Warrior Dash and Iron Warrior Dash 2013

So we have a tailgating group. A pretty big tailgating group that meets early - usually around 7 or 7:30am - for every home football game in Knoxville call Party of the Southland after the marching band at UT "Pride of the Southland" because as you recall, we are a bunch of former band nerds.

In 2011, one of the guys in the group found Warrior Dash and Ben decided to go with him to run it in Charlotte, NC.  They had an awesome time despite running the race and driving all the way back to Nashville via Bristol, TN after the race and un-showered.

Ben with his free beer in Charlotte 2011

In 2012, after hearing about it for a year they convinced 3 more people to join so we had the first ever Party of the Southland Adventure Weekend that consisted of staying in a Murder Cabin, Warrior Dash, and White Water Rafting where we damn near capsized the boat on a class 2 rapid.

The 5 of us in Mountain City, GA in 2012

After another year went by we convinced 2 more to join us in 2013.  We headed down to Douglasville, GA where they were holding Warrior Dash - roughly 3 miles, and Iron Warrior Dash - roughly 15 miles.  

Two guys in the group - Ben included - decided to go balls to the walls and run the Iron Warrior Dash.  The rest of us slept in, enjoyed a nice leisurely breakfast and headed down later for the shorter race. 

There were storms the week before the race so logistically this race was a nightmare.  They had to change where you parked so you had to stand in like for roughly and hour to get to the race site from parking, then stand in a 2 hour line to get back after the race.  Fortunately, like I've said before, my friends are awesome.  Really awesome.  Sure it was hot, and we were standing in line which no one likes to do, and we were tired - especially the 2 who had run 15 miles - but we could send people out on beer runs so we just stood there and enjoyed a nice Leiney's Summer Shandy and each other's company.  If you haven't tried this Leinenkugal Summer Shandy you should. It's a FANTASTIC summer beer.

The race was awesome. I think as a whole our group enjoyed the previous location in Mountain City a little better, but this was still just as awesome as we have come to expect from Warrior Dash.  The obstacles were tough, especially a roughly 20 foot wall you had to get over with a rope, and the mud.  Usually the "mud" is just brown water.  This was mud, thick mud.  And it smelled like chili.  I felt like I was crawling through cold chili.  A lady in front of me just stopped moving.  She said "I'm stuck I can't move anymore".  I stood up, stuck my hands through the barbed wire, and helped lift this lady up to where she could get on her feet.  It was amazing how much you sunk into this mud.

I highly HIGHLY recommend this race.  They have one in Tennessee, 10 miles from where I live, but for some unknown reason they have it on a Saturday, in the fall.  Don't they know Southerners have other things going on Saturdays in the fall?!?!

After the race we headed back to the hotel and cleaned up and headed out to Dave and Busters for some games and food.  I had an alcoholic snow cone.  I love snow cones.  More that most adults, you add alcohol to it...sold.

A couple of the girls got a little too addicted to the Jurassic Park game.  To the point we all left them there.  They came in the hotel not too long after we got back and we were surprised to see them.  They said "yeah, we beat the game"  Ridiculous.

This has been my favorite race series we've done.  I want to try Spartan again with better weather, but this one is awesome.

The now 7 of us in 2013 in Douglasville, GA

The next day we headed to get some food at the Vortex.  You've probably seen this if you watch the Food Network.  It's famous for the burgers.  It's a 21+ bar, that serves ridiculous burgers. Ben and I split the "Fat Elvis" which has peanut butter, bacon and fried bananas on it, and the "Double Coronary Bypass" which has 2 fried eggs, 6 slices of cheese, 8 slices of bacon, and instead of buns....two grilled cheeses.  We also had someone get the Carnivorgasm which is a meat Heaven and a few other burgers that I can't remember through the haze of meat sweats.

After that we all headed our different directions - Knoxville and Nashville and called it a successful weekend.

Color Run!

Now yall don't understand how long I've wanted to do this Color Run.  I heard about it probably a full year before I was able to run it.  They announced it was coming to Nashville in the fall and here's my reaction - Dangit!  That won't work I'll be in Knoxville for a football game...priorities yall - but it's a Sunday! I can come back and run!  I took a week or so to spread the word and get a group together and we go to sign up SOLD OUT!!!  It's not for like 9 months!!!!  I tried to get on the waiting list, I tried begging...nothing worked.  I would have to wait.

Then they announced a second Color Run in March.  I signed myself and Ben up immediately, called my sister, she signed up immediately. Call my mom and dad and they signed up!  This is really going to happen!

The whole crew!

My dad who used to run alot has told us, if it's 40 degrees and over wear shorts, if it's less than that wear pants.  You'll warm up when you run.  It was probably 39.9 degrees.  I knew I'd be fine when running, but I didn't anticipate the hour wait to start the race.  They did wave starts, but they didn't assign times, so we all got there, formed this GIANT white snake (except for the blotches of color where my mom got impatient and didn't hold her free packet of color and threw it well before the starting line) and stood while they started people in like 10 minute increments maybe 50 people at a time.  It was freezing!

Finally the race started.  I ran with my sister, Ben with a friend of his and Mom and Dad ran solo.  Ben and his friend took off and were well ahead of our wave.  They turned up Broadway (in downtown Nashville) and the first color zone was yellow.  They said all they could see was a cloud of yellow, people in masks spraying the yellow stuff.  They began to wonder if it was a bio hazard attack or if this was the color run.

Bio Hazard Terrorist Attack or the Yellow Color Zone?

We finished the race.  It was fun. But the after party was 10000000 times better than the race.  They pump loud music, throw out millions of packets of color, free socks, and party.  Jenn, her sister, and her mom played there for probably and hour while Dad and Ben stood back and waited....and waited...

After looking forward to the race for so long it was awesome, but I think next time I'd want to be a volunteer. Spraying on that color seems awesome!

Clearly you get way more color at the after party than the run.  

Note to future color runners, It doesn't come out of light hair very well.  Jenn and her sister had pink highlights for several days.

We survived the hardest race of our lives...or did we?

After the half marathon Jenn took a break off of running.  A long break.  Ben took our week long vacation off...then got back to running.

I knew we had a race scheduled 4 weeks after our half marathon, 3 weeks after we got back from vacation.  In those 3 weeks after vacation I think I ran 3 miles.  I had eaten and drank my way through Disney World, then not run so I was beginning to sweat it when the next race, the Spartan Race, came up so quickly.

This was the second to last weekend in March.  It was cold, VERY cold.  This was truly the race from hell.

The race was Sunday in Charlotte, NC at the White Water Rafting training site for some of the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta. There were 6 of us going.  Ben and I drove in from Nashville to Knoxville and piled in a friend's dad's van and the 6 of us headed towards Charlotte.  Ben usually takes the lead in planning trips, he likes things planned out and people like for them to be planned out for them. Well the story differs depending on who you talk to but let's just say that no one knew where we were stopping for the night.  Were we driving all the way to Charlotte?  Were we stopping in Asheville where one of the people on the trip used to live?  Ben said he didn't know so he didn't make us a reservation.  After deciding to drive to Charlotte, we couldn't find a room.  8 hotels later we FINALLY found one with a room.  We'll take it!  We even cancelled our room in the other hotel for the next night and decided to stay here the whole weekend.

The next morning we got up, piled in the minivan and headed out to the mall in Charlotte - what else were we to do for the day?  As we pulled out of the hotel parking lot we heard a noise.

Not just flat, but riding on the rim with 6 people in the van.  We all got out, found the spare, changed it, took it to get it repaired where of course it couldn't be repaired so we had to get a new tires.  After 2 hours we were back in the car heading to the mall.

The girls shopped for a little bit, we found a F.Y.E., remember those old stores that sold what were called CD's?  It was like walking into a time capsule, it even smelled the same.  We bought the new Reel Big Fish album because we still live in that one week in the 90's when ska was popular at our house.  We saw a movie and headed to some chain Mexican restaurant for all you can eat enchiladas and margaritas.  How else would I fuel my body for a race I clearly wasn't prepared for?

We headed back to the hotel where I lay away in bed unable to sleep for fear of how the race would go the next day.  I've done obstacle races before, so this wouldn't be too different, except it takes much more of a badass.  At other obstacle races, if you can't complete an obstacle you just usually cuss, then walk around it.  Not here, you cuss multiple times, then complete 30 burpees.  You don't know what a burpee is?  Consider yourself lucky.

Let's start the race day by saying I have great friends.  The weather was <expletive> terrible.  Pouring down rain and roughly 45 degrees.  We ran from the car to packet pickup and ran back to the car to wait until our wave start.

The first obstacle of this 4 mile race?  Wading through chest deep water and with it being at the White Water Training Center and pouring down rain there weren't any obstacles that weren't water.  The course was solid mud, like ankle deep mud.  Running wasn't much of an option - not that I could run far or fast after a month of no running and eating like crap.

On of our teammates had to head to the medic tent because he had gotten so cold.  He's an EMT and said when he got to the medic's tent he told the people to forget about him.  There were people way worse off than he was.  But they did cut his clothes off him to get him warmed up.  Yikes!

We finished the race.  It had started to half sleet half rain by the end of it. My lips were solid blue and I couldn't get my teeth to stop chattering. I was afraid one was going to break they were chattering so hard.

This was Sunday and we were supposed to drive back to Knoxville, drop off people and drive back to Nashville for work the next day but there was NO way we could drive back in the condition we were in.  Our random hotel we found two nights before let us come back - even though it was way past the time to check out - to shower and warm up.  I honestly don't know what we would have done if they hadn't let us.  We were in bad shape.  So Thank You random hotel in Charlotte, we'll forget about that little scabies incident that one of our friends had after that visit.

Unfortunately I have none, zero, zip pictures from the race day.  You probably wouldn't want to see the pictures of some of us half naked riding back in the van trying to warm up, or covered in mud with blue lips.

Edit:

After cleaning out some phone albums we found these on Ben's phone that he swiped that day and non of us remembered!

Disney's Princess Half Marathon 2013

So we left off as I turned on my alarm clock for 3:15am for a half marathon.  Ben and I both agree that this is the hardest part.  That's an asinine time to get up to run.  Running is hard enough, running 13 miles is hard enough, don't make me do it on little sleep.  How am I supposed to go to sleep early at Disney World?!?!

But we did it.  We woke up, got into our sweet costumes and headed to EPCOT.  A suggestion - bring an old sweatshirt or something you can toss because it's COLD that early in the morning.  At least it was to me. Disney donates any clothing left on the course.I brought a nice Tennessee hoodie figuring those Florida residents shopping at the Goodwill would have a better option than that nasty Gator stuff.

After what felt like FOREVER waiting in line for a bus, getting to the race, waiting for all the other corrals (with it being our first we were placed in nice corral G...out of corrals A-H) it was finally our turn.

We felt good, took a little while for everyone to find their groove, we were going strong. Then we FINALLY get to it.  The castle.  Holy crap I'm going to run through the castle!...ok it was more like very slowly walk since everyone stopped so that was frustrating.  But I ran OUT of the castle!

I'm halfway to being a Princess!

Then the worst thing happened, because we were in the second to last corral the pace changed DRASTICALLY.   After the castle everyone stopped running.  The castle was roughly mile 7, between mile 7 and 8 we had run an extra half mile weaving through people and trying to get around them. Then the course narrowed...and narrowed again...until it was one lane of traffic with cars going down the other lane.  It was IMPOSSIBLE to get around anyone.  After getting frustrated, and an even more frustrated Ben, I said "This is Disney, we shouldn't be frustrated!  Let's just enjoy the rest of the run, get some pictures and then enjoy our vacation!"  Which is what we did.  We walked from about mile 10 to 13.1.  Not at all the time we had hoped for, but we had a ton of fun.

FINISHERS!

Because it wouldn't be true to the title of my blog to only tell half the story, here's a list of our favorite eats and drinks at Walt Disney World.

Eats:

• Dole Whip Floats - Adventureland - Magic Kingdom - The only reason I go to the Magic Kingdom.  OK that's not true, but they are still delicious.  I LOVE the orange with pineapple juice and Ben prefers the vanilla with pineapple juice.
• Beef and Blue - Resorts - it's a sandwich Ben originally had last year (when I got the Princess Half bug when I realized we planned our trip the same week as the race and I didn't do it).  We had it at Pop Century last year and they had it at Port Orleans this year, Ben said it was better at PC.
• Le Cellier - Canada - EPCOT this was our celebratory meal the night after the race (and our "we need to stay awake so our internal clocks aren't jacked up for the whole trip").  Everything.  Everything is good here.
• Tangierine Cafe - Morocco in EPCOT.  If you are hungry this is the place to go.  We used a quick service meal credit (we had the dining plan) and had more food that we knew what to do with.  It was all delicious.
• Mickey Ears - Everywhere.  They are so good.  We eat so many of them when we go.
• Mickey Waffles - Resorts - I don't know if it's cause they are shaped like Mickey, or if they really are that delicious, but we highly recommend them.
• Yak and Yeti - Animal Kingdom - Both the quick service and the table service are delicious.  If you do the table service, get the burger.  I swear it'll be one of the greatest burgers you've eaten.
• School Bread - Norway - EPCOT  This is delicious!  And a BIG snack if you need something to tide you over between meals.
• O'hana - this is hands down the best restaurant on property.  Save room for dessert. Pineapple Coconut Bread Pudding with a Bananas Fosters Rum Sauce?!?! YUM!

Drinks:

• Grand Marnier Slush - France - EPCOT - I promise, beer drinkers, tequila drinkers, wine drinkers, teetotallers, EVERYONE will like this drink.  The only problem is the cup is entirely too small.
• Italian Margarita - Italy - EPCOT
• All you can drink - Spirit of Aloha Dinner Show - this was the best part of the show.  If you can drink it, they'll bring you another one.  
• Lapu-Lapu - Polynesian - drink these before eating at O'hana.  Don't go to WDW without eating at O'hana. 
• Avocado Margarita - La Cava De Tequila - Mexico - EPCOT.  Sounds weird but it's delicious.  If you can only make it to one place in EPCOT make it this bar.  There are so many margaritas to try!  
• If you dare to leave the property and head over to Islands of Adventure to head to the Wizarding World of Harry Potter the Frozen Butterbeer is the way to go.  I've had it both ways, the frozen is hands down better.
• Unfortunately Ben doesn't care for too many beers at EPCOT, but he does like the Hog's Head Brew at the 3 Broomsticks.

Disney's Royal Family 5K 2013

Holy Crap I signed up for a half marathon.  What's even worse is I signed up for one at the end of February, which means training all winter.  I hate the cold.  Ben gets mad because I refuse to do anything when it gets cold. I come home from work and hibernate until work again the next day.

Training or not the race was here.  I wasn't as prepared for it as I wished I would have been but I knew I wouldn't have an issue keeping at 16 minute mile (as required by runDisney).

The race was on Sunday, we also had a 5K we signed up for on that Saturday.  We got in town on Thursday night and went to the Expo on Friday.  It was a cluster of a mess. This was our first rD race but from word of mouth we learned the Expo is usually at the ESPN Wide World of Sports but due to the Braves being in town for some boring baseball stuff they moved it to the Coronado Springs Expo Center and Resort.  We finally got there after being bused to Downtown Disney, then to Coronado (there was no parking or drop offs allowed at the Coronado) it was a mess.  But after a few hours we made it through to get our bibs, shirts and swag bag.  Unfortunately the Expo was so crazy we didn't get a chance to look around much or go into the Official Merch Tent for rD gear.  (bummer)

From there we headed to enjoy a day of the Magic Kingdom.

Enjoying my Dole Whip Float in my shirt :)

We got up early Saturday morning to enjoy a 5K through EPCOT.  It was awesome.  They had all the fire lit up for the IllumiNations show in each country and music pumping through it.  We didn't listen to music for either race and decided to enjoy the scenery.  If you haven't run a long race without headphones you should try it.  It's amazing to hear how many beeps and technology people run with.

We finished that race up and headed all stinky still wearing medals and bibs to Be Our Guest for a post race meal.  (Which was delicious!)  We rode some rides and enjoyed the park before heading home to clean up - try our first ice bath.  I can say it wasn't too terrible.  We've read - and we are no professionals - that it can help muscles heal quickly so we figured we'd try it since we had the half marathon the next day.

That night we carbo-loaded in you guessed it, Italy.  Where else?  Although I don't think carbonara and lasagna followed by a Grand Marnier Slush in France are what the experts mean by fueling your body but it's Disney.

We headed back to the hotel - Port Orleans Riverside (I HIGHLY recommend it.  This Southern girl was excited to see the ceiling fans in the rooms!) - to try to get some rest before our 3:15am alarm for the race the next day................

2013 Goals...to run at least one race every month

A little back story to kick this blog off.  We have been married since 2007.  We met in the good old marching band at the University of Tennessee.  Band Nerds.

Ben - works in the corporate world by day and is a musician and brew master by night. He drinks beer. He has always "drank the beer".  Except for a brief time each fall when he drinks "Touchdown Juice" aka Jack Daniels.

Jenn - works during the day and drinks margaritas, fights her curly hair, and plays with the doggie by night.   Her first purchase of booze was a handle of Jose Cuervo tequila.  She drank so much of it it made her sick and swear off tequila forever.  Turns out forever was only the rest of college until she could afford "non-$1 beer or $5 pitcher" drinks.

We've both run off and on for a couple years now. The first run we did together was a 5K where Jenn had to stop to tie her shoe and said she'd catch up to Ben.  She sprinted towards him as he had stopped maybe 50 feet ahead and she expected him to catch her and swing her around in the movies.  That didn't quite happen. He lowered his shoulder like he was stopping the winning touchdown run in the Superbowl and busted my nose open.  We finished the 5K with me and my bloody nose.

This year we decided to run at least one race every month for 2013.  If we ran two one month, we still had to run another one we couldn't roll over runs.That's what me and the hubs decided this year.  We would run at least one race every month.  Now we knew we had some already planned, Disney Princess Half in February, Warrior Dash in May and Tough Mudder at some point in the year so it couldn't be that hard to fill in the rest right?

Well we decided this about 2 weeks into January, so we had to hustle to find one in January.  Fortunately we found the Zoo Run Run in at the Nashville Zoo!  Naturally, given our names, we try to choose runs where we are rewarded with booze afterwards.  This race was right up our alley.  In the past local brewery "Blackstone" had served their beers and you get one free beer.  Unfortunately for us, this year Mich Ultra was the sponsor.  Gag.  Naturally we thought it necessary to try this new restaurant in town that has two sides of their milkshake menu, regular, and spiked.  Ben had a Reese's Cup infused vodka milkshake and I had a Black Russian Milkshake.  But we were one run down with 11 months to go.

You know why flamingos stand on one leg?  If they lifted the other they'd fall down!