The Foot Traffic Holiday Half is a fantastic end to your year. If you are local, or even if you are visiting from out of town, Foot Traffic (a local running company) organizes a fantastic and fun race for all paces. I ran with my best friend from college, and we both felt welcomed and warm for the entire race. The morning started with ample parking in a lot on Swan Island, and a great number of buses to shuttle us to the start. This was VERY well organized, and we had no problem getting right on the bus.

Once we arrived at the start line,we noticed right away that there was a huge line of porta-potties to greet us! Every runner's dream! We were led into an INDOOR packet pick-up and waiting area in Adidas campus, replete with fun Oregon Lottery photos, merchandise to purchase, coffee, and some snacks. We had a great time catching up before the race in a warm, inviting environment.

The race itself was well organized, and fairly flat. The route led us along the Willamette River, which was a little cold but beautiful. We were greeted with several groups of carolers, lots of local cheering residents, some excellent costumed race volunteers (see picture), and, yes, MORE porta-potties! It was a relief to my relatively inexperienced friend who is just starting out again.

At mile 7ish, we heard that there was a horrible tanker truck accident that caused a thick plume of black chemical smoke that was blowing into our route. Unfortunately, police had to cut our race short, so we had to finish our route later. Even though our half was actually 10 miles due to this, we had a great time. At "mile 12," they were even passing out gingerbread cookies!

The only thing we wished Foot Traffic offered was an opportunity to buy either beanies or sweatshirts. We loved the race so much, we wanted all the swag! Their race shirts were very high quality, I got so many compliments on it the next day. The medals were also VERY cute, if you're a bling person like me! I'll definitely make this race an annual thing.

HF#11936