The Bolder Boulder was a great success!! I’m really proud of how the race went and how well I did.

The race itself went just as smoothly as the previous years that I have seen. My friend Theresa that ran with me in New Mexico and at the Color Run met me at the park and ride bright and early in the morning and we made our way to Boulder. We arrived at the starting line amongst the thousands of people and found each of our waves. I chose to run in my own wave because it was a little earlier than hers and I had a personal vendetta with this race and wanted to run with the least amount of people possible. Technically, you are allowed to run in other waves, however, if you run in a wave BEFORE yours, your timing chip will not be recorded; but you can run in waves afters yours.   It didn’t necessarily matter that I ran with my assigned wave because after the first 5 waves, it’s already super crowded.

Warming up in the cool morning air!

We warmed up on a side street and separated into our respective spots. The weather for the day was perfect, not too cold, definitely not too hot – perfect for when you started running.  I nervously bounced around listening to my music and chatting a little with the people around me.  The crowd moved closer and my nervousness grew. Finally, it was our turn! A man on the side played the “charge” song on his bugle horn and we were off!! Instantly I’m dodging people left and right. Within the first kilometer there’s already walkers blocking my path and people staggered all over the road. I feel like I run twice as far with all the cutting in and out I do.

Waiting in my wave

Maybe next year I’ll take it easy and just take in the sights, capture pictures, and even do the slip and slide, but this year I was super competitive with this race for multiple reasons. I talk about them in my pre-race review but I am happy to inform you that I accomplished all my goals!

Goal 1: To finish in under an hour! CHECK!

Goal 2: Finish close to 51 minutes because that’s what I ran in New Mexico. CHECK. I finished in 53:03 official time!! I very happy with this time! About 8 minutes fasters than last year, and to top it off…Last year felt, well, DIFFICULT to me! This year, not only did I crush my time, I felt GREAT!

(Secret Goal 3: Beat a few girls from high school that beat my time last year: CHECK. Oh yeah! Well, only one ran it this year that I know of, and I beat her time by a good 5 or 6 minutes! Shhh…don’t tell them I was racing their times!!)

I feel very accomplished with myself after this race, I also placed 58/638 in my age/gender group! This is amazing to me! That’s the 9 percentile! I have a strong desire to train really hard now and keep working on my PRs to get faster! Shout out to Theresa when she reads this: I believe she ran faster than in Albuquerque with a new PR – 1hr8min! So awesome!

Finishers!

So next year, I can register for even earlier times and maybe break 50 minutes..maybe! I know 2 minutes slower than my PR seems like a lot, however, those two minutes are easily accountable – and I hope that doesn’t sound like I’m making excuses… with 55,000+ people running, as you can imagine, I had to dodge people constantly! I only stopped at one water station and after quite literally running into a runner that decided to stop dead in her tracks, I avoided the rest like the plague.  Also at the end, when there was 0.4 miles left of the 10K, when you’re SUPPOSED to start really picking up your pace, the crowd bottle necked into the stadium entrance and slow people tended to get in the way. As I entered the stadium, I was about to launch in to my full sprint mode because the finish line is just a lap around the football field, when a girl cut right in front of me in such an extreme way that I literally ran into her and had to hold up my hands to brace myself and accidentally pushed her in the process…which caused the man behind me to accidentally push me. This is the only thing that irritated me. Also, this course is considerable more hilly than my PR course in New Mexico.

The course itself was as fun as always…the dorritos people were there, as will as a couple slip and slides, the mile 2.2 marshmallows, LOTS of bands, belly dancers, an Elvis impersonator, and plenty of people cheering on the sides!

Chick-fil-A Cows finishing!

After I met up with my friend, we walked around the sports expo. I found a couple new products I want to look into! Check this out: A flip belt!!! I REALLY want one! We got a free popsicle and other free food samples. After wandering around, walking off our running legs, we headed back into the stadium to watch the pro runners and the memorial day tribute. First was the pro women followed by the pro men. They are AMAZING to watch run it! 5 min miles, finishing the 10K in about 33 minutes!!!  Crazy to me!! The usual paragliders for the memorial day tribute had to be cancelled due to wind, so we decided to head back home for nap time. After my nap, I joined my friend Amanda for a Memorial Day Rockies Game with Fireworks show (I got the day off!!!!!!!!!) Great end to a great day!

Fireworks from the field

UPDATES:

I registered for another race and will be doing the Buffalo County Stampede next weekend in Nebraska. And I write this write up from Montana…two days till the Missoula Mile!!!!