Teresa Barcellos's Staging Area

I thought this was the most scenic of the Beach Cities races. Hillier than the other two but overall very manageable.

I thought organization was fine overall, though communication could have been a little better. I did not attend the expo (and really appreciated the option of having someone else pick up my packet), so can’t speak to that. I thought the shuttle information could have been more clear online- it was not easy to find and the website actually only said that shuttles would be available to return to Costa Mesa hotels. I had to double check my original hotel reservation email to confirm that there would be a shuttle back to the start. It also would have been nice to have more clear signs as to which buses were going where (or separate areas for Costa Mesa v Newport Beach shuttles) at the actual finish. That said, once I found the bus I only had to wait a short reasonable time for the bus to fill up before it headed back to Fashion Island. There were no issues or traffic problems getting out of the lot as people had mentioned in previous years.

I’ll preface this by saying that I realize the main focus at this event was the half rather than the 5K and also that as the inaugural event, I expected some issues/room for improvement- but I also expected that as an organization Conqur had enough experience to put on a smoother first race than what I saw.

The positive: As others have mentioned, the volunteers on the course and at the finish were enthusiastic and cheerful in spite of being out in the cold and rain. The Rose Bowl finish is a cool idea even if it was a little anticlimactic in the rain. The shirt is one of the better race shirts I’ve gotten recently. The medal design is nice. Two free Ballast Point beers is a pretty good deal even if I couldn’t bring myself to drink beer at 8AM 🙂 And I do appreciate that the 5K was also Sunday since working Saturdays means a lot of 5Ks aren’t available to me.

Problems:
-Congestion and parking- I have done other races at the Rose Bowl but never experienced this level of traffic. We arrived at the Arroyo exit on the 210 by 5:40 and it took over an hour to get to the parking lot, presumably because ALL other entrances were closed. Since this entrance also crossed the course (and the traffic was presumably part of what delayed the start), it seems like it would have made more sense to keep the Linda Vista entrance on the west side of Arroyo open as well.
-The delay: I assume it was mostly due to the parking issues, but never felt like it was clearly explained. Particularly frustrating for a 5K since I spent more time waiting than running…And since I had planned to wait in the car until ~6:45-50 for a 7AM start, was dressed to be comfortable running at 5K effort in cool weather rather than standing still in the cold (admittedly my choice)
-The narrow start chute: This start chute was SO narrow that just a few people walking abreast could completely occlude it. I signed up for this race partly because I thought the fairly flat course and cool weather gave me a decent chance at a new PR- those hopes were dashed when it took 1:45 to get through the first 0.1 miles. Not being especially fast I lined up maybe 1/4 way back through the pack- but there were so many large groups of people walking in front of me that I could not get around them. It would have been nice if either the start mats were at the turn onto Arroyo to allow room to spread out quickly like normal OR the half and 5K starts were staggered (maybe with separate finish chutes instead of separate start chutes) so that each group could use the entire starting space.