I love Fleet Feet races. I think they are usually very well done. This race is no exception.

Pros:
+ Well managed race, very simple packet pickup (including race day pickup), gear check, and communication.
+ Love the swag – it’s a very simple technical tank top. I feel like most races opt for t-shirts so it was a nice change. I also was glad to see they kept the design rather simple instead of making it extremely girly with the female & magnificent mile race theme.
+ Loved running on Michigan Avenue! I’ve ran plenty of races in Chicago and no other race gives you the opportunity to run that stretch of Michigan Avenue like this race does.
+ Fun extra perks. I didn’t end up going but a few of my friends from my run group were able to attend the shake out run event the day before and had a blast.

Not so great:
- The extensive use of the lakefront path on the course. This ended up working out well and not bothering me as much as I had originally anticipated. This race was rather small this year, about 6k of people, so there really didn’t end up being a bottleneck issue/spacing issue. I understand that it costs money to close down the streets of Chicago and Fleet Feet is running a business. Losing money or losing margins is just bad business, plain and simple. So I understand why the route changed from running on the Chicago streets a majority of the race to utilizing the lake path for a majority of the race. If you are a Chicago native, the course may have been a little disappointing. This is the same path most people run almost every weekend, so running 8 miles of a 13.1 mile race on it is sort of a let down for the price of the race. That being said, since the race was a smaller number of people than I’m sure they expected the spacing worked out well – if they kept a lot of the race on wider streets it would have been almost TOO spaced out. Also, people from the suburbs may really enjoy the lakefront path. My mom doesn’t like racing through the loop or Chicago streets because of issues with potholes and a lot of the questionable smells and GPS issues, so for her this race would have been perfect and we both plan on signing up to run it together next year.

I do recommend this race if you’re a woman looking for a fun half to do in Chicago. Fleet Feet manages great races and I’m sure this one will only get more popular in the future.