I had the pleasure to run Brazen Racing's Western Pacific half marathon as the 1:45 pace group leader. Brazen puts on a ton (20+) races in the Bay Area, all of which I've heard are excellent, and this was my first time running/pacing one of theirs since moving to CA. I had been warned that the course typically measured long (though the marathon was USATF certified and thus, a Boston qualifier), and it was, by about .1 or .2, +/-. That made it a bit tough to properly pace my group of runners because the discrepancies between my watch and the mile markers on course were significant at times, but in the end, it all seemed to work out, and I was over by only about .1 mile and still got us in sub-1:45.

Brazen is also known for their aid stations, which were nothing short of small buffets. I didn't partake so much in them (but definitely would have, had I been running the full), but the volunteers at the stations were lovely and upbeat.

The course was almost exclusively on loose gravel/fire roads and pretty flat, though it seemed harder to get to the appropriate speed on the fire roads than on the few pieces of pavement we had--might be just an issue with my internal metronome though. As a trail run, the course was open to the public, but on a Saturday morning, somewhat early, it wasn't very crowded. This also might be tough for you, as a racer, if you're relying on crowds of spectators lining the course because that was definitely not the case here; things were pretty quiet.

I can't speak to the shirt quality because we got pacer-specific ones, but the medals and post-race fanfare was all pretty ample and seemingly well-managed. I'd definitely do another Brazen run and am looking forward to exploring other trails in the Bay Area.