Got up 4:50. Got ready real fast because Dustin and Heather were already waiting out front at 5:10. Me and Heather were one of the lucky people who were able to get on the first wave of buses. The bus was warm and made us sleepy! After the ride up Provo Canyon and past Sundance we disembarked into the freezing dark and made our way into the huge tents that they had set up for all the runners. It was pretty awesome not to have to stand out in the cold forever! We had a couple hours to spare so we just picked a spot, sat down and chilled. I mostly people watched, and I tell you what there were some GREAT costumes. I'll talk about my favorites at the end...
So we decided to go with the first wave of runners, which would start right at 9 a.m. and was for the people who had a goal of 2:10 or faster. We wanted to run 2:15 but we also didn't want to wait for the second wave. A little after 9 we were off! And HOLY FETCH was it some steep downhills! Now you may be saying, wait, downhills are awesome! Let me tell you, they are awesome for a little bit. 12% grade tends to get pretty old after a couple miles! It was so cold at the start that basically the only warm part of my body was my torso. My legs were completely numb, as were my feet. This created a big problem! Usually I am in total control of my feet, and I have a very soft landing, so soft that people don't even hear me when I'm running behind them. Well, I had ZERO control because I couldn't feel my feet. I could tell I was pounding them pretty hard on those downhills, and even though I tried my best not to over stride and to let gravity take me, I couldn't do much about the pounding. Between miles 3 and 4 I could already feel shin splints coming on, and my quads and knees were killing me! But, on a happy note, we were able to make up a ton of time on those first four miles. I do believe we hit an 8-minute mile at one point, and it felt really good to see the time we were making!
When we got to Provo Canyon, I starting struggling pretty bad. Those downhills took a lot more out of me than I thought they would! Somehow, someway, I managed to keep a 10 minute mile pace! I was pretty amazed, usually that takes a lot of effort to maintain for any amount of time. I know, I'm slow, ha ha! Once we got on the Provo River trail I felt like I was super sluggish, but finally my GU kicked in and gave me some energy. The rest of the race was pretty much deja vu from last Saturday, it was the exact same trail that me and Heather ran on. The rest of the race was pretty uneventful, the weather was perfect and I managed to keep a pretty even pace. I think our slowest mile was a 10:44, the rest of them were just above or below 10 minute miles. It was pretty awesome!
With one mile to go I told Heather, "If you're feeling good, go for it!" I knew we were on pace to get a 2:10, (we could have done a 2:05 but had to take a bathroom break around mile 8) so I told her to go ahead. My calves were cramping up pretty bad and I was putting so much effort into just maintaining a 10 minute pace. So Heather pulled ahead a little bit towards the very end, I could barely see her through the sea of runners around me. The finish line was kind of hidden around a little bend, and as soon as I saw it I sprinted with all I had left! I crossed the finish in 2:07 (according to my watch, I knew my official time was a little bit more than that), got my finishers medal, found Heather and Dustin, took some pictures, found our clothing bags, and headed home. Me and Heather were excited that we had achieved our goal!!
Official time for Heather was 2:09:50, and my time was 2:10:14. Perfect in every way!! We could not be happier with those times, and I know I put everything I had into that race.
Okay, so some of my favorite costumes! There were so many! One guy was a shower. Literally, he had a shower rod connected to his body to where it circled above his head, complete with red shower curtain and shower head. Hilarious! I saw him ahead of us at one point, picked him out easily. Haha! Another guy was dressed as a Swedish girl, complete with green skirt, fluffy white blouse, little brown vest, and blonde wig with pigtails. Oh, and don't forget the best part. He filled out his blouse with two big white balloons. We are pretty sure he was not straight. Hahahaah! But he looked pretty convincing! My all-time favorite was a guy dressed up as a missionary, with white shirt and tie, bike helmet, sunglasses, and he even carried a Spanish Book Of Mormon. We passed him pretty early in the race and I told him as I passed, "That costume won't be legit unless you can pass out that Book Of Mormon by the end of the race!" He laughed and said he better get to converting then. It was pretty funny! One last costume that really got me was two buddies who were dressed at Jesus and Satan. Oh my gosh, so wrong yet so funny. One guy had the long hair, beard, and robes so that he looked like Jesus and the other was dressed all in red with devil horns and pitchfork. Good thing we passed them around the middle of the race, wouldn't want to be nearby when the lightning inevitably struck them. Ha ha ha!
Keep in mind, these people ran the entire 13.1 miles in these costumes! Me and Heather kept it simple, we went as roadkill! We took some white shirts, laid them in front of the car, painted the car tire with black paint, and rolled over the shirts. In five minutes we had some pretty awesome shirts! Then we smeared black and red makeup on our faces and legs to look like road rash. We looked pretty awesome, but most importantly, we were comfortable! Haha!
Well, I apologize for the long post, but I love doing very detailed race recaps :)
p.s.- I get to go home to AZ in less than two weeks!!! Then again for Thanksgiving! Life is good :)
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