Registration: Lottery style. Registered February ish and found out I was in in March? $120 CAD, which equals approximately $90 USD. After you're accepted, you have a week to officially submit payment (didn't take credit cards during lottery placement)

Emails/updates leading up to the race: I got close to none after I officially registered and after looking at their FB site, I don't think I was the only one with this problem. I had to email them 5 days before the race to get my bib number, wave, etc.

Website: I wasn't a fan of it, I had to go through a whole lot of stuff, just to get what I was looking for (packet pick up, race day info, etc). Yeah, Nike has fun websites for buying stuff, but the race website needs to be more user friendly and easily accessible

Packet Pick Up: Held at Harbor Centre right along the Lake. Nike had it's own tents, etc set up. They had early pick ups for local runners the days leading up to the race and then race village Friday-Sunday. It was pretty easy, no line (I remember the DC half in 2013, massive lines by the end of Saturday). Able to get my bib and shirt, bag, etc all in one swoop. Then went into the Nike Expo of it, tons of stuff to buy and then a small area of other vendors to go through.

Race day, Getting There: Here's my thing. I drove 4.5-5 hrs on 4 hrs of sleep the day before a race to come run this and see Toronto. They race itself was on Toronto Island, so I really didn't get to see Toronto. The Ferries shuttled us over and we were all given a ticket with a color and time for the ferry. It all ran smoothly from that standpoint. If you missed your ferry, you had to go see what was the next ferry with spots open for you to get on was. If you had family coming to watch, you purchased spectator ferry tickets at registration

Pre Race: Official race time was 930 AM. That means, since I had a 7 AM ferry, and I got there at 705, I had a 2 ish hour wait before much of anything happened. Yeah, I had time to use the bathroom twice and check my bag, but when there are people coming from 24 countries who have hotels to check out of, it pushes check out time down the line. There were food trucks with food for purchase, but no free type food

Corrals: So everyone was given a corral, but you were suppose to get a wrist band with what corral you were in. Mine wasn't in my packet that I saw, and I didn't realize it until I was at the start area and was given a corral 7 wrist band (again, not good in terms of time when the latest i can check out is 1 pm). I was able to get into my corral 4 and inch up into corral 3. Suggestion: make the bibs fun/cooler and somehow have waves indicated on bibs. Less crap for me to remember on race day. Waves were let out minimum 5 minutes apart. Wave 3 started 15 minutes after the start.

The course: Very flat course, get some Toronto Island Scenery, really good views of Toronto, and hey, got to run on an active airport jetway. I really wish it would have been in mainland Toronto. Like I said earlier, driving 4.5-5 hrs on not a whole lot of sleep, it would have been nice to actually see Toronto and all it's neighborhoods, especially for the price of the race. Also, the course was 3-4 different terrains. I think we ran on sand, grass, pavement and gravel. I feel like I needed cross country shoes! Paths were narrow to boot. Overall though, I enjoyed the flatness of it, the views of toronto and what not. Good otherwise

Bling: A Tiffany's Pendent. A good thing because my medal rack's neck can't handle many more medals and I can wear it daily

Post race: food was in bags that they handed you as you exited, much appreciated. Food trucks still there and heat sheets if you wanted them. Bag check was crowded, but people didn't realize bags were being handed out on both sides of the bag check, so it only took me a few minutes, but others who didn't realize this waited awhile. I was lucky to get on a ferry within 15 minutes, but others waited awhile. Really didn't get a chance to do the post race finisher's shopping (getting a shower and checked out trumped all).

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