The Rock n Roll is a half marathon series that races in cities all over the country. Every mile or so there's a band stage playing cover songs and the relay stick is a drum stick. I mean, it's just a cool race! Three of my running buddies and I signed up to run the relay half, a split of 7 miles/6.1 miles. Since this race was a Rock and Roll theme we decided to have some fun with it and bought Wonder Woman socks (with capes!) and made matching tutus. Despite our best efforts we couldn't get Brz to dress up with us, but we still had a blast. We left for downtown around 3pm the day before the race, checked into our hotel (bonus!), went to the expo, then to Meddlesome Moth for dinner and Pokey-Os for dessert. The dinner was amazing - split pea guac, moth balls (cheese and pasta in a creamy pesto sauce), chopped crab and shrimp salad, ribs and potato salad, shrimp and grits and ahi tuna with avocado and jalapenos. Delicious!! Dessert was make your own ice cream sandwiches (coconut chocolate chip with vanilla!). We headed back to the hotel to just relax and hang out, then hit the sack early for a 6:15 wake up.
The morning met us with 18mph winds and 48 degrees. Thankfully our hotel was just outside the starting line so Julie and I walked to the corrals while Julie and Rachel rode the Dart to the exchange point. We had about 30 minutes to kill before the first wave started but then we were off and running. We set a pace of 9 min/mile but hit closer to 8:30 for the first two miles. Something felt off for me but I pushed through for about another mile and a half before I told Julie to keep going and I walked for a second. I think the wind was getting to me mentally. It was also pretty hilly and cold. After walking for about 20 seconds I ran to the 4 mile water stop, drank a couple sips and kept going. I ran the rest of it and felt pretty good overall. My goal was to run the 7.1 with a 9:00 pace and I came in at 8:58/mile. I tagged off Rachel and off she went. The other girls all had amazing runs with paces between 8:45-8:55... unreal times! When we checked the results later we found out that out of 134 girls relay teams, the Unruly Julies came in third and The Foxy Ladies came in ninth!! We really did ROCK the Rock and Roll!!
Julie and I took the dart to the finish, though we missed both of the girls crossing the finish line. Then we carted our four freezing heinies back to the hotel to change and pack up, then eat a well deserved breakfast at OHOP. I loved that this race was more of a girls trip than just a race. These are my peeps, and it was great to get away together!
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