Running In My Drinking Shoes: PartyOTS

Showing posts with label PartyOTS. Show all posts

Wednesday, April 16, 2014

Warrior Dash - Georiga - 2014

Finally Finally FINALLY, my favorite race and race weekend of the year. Warrior Dash. This is the 3rd year we've run as a group (hubs and John went in 2011). You can read about last year's here! If you are looking into running an obstacle race or mud run, hands down this is the one to do. They are by far the most organized race we've done. (I'm not including Spartan in this since our experience with that race was less than the "norm" as far as races go. Read about it here) Last year they had some...snafus to be nice. Parking was a nightmare, buses to get to parking was a nightmare. They owned up to it in a big way. They apologized and offered all runners from that race I think at least a 50% off discount for this years race if not more. And this race was DEFINITELY above par. Minus a back-up at Goliath (their big and new obstacle this year) there we had zero issues.

2014 Warrior Dash - Mountain City, GA

We've had everything planned out for AT LEAST a month, probably 2 months. Of course, the curse of the new runner hits. I've probably talked about this before, we have a theory that if someone comes and runs with us who has never run with us before, something bad happens. See my post on the Spartan Race where we had several new people running with us and it almost killed us! The Tuesday before the race, so 3 days before we were heading to Mountain City, GA our cabin rental place called Ben. They had a pipe burst 2 weeks before and "thought it would be fixed by now" so we had to cancel our reservations there and find somewhere new. Back to the Murder Cabin! We stayed here in 2012, it is seriously a set of a scary movie. You know how I know it's the set of a scary movie? It has a book case...no real hotels have book cases, if you still question it, the copy of Deliverance that we left in 2012 was still on the bookcase.

We arrived Friday evening and proceeded to get ready to properly fuel our bodies for a race, with a shrimp boil and beer. It was delicious. After we devoured it, we chilled for a little while and went to bed.

Pre Race Crew

The next morning we got up early and headed to the race site. It was awesome. Completely different than the previous year as the course was basically completely reversed. It was uphill both ways, seriously you began and ended the race going uphill. Jerks. We had to swim through a lake that was absolutely freezing, climb over cars, jump fire, (successfully) traverse A frame walls. It was a great race.

Warrior Roast

Goliath

After Ben almost killed a photographer on Goliath we headed to the post race party. Beer and Turkey Legs. You really can't ask for a better combination. We hung out there then decided to head back to the cabin and drink the beer we had already purchased. Apparently we thought we were in college still because 5 of us drank nearly 40 beers...excluding the ones we threw like grenades when someone didn't describe something well enough during our game of Charades (phone app....where you put the phone to your head and you have to guess what the word is based on the other person's description). We grilled out entirely too much steak, then of course at it all, complete with baked potatoes, watched Boondock Saints at senior citizen audio level and crashed.

Post Race!

Turkey Legs!

Post-Race Party!

2 years ago we followed up Warrior Dash with white water rafting on the Ocoee. Why not do it again this year? It was awesome last time. What we didn't realize was that Warrior Dash was a month earlier this year as compared to 2012. When I say the water was cold, that's a severe understatement, if I were to say it was freezing, also a severe understatement. Was it awesome? Of course. There were only 2 boats of people, then they had about 4 or 5 boats of trainees. It was crazy to see them in their training. That's a tough job. Hats off to anyone who does it.

It was an awesome weekend with amazing friends. I get to run another Warrior Dash in Ohio this year, it's going to have some GIANT shoes to fill if it's even going to come close to the race weekend we just had.

Tuesday, December 31, 2013

2013 Summary!

2013 has come to an end! And if you remember from our very first post our goal for 2013 was to run one race every month. If we doubled up one month, we still had to run one the next month.

Unfortunately we didn't hit every month, August and October ended up being very poor and busy. We were prioritizing and budgeting as Ben likes to call it for the Disneyland Half Marathon in August, and in October was busy with football season and getting ready for #500Strong for homecoming.

We had some awesome memories however!

From our first run at Grassmere Zoo in Nashville for the Zoo Run Run then heading over and grabbing some spiked milkshakes at Burger Republic.

Starting 2013 off Right with the Zoo Run Run at Grassmere!

Then doubling up in February and doing the Royal Family 5K followed by the Princess Half Marathon!

Royal Family 5K at EPCOT

And, while we didn't know it at the time, we were finishing half the runDisney Coast to Coast Challenge with running the Princess Half Marathon!

Princess Half Marathon in Disney World!

While i'm not sure if it was the best idea, we certainly tested the limits running in the elements of the 2013 Charlotte Spartan Race

Then making it a family affair in March at the Color Run!

Color Run with the Famliy!

Then we headed to Georgia for the 2nd Annual Party of the Southland Adventure Weekend for Warrior Dash!

PartyOTS Adventure Weekend 2013

We brought a couple newcomers with us for Foam Fest in Nashville. While it was our least favorite race of the year, the Banderas made it much better!

BANDERAS!

Then we all busted out our #Swag for the first Urban Obstacle Course by Muddy Buddy!

#SWAG

We learned at the Fourth of July 10K that after a 10K, 2 beers is my limit for re-hydration. 3 beers, and I feel terrible.

Sisters at the Fourth of July 10K

Then we missed our first Tennessee home game in 20 years to complete the runDisney Coast to Coast Challenge at the Disneyland Half Marathon!

After just running through the castle

We met some friends from college as they also completed their Coast to Coast Challenge.

The whole crew at the Disneyland Half Marathon!

Then we nearly froze to death at the BoroDash in Murfreesboro on Thanksgiving!

Ben and Jenn at the starting line!

And we finished it off with the Christmas Story 10K virtual Race!

It's a Major Award!

We look forward to repeating some races in 2014, trying some new ones, and continue to run in our drinking shoes!

Saturday, November 9, 2013

Tennessee Homecoming 2013! #500Strong

Party of the Southland is a group of friends who the majority met in the Pride of the Southland Marching Band at the University of Tennessee. We have tailgated together for 10 years, and party, run, travel etc together whenever possible.

For the last few years, most of us have not marched homecoming. For various reasons: live far away, cost, butthurt about days past etc. After last year me and Ben decided we would march this year. And we'd convince anyone we could to march with us. We had no idea what that would turn into.

2 weeks before the deadline to register for homecoming Ben created a Facebook page along with the campaign slogan #500Strong. He wanted to get 500 alumni to march homecoming. In 2012, they had roughly 130. This was going to be a huge task but with the help of basically everyone, I don't know many people who didn't convince at least 1 person to march they almost hit their mark.

469 people.

Yes. FOUR HUNDRED AND SIXTY NINE!

In 2 weeks! They used recruiting videos, old rivalries, and training daze to convince people along with just plain peer pressure.

Ben realized that if people had more to come for rather than just a few hours on Saturday they were more likely to come. So he started planning. He had a run for those people who wanted to come on Friday morning, a private party Friday night at Saw Works Brewery, and an after game rally point at Central Flats and Taps Everything went off without a hitch. To my knowledge everyone had an awesome time, while the game didn't turn out as we had hoped, hopefully that's not what people are remembering from this weekend.