Tuesday, December 1, 2009

Turkey Trotting: Race Recap (and some other stuff as well)

Early Thursday my cuz and I woke up, donned our pseudonyms and other race gear, and made our way to the great city of Detroit* for the Turkey Trot 10K. Check out the cool tech race shirt below.

Now, my cuz has been running on and off for the past three years; occasionally training for a 5K or 10K here and there. But, his quasi-residence in Orlando has provided him with the opportunity to run a few Disney races (a 10K and 13K) recently. His enjoyment in those races led him to sign up for the Disney Marathon in early January.

Cuz asked me to join him for a portion of his marathon—which I readily agreed to do—and this 10K was a practice session for our upcoming run.

Now, returning to the above mentioned 10K race, we rolled down into the Dirty D with lots of other folks on a cool and crisp day. The start of the race utilized both sides of a street divided by various shrubbery, then wrapped around a traffic circle. So, depending on what side of the street you lined up on, there was staggered start. The two sides rejoined after the traffic circle.

The race itself was fun; we held a good conversational pace and joked during the course. The people lining up for the parade (which followed the race) were energetic, and many crowd hive-fives were dispensed.

When the 10K and the 5K split apart, someone may have yelled “quitters” and “I see your 5K and double it” and maybe a “10Kers do it for twice as long.”

We finished strong and were rewarded with delicious food—including salt bagels. I don’t know what the deal is in Lansing, but in the greater Dirty D area post race salt bagels are a staple. A race director would sooner go without water than salt bagels. But not here in Lansing where people barely know what a salt bagel is. Sometimes my town is depressing.

On Saturday I headed out for a 10M run down the rails-to-trails trail near Buck and Bunny’s abode, and was 4M into at 10M out/back when the need to use a restroom manifested itself. Fortunately, I saw a party store and was able to maintain some of my runner’s dignity.

Finally, I decided to run one last 5K this year, and it will be this weekend, baring any unforeseen dramatic changes in the weather or loss of motivation due to weekend late nights.



*Such things are notably subjective

7 comments:

Sun Runner said...

You opted for a party store bathroom over the bushes? Oh man and here I thought you were a real runner. Real runners do it in the woods. ;)

It's "donned" not "dawned." Just FYI.

-Your friendly neighborhood professional editor

Jen Feeny said...

Sounds like you and the cuz had a great time! So cool that you're going to cheer him on at Disney, pacers are the best and he'll def appreciate it when the going gets tough!

So a mysterious 5k huh? Aren't 5k's out of season up there?

Amy said...

See... aren't you glad you didn't bandit now? Bandits don't get no tech tees.

Sun Runner said...

@morgan: I'm going to run a 5K this weekend. Gotta do my December race! We run all year round up here, we're a tough bunch. Except for our friend Spike who's so wimpy he has to use a PARTY STORE BATHROOM to do his business.

We're distance runners...I let go of my dignity long ago and just accepted the nastiness. More like embraced. :)

Running and living said...

Jealous! I did not even get a Tshirt for my trot!

The Laminator said...

Awesome running with fam no? Nice turkey trotting!

The Boring Runner said...

Wow, that is a really nice shirt. I'm really glad you yelled at the people who peeled off. I just usually do that under my breath.