Friday
We dropped the dogs off at the pet hotel and left Chicoutimi around 8am Friday morning. Normally to Barrie, it takes a good 11 hours; unfortunately, we had to make a stop in Quebec City and that cost us about an hour. After a relatively uneventful drive, we arrived in Barrie around 8pm, tired and hungry. As luck would have it, we managed to meet up with some friends for dinner. We finally made it back to Chris' parents' house around 11 and were in bed by midnight or so.
Saturday
5:30am. Alarm goes off. Ugh. I'm not a fan of early mornings. We dragged our butts out of bed and after a stop at Tim Horton's for some caffeine/breakfast, we were off to Burlington. I dropped Chris off at his coaching clinic for 7:30 and then I had some time to kill before picking up my race kit (the expo opened at 10am). I had a flash of brilliance and decided to go to the Ikea in Burlington. Except.....it doesn't open til 9am on Saturdays. What did I do? I pulled into a parking spot and took a nap in the car. Real classy, I know.
Thankfully, the restaurant opens at 8:30 so I was able to get inside a bit sooner. After some chocolate milk and a cinnamon bun, I wandered the showroom, imagining what my house would look like if I had a million dollars. I really wanted to get some new dishes since ours are a mismatched mess, but decided against it in the end.
According to Google Maps, going from Ikea Burlington to Copps Coliseum in Hamilton should take less than 20 minutes. I had only the vaguest directions since Chris has the phone with him, but I figured it couldn't be that hard to find a stadium once I got downtown. Wrong. I was expecting to see signs, directing you to this local landmark, but alas there were none. On top of that, Hamilton's entire downtown is composed of one-way streets. Loads of fun. (On the plus side, I did get to turn left on red once as a result.) After an hour of driving and having asked 4 different people, I finally arrived at the expo.
I hate expos. To me, they seem like a giant money grab. This particular event was set up in the concourse around Copps Coliseum. You could only go in one direction and of course the bag pick-up was at the end. So you had to navigate through all the booths as people forced brochures on you, dodging slow people the whole way. I was in no mood to buy anything after all the driving around I had done - I just wanted to get in, get out and go home. I finally got to the end and picked up my kit, which included a nice purple and black long-sleeved technical shirt. And then I had to walk all the way back through the expo to get out because they blocked off the exit near the packet pick-up.
Finally, after all that, I went to my grandmother's house since she lives about 10 minutes outside Hamilton. I spent the afternoon there and we did our usual crocheting and working on crosswords. For dinner, we went to East Side Mario's. I had spaghetti bolognese - perfect pre-race carbo-loading meal. After dinner, I said good-bye and went to pick up Chris after his coaching clinic before heading back to Barrie. Chris was hungry so we stopped to get some delicious pizza (more carbs - I promise I only had one piece....and some crusts) and then it was off to bed.
Sunday
5:30. Alarm goes off. Again. I wanted to leave extra early so I would have time to navigate downtown Hamilton. I did not want to repeat Saturday's experience and I had no idea where I would park either. For breakfast, I had my leftover spaghetti which was a fabulous way to start the day. Seriously. I love pasta for breakfast.
After dropping Chris off at his conference, I was on my way to the race. I was having some serious doubts about what I should wear for the race because the weather seemed so iffy. It looked like it might rain at any second yet they were calling for a high of 15*C/59*F. Jacket or no jacket? I managed to find parking with relative ease and I got to Copps Coliseum about an hour before the start of the race. That gave me time to check my bag and hit the bathoom (a couple times). One advantage to using the stadium as the race HQ - no porta-potties!!! Real bathrooms!
About 15 minutes before the race started, I made my way to the race start a couple blocks from the stadium. In total, there were about 7000 people participating in the race, either running, walking or relaying, so it was a big start. I found a spot towards the back, slightly behind the 3:15 pace bunny. I had finally settled on wearing crops, a T-shirt, arm sleeves and gloves, but as I was walking to the start, I wasn't sure I had made the right decision. It was cold!!!
Finally, the gun sounded and we were off. Well, the leaders were off anyways - it took a good 5 minutes for me to cross the start line. The first mile (11:00) was a bit tricky, trying to navigate around all the people and get a good pace going. It was interesting for me to be working in miles while the course was marked in kilometres. I don't really have a mile-by-mile replay for you, but here are some of the highlights that I remember (in no particular order):
- Each km marker had a funny/inspirational quote on it. My favourite was "Not all runners have what it takes to go the distance. The polite term for them is sprinters."
- I got high-fived by someone wearing a Notre Dame jacket.
- Someone set up a bacon stand at the end of their driveway. Sadly, by the time I got there, they were packing up but it was still a cool idea.
- There was a choir outside a church that we passed and you could hear the organ music from inside.
- We passed a lot of cemeteries. At least 3 or 4, I think. The last one has some signs warning "Dying Runners Ahead"and things like that. There was a plastic skeleton dressed in running clothes on the side of the road, and two people dressed as the Grim Reaper were there giving high-fives.
- I passed 3 military members in combats with their ruck-sacks on.
- There was a guy dressed like Elvis.
- T-shirts with funny quotes on the back. "My pace or yours?" "If you can read this, it means I'm not in last place."
The first 20km of the race were fairly flat and uneventful. The last 10km, however, were a challenge. I could feel my energy lagging and I wish I had started taking Gatorade from the aide stations sooner, rather than relying only on my hydration belt. The rolling hills weren't too bad, just tiring, and it was starting to get quite hot at that point. I was a little concerned about the last big hill everyone warned me about around km26-27, but I have to say - I killed it! I ran the whole way up, passing people left, right and centre. And when I got to the top, I actually thought to myself, "That's it?"
After the last big hill, it was an easy 3km to the finish. I tried to push myself as much as I could but I was getting tired and I knew my goal of 3:15 was slipping away. Once I got Copps Coliseum in my sights though, it got a lot easier (the downhill to the finish also helped). The finish line was inside the stadium and they projected all the finishes on the Jumbotron. The second I saw the word "Finish", I just gave it everything I had and sprinted to the end. I blew past at least 5 people in the last 20m. I hope they post the finish videos- I felt like I was going so fast!
And now what you've all been waiting for. Final time: 3:18:26
I got my finishing medal:
And.....I ran into my friend KirstenH9 who also ran the race and posted a great time. I don't have any pictures from the actual race because there was no one there take any but I'm waiting on the official race photos.
Unfortunately, almost immediately after the race, I had to go pick up Chris from his conference. I spent a good half an hour stuck in traffic trying to get out of downtown Hamilton. I finally got to the school where the football conference was, changed in the car in the far corner of the parking lot, and soon we were on our way to Montreal. We stopped at a couple service stations along the way so I could stretch my legs a bit and each time, I saw people from the race (they were wearing the race shirt). It was crazy!
I think that's about it. For those of you that are still with me and care, here's my Garmin data from the race. Thanks for reading!
sounds like a great wkend, congrats!! i want to do that race eventually!!
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