Last Saturday a couple of my girlfriends and I "ran" a 5k in Austin - a first for all of us. We trained, we practiced, we planned. However, no amount of planning could have prepared us for what we were about to encounter. I picked Trish up at 6 am and we drove to Austin for a race that was supposed to start "promptly at 9 am." We met Melanie and Beth at the race site around 7:30 and bundled up for the 40 degree wind chill factor. We huddled behind a UHaul truck trying to shield ourselves from the biting wind. We laughed a little, danced a little, and finally realized this was less fun than we imagined. We surveyed the surroundings and wondered how bad the course would be after the torrential downpour the night before.
Finally, around 8:45 we saw people start to line up so we followed. We waited in line with around 6000 of our closest friends and waited and waited and waited. Every once in a while the crowd would cheer and the masses would surge, but we didn't actually start running until 10:00. Now, the COLOR RUN advertises "color bursts" at each kilometer marker. However, the UHaul with the color got stuck in the mud and the wind was taking the color off into who knows where, so it was a bit of a bust. The course was an absolute JOKE. Mud. SO - MUCH - MUD. There were parts you absolutely COULD NOT RUN. A lot of the course was uphill and people were losing their shoes in the bog, slipping and falling, and some were just sitting waiting for someone to help them along. We stayed the course and did the best we could, sometimes running - sometimes walking - sometimes slipping and sliding and trying not to eat it.
At the end of the race we celebrated for a minute with the other color crazed and mud covered "runners", grabbed a couple of bananas and then decided to head to Chuy's for a well-deserved cheesy, mexicany lunch. :) Beth lost her shoes to the mud in the middle of the course and Trish & I both trashed ours. We cleaned up at the cars as much as we could and stripped off our colored and muddy clothes. At Chuy's we saw a few other color-splashed diners and had to laugh. It certainly wasn't what we expected, but we were now part of this little club. Would we do it again?? Yeah. Probably so. :)
