Denver Half Marathon – The Aftermath

Note: This is essentially part 2 of my race report. If you missed part 1 which was actually about the running part of the race you can read it here.


Do I look cold? I am.

The thrill of my accomplishment was quickly stifled by the cold. Not 10 paces past the finish line I stopped while some kind volunteer cut the timing chip off my shoe. I was terrified that she was going to ask me to lift my leg up because rigor mortis had already set in. I was looking around somewhat dazedly at the crowd wondering how long it was going to take her to cut the stupid thing off when I realized she had already moved on to the next finisher.

Hey. Where’s my freakin’ medal? I crossed the finish line a good 20 seconds ago. I followed the other runners to a table where they were handing out bottled water. Not interested. Who’s handing out the medals? Finally I see a guy handing them out and I make my way over to him. Each step is painful but well worth the shiny goodness now within my grasp. He hands me the medal still in its plastic bag and my frozen, wet fingers can’t get the stupid thing open. I thought a beautiful woman was supposed to hang the medal around my neck for me upon completing the race. I’m disappointed.

After the medal ceremony handout, I followed the other medaled runners down some steps (ow ow ow ow) and found myself in line for something. I was a little confused from the cold and the pain and it didn’t even occur to me to find out what the line was for until someone came up behind me and asked “what’s this the line for?” I looked up to the front of the line and saw that it went into a tent.
“It’s the line to get in there,” I answered pointing at the tent.
“What’s in there?” he was clearly not satisfied with my original answer.
“No rain,” I said, as if it should have been obvious. At this point the guy in front of me turned and told us that they were giving out free pairs of dry socks in there. I frowned. What am I going to do with dry socks? My shoes are soaked and it’s still raining.

Next stop was the bag check to reclaim my sweatshirt and pants. Cheer Team Vanilla met up with me there and it’s a good thing too, because I was so sore that I needed help getting into my sweatpants. I grabbed another couple of goodie bags, my free beer and we began the walk back to the car. I was walking so slowly that my wife walked on ahead to start the car despite the fact that she was pushing 2 kids in a stroller.

All in all it was a good race and a really nice course past many of the Denver landmarks. The organizers did a wonderful job and if they keep pulling off world class events like this I bet they’ll even be able to get some celebrities to come run this thing.

Congratulations to Lei who was the closest to guessing what my time would be for the race. Lei if you want to e-mail me your address I will send your prize to you just as soon as I figure out what it is going to be.

Cheer Team Vanilla went up to my office to briefly get out of the rain and snapped this picture of the start.

I'm such a goofball.

This is the shirt I got... and my medal.

This is the vanilla shot that I didn't use... and my medal.

Awww, wook at da' cute widdle 8oz beer... and my medal. Yeah, this beer shot was not going to be enough to make me forget about the pain.

Did I mention I got this medal?