Happy Valley 10k and 5k - Race Report, Results and Photos

Looking for some hill work? Have I got the race for you!

But first, here are the particulars:

Need to see the results? They're right here and/or right here.

Want to see photos of yourself all sweaty and sad-looking? Jake Egbert Photography took care of that for you right here and here.

So, the race.

Well, after the illness and subpar performance at the Corvallis Half, I wanted to get something on the schedule fairly quickly just to keep my training momentum going. And while it was a bit of a drive, Happy Valley is just outside of Portland, the date was about right, so I signed up for this one. Definitely sight unseen. Unfortunately.

As I drove into the Happy Valley area, I noticed immediately that there may be a problem. There's no valley. It should really have been named Happy Hills. I mean, I'm not a stickler for detail, but come on.



Yep, that chart that looks like waves on the open sea? That's the elevation profile. It was actually a 5k loop and the 10k ran it twice, so that's why the halves look very similar.

Anyway, the race started at Happy Valley Elementary and the packet pickup was inside the school. Indoor bathrooms...yes! So after a quick pitstop, about 50 of us 10k runners and around 250 5k runners toed the start line and were off! Well, actually, it was more like, we...were...off... Yes, we started right uphill. No messing around with a flat start, let's just get this thing headed uphill.



As you can see on the map, it was a quick uphill jaunt on King, then a left on 146th. That was a pretty good downhill most of the way, then slightly uphill at the end before we turned onto Ridgecrest. Then some zags and a hill through a neighborhood section and back to Ridgecrest. Then a odd little loop into Happy Valley Park. Downhill going into the park and uphill coming out. Once we took the left back onto Ridgecrest, we got the most brutal uphill of the course, all the way to 132nd. Just had to grind it. Once on to 132nd, it was a pretty good downhill almost all the way back to King. Then another left with some down, then up and we're back to the start and the 2nd lap.



Not sure how, but I kept a very even pace through the first three miles, at 8:10, 8:08 and 8:09. Once we dropped all the 5k runners, I had a bit of a lapse in concentration and dropped to an 8:23, but picked it back up for an 8:07 on mile five. Mile six was sort of slow at 8:23, big hill, then finished it up at about the same pace. Averaged 8:14 overall. Not great, but an improvement over my horrid pace at the Corvallis Half.



Not real happy that my Garmin read 6.44 miles at the end. I realize that kind of course can add a bit to the total mileage, but an extra quarter mile is a LOT of extra running. That's two minutes added to my time. Nope, not happy about that, Happy Valley.

Good cinnamon chip bread from Great Harvest at the finish and some amazaballs bundt cake mini things that were fantastic! I think those were from this place - check them out!

Shirts were pretty cool. They had both tech and cotton, but luckily I grabbed a tech shirt before they ran out.



So there you have it. Not a bad race. Good organization and low-key, but so, so hilly. Probably would not run it again. Now I need to find one or two more of the 10k variety before my next goal half: the Eugene Half Marathon at the end of July.

The Yearly Purge of Old, Stinky Running Shirts

Yes, it's that time of year again. The races are pretty much done for the year. Most of us in the running world are taking a little time off for the holidays before getting back into full-time training in 2013. Or we're doing some maintenance running to keep the legs and lungs ready for the planned Spring races.

Whatever you're doing at the moment, I know one thing is true: you've piled up a few race shirts over the last 12 months of 2012. I know my "running" dresser drawer is getting a little tight. So I've started the yearly purge of shirts and shorts and socks that need to go. And how do I decide what stays and what goes? Simple.

I work out like normal, and when I'm done, and headed to the showers at Dixon, I lift up my shirt and take a real good whiff. If it smells like a furry mammal crawled into my shirt and died of old age, then I just toss it into the garbage right then and there. And as much as I love tech running shirts, after a certain number of sweaty workouts and subsequent washes they just can't be saved any longer.

They acquire a true funk.

So far, I've tossed three shirts. And I've got a notion that one pair of shorts and maybe one or two more shirts will be destined to join their buddies before the winter is over.

Hey, have a good run out there...and don't forget to smell good doing it!

California International Marathon Review and Results (CIM 2012)

"Call me Ishmael."

I thought of the first line of Moby Dick more than once on this swirling maelstrom of a race course at the 2012 California International Marathon. To further butcher a good metaphor, by the end of the race, I wasn't sure if I was Ishmael or the Great White Whale...

First, let's take care of some business.

If you're just looking for results, here they are. They're only unofficial results until Wednesday, I believe, then they should get the official results up.

And here's an article on the winners: Daniel Tapia and Alisha Williams, the first two American winners at CIM since 1999 and 2000, respectively.

Wow, what an experience this one was.

First, as you know if you're a regular R's reader, I simply was not ready for this race. I had injuries. And setbacks.

And if you recall, I had wondered publicly if one could run a marathon on no training. Well, according to my personal sample size of one: yes, you can. But it won't be fast.

So let's go back about a week before the race. It wasn't a secret - the weather forecast did not look good for the 2012 CIM. But it's one thing to look at an online forecast a week before the race.

And it's another to look out your Sacramento hotel window at 5:00am the morning of the race. The rain was coming down in sheets...and the sheets were being blown sideways by huge gusts of wind. It was ugly.

Here's a photo album of the damage the storms had done in the Sacramento area in the days before the CIM.

The third and final of the storms in that series to hit Sacramento was hitting, you guessed it, on Saturday night and Sunday morning.

But what to do except run the damn thing? Well, if I had lived in Sacramento, I may have skipped the whole thing. But I already flew down, got a hotel, rental car, etc, etc...I was running it.

So I put on my finest definitely-not-rain-proof-running-outfit and headed for the buses to take me to the start line. Jen snapped a picture of me in the hotel, looking like a kid heading to his first day of school in a new town, dry and happy.

So Jen drove me as far as she could, then dropped me off. I ran through the driving wind and rain, which in the dark before sunrise, had a scary biblical quality to it, and jumped on a bus to take me to the start line. There were supposed to be tents and such near the start line, but the wind was howling and garbage was flying through the streets; you really couldn't see much of anything. I scrambled to a strip mall next to a gas station, where I actually found decent shelter from the wind and rain. I vowed to stay there until 6:55am, five minutes before the starting gun.

In this photo gallery from the Sacramento Bee, the gas station in Photo #1 is just across from where I was hiding pre-race, and the shelter in Photo #2, is where I was huddled, trying to keep warm.

At 6:55 exactly, I sprinted out to the start line and got close to the 4:00 pace group. I tried to hide behind people, but the course started out directly, head-on, into the wind that was gusting up to 40mph. There was just nowhere to hide. See Photos # 13 and 14 in the gallery just above to see what I'm talking about.

They played the Star Spangled Banner, gave us a couple "good lucks" and we were off! The first two miles were IN. SANE. The wind and rain was hitting your face like hail, so you had to keep your head down, and hopefully had a hat on, so you could keep some rain off your face. Only that made it so you didn't see the garbage bags, gloves, t-shirts and sweatshirts that were coming back like missiles, blown by the wind. Cardboard garbage cans and plastic garbage bags were flying around. People were jumping and dodging trying to miss branches and palm fronds down in the street.

Crazy.

The wind was coming from the South, so as you can see on my Garmin map, it was either in our faces or blowing sideways across us the whole way. It was never behind us, on this point to point course, so it never helped us.

As befitting my horrid last two months of training, I went out fairly well, then faded oh so quickly right around the half marathon mark. I wanted to stay with the four hour pace group as long as possible and actually slowly moved up with the 3:55 group for quite a while. But after 13 miles, I faded back.

There were huge streams flying down the gutters during the entire race and every couple miles, there would be lakes that covered the entire street, like this.

There were also two sections where there were rivers - I'm not kidding here, these were 4-6 inch deep rivers flowing across the street. There was absolutely no way to get around them. You had to go right through them. If you were thinking right before you got to those rivers, "well, we can't get any wetter," you were wrong, weren't you?

Lots of good signs along the way, but my favorite was "Embrace the suck." I couldn't have put it any better.

I was having trouble meeting up with my support crew, Jen, but she finally found me at around mile 18. My quads were just trashed at that point - have I mentioned I didn't train for this race - and this series of photos is me telling her "no, I won't be finishing around 4:00, my quads are done." And her yelling, "But you're doing great, you've got a good time." And me yelling, "You don't understand, I'm done. Look for me at 4:30!"

And it turns out, that's exactly what happened. I totally seized up in the last six miles and was lucky to get across in 4:28:54.

And while Jen didn't get any shots of me in the first half of the race, when I actually looked like a normal runner, she did get me shambling across the finish line like a zombie.



The course itself was as advertised: up and down, but with gentle rollers and an overall downhill slant. I could see myself trying this one again...if I'm in shape...and the weather report is better.

So of course the sun came out at about noon and the rest of the day was positively beautiful. What are you going to do, right? Since we were flying back that night, and since our hotel wasn't allowing ANY late check-outs (and we couldn't get back there before noon), we found a local YMCA and I paid the day-use fee so I could take a shower!

Good race expo and great organization and volunteers there and at the race itself. Decent swag and a good looking black tech race tee. Also got some cotton gloves, a cinch backpack, a weird handband thing, and a big ass medal (B.A.M!), that you can apparently use as a coaster. It weighs about four pounds.

All in all, the race went as expected because I didn't have any expectations coming in. Being totally unprepared will do that to you.

But I'm not giving up. I'll roll my Boston goal to 2013 and I'll be back.

Next planned race: Corvallis Half Marathon in April. See you there.

credit for the opening video of the CIM to franzevna.

Seafair Torchlight Run Results and Race Report

Subtitled: Another PR goes down!

If you're just looking for race results, here you go.

Now let's talk about the race itself!

A little history first. It seems absolutely impossible to me, but going through my old race numbers, I think this is my first Seafair 8k since 1990! Wow. They called it the Seafair Henry's 8k back then. I don't recall the first thing about the race or course from that long ago, but it was downtown, which means we probably ran along the Viaduct, because of the Washington State Law that says any race in downtown Seattle proper must be run along the Viaduct.

Weird race prep for this one. Me and the kids drove all the way from Corvallis to Gig Harbor, WA on Saturday morning. After I deposited them at the Grandparents' house, I then drove on to Seattle for the race. No, five-plus hours of driving is not recommended for pre-race strategy.

So I wanted to get to Seattle Center a little early, as I had find parking on Torchlight Parade night, pick up my number and shirt, take the shirt back to the car, then get back to the start line and get warmed up. Oh, and the registration said packet pickup was at "Seattle Center." Period. Ummm, it's a pretty big place. Could we nail it down a little better than that?

Anyhoo, I found a few folks that already had their numbers and got directions on where to go. Long story short, I got the parking, shirt, number, put away the shirt, found out the race started a half-hour later than I thought and had a WHOLE lot of time to kill.

But then people-watching at Seattle Center is a pretty decent way to kill time, so that's exactly what I did.

With the race starting at 6:30, I knew it could be a hot one, and I had no clue of where exactly the course went. I figured we'd have a little shade from buildings, but I didn't know how much.

So with 5k runners and 8k runners all lined up and running together, we were about 3500 strong. I knew we took off down 2nd, went down a decent hill immediately, and would eventually finish going back up that same big hill. And that's all I knew.

With KIRO copters filming overhead, we were off!

I wanted to beat my lifetime 8k PR of 37:40. My only plan was to keep the pace under 7:30, but as fast as possible while keeping my heart rate at a decent range (I don't wear, and never have worn, a heart rate monitor,but I can tell by my breathing and shortness of breath when I'm going too fast).

We ran from 2nd to Denny then right to 4th Ave and headed downtown. That's where all the crowds were waiting for the Torchlight Parade and it's pretty amazing running in front of that many people. They estimated the crowds at between 200,000 and 300,000 and they're mostly very positive with a lot of kids looking for high fives. It's pretty fun.

I enjoyed the shade between the huge buildings on 4th very, very much. I also liked the slight downhill for much of that stretch. The only problem at all along this stretch was the bad surface of the roads. Lots of potholes, huge metal grates, metal construction plates, etc. Reminded me of the horrid downtown streets from the Portland Tri a few years back. I clocked 7:07 on my first mile, which I thought was a little fast, but not too bad. Then I ran the second mile in 6:52! Wow.

OK, that's too fast, and I knew that was too fast, but I felt pretty good. And it was on a section that had a lot of downhill. So I didn't check myself too much. I just figured I'd keep it up as long as I felt it.

We finally turned down toward the water and moved onto 1st, still running south. We went past CenturyLink Field, otherwise known as Seahawk Stadium, and I knew the good times were just about over. It was also around here that everyone in front of me cut off a corner. Hey, we weren't up in the front with the leaders. And it was only about 20 feet everyone was cheating going around a corner without getting to the cone. No biggie.

But it still bugs me. I ran all the way to the cone before making the turn. I don't know what the people behind me did, and don't really want to know. I do know that the 20 or 30 people in front of me cut the corner. Every single one of them. Irritating.

So we made the turn to head back to the barn and, of course, we headed onto the Alaskan Way Viaduct. Yep, and it's uphill when you're heading north. Now, I know the elevation doesn't look like much, but it's a steady climb going onto the Viaduct there.

And the sun was blazing into our faces now that we were out of the downtown area.

And there were no more cheering crowds now that we were on the Viaduct.

And we met back up with the 5k runners...and walkers...who had branched off a while earlier...and they meandered in front of the 8k runners at random points...while they took photos of themselves in front of the new Seattle Great Wheel.

It took some concentration here. I was tired, I was hot, I was annoyed at having to dodge walkers...and I knew I was slowing down. Mile three time: 7:14. That's OK. Mile four time: 7:45. Uh-oh.

When we finally took the exit off the Viaduct onto Western, I was a happy guy. I knew we were getting close there. I just needed to hold on a bit longer. I also knew we had that very last hill at the end, but didn't know anything between here and there.

I found out soon enough.

We took a right onto Broad St. and OH MY GOD...it went straight frickin' uphill to the sky! It was only a block long hill...but sooooo steep. Just before that hill, I knew I had the PR in hand. After that hill, I knew I had to keep the pedal down or I might miss it.

Got back onto 2nd, fought through a huge mass of walkers on the last hill and made it to the finish line with a 37:17. A full 23 seconds off of my now-previous PR.

Woot!

That was good for 224th out of 1872 8k runners. And 17th out of 105 runners in my division.

So the go-out-too-fast-and-hang-on plan works once again.

All I can say is, it's a nice feeling to set a lifetime PR when you're 45 years old. I was smiling for a good couple hours after I finished the race.

Next up on the PR pain train? The Fall Festival 10k, right here in Corvallis.

See you there.

Want to Earn $1000?

The hard way?

Sorry, slipped into my Rodney Dangerfield persona for a moment there.

Actually, you can earn $1000, cash money, by designing the 2012 Peachtree Road Race T-shirt! Nice, right?

You've only got two weeks though, so you better get moving. The official rules from Peachtree are right here.

If you ever wanted to be known by a large number of people, this is your shot! Your design would be on the backs of over 60,000 people! Peachtree is one of the biggest races in the world, so you'll never have a better chance to impress people than this.

Last year's winning time at the Peachtree 10k was a 28:05 by Sammy Kitwara. A fairly quick 4:31 pace. In other words, getting your design on this guy's back will be the best chance you'll ever have of going that fast! If you want to know what kind of race Peachtree is, please note the results page from last year - two-thirds of the 2012 US Olympic Marathon Team raced last year, Abdihakim Abdirahman and Ryan Hall, and only finished 9th and 17th respectively. And multiple-time Seattle Marathon winner, Uli Steidl, could only manage 53rd. Yikes!

Good luck!


Awesome T-shirt at Zazzle right here.


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McDonald Forest 15k Trail Run Review!

So after missing out on running the Corvallis 5k earlier in the morning, I had to quickly clear my head, and my irritation, and get ready to run a tough trail 15k at the McDonald Forest Trail Run.

We arrived at McDonald Forest with the rain coming down pretty good and the promise of mud awaiting us on the course. Which was fine by me. Really, I haven't had a muddy race all year and with only this race and one more to the end of EPIC 2011, I was sort of hoping for a little mud!

This race was looking like it would start right on time, so a quick trip to the Honey Bucket, then I lined up in the starting chute.

And POW! Off we went. The 5k runners quickly went left, around the lake, and the 15k runners went right, around the other side of the lake, and that was the last I saw of the 5k folks. The first two or three miles of this one is pretty nice. Mostly flat or downhill, with nothing too steep up or down. But as soon as you hit that three mile mark...OOF. This race goes up.

This is an interesting course in that there are a couple spots where you can see the runners ahead of you, but then you take a quick turn and don't end up back where you just saw the other runners for a number of minutes. Tease!

At one point, just past four miles, and going up a nasty hill, my Garmin told me that it lost satellite reception. That's the first time its ever done that to me. It was very cloudy and raining, and we were deep in the middle of McDonald Forest, but it's still annoying to know that your trusty Garmin isn't keeping track of where you're going any more! And if you look at the pace chart above, you can see where it loses it - right where my pace goes to a spiffy one minute per mile pace!

Eventually the Garmin came back online and we were finally nearing the top of the brutal, never ending climb. And then came the part that feels so good the day of...and so bad the next day. The screaming steep downhill section. It's all you can do to keep up with your feet through miles six and seven. You're just flying through the woods! And strangely, even though it was still raining, there were very few patches of mud. The course was actually pretty solid.

So after one last uphill at the nine-mile mark, we were back to the lake and then downhill to the finish. Yes!

I crossed the line with a 1:24:21 time. Not stellar, but hey, that's one steep course. Over 2900 feet of elevation gain, according to my Garmin. I finished dead on in 100th place. Woot! Check the results here.

You might notice that World Champion Mountain runner Max King finished in second place. What?! I know, right? One Chris Reed beat him to the finish line, in an upset for the ages. But as you can read here, young Mr. Reed does in fact know how to run. Still, that's quite an upset. Congrats to Chris!

Also, note the winner of the 5k: Case Regan, a 7th grader from the cross country squad at Linus Pauling. Go LP!

And of course, we've got the always cool McDonald Forest 15k shirt. This year, it was a quality tech tee in a sweet purple color!

And the back, as usual, shows the pain!

Well, as far as I can tell, the EPIC 2011 train has but one race left. Oh noes! And that would be the OAC Turkey Trot 5k on Thanksgiving morning. Be there!

Corvallis 5 Race Review!

Or not, as the case may be...

So this was the first of a race double header for me on the 30th. The Corvallis 5k, at 9:00am, was to be my 25th race of the year and the McDonald Forest 15k Trail Run, at 10:00am, was to be my 26th.

Didn't happen.

Hey, I was ready and willing, but the Corvallis 5k wasn't.

All of the runners were literally lined up in the starting chute, at about 8:55am, when the race director announced, "Looks like we'll be a couple of minutes late. The 5 mile race will start a few minutes after nine, and the 5k will start at 9:15."

What?

I mean, WHAT?!?

Hey, it said in the flyer that the race started at 9:00. It said at the website that the race started at 9:00. I was on a tight schedule, with no room for error. I had to start at 9:00!

So I stood there and talked it over with my manager, otherwise known as my wife. Even if the 5k started right at 9:15, which was debatable, it would only leave me about 15 minutes to drive from downtown Corvallis to McDonald Forest and find a parking spot and get to the start line. Too tight. We came to the conclusion that I had no choice but to call this one and take off for the McDonald Forest 15k.

Not happy about that. I'll probably run the course later this week just to make myself feel better, but it's not the same. Here are the results. Yeah, I'm not in there.

Shirt is pretty boring, except for the fact that the back says, and I quote, "Spread the love like you spread butter! Mad Love!" Um, ok.

On to the McDonald Forest 15k!

Race T-Shirt Review - Sophie's Run

Well, with two more races coming in the next two weeks, we need to get caught up on the race t-shirt reveiws. So let's check out the shirt from Sophie's Run 5k.

Ah, the classic gray t-shirt. That's all good. Never a complaint with gray.

Material? 100% cotton. Thanks. And the fit is very nice. Neck is normal, cut is normal. Thanks again.

Design? Big, bold, red. Not bad. There's no question about what shirt you're wearing here. It's SOPHIE'S RUN! That's cool. Let people know. That's what the race shirt is all about - you're wearing it to tell people, "hey, I ran this race!"

Sponsors? Holy spackle! Do I really count 34 sponsors on this shirt? Yes, yes I do. Now I'm all for getting sponsors, especially for a benefit run like this, but maybe we don't have to put every single one of them on the shirt?

Overall: B+

Race T-Shirt Review - OSU Pet Day 5k!

Sooooooooo, is it just me, or does anyone else think this is a bad color for a race shirt?

Hey, don't bury the lead, right? I mean, this thing is green. Not a good green, either. A bad green. A bad, bad green. Let's face it, this is an ugly shirt. No two ways about it.

Which is sort of sad, because it's 100% cotton, and while the graphics are basic, it's got a dog! Dogs are cool!

But it's green.

I don't know what else to tell you on this one - the photos say it all.

Overall? I already gave it away. Without ever putting it on. That's my take on it.

Grade: D (only the dog kept it from getting an "F")

Race T-Shirt Review - Corvallis Half Marathon

Hey, it's the first tech shirt of the year!

The Corvallis Half Marathon brings out a high-quality Sporthill tech running shirt. Nice gray color - I like that. Gray goes with just about anything. The design? Meh. It's not too exciting, that's for sure. I like the Roman numerals - that's cool. The orange color of the design is good, but hopefully they'll jazz up the logo just a bit next year. As this was the inaugural running of the Corvallis Half, word was most things were done, necessarily, on the cheap. Since they sold out this year, with 1800 runners, perhaps they'll use a little money to get a nice shirt design next year.

The shirt itself is sized a bit small. Now, if you're cut like the R's...um...where was I going with that? Anyway, if you're in great shape, it's fine. If you're a barely-sub-two-hour half marathon runner like, well like me, then it's cut a little small. Too bad.

The back? Lots of ads again. A little better look than the last few shirts we've reviewed, but nothing spectacular.

The medal? Well, it's a medal. Again, it's pretty plain. No color. Square. Again, it's average.

Overall? Solid, but with lots of room to improve for next year.

Grade: B

Race T-Shirt Review - Beaver Freezer!

Let's check out this year's shirt from the Beaver Freezer Triathlon.

Well, it's black. That's about 2/3 of the way to an "A" grade right there. I mean, black t-shirts bring back awesome memories of concerts you went to in high school, right? AC/DC, Van Halen, Living Colour, Fishbone, Nirvana - you only got the shirt in one color: black. Good then. Still good now.

Unfortunately, it's another 50-50 shirt. I'm not getting the love for polyester. I'd take 100% cotton every single time. And it's a true t-shirt, not a tech racing shirt. The last time I raced the Freezer, in 2009, they gave you a tech shirt. I miss those days. Those were good days.

The design is cool. Pretty simple, but effective. Orange on black. Shows the year of the race, which is a big plus in my eyes. The design on the sleeve is just...odd. "Oregon State Triathlon" big and bold - OK, I get that. Then they've got the beaver on the bike logo, which is cool - that's fine. Then they've got "12 mile bike" and well, yeah... Sure, it was a 12 mile bike, but the race was a tri. Why are they saying 12 mile bike and not mentioning the swim or the run? Very odd...not horrible...just odd.

The back? Ads. Lots of ads.

So overall? Well, it was close, but just not quite there. Still, it's wearable, even when not working out.

Grade: B

Make a Change Trail 10k T-Shirt Review

Well, if you've read my race report on the Make a Change Trail 10k that wasn't, then you know just how un-trail-like it really was. So it's unfortunate that the race t-shirt for the Make a Change trumpets the "Trail" part right there on the front! Ah well...

So let's review:

-the color: gray is always welcome as far as I'm concerned. It goes with everything. It shows up the sweat nicely when you're working out. It's looks like a run shirt should look!

-the design: well, the orange and black is nice. The runners are sort of generic, but fine. The "change?" Well, that's not really the kind of change I was thinking of, but... And even as a play on words, it's sort of odd. I mean, it's money, and we're donating money to a cause? I guess?

-the material: dude, this thing is 50-50. That's just wrong! I mean, cotton is king, right?

-the neck: holy crap! This shirt has the smallest neck ever put on a shirt. I think they accidently sewed a small neck onto my XL shirt. I can't even breathe in this thing. As soon as I was done taking photos of it, I cut the neck open so I could actually wear it!

-the back: same as every other race shirt I've seen lately. Sort of boring, but whatever.

So just looking at the shirt, I'd probably grade it fairly high, but the material and the weird neck bring it down a bit.

Overall: C

Spring for Kids Run T-Shirt Review!

Wow, I'm getting stacked up on the t-shirt reviews here lately. I've got three shirts waiting in the wings and another coming in a few days with the Corvallis Half. Time to get cracking...

So today let's take a look at the Spring for Kids 5k race t-shirt.

Well, it's white. And it's 100% cotton. So we're good there.

Design? Yeah, kinda boring. I mean, I'm all for the "Yay education!" theme of the shirt and the run, but that design is straight out of the 80's. Which, frankly, is when I was getting my education. And let me tell you, that was a long time ago. So a strike there.

The back? Ads. Lots of 'em. Nothing new these days. I think the next two shirts coming up look exactly the same on the back. Which is the problem. Come on, can't we come up with something a little more exciting than 20 company logos lined up side by side? For a good example of a race t-shirt back, check out last year's Shamrock Run Shirt here. Really bad example? Check out the Cowtown from 2009: Yikes!

But it is white.

T-Shirt: B-

Pro-Motion T-Shirts for Sale - Cheap!

Yeah, I know we've talked about this before, but let's face facts: running shirts get funky!

And I don't mean good funky. I mean stanky.

So toss that thing already and head over here to this Pro-Motion site where you can get cotton and tech racing shirts dirt cheap! Why not, right?

Tell 'em the R's sent ya!

Race T-Shirt Review - Corvallis 5k

Hey, maybe they finally figured it out...yes, dark gray is a fantastic color for a race t-shirt! Much like the Eugene Marathon t-shirt, the Corvallis 5k shirt is a nice, dark shade of gray. It goes with everything and it doesn't show your lunch that you spilled like a white shirt, it's all good!

I like the design as well. Simple, yet modern. Not a bunch of ugly graphics mucking up the shirt, and the combination of dark gray, white, and orange makes the best of the Corvallis/Oregon State University connection.

Shirt: A-