Tuesday, September 30, 2014

Women Rock Chicago

Front & Back of the calendar
With Candyce & Sam
Originally the Women Rock race was scheduled for September 20th so when Spartan announced that the Super would be on September 27 I didn't see a conflict in my schedule and registered for both. Months later I found out the date of the race had been moved to the 27th which was really frustrating. It bums me out when I have to chose between races that I really want to do, I have to make pros/cons lists just to decide. After much thought and debate I decided to transfer my Spartan Race entry and run Women Rock instead. It's only a few weeks before the marathon and I was worried that I might be risking injury at the Spartan.

The beautiful view of the skyline
I had already done packet pickup well in advance at a different expo since I'm a series member. The week of the race one of Team Ortho's volunteer coordinators reached out to me about helping on race day. Sam and I talked about it, trying to figure out what we could and finally decided to get to the race site early Saturday morning (5am) to help finish with the setup. There was a seriously low number of volunteer turn out so we did our best to get as much done as possible. Right before the race started we dropped our stuff at bag check and headed to the starting line.

Oh hey ostrich!
Post race bling selfie
I haven't run many races in Lincoln Park and I forgot just how scenic it can be. There really should be more runs over here to switch it up from the Soldier Field Lake Front Path area. The 5k isn't timed and we were in no hurry that morning, we just kept a nice leisurely pace. I didn't even turn my Nike+ app on. I also didn't bring my headphones, sometimes I like to run and enjoy my surroundings. Take everything in and really appreciate it. Once we crossed the finish line we didn't even grab our medals before heading right back to helping out. We threw on volunteer vests and worked on keeping the traffic flow going in the finishers chute.

For those of you who may not know, this is where there are shirtless models handing medals out to hordes of sweaty ladies. Keeping them moving in a forward direction is not easy. Trying to tell them they can get pictures later? I may as well have told them I steal candy from children. Some women were awesome and told us its a women's race and they'd rather have a strong women hand them their medal. We watched as the waves of 5k, then 10k and finally half marathoners crossed over the finish line. I saw tons of familiar faces and cheered them on as they made their way towards me. When the final runner made her way up to us we couldn't help but laugh when she said all she wanted was her champagne and the half naked men.

I didn't get to enjoy the post race festivities, but I did manage to snag myself a champagne flute before they packed everything up. I also scooped up a few calendars since they have personal significance for me. (I worked on the photoshoot, doing the grooming/makeup for the men...tough job I know haha) By the time we made it back to the car all we could think about was lunch and a nap. Being at the finish line we heard quite a bit of feedback from the runners after us. Its so interesting how people have such different experiences. One of the most common complaints is about traffic on the Lake Front Path, I hear that at almost every race. I often wonder how people think that can be avoided, aside from signs saying a race will be taking place I'm not sure what else can really be done. I thought it was a great race. There were a few hiccups along the way but nothing detrimental to my experience.

3 comments:

  1. This is definitely a race I'd love to try next year. You are so smart to hold off on Spartan until after the marathon, too. I was terrified the entire time that I would get injured. I don't know how I made it out of there with only a few scrapes and bruises!

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  2. It was great to see you there, even though I didn't have much time to chat! Thanks for volunteering - it was CRAZY!

    I didn't know you'd helped on the calendar - they looked great, y'all did an awesome job :)

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  3. Honestly I don't understand the whole idea with the "half naked men". I remember seeing them at the expo for the Shamrock Shuffle and it sort of discouraged me to sign up. Anyway, I am not here just to complain. :-) Congrats on another race. Oh, and how did you get to be a series member?

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