I ran the 10 km Madison Shamrock Shuffle. I really appreciated the option for early packet pick up at the Orpheum in Madison, it was super fast for me to grab my packet and conveniently located downtown. The "expo" was more than I expected for a local 10 km, our Fleet Feet had official merchandise for the shuffle from Nike, all of which looked like super nice quality (although I didn't end up purchasing anything). The t-shirt is a standard cotton unisex long sleeve, which I'll use for PJs, but the design is fun and you could also opt to not receive it and have $5 lower registration for the race.

Day of the race was pretty easy to navigate. My friend and I got there about ~40 min early, easily parked in the ramp closest to the race. We stopped at the Orpheum to get warm and also use the bathroom, but the line was insane, so we meandered down State Street to find the port-a-potties. There were only 8 for ~5000 runners that I could see - so I hope in the future they'd scale that up. I was able to get into one before the race start, but I waited about 15 min in line.

They did their best to arrange the start corral by pace - and I think people were pretty honest about putting themselves where they should be, which I really appreciated. It sucks having to dodge walkers etc who decide they need to be at the front. The start corrals had really fun music and a very enthusiastic announcer, which made waiting for the start great.

The race itself was nice and challenging enough to keep it interesting. It's a sort of out and back along the lakeshore path on UW-Madison campus. You go up the famed observatory hill within the first mile (and subsequently back up it in the last mile) and then go along the lakeshore path, which was beautiful. It's relatively flat except for the Observatory Dr. section, too. They had two water stops along the 10km, which worked out pretty well. Just water at those, but that's really all I wanted/needed.

There was some congestion in the first part of the race while people were still evening out, but overall I didn't have any issues with crowdedness as I did in other years. The only tough part was when the 5k-ers crossed back into the 10 km course - by the time I was going back and the courses intersected, it was a lot of the slower/walking 5kers, who was frustrating to navigate around. However, there was enough space, and mostly I was just tired at that point.

The finish was really easy - they had water and bananas which is perfect for me. I didn't end up going to the post-race party at State Street Brats, but that was an option for those who wanted it.

Overall, it's a great start to the season and I really enjoyed myself. It benefits the Boys and Girl's Club of Dane County, which makes me feel even better. I'll definitely do this again (and have done it/registered for the past three years!) There's enough crowd support to be nice and so many people dress up that the people watching is fun, too.