Race Recap: Goodlife Fitness City Chase

This race is amazing! I’ve done it once before two years ago with Daniel and we had every intent on doing it again. It’s definitely one of those races that are a blast to do and incorporate teamwork, athleticism, and strategy. Since the race was on Saturday photos haven’t been released yet, but when they do I’ll post them in a blog post similar to this one.

The Expo/Parking

If you’re from Toronto or have ever been to Toronto, you’ll know how terrible it is to park here. Especially downtown. The start/finish line was in the Distillery District which is in the heart of Downtown Toronto, so parking was not the greatest. There wasn’t any designated race parking, so although there happened to be a Green P down the street, we had to pay to park. The downside to this is that since the race can literally take up the whole afternoon, parking can get kind of costly. The parking lot is also about a five-minute walk from the expo, so it was a bit inconvenient to get our race kit and then head back to the car to drop stuff off (there was no bag check).

Sunscreening up! I used Goddess Garden Sport Organic Sunscreen…review to follow!

The expo seemed like an average expo to me. Manitoba Harvest, Ocean Spray and Deep Relief were all there giving out free samples, which really came in handy post-race. Picking up our race kit was a bit of a tedious process though: the first step involved giving them the last name used during registration, which resulted in us receiving a number. We then had to take that number to another table, which gave us our bibs, and then make our way to ANOTHER table to get our race shirts. I should note that we missed pre-race kit pickup, so I guess some of this headache could’ve been avoided.

Pre-Race Warm Up

Goodlife Fitness has a ton of classes at their clubs. I used to be a member, so I’ve taken quite a few classes and they’re a ton of fun. Since Goodlife sponsors the race, they brought in some of their instructors to guide us through a pre-race warm up that was not only effective, but actually a lot of fun. I want to say that what we did was Zumba, but I’m not 100% sure.

The Race

The race starts with all the Chasers getting clues as to where the clue sheets are. The clues on the clue sheets are pretty ambiguous, and although some clues are easy to solve, others are very difficult. They had a different element from the last time we did this race which involved three “hard core” Chasepoints which were deemed optional. Daniel and I decided to take on this challenge, but little did we know what we were in for!

One of the hard core chase points – we had to pull a bus 30ft!

And then I face planted…

One of these hard core Chasepoints involved kneeling in a tent-like structure with your partner while solving a puzzle. Although this sounds easy, there’s a catch: a man with a paintball gun is at the other end and shoots you every five seconds. I’ve never been paint balling before, but those things hurt a ton!

You can’t see it, but just beyond where the people are standing is where you solve the puzzle.

It’s also worth noting how much chasers help you while on course. From willing to take pictures of you completing Chasepoints to helping you with clues, this race is truly one that has me feeling all the feels.

Although we took a half-hour longer to complete the race, we managed to complete all three hard core Chasepoints which all had huge line ups, so I can’t complain. It would’ve been nice to have a better time, but I feel like City Chase is one of those races that you can’t expect anything from because things change from year to year. The “course” is never really the same. That’s one of the things that make this race so awesome!

 

-Running Fast, Lifting Heavy