At one time the Bay to Breakers was the biggest, most famous, non-marathon race event in North America if not the entire world. It would boast some 150,000 registered and non-registered runners; host some of the deepest elite-professional fields of the year; feature fast centipede teams, outlandish costumes, naked runners, as well as being a 7.5-mile block party. Those days are in the past, but it’s still a favorite event for many in San Francisco. I have wanted to do Bay to Breakers for decades but never got around to it. This year I put it on my calendar and signed up in January.
The 2026 field had about 30,000 runners total with 22,000 in the 12K on a course that stretches from the bay on the east side of the city through its streets for about 4 miles and into Golden Gate Park for a long downhill finish to Ocean Beach.
Race day weather was perfect, in the mid-50s, with a bit of a headwind (but not bad) and clear skies. My plan was to run the first 2 miles at sub threshold effort, get up the massive Hayes Street hill. The steep part (7% grade over 0.4 miles) starts at about 2.3 miles but you are climbing most of the first half of the race.
I lined up close to the front, next to a couple of the women’s centipede teams, about 8-10 meters behind the start line. It seemed that 70% of the people were wearing costumes, I had surfer shorts and a colorful race singlet from another race and figured that’d be good enough. Just a minute to go before the start a group of about 5-6 guys standing right next me who were wearing chef hats and aprons stopped dropped their shorts and would run the course as bare butt chefs.
After the start I got shoved around a bit and had to weave and dodge around costumed runners over the chaotic first half mile. But after that the foot traffic smoothed out and we were strung out over the wide streets, or packed into small groups.
The Impalas women’s centipede team was just ahead. They had a dozen runners wearing green hula skirts that went swish swish swish as they strode along. They were a good pace group so I stayed near them until half way. My effort and pace for the first two miles were right on.
There is no easy easy way to get up a long steep hill and the 150 foot climb with some pitches exceeding 10% was tough going. I slowed considerably but the effort level went up. Once we crested the hill we dropped down steeply for a quarter mile and then had another mile of gradual ascent before the course flattened out. By then we were into Golden Gate Park and I passed the hula skirt centipede and ran the rest of the way with group of five or six runners who were keeping about the same pace.
Occasionally, another runner would pass and leave us in their wake, but the rest of the way went smoothly and the gradual downhill felt great.
We got to Ocean Beach with about 600 m to go and made a sharp left toward the finish. I had a state championship 5K road race on the following weekend and felt no need to hammer. Some runners pulled away in the stretch but I kept it at threshold effort. Got exactly what I wanted out of it as a workout. And as an event, Bay to Breakers was everything I had hoped for. With family in the Bay area, I might return for the race.
rrunnin234 