San Francisco Turkey Trot

If you ran on the cross country team for any of the high schools in San Francisco like I did, most of this course will be very familiar to you. Unlike most running races out there that take place on paved roads, this is an good ol’ cross country style course with varying terrains including the dirt track in the Polo Field, the grass of Speedway Meadows and Lindley Meadows, rocky trail of JFK, and my personal favorite, the twisting trail through the Chain of Lakes.
It’s a nice change of pace from the same old, same old road race in Crissy Field, on the Embarcadero, or on the streets of Golden Gate Park that is held predominantly on paved cement. Since I can’t go back in time to my high school days, running this race brings back great memories.
The race is hosted well with the course being clearly marked, the Lowell Track team giving clear directions, and lots of great stuff post race. The only knock I would give on this race is that they do not use timing chips to track your official time. Times are only based on gun time. I know that the use of timing chips is expensive, but collecting paper tags is so outdated and probably inaccurate.
So if you want to run in a straight line on paved cement, go find a race on the Embarcadero. If you want a taste of what it’s like to run a real deal Golden Gate Park cross country course, you must sign up for this Turkey Trot!

I was really excited to run this race, but it turned out to be disappointing. I’m not sure how they chose the route they chose, but we ended up running through the wet grass/​mud for a large portion of the race. Not to mention, the trails were incredibly narrow so we were in super close proximity to those around us.
I heard the Turkey Trot at AT&T Park was much better so will likely run that one this T-​day.

First time running it this year with my son. Pretty easy run mostly on trail/​dirt path around the Polo field area. You have a choice to do a 3 mile or a 5 mile. It is a timed event. But they give you ample time to run both races. No minimum time requirement to complete. Our luck it happened to be raining the night before and towards the end of the race so the paths were pretty muddy. Hint don’t run too close to the person in front of you unless you like mud in your eye. But this is for sure a more of a fun run for the family. Fun to watch the kids chase down the turkey down the track. Wonderful site to watch people dress up as turkeys, pilgrims, indians, thanksgiving dinner… this year someone dressed up as Xmas tree, beer bottle, and a california raisin… i guess thats how they celebrate thanksgiving.
The Kids race usually run first around or near polo field then the 3mile and 5mile start at the same time after wards. Trails are marked clearly and tons of volunteers around to help you find your way. This is a smaller event run by Lowell High School track team and money raised goes to them. Dont let the size fool you it is a well organized event. Not sure how it was in previous years but there are no warm ups and FRS was the only real vendor handing out energy drinks and chews. Post run they had Nesquick chocolate being handed out, myoplex drinks and bars, trail mix granola bars, bagels and some pastries, and bottled water.
To the guy dressed as a indian wearing only a loin cloth and head dress… WOW…you sure can wear that loin cloth… thanks you made my run even more entertaining.
Parking was easy… plenty of public bathrooms around beside the porta potties. Looking forward to running it again next year…

Actually this is a review for the Turkey Beach Trot. Was a yearly habit until the snowy plover got involved. Apparently plovers take precedence to turkeys.
The park run is fun, but there was something pretty awesome about running with Indians and Pilgrims trailing a big turkey on Ocean Beach.

This was my first Turkey Trail Trot and it was a pretty decent run. It was a mostly flat course over natural terrain, including grassy meadows and dirt pathways/​trails, which was nice on the knees! I guess in the past years, parts or all of the run was on Ocean Beach, but the course has been moved to more solid ground in GGP. And thank goodness for that, running on the beach? No thank you!
Anyway, I liked the course because it was pretty scenic and took you through some nicely hidden GGP trails that I would have never know of had I not done this race. Registration was closed after 1200 trotters have signed up, which is great so there’s hardly a crowd you need to push past. A ton of people come dressed in festive turkey day garb, making for some very nice distractions.
They’ve also got a lot of volunteers to guide you through the course and cheer you on. Although, at Mile 1, one of the volunteers, while I totally appreciate the support, cheered us on as we passed by yelling «you can do it, you’re almost there!!» Uuummm, are you kidding me girl? Depending on whether we were doing the 3 or 5 miler, we had ²⁄₄ more miles to go, not even halfway! DO NOT TEASE ME!
Speaking of the different races, my bf and I had done the 3 miler and when checking the results, I was thoroughly surprised when I saw that I was 38^th out of 240 trotters. I then looked back on the home page and the 3 miler was actually supposed to be a walk, while the 5 miler was for actual runners. Haha, if everyone was walking, how the hell did I manage to come out 38^th?!
Overall, great run to do and a fantastic way to get some exercise on Thanksgiving Day before gorging on all the delicious turkey food you know you’ll be chowing down on later in the day.