French Fry Runner

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.

Halloween Half Marathon Recap

Woo hoo! I’m officially a half-marathoner! I’ve come a long way in a year and a half. I didn’t think that I would ever be able to run a half marathon, but here I am: sore, tired, and happy. It was a great experience, and I already have four other halfs (yes, I’m making that a word) that I want to run (that I’ll tell you about later).

For now, let me tell you how it all went down.

After a night of light sleep, I woke up dark and early at 4:30 a.m. My sister-in-law was running the race too, so we both got ready, put on costumes (gotta love my TMNT costume!), ate (two pieces of toast and an apple cider for me), etc. and were out the door at about 5:30 and drove to the mall to catch the buses that would take us to the start. We didn’t have to really wait in line for the bus, so we hopped on, got settled, and chatted for the ride. We were told that there were too many cars and stuff up the canyon, so our bus driver overshot the start and had to turn around on a treacherous road. They let us out and made us walk (!) for like a quarter mile to the start tent. Now, our wave start wasn’t till 9:40, so we hung around for 2 hours in the tent. It was alright, I guess, since we got to people-watch and enjoy everyone’s costumes. If you run this race, make sure you have someone to talk to or something to do to pass the time because you’ll be waiting a long time . . . There wasn’t a line for the porta potties, so we were able to do our business. I brought a Zbar to munch on at about an hour till we took off. Another hour later, we were ready to start. Our wave was really small, which I liked. Then we were off!

Look! I’m finishing (and have no idea who the person next to me is)!

The first three miles were awesomely downhill. I ran the first 5k about 10 minutes faster than I have ever run an official 5k before, so that was fun. So basically we flew down through the canyon. I felt like a rockstar. It was reeeeeally cold, and the steep downhill caused my pants to creep down a lot–nothing like a little plumber’s crack to make things exciting. (Sorry, people behind me!) I ended up pulling up my pants a lot. Moving on. The race continued on a gradual downhill, which was nice, then we hit about mile 6.5 or so, where there was a huge gradual hill–for like 1.25 miles. They had to move the start down the mountain due to some snow conditions, so they had to add the extra distance somewhere–why they chose a hill, I’ll never know. Well, it was a pretty logical choice, but still . . . I was able to see my sister-in-law going up the hill while I was running down. That was pretty fun.

Anyway, after the hill, we kept on a river trail, which was really pretty. I loved the fall colors. I ate a handful of gummy bears at mile 10, and started to slow down at like mile 11. The last mile was definitely the longest, and I think that the last .1 was measured wrong (It always seems that way . . .). I saw The Engineer (husband) as I finished, and the announcer called out my name, which was cool. We finished the race in a business park, where we got some water, bananas, oranges, and chips. I didn’t eat the oranges because they weren’t cut, and some were moldy (gross!). I got my medal and stuff, found The Engineer, and walked/hobbled around a little. Then we cheered my sister-in-law as she finished. It was overall a good experience. I have some beef with the organization/race itself (race review to come), but the course was pretty good, and now I can say that I did it! WOOOOO!

Official Chip Time: 2:22:57

Four Things Thursday

My race is on SATURDAY! I can’t believe it’s already here. I don’t know whether I’m more nervous or excited–probably a bit of both. I’m excited to see everyone’s costumes. It’s gonna be great. I hope it’s not too cold, but I’ll plan for that because it starts up in the mountains.
I ate THE BEST gyro ever tonight for dinner. There’s a burger place in my town that makes killer gyros, and every time we go to said restaurant, I have the gyro. Nothing else compares. Definitely one of my top-5 favorite foods
I bought myself bright pink arm warmers. I don’t know how I’ll feel about wearing the pink (I’ve never really been a pink-wearing person), but they were the only ones in stock on runningwarehouse.com. I’ll do a review on them soon.
Here’s a sneak peak at my ninja turtle costume!