Despite my lackadaisical running schedule these days, I pulled myself out of bed yesterday morning to go run the Run Geek Run 8k in West Potomac Park.
The race started at 8 am. My personal chauffeur XFE dropped me off as close as he could get and I set off with a banana, my iPod and my camera. I was, of course, ridiculously early and there wasn’t really anything to do, so I spent about 45 minutes just milling about, taking pictures. There was a DJ playing music, which was nice. There was a row of about 12-15 porta-potties, and not too much of a line.
It was actually a pretty small race. I signed up for it only because it was supposed to have a tech shirt. However, when I went and picked up my race packet on Friday, no tech shirt. In it’s place was a long-sleeved t-shirt. Serious bummer. I tweeted and Facebooked the race event organizers, but did not get a response. So, I brought my shirt along on Saturday morning and tracked someone down to ask about the mix up. She said they’d had sizing issues with the tech shirts. To which I say, get your act together. It’s not the first race of the season. You are a running store, you should probably know a little something about shirt fit at this stage of the game. Whatever.
The race started on time, no corrals or anything. A few people were dressed in their best geek gear. I set a good 10 minute pace from the start and had no real problems. It wasn’t a terribly crowded course where you’re dodging tons of people or anything like that.
- I traded spots with these two girls a number of times until they just blazed me the last mile or so. They really kicked it up.
There were water stops at 2 miles and 4 miles, approximately, but I didn’t need them. True story: I saw a woman eating a Gu at around the 1/2 mile mark. Hilarious. It’s just a five mile race — probably don’t need a Gu to replace the approximately 500 calories you’ll be burning. Personally, I’ve never eaten during a run, even my half marathon. I just don’t have the coordination.
This was the guy in first place. He passed me when I was about 1.4 miles in, so about 15 minutes in. Crazy. The picture is blurry because I’m so fast. Actually, I didn’t stop for pictures. I’d just stick my camera out and snap.
Me around mile 4. Not very flattering, but I wanted to get a photo of me with the Washington Monument.
This was my time on the second clock, the one after the finish line. I didn’t get a good shot of the finish clock. So I finished in about 50 minutes. I went up and down on my pacing, starting a bit slower, speeding up, slowing down. The usual. I can’t pace for shit.
The post race party was pretty small: water, bagles, bananas and chocolate chip cookies, which was a nice touch. I stuck around for about 30 minutes post-race, and had a cookie while cheering on my fellow racers. Then began the long hike to the metro. The race website insists that it’s a metro-accessible location, but that’s a bit of a misnomer. The nearest metro was Foggy Bottom, which had to be at least a mile or so away. But it was fine. It gave my legs a chance to cool down and my sweat to evaporate.
All in all a good race, but I certainly wouldn’t have done it for a damn t-shirt.
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