A Tale of Two Races

This past weekend I had the pleasure of meeting some of my favorite people out in Vegas, and putting down some hard-earned miles as part of the Rock And Roll Marathon series. The race was at night, so we had a few hours to enjoy Vegas and take in some of the holiday fun.

It was a typical pre-race experience. Head to the start line. Go the bathroom 8 times. Snap some pics. Say a lot of ridiculous things out of nerves. You know, things like that.

Then, the start of the race came. Admittedly it seemed a little chaotic but we didn't think too much of it. And so we ran. The Ekern girls, ALL of the Ekern girls ran the race, and ran the race strong. It was Emily's first, and she dominated it. Meghan overcame her mental 'mile 10' issues from her first race. My brain didn't tell me to 'just quit' the entire time, and Rebecca not only kept me pumped, but got the crowd pumped too.

We met at the finish line. Shared our race stories, and that is where the trouble begins. To be honest, I have spent too much time thinking about this, reading about this, and caring about this. What is 'this'?

A total, and complete disaster of a race experience. From a crowded and unmanageable finish line, to unpotable water served on the course to an apocolyptic style mob scene in the hotel after the race, this race was mismanaged in a way that should be a crime.

And because I just can't bring myself to re-hash all the details (like being in a scary crowd hearing medic yelled every few minutes and people vomiting every where you look), I am linking to a bunch of blog posts that cover the issues much better than I could.

http://www.8newsnow.com/story/16223225/did-water-given-to-marathon-runners-make-them-sick

 http://fortyandrunning.com/2011/12/06/nightmare-in-las-vegas

http://www.mosaicmomma.net/2011/12/power-of-apology.html

http://runitfast.com/2011/12/05/the-nightmare-on-the-strip-rock-n-roll-las-vegas-marathon-half-marathon-full-of-sin/

For those that were lucky enough to be in an early corral, and finish fast; it was a super fun race.
For those who were in a later corral, and ran an average pace, experienced inadequate racing conditions, and a failure of epic proporations at the end of the race.

LUCKILY, us Ekern girls are resiliant, and can keep a cool head. I don't know what I am more proud of: all of us finishing the race, or all of us getting back to the hotel without a hint of anger/impatience/whining. Even though my boobs felt like they were literally going to explode.Even though Meghan was the unlucky one that was having intestinal issues (thank you hydrant water). Even though all of our bodies were being invaded by lactic acid from running 13.1 miles and then standing in a taxi line for over and hour.

We laughed. We swore. We even helped save a girl from fainting.

We had great intuition about getting the HELL OUT OF the Mandalay Bay when we did, and we witnessed a fight over a taxi cab.

Because it took us longer to get back to the hotel that was about 2 miles away than it took us to run 13.1 miles, we didn't get dinner. Instead we ate corn-nuts. Peanut butter and bread, and Combos. The post-race food of Champions.

And the next morning as we were remembering everything terrible that went wrong, I felt blessed to have family that could make me question whether my abs hurt from the race or because I was laughing so much, in spite of all the chaos.

When is our next race, girls?