bay to breakers

Bay to Breakers is a 12K (about 7.5 mile) run in San Francisco every third Sunday in May since 1912. It starts at the Embarcadero (on the bay) and finishes where Golden Gate Park meets the ocean (breakers). I never heard of it before, but it's part race, part street party. By the time I showed up with my camera, it was more or less just a street party. I figured it would be a good chance to get some interesting pictures, try out the new camera lens (Sigma 24-70mm F2.8 EX DG), and try my hand at taking some shots while in motion. My original goal was to capture some action shots of interest and have the people pictures be candid. That didn't work out so well. I found that as soon as people saw the camera lens, they really enjoyed reacting to it, so I decided to roll with it. No pictures from the sidelines here -- I took my pictures from smack in the center of the race/party route on the street, a lot of it walking backwards. I also didn't prompt anyone for a reaction, although sometimes a prompt isn't necessary when the diameter of the end of the lens is 82mm (it's intimidatingly large compared to my standard lens, which is 52mm). On to the photos -- the full gallery is in my Bay to Breakers flickr set, but my favorite reactions and poses are below. A little cropping will do these good, I'm sure.

















Good times. Next up, the desert.