Sunday, December 7, 2014

25 Days of Christmas: Day 7

This morning was one of the most fun mornings I can remember!  We woke up bright and early and headed to Busch Gardens so I could run the Christmastown 8K!! I've been looking forward to this for SO long!! 

It was super cold this morning, but I was ready for a cold morning after running in the half marathon in the freezing cold!  If only the wind wasn't blowing this morning, then it would've been much more bearable! We saw some crazy costumes...a lot of tacky Christmas sweaters!  I, however, chose to wear one of my Elf shirts :)

I've done a big ol' handful of races, but this one definitely ranks high at the top of my list of favorites! Now, the first part of the course and the end were running through the parking lot--those parts were kind of boring.  However, running through the park was the complete opposite--there was so much to look at, Christmas music playing, volunteers and workers cheering everyone on...it was so wonderful!!


Cold, and ready to start!


So, the first mile or so of the course was up hill, through the parking lots (there were also a couple hills in the park).  The hills didn't bother me at all....what bothered me is the amount of people I was passing between 1/2 mile and Mile 1 who were already walking.  Based on my estimated finishing time, I was in the 3rd out of 4 waves.  All those fools should've been in the 3rd or 4th wave if they weren't ready for those hills.  Just saying.  They don't even know "race course courtesy" and move over to the side if they're walking.  All of us who were running at SUCH a hard time getting through because they were walking side by side, almost blocking the entire pathway! Plus, if you've done a race before, you know how congested the first mile is anyway!  Okie doke, rant over, on to more festive, fun stuff! :)
 
When we finally headed into the park, I took my phone out of my arm band to take a quick picture of the decorations.  It didn't take me long to decide to keep my phone out the whole time I was in the park to document everything!


The amount of people stopping to take selfies was expected, with all of the fun decorations around. But me, I didn't have time for stopping! haha
 

 "Runnin' around the Christmas tree.."


This bridge was one of my favorite parts of the whole run.  They had Marines lining the sides, giving us high fives as we ran by and telling us Merry Christmas.  I wish I had thought about it then, but I wish I had thought to take a video running through there--that would've been so cool!
 
 
SANTA!!! OH MY GOD!!! I KNOW HIM!!
(Elf is on right now, so it only seemed appropriate to include that quote.)
 

One of my favorite countries to visit at Busch Gardens, Ireland.
 

Closer to the end, I pulled out my phone again to tell Matt I was at Mile 4, to give him an idea of how close to the end I was. (I discovered I'm fairly good at texting and running at the same time, haha). He texted me back telling me where he was, so I was able to find him and pose for a picture...I'm pretty far back though...


Thank you, Thank you, Thank you, Matt, for getting this video of me crossing the finish line AND of them calling my name as I did!!

 
DONE!!  My official time was 50:59. For not caring about what my time was going to be, I am definitely satisfied!!
 

One of these elves saw my shirt and came up to me and said, "you need a picture with us!" haha. She must've read my mind anyway, because I was getting ready to ask them.
 

After going to Williamsburg twice in one weekend, we were ready to go home!
 

1 comment:

Nina Diane said...

congrats!! Loved seeing all of the pictures as you ran!