Moving into the 2000s, music-wise.

In the midst of freaking out about this weekend's RnR VA Beach (remember when I was freaking out about how I was going to get there? Silly me. Where am I going to stay if my friends bail?! This is a whole lotta crazy for the world's ugliest medal; or just karma for criticizing it)

Anyway, Carolina Liar was just announced the headliner for the Savannah race. You have no idea how happy I am to get out of seeing Bret Michaels. I know he might be cheap, but seriously?!

This also happens to be the race I would get my Rock Legend, but I was not looking forward to the very expensive flight. This definitely helps make up for it. I might actually want to go to this.

But back to the task at hand. I need to do some serious scheduling for this weekend.
Anyone have an extra 6 feet of carpet I can borrow for the weekend?

Chinatown Bus: Thoughts? help!

Hello my 2 readers! I need your help.

I have procrastinated making travel plans to Virginia Beach for this weekend (maybe it has something to do with that god awful medal? Truth, the damn thing has grown on me and now I really want it for the fact that it's so damn ugly) Anyway, now I need your help.

My best bet at the moment is to take a Chinatown bus. It's the cheapest and fastest way to get there. It's hours faster than a greyhound or a train (8 hours as opposed to 10-12 hours) and it's more than half the price.

So, my question is: Should I fear for my life?

Our getaway vehicle.

Wish us luck!

Irene, you suck.

Getting my last long run in before I'm stuck in the apt for a couple of days.
Would rather be wearing a pineapple hat and a medal while sipping on a Mike's hard lemonade at Beachpalooza, but instead I'm preparing for a hurricane. In New York City. Seriously?!
Hope everyone is safe!

I heart visitors!

Especially when they come fun-sized.

New York City, you're not ready.

The Highline

The highline. 

I run the streets of New York City.

literally.

Did you take advantage of NYC's Summer Streets? This morning was my first chance to do it and it reminded me of running the NYC Half. This is the third time I've taken advantage of running in the streets of NYC (second being the Mini 10K. Not gonna lie, it's pretty badass.

 Running down Park Ave. from 72nd

This was around 7am, I'm assuming it didn't stay this quite as the day went on. 

 View from bridge.

 Above Grand Central.

 The Uptown Rest Area. They had free bike rentals and skate rentals.

 And an awesome water fountain! 

 I did not have time to check this out, but it looks cool?

Street Art?

Hope everyone has a fabulous weekend!

Warrior (Princess) Dash.

Red Frog Events, Be still my heart. I am a fan of your events. The Warrior Dash was amazing as an event. Who doesn't want a Viking hat and a chance to call yourself a warrior (princess, in my case)? I love that it has a wave start and it can easily be made into an all day fun event, even for your friends who don't run. It had a great outdoor festival vibe. There is food, beer, music and running. What's not to love? With that being said, let's move on to the actual race recap, shall we?

YO. Who's idea was it to sign up for this thing?! Can I state for the record, I would rather run a full marathon untrained before I rocked one of these again. Ok. Maybe not. But that's kind of what it felt like (I'm assuming). I have never worked so hard in a race- that includes my first half marathon- as I did for this 5K. Muscles I didn't even know existed are making it difficult to move. My outer thigh is so bruised it's brown and I have no idea if I got it from the obstacles, my foam roller or the much needed message I got. It's safe to say, you will never read about another mud run on this blog, so take it all in now.

Silly me, thinking it was pretty awesome we were in the mountains of upstate New York. Little did I know, we would be running up and down them- and by running, I mean crawling. This? Yea. Not my idea of a good time. 

On our way in we got some advice from a few people in an early wave: Conserve your energy on the first hill.

First hill= a side of a MOUNTAIN for the entire first half of the race. 

When we were lining up, we accidentally went with the wave earlier than ours and ended up last to cross the starting line. Not long after, we started passing people as we were walking. That was kind of cool. What wasn't cool? About half way, having the faster runners of the wave behind us, pass us.

Nice touch.

Barricade Breakdown

The obstacle proved to me (incase I was under some delusion otherwise) that I have no upper body strength. But I do have long legs, which got me over the walls.

Road Rage

I was convinced I was going to cut myself on the rusty cars. After this, I didn't care how long it took me to finish the obstacles. As long as I did them, I'd be happy.

Teetering Traverse

Not going to lie, I crawled across it.

Deadweight Drifter

I believe my face says it all. And that was the end of being clean and dry.

What goes up. . . 

The next half of the race was all downhill. Or running sideways across the mountain.

Rubber Riochet

I don't know what the point of this was, but whatever?

Cargo Climb

I thought I was going to have to skip this one. I am desperately afraid of heights. 

The rest of the obstacles I did not get a chance to take a picture of:

Chaotic Crossover

Someone was singing Spiderman, which entertained me and I finished.

Petrifying plunge

I heard the volunteers screaming something about taking a running start into this one. It was a really big slip-n-slide. I was not amused.

Warrior Roast

I was extremely concerned about catching on fire.

Muddy Mayhem

Just in case you managed to stay clean. 

The much needed beer.

People were paying to jump onto this thing. I thought it was quite comical that it happens to be right next to the first aid area.

In Summary:

Before.

After.

Never have I ever felt like I earned a medal more.

Official warrior princess status.

Can someone please inform me of WTF I was thinking?!

RnR Providence.

Be careful what you wish for!
I've always wanted to run a race in the rain. Maybe a 5k. That would be fun, right? Sunday that wish came true for the entire Half. On top of that, I was getting a cold. All the right ingredients were there for this to be a disaster, but surprisingly it wasn't that bad.

 The State House. Where the Start and Finish line meet.

 Stretching in the rain. That poncho stayed on until about mile 7. I was trying to keep it on the entire time, but I decided dying of heat stroke wasn't worth it. 

 I have never seen the infamous "sag wag" but this was parked right behind all of the corrals.  I made a mental note to stay away. I didn't know though. I was sick and it was raining. 

This was going to be an interesting run.

The Start line. I was going to crop out the couple kissing, but I thought it was too cute. 

This was definitely deserved. 

Providence, wish I would have gotten to see more of you, but oh well! 

Your streets are paved extremely well.

The End.

Sub-3 head wind in the pouring rain.

Yup.
That pretty much sums it up.

Eyes on the prize: August

Next weekend. 

This will be mine.

One medal closer to the Rockstar. 2 more to go.

Truth: I'm having some left leg issues. I almost didn't do my long-run this weekend, but I'm glad I did. Now I'm taking the rest of the week off in an attempt to taper. 

I kind of wanted to take the rest of the summer off, too, but then I realized I was coned into this:

Not that I'm really complaining. . . nevermind. I am. I am very nervous. I have been reading recaps and even though it's only a 5K with obstacles, it sounds like you are going to need some upper body strength. Yea. I don't have that. The friend that I am running with is faster than I am, so that concerns me also. I'm afraid of heights and I don't like to get dirty. Yea. This is going to be a disaster.

But I do think it's going to be completely worth taking a day trip out of the city and enjoying beer and turkey legs with other muddy runners. Or at least that is what I'm telling myself so I don't freak out.

And Groupon totally roped me into this one:

It was $25 and what else was I doing on that Saturday? Fred is coming in town that week and it will be fun to make him do this with me. He is also faster than me, but I have no shame in making him wait for me. I will have to keep the bitching to a minimum because I'm sure he will leave me if not.

And those? Are just August.

On a sidenote, did yall know Red Frog Events puts on both of those events? I noticed they were hiring and I noticed their company seems to be amazing. Only downfall? Chicago is not in my list of cities to move to. Oh well.