I have always been very impressed with races organized by the Canada Running Series. I have completed several half-marathons and an 8k that were C.R.S. events and they were all wonderfully organized.
This year, I decided to register to run a 10K road race call Vancouver Eastside 10K which is another C.R.S. event. Runners will have the opportunity to run in areas that are considered unsafe by some people, since runners will run within Vancouver's skid row - Canada's poorest neighbourhood and it is an area that needs a lot of help.
I love how the race organizers support organizations such as Greater Vancouver Food Bank, Breakfast Club of Canada, Downtown Eastside Women's Centre and Watari Counselling & Support Services. Runners and the public have the opportunity fundraise and/or donate food and goods such as socks, gloves, soap, etc at the race site on race day.
The race starts in Vancouver's Downtown and goes down through the Downtown Eastside and Gastown which is the 5K part of the run. You will run back through Gastown, Downtown Eastside and Vancouver' Downtown for the finish line for the 10K finish. The route has lots of small hills, but most of the roads were wide and it didn't feel crowded whatsoever.
Since it was raining, there were very few spectators with limited spectator support which was expected for this type of event in this type of weather condition. Sadly, for most of the route, many of the spectators were the homeless. Crowd support was the strongest near the finish line.
As typical for a C.R.S running event, the finish line was very well organized with lots of food (mega-sized cookies, bagels, bananas, energy bars, boxes of raisins, and Greek yogurt and drinks (water, gatoraid, smoothie energy drinks) Since there was heavy rain, all runners received a textured white hazmat suit style running hooded jacket with a Vancouver Eastside 10k logo at the back of the jacket. It's a decent quality hooded running jacket that's also good for emergencies too and I never expected anything type of free protective clothing at the finish line.
The green coloured vintage looking souvenir shirt given to all runners is pretty rad since it doesn't look too technical, but it isn't 100% cotton, so you can use it for workouts and running too. The military dog tag medal given at the finish line is quite original and unique with a picture of the statue of Gassy Jack at the back. read more