Happy New Year!!
Hope you all had a fabulous New Year’s Eve…. quiet or not, hopefully you enjoyed yourself.
We stayed home, however we invited a few of our favorite peeps over to celebrate.
Me celebrating.
My fabulous new business partner Michelle and me.
We had everyone come in comfy clothes. I wore yoga pants, crazy cotton top and a black wrap sweater thing. Super comfy. I enjoyed some Prosecco and some good eats. I tried to behave a bit though as I had a New Year’s Day race on Saturday.
HANGOVER CLASSIC 5K and 10K – Salisbury, MA
The race was one I had done before, I think I have done it the past 3 or 4 years. I did the race last year. It is usually not too big as the weather is crappy. Well due to crazy warm weather and I think the world deciding to start the year off right, the race was HUGE.
The race organizers said they were capping it at 1200, but I swear I saw bibs higher than that. It was nuts during registration and before the start, no one knew where to go and the lines for the bathrooms were ridiculous. They only had 4 port-o-potties outside, plus the use of a few bathrooms inside a bar. Yes the race headquarters are at a dive bar at the beach.
I was one of the fortunate ones and got to hit the head before starting the race. THANK GOD! It would not have been pretty had I not had that opportunity. It was crazy packed at the start, as the road is fairly narrow. I had no idea how far back we were. The gun went off out of nowhere and we were off… well kind of …. we started walking, then stopped, started walking and then eventually like a 15 minute pace of jogging. It wasn’t till about mile 1 that we really got running. The race had everyone starting at once, as there are actually 2 races…… a 5K and 10K. I opted for the 10K.
I ran with my running buddy Tom. We kept it pretty relaxed the first half and picked up the pace as we went. Although we realized the course was different from prior years. As we crossed state lines and headed into NH. We finally got off route 1, heading back towards MA running through a residential area. But then the course went left….. um…. to the beach. We had to run on the beach. It was low tide, so the sand was like running in mashed potatoes. We ran on the beach for about 1/2 of a mile, but we had to run down a ways and then along the water and then back up to the road. That sucked. Although once we got back on pavement I felt like a speed demon. We picked up the pace mile 4 to 5. But the last mile I started to lose steam. I told Tom to go ahead, he cruised off, making his pace look effortless…. bastard… I mean that in the nicest way though. 
I was surprised though as I neared the finish line and realized I was going to do under 50 minutes. After our slow start and the beach segment I thought I was dragging ass. But I finished in around 48 minutes. That is an estimate though. As… um… no results have been posted yet. Over 24 hours after the race and still no results. Plus when I finished they had run out of water….. apparently all of the 5K’ers and the fast 10K’ers drank it all. WTF. All they had was beer. Thanks but after my tasty prosecco the night before, the last thing I want is crappy keg Budweiser. I have my standards.
So my review……
Pros – low key race, fun way to start the year, starts at 12:45 so if you are hungover you have a little recovery time, they have a Polar Plunge for those who want to hop in the water after running and they get a mug if they are one of the first 600 to do so.
Cons- organization is severely lacking, this race is put on by a running club that calls itself the “Winners Circle”. They know what a good race is, they have excellent racers in this club. No water stop for the 5K and only one for the 10K. Not enough water at the finish. No post race refreshments. Not enough bathrooms. The route changes every year. No warning about the beach run segment. Guessing it is not USATF Certified. Times are still not posted online. No chip timing, just old fashioned clicker and they write your number down. Cost $20, not bad for a normal 10K, but with no amenities it is steep. The shirt was not really anything special, long sleeved but kinda blah.
Conclusion: They get a D. The style of this race worked and it was fine when it was smaller. It was just a fun low key race, which I am fine with, but that only works for about 400 runners. 1200 runners, many of them newbies, makes for chaos. This race is also part of a series, the Will Run for Beer series which has several professionally organized races. I think many of the racers who have experience with the series organizer’s races were thinking this one would be up to the same standards….. it was not.
So I started off the New Year with a 10K. Just not the 10K I was dreaming of. Oh and by the time I am finishing this post, they have finally gotten times up….. according to them I did a 48:40. I’m fine with that considering the slow start and the beach portion. 
Also they are missing about 500 results for the 5K and apparently runners 8 to about 300 in the 5K ran a longer route. Fabulous.
Hope your first race of the New Year goes better than mine!
Britt
I have been very anxious to get this firmed up with this caterer as I have brides waiting for menus and I wanted to have quotes from at least 2 caterers (only have one so far). Fortunately we just postponed till tomorrow! Also fortunate for me was that my good friend Aviva was home alone tonight and wanted to grab dinner!
