Then I signed up for a bunch of runDisney races and had a trip to Florida to plan and pay for and quite frankly I didn't want to spend the money to do a weekend in San Diego. Those darn run Disney races are SO expensive!! I was going to skip the Costume Run. But I just couldn't get past wanting that awesome finisher's medal for the Costume Run.
I must be crazy. At the last minute I decided to go ahead and do the race.
On race day I got up at 2:00 a.m. and left my house at 3:00 a.m. to drive down to San Diego so I could be at the start line at 6:00 a.m.
The drive down was nice. There's not much traffic at that time in the morning. I somehow managed to miss the turn into Qualcomm Stadium and had to drive a ways before I could turn around. Some signage might have been nice. At least once I got there parking was quick and easy.
I found the bib pick-up, got my numbers and my hat. Hat? Usually you get a shirt. Humph. Dumb hat that I'll never wear. Walked back to my car and put said hat in the trunk.
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| Dumb hat that I'll never wear. |
I walked back to the start hoping to find some of my fellow Bling Whores (it's a Facebook group I'm in). We were going to meet for a group photo. One of the ladies recognized my costume and stopppd me. Her name was Sharon she was there with her brothers Scott and Bruce and her sister-in-law whose name I don't remember. Nathan also showed up and we all took a photo together.
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| Bling Whores photo (Sharon right, me center, Nathan left) |
Finally it was time for the race. I lined up towards the back and off I went. I had a few issues with my phone early on but the race was going well. I knew I could run the first three miles without a problem. It was the last 10.1 that worried me. LOL.
My plan was to run as far as I could then run/walk the rest of the race. I made sure to stop at every water station so I could stay hydrated. They had water stations at nearly every mile.
I was chugging along pretty well running and walking. I made one pit stop around mile 7. Round about mile 10 I was starting to run out of gas. The last three miles of the race weren't pretty. I was spent. I did a lot of walking those last 3 miles. Thankfully the last half mile was downhill to the finish line. I ran to the finish. It's amazing how your energy kicks back up when you see the finish line.
I crossed the finish line in 3:02.12. Whoo hoo. I beat my previous half marathon time by nine minutes and 28 seconds.
I got my fabulous finisher's medal and headed home.
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| Finisher's Medal |
This was the inaugural running of this race. I thought it went pretty well for a first time race. That said, I'm not sure I would do it again. The course was a snooze fest, very boring. First we ran around the parking lot of the stadium. Then we ran an out and back course down Friars Road. Blah, boring. The road was only partially closed so we had cars zipping past us. Thankfully it was cloudy & cool today. That course would have been brutal had it been warm & sunny. No shade and hot asphalt would have been awful. The last three miles were around the parking lot again. The course through the parking lot was poorly marked. A lot of people, myself included, ended up cutting corners because it was hard to tell where we were supposed to be. (This could account for my good finish time).
There were lots of cute and creative costumes. It was fun seeing what everyone wore.
All in all it wasn't a bad race. Goodness knows I've run worse. It was just boring and tedious. It was a long drive to get there and get back home. A four hour round trip. The medal is really cool. If they move it to Los Angeles next year and if they offer an awesome medal again I might reconsider and do it again.
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| At home after the race. |
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