This was my first Shamrock Shuffle, and after missing it last year I was overly excited to be able to run it this year.

I did not attend the expo - I had someone else grab my packet for me which was a breeze from what I was told - but I will say that they gave me the wrong T shirt size which I was really bummed about when i went through my packet.

Race day was a bit ominous it started out with a beautiful sun rise but we all knew what was in store for us in the coming hours. Wind and Rain....

I was station in the Elite corral and we were told to go one way touches the Elite tent but the "security Guards" wouldn't let us access the tent the way that was drawn out on a map for us and we had to go all the way around the park to get into the area, so that was a little frustrating. I assume that they just didn't understand that people were allowed to walk through that way. But walking thought the park everything was clearly labeled. It was done in the same size scale as the Chicago Marathon, which gave me chills walking thought all of that again.

That is one cool thing about this course, you stay all downtown and the start and finish are identical to the start and finish of the marathon course. I didn't realize the magnitude and size of the race until the actual race day. With that being said...this leads me to some of my complaints about the race, and they are a bit superficial, t shirt and medals... were not up to par. The race medal is something we all cherish as a token of a hard race completed, this medal looked like it was something that cost $2 to make. IT wasn't even a real medal, and the T shirts seemed to be done last minute as well. As a creative guy I am a bit more critical of these aspects.

The race overall though was a blast, besides from the weather, the course was clean, the spectators were visitors, the course was perfect ( flat with a few steps uphills to wake you up), aid stations (2) were plentiful, and as always the volunteers were so ENERGETIC! Especially in the finishers shoot.

I would absolutely recommend this race to a friend. It is a great race to kick off the spring season with and to shake off all of those winter cobwebs.