Toronto at Night: The Michelob Ultra Night Run 10K

The start of the Michelob Ultra Night Run in Toronto

A 10K race through the streets of Toronto at night – how much fun was this?

Five of us from the Crossfit running group packed into Ts little – but awesome – car and headed downtown for the start of the race in the Distillery District. A few other folks from the gym had made their own way there.

Traffic was terrible, because Toronto, and we thought we were going miss the start of the race.

After a Uey and some wiggling through some side streets (all completely legal .. ) we finally were able to park a couple of blocks away form the start and fast walk our way over there.

Turned out the race didn’t get going for another 35/40 minutes anyway, so it wasn’t really an issue, just some added stress to kick off the race.

This was a night run, and our race kits had included head lamps and light up armbands. The were also giving away foot lights at the start of the race.

When we arrived it was still light, but it soon got dark.

The race started out on Mill Street in front of the entrance to the Distillery, then we hang a right onto Cherry Street and run all the way down to Cherry Beach, then along Cherry Beach to Tommy Thompson Park, and back again.

Some parts of the course – especially along Cherry Beach – were dark, and I was glad for the head lamp. We’d kind of debated whether we’d need them or not before the race, but it definitely came in handy. Every so often there would be race guides, water stations, or drummers to help us find our way.

There was a good number of people racing – around 2000 – So you weren’t alone too much during the race, but on the way back the course did spread out quite a bit.

About 1/4 of the way into the race I was contemplating running off into the woods at the side of the track for a pee (not the first time this has happened this year), but as it was quite dark I didn’t want to step in a hole or something and twist an ankle/knee, or something like that, so I increased my pace and hoped for the best. Luckily at around the half way point there were public washrooms and I took advantage of them.

I didn’t come into this race expecting much in terms of performance – I had just run the last 5 Peaks race of the season the same morning, but actually I surprised myself and did quite well with an average pace of 5:35, finishing in about 55 minutes. Not a PR, but a time I feel pretty happy with.

Afterwards there was beer and snacks, and I can’t really think of a better way to finish off a night race.