The Color Run!!!!!!!

Beginning my day at 4am is really for the birds. Ok now that I have that out of the way I will tell you about it all. After staying up until around 11pm preparing I was quick to awaken at 4am, then again at 4:30am. Quick shower (yes even though I knew I'd need another one before noon), get the kids up and get us all ready. I wanted to be out of the house no later than 5:45am so I could be downtown (assuming I didn't hit any traffic) by 6am. Naturally, if you know me then you already know this didn't happen. We finally made it downtown around 6:20am and headed to the parking garage to meet up with my "goodest" friend and her family.





After waiting around in the Civic Plaza for about 30 minutes they announced for everyone to start heading to the street to line up for the run to begin. Some of our group was already up there so we made our way towards them. Trying to round up a group of 15 to one place when there are 6,000 people registered is about as easy as winning the Powerball. So eventually we found them and we were only missing 4 people out of the group because they were late arrivals. We were towards the beginning of the hoard of people. Literally the start line was about 20 feet from us.





So after standing around for about 5 minutes I realized that I had to use the restroom. Naturally I'd have expected this out of my children, but not myself. All I could think about was how long this 5k was going to be because I was going to hold it. I didn't want to leave our spot and risk not being let back in since we already had to convince the volunteer girls to let us past the tape (marking the waves) since the rest of our group was up there. Then after texting, I was told that part of our group was stuck in wave 2. So I went to to meet up with her to give her the group socks and cape. Since I was way back there already I decided to go use the restroom. Porta-potty's are the most disgusting things, but I was thankful for them at the moment. In deciding to do that I found the last 2 of our group. Then we all went back and made our way back to the rest of the group.



Then it began. Off we went. I began by jogging with everyone, not thinking about those in our group that needed to walk. How rude of me. It didn't take long at all for our entire group to get split up. Even my son ditched me. My daughter stayed by my side. We jogged for a good few minutes then I decided with this many people and it not being timed, we just needed to have fun with it. No need to over-exert ourselves. So we walked for about a block then jogged again as we came up on our first color station. Wait, let me back up for a minute. I told my daughter that we were going to walk on the right and then go to the left at the color stations. Her response was "why? Because of the trajectory of the winds it goes that way?". I just laughed and told her "No, that is where you are supposed to get more color". That really cracked me up because we don't generally talk like that. So we go through the first color station and found out very quickly that this stuff is no joke. Keep your mouth closed, don't inhale and run through with your arms up. Sure, it is only colored corn starch but it is enough to choke you out. Before we knew it we had gone another kilometer and reached our 2nd color station.



As we kept going I noticed more and more people walking. It seemed that really the only onces trying to seriously run this were those going for their personal best. At one point my daughter and I were walking again and I suddenly hear someone behind us telling me (using my name) to push hard and to get going. I looked to my left and saw my friend and her husband run by us waving. So my daughter and I decided to catch up to them and run with them for about 30 seconds. That was more than enough for me at this point because it was really starting to warm up outside. After my camera battery died I eventually had to stop on the sidewalk to look in my bag for my second battery. By the time I found it and got it put in my camera I realized that I would start seeing some people I knew coming against us. So I figure how fun would it be to get them in action? So between the 2nd and 3rd kilometer that is exactly what I did.







Shortly thereafter we hit the 3rd color station. This is what it is like to go through it. (look close and you might actually see me in there)



We hit one more color station before we hit the finish line. My daughter and I decided that we were going to jog the last 2 blocks until we crossed the finish line. It was overall an awesome experience because throughout the 5k you had other runners/walkers cheering each other on, high-fiving you (because some genius measured the route incorrectly so they basically had to double it so we went one day, turned around and went back the way we came). Towards the end there were spectators cheering for you as you were nearing and crossing the finish line. And not that I told them, so hopefully they will read this, but a couple friends were at the finish line smiling while my daughter and I were coming. That made me feel special and you can't tell me they weren't there for us because in my mind they were. So thank you both! After the finish line we waited around for a little bit then decided I better go look for my son before it really became impossible to find him. It didn't take long, thankfully he was smart enough to stay put where he could see me if I walked past.







Now you may be thinking a couple things here. 1) You don't look very "colorful" considering you just finished "happiest 5k on the planet" aka The Color Run. Or 2) I saw you post pictures on Instagram/Twitter that showed you with tons more color than that. Well, let me explain. I was slightly disappointed in that myself. Especially considering we were getting doused in powered at the color stations. It must've been the trajectory of the winds that my daughter mentioned earlier. Oh, for those that care, yes I did use my fancy phone application and we finised in 45 minutes. Not my best but we had fun! Anyway, next comes the "Color Party" in the plaza. This is where they have the "Color Explosions" about every 30 minutes.



This is what it is like to be in a color explosion.

It was so cute, a couple even got engaged! It was all over the news that evening also. She was so shocked. Good job to the soon-to-be-groom in planning that one.





Overall this was such a great experience and I'm glad that I chose this to be the first 5k to participate in. It will definitely be one that we will do again next year. But until then, I need to start training more seriously to get ready for the more competitive, timed Hot Chocolate 15k/5k. And let's not get crazy, I am only doing the 5k and definitely looking foward to the chocolate party that will follow after I cross that finish line.






Now on a side note I will share with you all that my "goodest" friend has lost her everlasting mind! I woke up to the following text message: "Decided that in 2014 I'll do the half in Disney!! It'll keep me training plus it's sold out for 2013 already!! Start training lady!:) lol" Basically I wished her luck and asked if she was going to do the 15k for the Hot Chocolate Run. That was also an effort to distract her from that crazy thinking of hers. She then had the nerve to tell me "You shoudl train with me and we can do it together we have a year and a half!! You can totally do it!!" By the time our conversation ended I told her (twice) to let me get through the chocolate run first then ask me again. I can't even run 1 mile straight without walking and here she is thinking about me attempting to train for 13.1 miles?! We will revisit this at the end of next month I'm sure because I already know she is not going to let me say now.

Now I don't want to hear it from a certain someone *coughmspcough* pointing at me and saying "that's what you get". Just hurry up and pick your 5k so I can use that to prepare for.