wouldn’t say it’s the most picturesque, but it’s out in the country so that is nice. Some people complain about it being hilly, I don’t find it too terrible in that regard, but there are some hills.
So I wrap up my 5k, trying to forget the absolute annoyance with every other thing that morning … only to cross the finish line to find more of the same.
Cross the finish line — “congratulations! here’s a small bushel of lavender plants – we ran out of medals! enjoy! someone will mail you your medal!”
ARE. YOU. KIDDING. ME? I’ve literally never run an event where the organizers ran out of finisher medals. Have you? No, you probably haven’t – because it’s one of the most basic things a race company needs to plan, and they completely botched up that one simple task – order enough medals.
I’m never ever going to see that medal. Was someone writing down bib #s of those of us that paid for a shirt and medal and got screwed on half of that deal? I highly doubt it.
And then, here is the piece that really really caps it off. My friend – also in the 5k distance – finished and walked over to the food and snacks table and wanted to get a granola bar. He says he was told – I kid you not – “Oh, sorry – the granola bars are just for the 10k and Half Marathon runners.”
ARE. YOU. KIDDING. ME? Now we’re gate-keeping snacks? Absolutely insane. Again, basic simple things that literally every other race company and venue seems to get right – and this company can’t even manage these simple things any more.
Again, like I said at the start – the executives at this company should feel absolutely ashamed at their execution of this event. But I bet they don’t.
Doukenie as a winery is perfectly lovely. Nice people, nice scenery, nice wines. No one should interpret this as anything negative about them overall. But they should seriously consider whether they want to lend their name to this company once again next year.
They had a bunch of timing correction issues, and then what was really the weirdest was no additional medals or anything for placing in your age category. Or at least, not when our brackets were called (which again would point to extremely poor planning by the company). Again, little bushels of lavender handed out (WTF?). My friend placed 1st in his bracket, got a bushel of lavender and a “2nd place age bracket winner” slip of paper good for 15% off the next run. I placed 3rd in my bracket, and I also got a “2nd place age bracket winner” slip as well.
I’m surprised the executives running the company can even get out of bed and tie their own shoes in the morning. The level of incompetence for a race company is staggering. And you see similar indicators of this in other reviews down below this one, so this isn’t just a one-off.
Small, challenging race
If you're not used to running on hills this may be a challenge for you. It's a small, friendly race with good food and wine at the end. You should … MORE
If you’re not used to running on hills this may be a challenge for you. It’s a small, friendly race with good food and wine at the end. You should pick up your packet before race day, or, if you pick it up on race day, plan to do bag drop after you do so that you don’t have to make the 1/2 mile walk back to your car. Also, bring your id with you if you plan to enjoy the wine afterwards!
It's OK
The race is fine. Nothing particularly special about it- it's a pretty area, gently rolling hills. I expected to run through more wineries but it appears there was only one … MORE
The race is fine. Nothing particularly special about it- it’s a pretty area, gently rolling hills. I expected to run through more wineries but it appears there was only one (at the start/ finish). My biggest complaint is the way they nickel and dime runners. Everyone is forced to pay to park (the number of vehicles isn’t taken into account), you are required to purchase a wine glass ($25 for runners) to participate in the wine festival. By the end of the race they had run out of bottles of water and the majority of the snacks. It wasn’t poorly organized but it also wasn’t anything to write home about.
Pretty scenery but...
First the pros: beautiful scenery running through some of the vineyard and other farmland and the wine tasting at the end was fun! The cons: parking is pretty far from … MORE
First the pros: beautiful scenery running through some of the vineyard and other farmland and the wine tasting at the end was fun!
The cons: parking is pretty far from the start of the race so get there early! When I asked if this would be a hilly course I was told “no this is a mostly flat course” and that was a lie. Some of the hills were just small rolling hills but there were two very long hills. My Garmin and my husbands iWatch had our distance at 13.4 which is t a big deal but the race records are going to show the wrong finish time for both of us. There is a stretch of the race on a road that has a lot of potholes which can be pretty dangerous if you are running with a large group around you. We couldn’t hear the announcer at the start of the race. I think she was using a karaoke speaker. The race info said there would be water stations starting at mile 1.8 and then every mile after and that was also false. There were a total of 6 water stations which is unacceptable for a half marathon!
This is completely out of the organization’s control but the wind picked up right around the 6 mile point and was up to 20 mph guests and that is pretty miserable when running through open fields.
Thankfully I don’t run for a specific finish time and just signed up because of the wine tasting afterward. If you decide to run this race it would help if you train on lots of hills and don’t have high expectations.
Do not bother
I ran this race in 2015 and it was a great race. Everything was very different in 2024. Parking was no longer convenient to the race start/finish and festival and … MORE
I ran this race in 2015 and it was a great race. Everything was very different in 2024. Parking was no longer convenient to the race start/finish and festival and the weather conditions made the lot a mud pit by the end. Packet pick up was in process for lots of runners when the race started. The roads were not blocked to traffic during the race. There was only one mile marker on the entire course. 10/10 will never run again. I feel horrible for recommending the race to a friend.
Organization was lacking, but beautiful
The course was very scenic, and the weather was perfect this year! But the organization was severely lacking....the start line was kind of a mess, no staggered start with the … MORE
The course was very scenic, and the weather was perfect this year! But the organization was severely lacking….the start line was kind of a mess, no staggered start with the different race distances. And when we crossed the finish line, they had people handing out slips of paper that said our medals are on the way. No communication about them from anyone at the expo the day before, or at the race itself.
Updated to note I emailed them and received my medal in the mail a couple weeks after the race.
A lot to "wine" about
What an epic disaster! I will start by saying do NOT sign up for this race or anything produced by Bad to the Bone Sports. This was the rudest, most … MORE
What an epic disaster! I will start by saying do NOT sign up for this race or anything produced by Bad to the Bone Sports. This was the rudest, most unprofessional race company I have ever dealt with and I race a lot. Also $100 for this “half marathon” was a joke. I will cut to the chase and say the reason I put “half marathon” in quotes is the course was about 1 mile short which is an egregious and unacceptable mistake and the response by the race company was even worse. Now for the full review. I was looking for somewhere to go for my three day weekend and the DC area seemed like a nice and appropriate place to spend memorial day and I found a race on all 3 days there. This sounded like the most interesting of the races offered this weekend so even though I am not a wine drinker, I enjoy pretty, farmland and thought this sounded nice and it had mostly good or at least decent reviews. Just some background info on the race. This race changed production companies a couple years ago. It used to be by “Destination Races” and the reviews from prior years are based on their production. This year it was done by Bad to the Bone Sports who also do the Charlottesville Marathon and a few other races if you want to know what races to avoid. This year the location also changed to Tarara winery in Leesburg. Okay, fine covid I get it. This race is located outside of DC. I stayed in a hotel by Dulles airport even though I drove since it was equidistant from all my races. One positive about this race is they offer morning of packet pick-up which I did since I drove in Friday. Friday night was very rainy, luckily the rain mostly cleared by Saturday morning but it made parking a muddy disaster. Should have been a bad sign. Packet pick-up was easy. I was actually pretty excited for the race as the bib was really pretty and personalized and this was a medium sized race (capped at 500) so was able to be pretty normal and still fit within size limits now that things are opening up. The start was just a normal start. I did think there should have been some kind of sign or something recommending to line up by pace but it was just a mass start. The field was small enough and it was chipped time so it was fine. The race is all on the winery property and it is multiple out and backs. It is described as “rolling hills” and we know what that means. As I’ve said before I don’t really mind a scenic, hilly course. However I wasn’t that impressed with the scenery. It was nice enough but I’ve seen much nicer farms in New York and Vermont. The course was kind of annoying where there was this one and back you did twice with another out and back inbetween. What made it annoying was the front of the pack caught up to the large back of the pack group I was in on their second out and back while we were on our first. The lead runner was escorted by police on motorcycles who yelled through a megaphone for us to get out of the way. I understand why this was done but it was obviously going to happen with how the course was set up and they should have figured out a better course. The course is a mix of paved and gravel roads. With the rain it was kind of muddy but not terrible. There were not mile markers every mile which I feel like for a $100 road race there should be huge mile markers. I did notice a 5 mile marker at the wrong place and thought it was just accidentally there but that should have been a bad sign. There were also pretty much no spectators which is not surprising since it is all in the winery and is in a rural area. However other races I’ve done in rural areas such as the EVL Halloween half marathon and Amish Country Running Festival placed signs throughout the course for encouragement in some of the more rural sections. I feel like if I pay $100 you can put a few signs up. The aid stations were really good and frequent though. One of my few positives. I liked how they did it. They had cups placed filled with water and gatorade and then also water jugs with foot pedals if you wanted it contactless. However the gatorade was very watered down. I swear they tried to cut costs every way they could. Anyways I get to the end of the out and back at the halfway mark and I noticed my Garmin only says 6.12 miles. At that point I realized the reason the 5 mile marker was off is the course was off by almost 1 mile! I immediately lost any motivation since I realized this was not going to count for any half marathon clubs and I wanted to save energy for my half on Monday. I walked all the uphill in the second half. I was pretty annoyed and it was hard to enjoy the rest of the race. I mostly just started looking for farm animals and saw a few cows in the distance, some ducks, a cat and a really cute alpaca. I made it to the finish line and my Garmin said 12.2 miles. Yes the course was short about a mile. And I confirmed this with several runners so it was not a Garmin error. Completely unacceptable. Especially for an expensive race that is billed as a “destination lifestyle experience” trying to attract runners from all over. I understand human error and if this was a cheap, local, mom and pop type race company that I paid $30 for a half marathon I could forgive them but not a $100 race. Absolutely ridiculous. If I spend $100 on a race I expect flawless production and at the very least an accurate course. At the finish line you got your medal and your shirt. The medal is really cute with grapes and a baby duck but is not distant specific and not year specific and it turns out was just the medal for 2020 that they reused. I mean I get why they would use the 2020 medals but what was my $100 entry fee used for. Also the shirts are literally the cheapest worst shirts I have every seen. They are black, just have the name and a picture of grapes in one color (so cheap) and made of scratchy polyester so not comfortable to run in or sleep in. And they are tiny. I get men’s mediums since I like baggy shirts and this one is tight on me which means it is smaller than a men’s small should be and it is definitely the men’s shirt because they initially handed me a women’s medium which looked like it might fit a toddler. Really what did they do with my money if the medals were reused, the shirt was cheap and production was terrible. There is also a wine festival but you have to pay an additional $25 to enter on top of the ridiculous entry fee. I don’t drink alcohol so didn’t participate but this race was so bad I was tempted to buy a glass and start drinking again. Also the free post-race snacks were super lame just a bag of chips and a small thing of M&Ms plus a banana and water bottle. There was a food truck you could buy food from but they advertised two food trucks so they didn’t even get that right lol. To add insult to injury, the race company was completely rude afterwards. I was waiting for an apology email or something but crickets. They seemed to want to ignore the measurement issue and pretend it never happened. Anyways someone commented on one of their posts on their facebook page that the race was short. Instead of apologizing, the race company just deleted the comment. People then commented again. Instead of apologizing the company again deleted the comments and made it so no one could comment on any posts. Super professional! They then offered an explanation saying the wind knocked down the turn around sign for the first out and back and it was placed in the wrong location. They did not apologize at all in the explanation. The tone actually sounded annoyed that runners would complain about their mistake. Also this message is in a comment on a facebook post and not an email sent to all participants so you have to look for it. I still have not seen an apology email or any apology for their mistake. I get it we all make mistakes. I expect less mistakes if I pay this much for a race but what I definitely expect is an apology when a race company screws up this bad. I have seen same day apologies for much, much, much more minor things by good race companies. The only good thing I can say about this race company is they have chosen the perfect company name because they truly are bad to the bone. Not in a cool, tough way but in that they are literally bad at their jobs to the bone. Avoid this race and avoid this race company at all costs. And the costs are high!
(also I am not usually this negative a person and I try to give race companies the benefit of the doubt – please read my positive reviews there are a lot of great races out there. If you are looking for Virginia, I highly recommend Shamrock in Virginia Beach)
***Just an update 1 week later and still no apology! But I did get an email to spend $49.99 on personalized race photos in case I wanted to waste more money on a race I am trying to forget***
Short course, poor acknowledgement
Course was moved to Tarara Winery in Leesburg, started on pea gravel, then pavement, then gravel and back. Out and back course with rolling hills. Course only measured 12.13 miles, … MORE
Course was moved to Tarara Winery in Leesburg, started on pea gravel, then pavement, then gravel and back. Out and back course with rolling hills. Course only measured 12.13 miles, there was a turn early in the course that we missed. Race Facebook page deleted several comments from disgruntled runners before finally issuing a response that said we missed the turn because of the wind while setting up the race. They deleted additional comments and turning off commenting going forward. Race medal was supposedly from 2020 and the wine glass said a complete different race on it. It had rained pretty heavily leading up to the race so parking in a grass field quickly became a mud hole and I know of cars that got stuck
Humidity and course were tough
I ran a PR at this race in 2017 and then returned this year and ended up running my worst half marathon ever. A lot of the factors were personal … MORE
I ran a PR at this race in 2017 and then returned this year and ended up running my worst half marathon ever. A lot of the factors were personal but I will say that the humidity killed me, it was very tough! The wine festival after the race though is amazing and tons of fun!!
VA Wine Country Half Race Report
This race featured a rolling course on country roads through beautiful Virginia Wine Country. Some of the course was on paved roads and some was on gravel roads. I love … MORE
This race featured a rolling course on country roads through beautiful Virginia Wine Country. Some of the course was on paved roads and some was on gravel roads. I love the T-shirt and the medal can serve as a corkscrew. The post-race festival featured wine tasting from various local wineries and a very good blues band playing live music. My one suggestion for improvement is to set up changing tents so that racers have a place to change out of their race clothes to enjoy the festival.
Great half marathon
This was my first half marathon. I loved it! The scenery was beautiful and the course was challenging with some hills and upaved areas. Plenty of water stations and electrolyte … MORE
This was my first half marathon. I loved it! The scenery was beautiful and the course was challenging with some hills and upaved areas. Plenty of water stations and electrolyte water too. The wine tasting afterwards helps to push you through lol. All the wineries represented were great.
Beautiful day for a run
Fantastic way to spend the day with friends. Beautiful location and route through the country. And a great wine tasting afterwards. Very family friendly and plenty to go see around … MORE
Fantastic way to spend the day with friends. Beautiful location and route through the country. And a great wine tasting afterwards. Very family friendly and plenty to go see around the area.
Not a course for a PR or much support
Great post race festival -but make sure you have a designated driver! the course is finebut very hilly and there is minimal on course cheers. some of the race is … MORE
Great post race festival -but make sure you have a designated driver!
the course is finebut very hilly and there is minimal on course cheers. some of the race is off-road – uphill and very rocky.
Great Race!
This was a well-organized race that I look forward to completing again! My only "complaint" was that there was not too much information about the 5k posted online, but this … MORE
This was a well-organized race that I look forward to completing again! My only “complaint” was that there was not too much information about the 5k posted online, but this was a minor issue. The wine tasting after was a nice inclusion also (though it would be nice for it to start earlier than it did for those who finished the 5k).
Beautiful course!
This race is one of a kind! The course is absolutely beautiful and definitely well run. The best part of the race is the course and the gorgeous medal. I … MORE
This race is one of a kind! The course is absolutely beautiful and definitely well run. The best part of the race is the course and the gorgeous medal. I am so impressed with the swag, quality of the medal, and friendliness of everyone at the race!
Great finisher party!
This race was tough as the course turned onto a gravel/asphalt mixture. I lost time on that, but loved doing this race with my sweet cousin, Brittany! Our family flew … MORE
This race was tough as the course turned onto a gravel/asphalt mixture. I lost time on that, but loved doing this race with my sweet cousin, Brittany! Our family flew up to come cheer us on and we had a great time celebrating after.
Not exactly what I was hoping for
Course was a bit tougher than what I am accustomed to because of the miles of gravel road. The race itself was ok, but the extra fee wine festival after … MORE
Course was a bit tougher than what I am accustomed to because of the miles of gravel road. The race itself was ok, but the extra fee wine festival after was packed! Not enjoyable.
Challenging, but beautiful course!
The Expo was very small, but the volunteers were friendly. The shirts are absolutely adorable, but I wish they were technical/dry-fit. A lot of the course was on gravel roads … MORE
The Expo was very small, but the volunteers were friendly. The shirts are absolutely adorable, but I wish they were technical/dry-fit. A lot of the course was on gravel roads and it was pretty hilly, which made it challenging. The scenery was beautiful, though! The mile markers had cute rhymes on them about wine 🙂 I love the medal (it holds a wine glass!), but my boyfriend ran the 5k and was bummed that everyone got the same medal and it didn’t say 5k on it. There was a wine festival after the race and you could purchase a wine glass for unlimited tastings from 9:30AM-12PM. The lines for tastings were really long and we ended up just leaving an hour before it was over. Overall, it was a fun race and I would do it again!
Nice race, meh post-race
Overall I enjoyed the race. As others have said, it was hilly at times (which I anticipated given the location) and there was an unexpected, long stretch of gravel road … MORE
Overall I enjoyed the race. As others have said, it was hilly at times (which I anticipated given the location) and there was an unexpected, long stretch of gravel road (which wasn’t ideal, but would have been much worse had I not worn the right shoes). The water/energy drink support was great, with the opportunity to replenish at least every couple of miles. The scenery was really pretty at times (but mostly backroadish). All in all, I really enjoyed running this course with my friends.
I think our biggest disappointment was the post race festival. If I had a chance to do over, I would have skipped it entirely. My friends and I paid $25 a piece to participate, which we were eager and willing to do when we were under the impression we could sample from the 15 listed wineries; however, when it came time to join the festival, the lines were huge. We got through two lines before checking our watches and giving up. I’m not sure how many signed up for the post race (I just know that there were a lot of people), but assuming race organizers had those numbers, they didn’t adequately ensure the wineries provided the necessary staff/tables to accommodate post race participants being able to sample quickly. It’s a shame because the ‘shtick’ that draws people to your half (or at least drew my group) is the post race wine festival; otherwise, I can find an equally challenging trail course closer to home and save the money I spent traveling and “wine tasting”.
So in sum: Good course. Poor post race, but could easily be fixed.