Clearwater Distance Classic

Clearwater Distance Classic

Clearwater Distance Classic

( 8 reviews )
75% of reviewers recommend this race
  • Clearwater,
    Florida,
    United States
  • January
  • 3 miles/5K, 5 miles/8K, 13.1 miles/Half Marathon, 26.2 miles/Marathon, 50K
  • Road Race
  • Event Website

Nora

Boston, Massachusetts, United States
26 12
2015
"The Clearwater Distance Classic - Beautiful Views, Surprisingly Difficult Terrain"
Overall
T-Shirts/SWAG
Aid Stations
Course Scenery
Expo Quality
Elevation Difficulty
Parking/Access
Race Management
Nora 's thoughts:

My mom and I were both excited to run this race, having not run a long race since the Rochester Marathon in September. Right at 7:05 the gun sounded, and everyone was off! And I mean, everyone. This race offered a 50k, marathon, half marathon, or 5-mile distance, and everyone started at the same time. This made it a little hectic and crowded at the start, but not terrible. Everyone just seemed happy to be running!
The race took us into the edge of downtown Clearwater, and then across the first much-anticipated bridge! On the website, they described this as possibly Florida’s most challenging half marathon because of the steepness and difficulty of these bridges, which provide great views of the Gulf of Mexico and Clearwater Bay. Being from hilly New England, my mom had scoffed at this. “Bridges?! How bad can they be?” Well, pretty dang steep to be honest.

The only good news was that the first one came somewhere around mile 2, so we still had plenty of gas in the tank. The views from the bridge were wonderful – all sky and ocean and impressive silhouettes of the hotels in the distance.

Once we crossed the bridge, we started seeing signs for Hope and Winter – the famous dolphins from the Dolphin Tale movies who live in the nearby aquarium. One runner shouted out across the bay area “HI HOPE AND WINTER!!” :) There were also jokes about all the beeps from GPS watches being understood by the dolphins nearby.

We passed some beautiful beaches, finally reaching the turn-around point in this out-and-back course. Once we finished, I grabbed my medal (which is actually one of my favorite medals ever - love the happy, smiling starfish!) and went with my mom to check out the post-race food! There was a good selection and we helped ourselves to chocolate milk, pastries, pretzels, and bananas. There was also pasta available, but neither of us really wanted that after running for 2 hours.

Other Notes - The expo is pretty small, but outdoors, which was kind of fun. I also really liked the longsleeve cotton shirts we got. Not great for wearing running, but perfect for hanging out on a lazy Sunday. The weather was perfect when we ran - cool in the morning, but sunny and warmer as the race went on.
Overall, the views make this race pretty special and definitely worth signing up for!

(You can check out my other race recaps at 2gensrunning.com)

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