Color Run

I'm training for this little thing called the Chicago Marathon! It's taking over my life, yet even though this blog is all about training, it's not taking over this blog. Which means, it's time for a glance at my training thus far.

It sucks.

Until about a week ago, I got up at 5 am Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Saturday in order to get my run in before the oppressive heat came. Correction... before the REALLY oppressive heat. Even though I was out the door by around 5:30, I was still running in 90 degree heat. Needless to say it's been hot in St. Louis!

However, the last few weeks have been AMAZING! The weather has been much cooler which led to several 70 degree early morning runs... GLORIOUS!

In order to not bore you with a synopsis of every run, I'll skip to Saturday's long run cause it was exciting! A few months ago I registered for St. Louis' Color Run knowing I'd have to run 16 miles on race day. If you've not heard of the Color Run, it's a 5K where every kilometer they throw a different color chalk on you so by the end you are fabulously colorful!

Our group before...

Since I had to run 16 miles I decided the best thing to do was to run to the race. This meant getting out the door by 4 am, running around my neighborhood, and then heading to downtown St. Louis. I've always seen people running before races and thought they were crazy. Why on earth would anyone do this? Apparently you'd do this if you are training for a marathon. My goal was to get 13 miles in before the race and finish the 16 during the 5k. However, my sleepy little head couldn't get out of bed and started about 30 minutes late. By the time we got to the corral I was only 11.5 miles in.

As we stood waiting (and waiting...and waiting) for the race to start my legs started cramping. I realized how difficult it was going to be to start up again... and I was right. By the time we started I had nothing left, but not starting wasn't an option... there was colorful fun to be had!

Luckily it wasn't long before we were at the first color station. It's kind of like a water stop, but instead of water in those water bottles, there was chalky color. Volunteers lined the street squirting us with a different color each kilometer. We soon learned we needed to be a tad aggressive in order to get covered. Not so much aggressive as overly excited.

Breathing in the midst of the chalkiness was as hard as you would anticipate, but here's the crew and I after the final kilometer. Some of us are a little more colorful than others, but that was all about to change at the color party.

After we finished the 5k we headed to the main stage area where every 10 minutes or so everyone would rip open color packets and throw all our color into the air. It was as crazy fun, but we were out of color (along with being sufficiently colorful) so we headed to the car.

Once we got to the car I realized I still had a mile and a half left on my run to do. This was really bad news as my legs were EXHAUSTED! I didn't think I was going to make it at all, but somehow when I got home I immediately changed back into my good pair of running shoes and headed back out the door. Two miles later was a little worse for wear, but had completed 16 miles!