Even though Thursday eventually turned into quite a beautiful day - it was freaking cold that morning. Usually I shed my track jacket before I run, but I couldn't bring myself to take it off. I know it was 30 degrees when I woke up, and I definitely had to sit there and wait for my window to thaw out before I drove down:
Never a good sight on race morning :(
Anyhow, I did a lot of shivering waiting around for the race to start. I got down there about an hour early since I had to pick up my race packet, but the lines were very short & it took me roughly 5.3 seconds. They were very organized in that department. So after pinning my number on, I sat on a guard rail on the north shore and people watched.
I did notice that everyone was sort of cultivated around the finish area and they already had the bagels and bananas and chips and pretzels out. It didn't take long at all for the 5,000+ participants to start grazing on them before any of the races started (1 mile, 5k, and 5 mile). Obviously, this was not good.
So the volunteers covered the tables with tarps and started cultivating around them like protective vultures:
I was highly amused by this.
Anyhow, the race itself was very flat and was a really nice course. It was throughout both the north shore area of Pittsburgh and a bit of downtown, as well. You got to cross the bridges & there were tons of spectators along the way to cheer us on. Everything was organized and there were no traffic jam areas - however, I do think only one water station for a 5 mile run is not enough. While I know the 5k and the 5 mile took a relatively similar course, one water station along the way for the 5 mile runners was rough.
I finished in 46:15 which wasn't terrible, but I only ran once between this race and my Disney run so I guess I can't complain. I got into the top 100 of my age group (out of 200).
But my major, major gripe with this race that left me with a very bad taste in my mouth was the fact that there were NO volunteers at the finish line to keep traffic moving. After about 7-10 steps past the finish line, you were hit with a non-mobile crowd of THOUSANDS of people crowded around the food and water tables. Not only was I shoving past people to keep moving to prevent myself from passing out after going from 6.5 mph to ZERO, it took me a good 5 minutes to even find the water/bagel table after the race was done. There were several of them apparently (I saw them before the race), but the 5k finishers came through before us and cleaned most of the early tables out. The tables that did have food and water were in the back and crowded around so heavily that you literally had to push your way through a crowd to simply get a bottle of water. Perhaps I just came through at a busy time, but there are plenty of races I've done that were much larger than this where I had a bagel and a bottle of water in my hands practically as soon as I came across the finish line.
The finish is obviously the most crucial point of the race for many runners, and I feel that this is where a majority of the planning and preparation should be concentrated. It was a frustrating way to end the race, but I guess it could have been worse.
Congratulations to all the finishers of the 22nd Annual PNC YMCA Turkey Trot. Whether you ran the 1 mile, the 5k, or the 5 mile - you earned your pumpkin pie on Thursday :) I hope you all had a great holiday!
Keep Running,
Kelli
