This is a super fun race, which was held on Saturday, December 6 at 9am at Soldier Field. They encourage everyone to race with the items in your goodie bag - Santa hat, Santa beard, and your sweatshirt. It's really fun to see so many people do that, which means you are running in a sea of Santas - quite entertaining.

Things I enjoyed:
+ easy packet pickup at Fleet Feet Old Town and was 3 days.
+ race day packet pickup available.
+ easy access to race via CTA or parking at Solider Field for $20.
+ cookies and candy on course (2 aid stations... I think only the second one also had water & gatorade).
+ bottled water, mini m&ms at the finish, and cookies & milk at the finish line 'pre-party'.
+ post-race party at Navy Pier - bring your race bib in order to receive awesome food and drink specials at Bubba Gump’s, Billy Goat, Capi’s, Chango Loco (Crystal Gardens), City Porch, Haagen Dazs, Harry Caray’s, Margaritaville, McDonald’s, Navy Pier Beer Garden, and Riva. - - I didn't participate, but sounds fun.
+ timed race with the B-tag.
+ the sweatshirts ordered ended up being about 2 sizes too small, but at packet pickup I was allowed to switch without any problems - - they even alerted me to the problem before giving me the size I had ordered, and they let me try on the other sizes without any issues. If no exchanges that day were allowed, then this would be in the cons list, but they handled the situation very well. From what I gathered, Chicago was the first race of the series, and that's why the sweatshirts were an issues... sounded like it should be fixed for the other cities (hopefully).
+ corrals and wave starts (not that everyone lines up where they should, but like any race that does waves to cut back on the congestion on course).
+ goody bag included dri-fit hoodie, Santa hat, and Santa beard.
+ plenty of race communication from the race management.
+ funny signs along the course (Grumpy Cat, Walken, etc)

Things I didn't enjoy:
- running through the tunnel at McCormick Place - - while it's nice and wide, it's really dark in there and I'm always afraid I'm going to twist an ankle on the uneven surface. I get that it's the best way to have the course, I just wish there was more lighting in there.

That's it for the cons. Other than that little part, it's a nice course because the out is on a wider path (most of the way), which thins out the runners a bit, so coming back on the lake front path isn't too bad (much better than if it was out and back only on the path like most races.

It was a fun run, which benefited Toys for Tots and ACS.