Banff Winterstart 5 Miler Race Report

My third race in a two week period, not to mention back to back nighttime races... I think I have learned a few things from these past few weeks! First, and most important point - I'm not sure I like nighttime races! I find the whole nutrition thing a bit tricky... Anyhow, time for a race report. N and I met up with DGB and her husband at the Old Spaghetti Factory for a late lunch. The food tasted good at the time, but it would come back to haunt me later. We finished lunch, walked around town (brrr, it was cool), then headed back to the hotel to get ready for the race. The start was at the Banff Caribou Lodge and Spa, just a couple of hotels down from where we were staying. As soon as we got there kids were handing out glow sticks. We warmed up a bit and were ready and raring to go for the 7 pm start. It was really dark out, and probably just around freezing.... This race was not chip timed and it wasn't really clear where the start was. I picked a spot and started the Garmin, but I was never really able to look at it over the course of the race since I couldn't see too much. D and I got caught in the shmozzle of people so we were pretty well forced to run with the group as there wasn't a lot of opportunity to weave in and out. We decided to try and stick together and have fun. Pretty soon in my stomach started giving me grief over my lunch at the Old Spaghetti Factory which made for a pretty uncomfortable race... The first 1.5 miles was all flat, but then it was up, up, up to the turnaround point, then back the way we came. There were no water stops along the course, but in the dark I really don't know how you could have managed it (not to mention the hazard of running over discarded paper cups, going downhill, in the dark, in quickly cooling weather). D wanted to sprint to the finish at the end, but I wasn't sure I could keep up with her sprint so I told her I'd meet her at the end. After taking a few strides D changed her mind and we crossed the finish line together. The Garmin told me 5.05 mi in 51:30. A bunch of runners came in at the same time so there was quite the line up to hand in our tear tags off our bib. My official time reads 52:17 which I know isn't right... Afterwards there was a post race party in the garage of the Caribou Lodge. I skipped the line up for food because it wasn't moving at all, instead opting to use my two free beer tickets that came with my race entry to get a couple of Big Rock Grasshoppers. We hung out at the party for a bit - I won a door prize of a t-shirt - then headed back to our hotel where Chili's was running a special for the runners. Two Presidente Margaritas and some chips and salsa or queso for a good price. A couple of margaritas later it was time to call it a night...

I liked the logo on the shirts - looks like this except in blue and green:

You can check out the artist's blog page here - some very cool stuff up there.

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By the way, I did run my LLR of 15 miles yesterday. I could probably write the most interesting blog post ever about it, but... Let's just say I learned a lot of things to not do on a run from now on. Like - don't start running too late, don't run in wooded areas in the dark, things to do when you see a bear warning sign and you are 2 miles from your car... Suffice it to say I got my 15 miles in the bag (I think it actually came out to somewhere around 15.37 miles).