I've always wanted to run in this race but never had the time. This year I took advantage of a great sale that came about after the group that runs the Rock'n'Roll series was sold and got in for $50!

Anyway, I read a lot of reviews and took heed of the warnings to go to the expo on the first day, the Thursday before the Saturday race instead of on Friday. That's because the expo is on Hutchinson Island which is just across the river from the main drag in Savannah. There are only two ways to access it, either by ferry or via the Highway 17 bridge. If you go during peak hours on the Friday before the race, it can take you up to two hours to cross the bridge! No thank you.

So we went on Thursday and breezed in. The expo was nice and really reminiscent of the three other Rock'n'Roll races we have done (Chicago, Las Vegas, San Diego). We got our bibs and shirts with no problem and then checked into our hotel.

We chose the Courtyard by Marriott because it is less than a mile from the start at Bay and Bull streets and maybe a half mile from the finish at Forsyth Park. This made access really easy and convenient. Plus the staff at the hotel were very accommodating and great.

This year because of weather concerns the start of the race was held ten minutes earlier than scheduled (7:20 a.m. instead of 7:30). The corrals were packed but not too crowded when the race started. The first five miles were in a kind of industrial area. The only hill in this section is an overpass you climb at maybe the first six-tenths of a mile.

Then after Mile 5 you are in the downtown area and the surface here is brick, which is a little different from road asphalt. There were lots of bands at various intervals and the water/Gatorade stations were great. There are a few small rises after Mile 12 leading to the finish.

Everything was great in this year's race. It's a nice flat course but of course the weather can throw a huge wrench in the process.

After hearing about this race from neighbors, I applied to run in the Army Ten Miler this year. I'm glad I did because it is a very well-run race with amazing scenery of Washington, D.C. You start and finish in the lots that adjoin the Pentagon and the race makes its way through the National Mall and back into Virginia again. There is a slight rise around Mile 3 but everything else is pretty flat. The starting waves seemed to be efficiently run and because it's run by the Army, there is a lot of security at the expo, the staging/finish areas and of course, along the course.

Expo this year was at the Armory, it was convenient to get to on the Metro blue line. There was a long line to get in because of bag checks but it went quickly. Inside it was pretty convenient to get your bib and T-shirt.

This year because of the humid conditions they cut the course about two hours after the race started and later waves had about a mile of the course removed. There were plenty of personnel to aid runners and I saw three runners receiving aid on the course.

Unlike other races in which finishers receive race medals, this race keeps with the Army's tradition of challenge coins, so finishers received a pentagon-shaped finisher's coin that was nice to get.

One drawback is that it is a fall race, it can be humid and fall of course is when other large races like the Chicago Marathon are held. But it's definitely a run I will consider in the future!

I'd never heard about this race until I started researching races that would occur the weekend we were to be in Boston. Once I saw the great reviews on BibRave, I knew I wanted to run in it.

First, the course is about as flat as you want it to be. There are some elevation changes along the course, but they are minimal. Like others have mentioned, the start is a little congested (the race is divided in three waves and you select where you will start based on pace signs) but no more so than other races I've run in the past.

The course is beautiful, it starts outside the Seaport Hotel and then makes its way along the river, past the Boston Common, over the Harvard bridge, then along the river to a turnaround, back past MIT and to another turnaround and back across the Harvard bridge before making its way back to the start. At times I felt (or told myself) I was just doing a fun run instead of trying to break a certain time for the first time.

The race support is great and the race medal and food and drink afterward are as well. One thing that's unique about this medal is you get to select a coin representing police, fire or first responders that you magnetically attach to your medal. The race start included touching remembrances of people who paid the ultimate sacrifice while on duty.

One element that hasn't been mentioned in the reviews is the exceptional kids run. It's a free run the morning before the race at the expo, sponsored by the Boston police and the City of Boston Credit Union. Basically you sign a waiver for your kids and they receive a T-shirt and then run in waves depending on how old they are. The distance is about a 50m dash (longer for older kids) on an upper level above the expo floor.

What was incredibly nice about this was the fact that Boston police officers presented each child with a medal -- and it was a real medal (a small badge), not a rubberized version of a medal or a ribbon as I've seen in past kids runs. The Boston police also had an outreach van where they gave out ice cream to the children afterward. It all was very impressive and stood out in my mind even more than the great race that I would run the next day. My 2-year-old daughter wore her race shirt for two days straight during our vacation as testament to how proud she was to have participated in this event.

I was a little concerned about security and what I would be allowed to bring with me on race day -- I usually have a pouch for my phone and a gel, but it was fine to carry on race day. I don't think they would let you through with a handbag or backpack, though.

We stayed at a hotel 1.3 miles away, which gave me a nice warmup before the race. I'd read the previous posts about parking, train issues so it was nice to navigate there on my own.

The t-shirt, as other posters mentioned, was a regular cotton/poly T-shirt instead of a technical shirt. The expo was on the small to medium size but it was nice to be able to buy past shirts, or even shorts (stitched with a logo of the Boston Police Runners Club) at a nice discount. They had activity centers and bouncy houses for children.