races – Page 5 – French Fry Runner

Winter Sun 10k Race Recap

Last Saturday, I ran the Moab Winter Sun 10k in Moab, Utah. It was a great race and an automatic PR for me since it was the first time I had run a 10k. Cool stuff. Let’s start from the beginning . . .

D900pic-0005 — Super-organized packet pickup

We (my coworkers and I–the Blister Sisters) left around 2:45 on Friday afternoon and made our way to Moab (about 3 hours away). We picked up our packets and went out for some pizza after we got there and had fun eating and talking.

After dinner, we went to a grocery store to grab some chocolate (and Gatorade for me). We then checked into the (super nice) hotel where we stayed the night. The room we stayed in was a 3-queen room, so all 6 of us were able stay in the same room. We stayed up watching Dark Knight and talking until like 11:00. It’s fun to hang out outside of work–especially when you’re friends with the people you work with!

We woke up and had an awesome breakfast provided by the hotel. It was delicious! I had 2 slices of wheat toast with butter and honey, a bit of biscuits and gravy, some juice, and hot chocolate.

Then we all got ready for the race and headed to the shuttles. It was cool outside, not too cold or hot. We hung out at the race start, which was really well organized with fire barrels, water, and hot drinks. Before we knew it, we were ushered to the start line. The race started promptly at 10:00, which was great. I ran with one of my BRFs, who runs about the same speed as I do. She was totally awesome to run with.

The race started with a few rollers before a huge hill at mile 2. We plowed up that thing and slowed down to catch our breath. After that, the race was alternating flat and downhill, which was nice and didn’t tear up my quads too much. We ran through some neighborhoods and through some pretty red rock, and we finished at the local high school track. I felt like dying at mile 5.5–and swore I wouldn’t sprint at the end–but I pushed forward and ended up sprinting anyway at the end to pass a girl we had been leapfrogging with a lot of the race. The food at the end was awesome (unlike the crap we had at the Halloween Half) and well thought out (as in chocolate milk, Gatorade, fruit, and PB&J sandwich quarters. They also had a nice raffle for local stores and stuff (great for the locals).

blister sisters edit-1 — Blister Sisters!

All in all, it was a great race, and as long as I’m still in the area next year, I’m totally running it again.

Official Gun Time: 1:01:36

What’s your favorite race?

(Stay tuned to the for some awesome giveaways in the next little while! I’m thinking 3 would be great, right?)

Oh! AND Handful Bra is having a closeout sale on their size large Original Handful Bra (ONLY $12!). I just bought one, and I can’t wait to try it and review it for you!

Halloween Half Marathon Review

So, I’m taking a page out of SkinnyRunner‘s book and posting a race review. I felt that I needed to separate my experience from the race organization/details.

The Provo Halloween Half Marathon is held on the last Saturday in October in Provo, Utah. The registration fee was $65 for “normal registration.” ( I know that’s cheap for a lot of places, but here it’s kind of pricey.) The race boasts a mostly downhill course, a start line heated tent, and “The most fun you can have . . . without getting arrested.” Well, I don’t know about that. There are a lot of fun things to do around here. But I digress.

Packet Pickup: The packet pickup and “expo” went pretty smoothly. There wasn’t a line for the packet pickup, which was good. The staff was efficient, and we were in and out in like 3 minutes. The “expo” was tiny. There were only a few booths, but some were handing out coupons for $5 off race entries and such, so that was good, I guess. I don’t know what I was expecting. I mean, this wasn’t like one of the Rock ‘n’ Roll races or Boston or anything, but I thought that with all the hype, it would be larger. Anyway, not bad.

Swag: Really cool gender-specific tech T-shirt and cool finisher medal. I really like the shirt for the race. It fits perfectly. They didn’t put the year on either one, though, which I thought was weird. Other than that, we got a bunch of coupons, a packet of Emergen-C, a mini men’s deodorant, and a “$500” gift card–which just turned out to be nothing special at all. Would have been cool to get a Clif Bar or something, or a piece of candy–after all, it is a Halloween race.

Buses/Start line: The buses were fine. We got on one quickly and were driven to the start. Unfortunately our bus had to overshoot the turnoff for the start line compound (they planned it that way) and turn around and drop us off a quarter mile from the start, so we had to walk. In the cold. Not the best way to please runners. (I also heard that the later buses got lost and made people wait for an extra hour. Not cool.) They had a heated tent by the start line and plenty of porta potties. They didn’t even have water, though, in the tent, which would have been nice since it’s a large race and we paid more than other local races for entry. I know that I was regretting that I didn’t have a water bottle. The start itself was lackluster–just a couple of race timer banners to run under.

Course: Mostly downhill through a gorgeous canyon, fall colors, 1.2-mile uphill section thrown in the middle. I enjoyed the course overall. Due to some snow in the higher elevations, the course start had to be moved a couple of miles down the mountain. The beginning of the race was a pretty steep downhill grade. They had to throw in 2.4 miles to make up the distance, and they did this with an uphill out and back, which was a gradual incline, but for people who expected the race to be almost completely downhill, this was not a welcome addition. It would have been nice if they would have posted the info about the hill on Facebook. They only said they’d changed the route.

There were a few water/Gatorade stations throughout the course but no gels or anything. I don’t like gels and brought my own fuel, but something like that would have been good for the people that expected it. There was a station at like mile 12, which I thought was weird. I didn’t stop at it. That water would have been good in the start line tent. The mile markers were inaccurate and sometimes not even there. I don’t think they updated the markers when they moved the start line. I felt bad for the people who didn’t know how far they had gone (a ton of people don’t have GPS).

Finish line compound: Meh. The finish was good and “normal”– people cheering, announcer announcing everyone’s names. They gave us our medals and a water bottle (only one), and then we were directed to the food, which was disappointing. Some moldy oranges that weren’t cut, cut bananas, and chips. There wasn’t any chocolate milk or Gatorade or any other water stations or anything like that. I had to go and ask for another water bottle. They also only had three massage tables, which were closing by the time we got there. Now, I know that the massage therapists can do only so many massages, but I think more therapists would have been better. Just because some people finish in three hours or more doesn’t mean they shouldn’t get a chance for a massage too. Bag check was fine. So, overall, meh mainly because of the food. I need chocolate milk!

Overall: I think the course was pretty, and I’m definitely glad I ran the half, but I don’t think I’ll run it again. I like it when races pay attention to the smaller details (and larger ones like mile markers and chocolate milk), and I don’t think this one delivered for the amount of money we had to pay.

Rating: This is my first rating of a half, and I really have nothing to compare it to, so I’ll make it my baseline. I’ll give it a 7/10 for organization and 8.5/10 for the run itself.