I had considered running this race in the past, when it was a "women's" race, but participated for the first time this year when they changed the marketing. Everything leading up to the race was typical of RAM Racing's (and Fleet Feet's) usual professionalism: easy registration, solid communication, reasonable packet pickup, "good" swag. (I use scare quotes because I am not personally 100% in love with RAM's designs, though they seem popular. This was one I didn't really care for, but lots of people were wearing it at the race--even though it was long sleeves!)

The race was also very well-organized, as I expected from these organizers. The start in Grant Park was super smooth, especially since so many races that start there are HUGE and this was only around 1,400 runners in the half (not sure how many in the 5k or total). So all the corrals were off and running within 6 or 7 minutes of gun time. There were elites, who had a special tent in the start area, and I do think it's fun that RAM attracts elite runners to the HMs they do in the area. And there were pacers going all the way up to 15min/mile.

I had a head cold going into this race so I started out pretty far back in the pack, going out around 12min/mi as we zigged from Columbus via Randolph to Michigan. The race went north on Michigan from Randolph to Superior, then turned around and came south, also via Michigan, again to Randolph. I hate to complain about getting to run on Michigan with no cars, but...you run on less than a mile of Mag Mile, I would have LOVED to run up to Oak St., say, or at least to the Water Tower! But you could see the Water Tower. A girl can dream!

Heading back east on lower Randolph, the 5k runners split off to go back south on Colombus to their finish line, while the half marathon runners continued straight east to the lake, turning south on the main part of the Lakefront Trail. The three-mile marker came just after this turn, and the race continued south on the Trail until about mile 8.5, then turned around to head back around the Shedd Aquarium and into Grant Park from the south, finishing at a location very familiar to Chicago runners.

There's not much crowd support for races on the Trail, which is fine, but there was kind of disappointingly little support on Michigan too--probably because it was a cool and drizzly morning, aka perfect racing weather. There were plenty of water stations, though, about every 2 miles or less, and each one had water as well as nuun, which was great (I drink a lot of nuun). One of them was also passing out luna bars.

The post-race party was pretty small, but then I was pretty late getting to it so it may have been more exciting earlier. The medal is really nice, one of my favorites ever, and despite my cold and slow start I ended up with a PR.

I chose this race because it fit well with my training schedule (after a different travel race plan fell through) and was about an hour from Chicago, where I live. While there was a super helpful packet pickup option right in downtown Chicago, I was actually out of town on that date--so I went with the packet mailing for an extra fee. It came right as expected, about two weeks before the race (and several days before the downtown Chicago pickup day). The swag, a short-sleeve tech shirt, was good quality and my usual size of a women's medium fit great. Cute design, too.

On race day, I was headed up to Kenosha EARLY for a 7am start time, but that probably just meant I avoided traffic. I followed the directions on the race website, which were very good, but didn't include distances so I was a bit nervous I was missing Kenosha. When I did arrive, there was tons of parking. I parked in a free municipal lot several blocks from the start, which was the perfect way to warm up.

There were some port-a-potty lines, but I made it into the slowest corral just as people were starting, and the race started off super smoothly. The course was immediately fun: right through Kenosha's historic downtown and to the lakefront, which is just beautiful there. After heading south, we looped back north and ran a few blocks inland for a while, but it was cool to see the town and there were a goodish number of people who had stepped out of their homes to watch and cheer us on. (It reminded me a bit, in this section, of the North Shore Classic in Highland Park, IL, for those who are familiar with that race.)

After running north back through the harbor area, we reached the lakefront again and continued north for a few miles. This was the toughest part of the race due to completely crazy headwinds (I checked the weather later and it was 20-30mph winds with gusts up to 45mph), so my memory is a bit hazy, but it was a pretty simple out-and-back section of the course that went mostly along the lake and a bit inland to Carthage College. There were pretty much no spectators in this area.

Once we turned around, the rest of the race passed pretty quickly (thanks tailwinds!) and the lake just continued to look gorgeous as we headed back toward downtown Kenosha. Another trip through downtown, a short out-and-back segment along the early part of the course, and we headed back to the harbor area to finish. Crowd support at the finish was good enough to give me a nice kick through the last 0.1 miles, which is nice, and I could hear the announcer calling my name as I rounded the final turns (fun!).

I grabbed a banana and bottle of water in the finish chute but didn't bother with my beer and brat (I realized I had left my ID in the car). I like the race medal, although the felt cape that indicates the year seems like it probably won't last very long. I do kind of wish the medal was year-specific, but it's not a huge deal. I was super glad for the mylar blanket, too, since the wind was so strong out at the harbor.

Over the whole course, aid station support was pretty good, although some of the tables were starting to be broken down when I passed them. I ran a pace a bit under 12 min/mi so while I'm not the fastest, I was certainly nowhere near the time limit, and it can feel depressing to have support disappearing on you like that. There were also two port-a-potties set up at pretty much every aid station, and they all had lines. (There were some additional bathrooms we passed on the course that I saw people run into--municipal fieldhouses at the beach.)

I had a great time (and a PR), and the course was really pretty and fun despite the wind issues. I'd totally run this again--it was just far enough from Chicago for me to appreciate new views of the lake, but close enough to make it an easy morning trip without a hotel room.

This was my third Hot Chocolate Chicago event, and my second time doing the 15k option. Overall, the experience was better than last year, and I would recommend the race generally, but there are definitely some issues to be aware of.

Pre-race: All communications are super professional, and Hot Chocolate always has a great website, so from registration to all pre-race communications, this race has you 100% covered.

Expo: First, the expo moved this year from McCormick Place to the Hyatt right downtown, which is a MASSIVE improvement. Someone else talked about the accessibility of the Hyatt because there was some minor sidewalk construction, but it is a crime against humanity to make people go all the way to McCormick Place. This was much better.

The expo itself is cool. Packet picket is amazingly simple for a race of this size, and I got everything quickly and in good order. Free chocolate and hot chocolate are tasty. Cool booths. Hot Chocolate merch available. Not too insanely crowded.

Race morning: This is a huge race, I think this year was 40k people, so the corral area is huge. If you're in the second wave, like I was, you needed to arrive well over an hour before you would actually start racing just to get into Grant Park before the first racers started. For a chilly morning, it can be a long time to wait around. I wore extra throwaway layers that I could take off and leave for race organizers to collect after the start. Gear check was fast and I had no issues getting into my corral, and everyone seemed to be in the right corral (or further back).

The start was well organized, considering the size of the field, and everything went pretty much as planned, timewise. But it's still a looooong start, so be prepared if you are at the back of the pack.

Course: The course goes through downtown Chicago, which is the main reason I run this race every year. Love getting to run around downtown with the streets shut down!

First thing, though, is to go underground. For those familiar with Lower Wacker and the other "lower" streets, that's where the race course heads just after Grant Park. Personally, I find it a strange choice to have runners packed into what is essentially an underground street/parking garage type space, full of fumes and bad smells--but at least it warms you up a bit. You need to be pretty alert here as the crowd is still tight and there a number of curbs and things like that to watch out for.

Potholes, manhole covers, grates, and curbs continue to be an issue, especially downtown, but there's nothing terrible--just keep your eyes peeled. The run down Clark is nice, then the race swings back to Michigan just before the end of the 5k course. The 5k runners split off and 15k runners continue down Michigan to 31st St. Things get a bit quieter here, with less to see and fewer crowds, but there are still plenty of runners and good aid station support.

Around the 7-mile marker, heading back toward Grant Park, the course goes inside the McCormick Place parking garage/service road. This is a terrible choice, and was the same last year. BE EXTRA ALERT HERE because not only are there potholes and crappy paving throughout, it also gets VERY dark inside. You can see the light at the end of the tunnel, so to speak, but it's still dark enough that all the runners around you will start shining in whatever bits of reflective gear they happen to have on, and it will get hard to see the road. I wish they would move this portion to go around the building.

Finally, you'll get back to Grant Park and the finish line, after a few more miles. It's a long walk from the finish to the post-race party, and for the second year in a row I actually skipped the party entirely. I wanted the chocolate, believe me (it's really good!), but the crowd is insane. I wish they had people closer to the finish line handing out little chocolates, or cups of hot chocolate, even if you couldn't get the whole chocolate fondue shebang that way. I would have LOVED to get a cup of hot chocolate without walking several blocks and waiting in enormous lines. I run this race alone, so it's not that fun for me to go to a party like that. For runners who have a group to hang out with, I imagine it would be perfectly cool.

Swag: This year's goodie bag was a full-zip tech jacket, lined in fleece. It looks pretty nice, and I got an early-bird deal where it includes embroidery of the Chicago skyline and "Chicago 2015 finisher," which is a nice little extra along with the HC logo. The jacket itself, though, does not seem as "nice" and is definitely not as warm as the tech hoodie half-zip or not-so-tech hoodie full-zip I got the previous two years. That said, I am wearing it right now! The medal, which is for 15k finishers only, is pretty awesome. Like last year, it's in the shape of a partially unwrapped, partially eaten chocolate bar, and the design of the "wrapper" was updated and is even better looking this year.

Overall: Good expo, great race with VERY professional production all around, but may be more fun for a group than a single runner--unless you are happy to leave without your chocolate.

I was looking to target a half marathon right around the beginning of October, and this one caught my eye because of its location in a seemingly beautiful (I'd never been there before) state park just 50 miles from my location on the North Side of Chicago. I tried not to think too hard about the "hills" part and focus on the beautiful scenery while I was training, but be warned: it's hilly.

I didn't want to drive all the way out to McHenry more than once, so I did packet pickup on race morning. This was very easy, as it's such a small race--there were a max of 400 runners, and I don't think they maxed out. It was chilly and a bit windy, but that was the perfect weather for me to run a half marathon and I was warm within half a mile or so.

The race map was really confusing. I looked at it over and over again, and eventually decided I wasn't even going to try to figure it out, and would just go by the course marshals. There was a race talk before the start and the organizers said there would be plenty of people at each crossroads, directing runners, so I decided to leave it to them. This was a fine choice--the course *was* really confusing, and I was often second-guessing where I was, and where I would be going next, but the course marshals were always there to tell me so it really didn't matter.

The views were just about consistently beautiful, and you run through the woods, up and down hills, along marshland, along a dam, on higher and lower ground, around a lake and some other water features, etc. There's a good variety of scenery, and while the leaves hadn't really begun to change yet to fall colors, it was lovely. I saw several egrets at a pond, tons of ducks, lots of furry caterpillars, and even a tiny snake on the path.

For the first 6 miles, the 10k and half marathon run the course together, and after they split apart, the half marathon field gets a lot less crowded--not that it was ever crowded where I run at the back of the pack. But for the last few miles of this race, I was frequently alone on the course, not in view of anyone else.

I ran alone for the last 2+ miles, and when I got to the finish there were a handful of people there, including my boyfriend. There are a few spots for spectators to watch, so the race is "spectator-friendly" in that sense, but as a runner you will only see people a couple of times (and there aren't many people).

The long-sleeve tech shirt was nice, although unisex. Organization was great, tons of water and gatorade (and plenty of aid stations), bathrooms along the course are real bathrooms for the state park, and there's plenty of parking. And places to eat afterward in nearby McHenry.

I ran the inaugural Edgewater 5k in 2014, and I knew I wanted to come back for the second year of my neighborhood 5k (even though it conflicted with a half marathon I really wanted to run!). It begins at Sheridan Road, and they shut the street down for the runners, which is fun. Runners go south on Sheridan to the beginning of the Lakefront Path at Ardmore, and head south on the path until a turnaround at Foster Beach. Runners head back north along the water, then back on the path and back up Sheridan to the finish. In 2014, the race started on Granville, but everything was situated a bit further north this year, with the race start on Rosemont and gear check and tents set up in the new pedestrian square at Kenmore and Rosemont.

The course is pretty fast, and most of it coincides with my normal running path, so the scenery is very familiar to me (though it's fun to run in the street). The race is a fundraiser for several local schools, and you can sponsor free entries for kids at the schools as well. So between the neighborhood/family element, and the sponsored student runners, there are a large number of kids at the race, especially in the 10-14 or so age range. I think it's a great experience to get so many people out there running on the path, so I really love this race, but beware it might be tough to get a PR--inexperienced kids tend to sprint a bit and then run out of steam in the middle of the street or path, and don't realize they are right in front of someone. So you may have to dodge around a bit (but there's always plenty of room).

Last year, I thought the tech tshirt for this race was pretty cute, and it's one I actually enjoy wearing on my training runs. This year, I wasn't crazy about it--the printing of the logo in front is noticeably cheap. I'm a little worried it will wear off in the wash too.

The race organization is good, except the website(s). The race appeared on several sites in its inaugural year, and some have never been updated or taken down. I would search and have to click on a few results before I made sure I was looking at the date, time, and location as of 2015 instead of 2014. It wasn't a huge deal, but it was a little annoying. It would be great if the race had a cleaner online presence. There's also no race map online, and the swag doesn't get publicized until the last minute if at all. These things really aren't a big deal for a neighborhood race, IMO, but you should be aware that it's not a super slickly organized 5k (like, for example, the Bucktown 5k, which is a much fancier "neighborhood race").

Packet pickup is a breeze, and on race day everything is very relaxed and well taken care of. Both years, we've started right on time, which is great, and there are plenty of bananas and water at the end. I'll definitely race this again.