Hot Chocolate Chicago 5k Race Report
I had hemmed an hawwed about doing this race for several months because I was unsure about whether I'd be ready for the 5k or the 15k. I really didn't have a huge desire yet to run 9.3 miles, but the 15k-ers receive the most beautiful chocolate bar medal. In the end I decided to go ahead and run the 5k and enjoy all the other race swag and goodies and just experience what I heard was a very large and crazy race atmosphere. My father-in-law says in terms of size that it probably ranks third in Chicago behind the Marathon and the Shamrock Shuffle.
When I signed up for myself and hubby, I received an alert that because our "expected finish times" where less than 11:30 pace (I think?) then we needed a proof of time to receive preferred corrals. I submitted both our PR's from this year and got an email back within a day that we had been approved. Communication was great leading up to the event, very professional! And I know that many disboard runners have said how they wished they would get approval emails after their time submissions, so I totally understand that feeling now that I have done it for the first time.
Saturday Expo:
I appreciated that this race was on a Sunday, which meant we could wait until Saturday to go to the expo and not have to rush around on a workday to pick things up on our lunch breaks. And this time my daughter got to come with us! Grandpa came too since he last minute decided to run it with us! It was at the Hyatt Regency in the lower convention area and was easy to find.
My daughter was excited to be handed a tiny chocolate square on her way in by a guy dressed as a big marshmallow and another by a volunteer. She was not going to say "Hi" to Ronald McDonald who was greeting kids though. So now we know...marshmallows are good but clowns are scary. They had a pretty nifty set up for printing bibs. You walked up with your print out from the computer, they scanned it and then a sticker printed out of a machine that was affixed to a bib from your wave and scanned again. The sticker had our name and our corral letter. I did notice that at least half the printers must have had the stickers in backwards because people had these lime green floating blobs in the middle of their names instead of over their corrals!
I got Corral C, hubby was F and grandpa was M....though he was able to switch to H which was good because he is pretty fast, he just had signed up too late for original proof.
We picked up our race jackets. OMG are these things nice! Embroidered logo, insulated, seems well made. I have not washed mine yet so hoping it holds up nicely. There was two slightly odd things about the jacket pick up...You were not supposed to open your jacket bag at all to try it on. You had to walk to the other side of the expo to try on samples ones (which was packed) and then if you wanted to exchange you had to walk all the way back and only could get a new one if you had not opened yours. Also the gear check bags were not in our jacket bags and you had to notice the 4 people handing them out. I knew what they were by looking at them (clear bags = gear check) but I'd imagine all the first timers would have walked right past. I noted that on my post-race survey.
We didn't spend too long looking at all the booths. But I did pick up a sweatyband that had little mugs of cocoa on it which was SO CUTE per daughter. And we got to play inflatable basketball in the kids area. We had to drag her away from that. Also they had people handing out full bags of cocoa swirled JetPuff marshmallows because they were a sponsor. Would you believe that I walked past the JetPuff people 4 times??!! Yeah, I gamed the system. I have a whole bag here at work with me for occasional snacking this week.
When we were done snooping around we headed upstairs and heard from hubby's mom that she was done with her hair appointment and was nearby so she came to meet us for brunch. There was a little hotel breakfast looking place so we just did that. And then walked over to the Maggie Daley park which anyone with kids who visits Chicago HAS TO GO TO! It's amazing...just keep your kids close so you don't lose them!
So I would say that was good Disney practice for our group. Expo-hotel brunch-walk to a park-have fun-wake up next morning to run.
Sunday Race Day!
Sunday morning we woke up early (4:45am to be exact.) OOF. Had to ask myself why I decided to start being a runner again, like I do every time I wake up early. But the kiddo was wide awake and ready to go to Grandma's...she's an early bird for sure. Wish I could borrow some of that energy. Hubby & I had showered the night before and set all our clothes out just like all the good dis-posters always do. We even packed a clean clothes bag for changing and this time I remembered clean dry socks and deodarent!!! We are lucky that the in-laws live in a condo building downtown and so their place is our de-facto gear check and parking lot. So we drove down to the condo and dropped off the baby to Grandma, took pit stops in the bathroom, and picked up Grandpa. We had a 15min-ish walk to the corral area. This race has the same starting line as the Chicago marathon and same finish line too. So it's like I ran the marathon, right...just removing 23.1 miles of it! It was a bit more chaotic than I expected. There were 45,000 people participating per the announcer!! EEP!
The best I could figure out was there were corrals A through W with A-K starting at 7am and the rest at 7:45 (so they weren't even letting them load in yet) and then after that a totally seperate 3k walk. There were huge signs for the first wave of corrals saying NO WALKING! I'm not sure about the back corral but I thought in my head "yeah, ok, what about run/walkers or just people who need a lil break?" But I guess the signs were good so that people knew not to start off walking a 5k and get mowed down by runners??? Honestly I thought the signs were a little over-kill. Once we figured out how to enter our corral areas (took us a while) it was easy for hubby and grandpa to get into theirs, but I had to go through three checkpoints to get into Corral C. I saw people getting turned away a bunch. By the third checkpoint I started thinking "How am I included in this group of super athletic humans" "Do I belong here" "Are they sure I should be here and not farther back"? But sure enough there was a "pace group" with pace signs that were right where I planned to run this race at about 9:15 to 9:30 and they were in my corral. I later learned there were the same exact pace groups back in like three other corrals, so that confused me a little but I was happy to be up in this one. It meant I could warm up!
Did I mention that it was 39 degrees out? I had my long race leggings, my new hot chocolate jacket, gloves, and headband. So I was warm enough once I was moving, but I was cold while waiting. Corral A went off at 7am, then they had us all moved up and unloaded B about 3 min later, and then C moved up and off we went. hubby later told me they were doing about 4-5 minutes between corrals after mine left. It took a half hour before he crossed the start in F. (spoiler alert, when I finished they were still releasing corrals, and when I was enjoying my post-race goodies, they were still releasing corrals) So this is a good race to submit proof!
Had phone problems again...my music would not work. UGH! My GPS did fine with my alerts, but two minutes before start and my music app just stuck on loading. I'm proud of myself for not panicking...shrugging my shoulders...and deciding to just run without it. But still bummed, I think I need a new phone.
BUT what a cool course! We started by going down-hill (YAY!) to lower wacker drive and running down there felt really cool. Like I was batman! My hubby later told me that he panicked because he thought we were running above wacker based on the maps and then maybe he had gone the wrong way with the 15k-ers. But it was the right way. Then tiny up-hill (BOO!) to Clarke St and eventually over to Michigan Ave . There were like three giant inflatables showing us where to go for 5k vs 15k at the split off and they were in the colors of our bibs. It couldn't have been more obvious and I appreciated that. The 5k turned at Michigan and Roosevelt and all the 15k people kept going straight. At this point I had run my most consistent race yet. Very even pace throughout the whole thing. I didn't mind no music. I wished I had it at the very end though. And then the HILL OF DOOM up Roosevelt to Columbus drive just like all the marathoners get to do at 26 miles. Did I walk at all on the hill? Yes, for about 10 steps just to stop the burning, then I noticed a race photographer at the top and that motivated me to start running again because gotta get a good running picture right? Also green shirt guy passed me so I just "attached myself to him" and mentally said "get me up this hill stranger guy." The turn onto Columbus for the finish I felt awesome. My GPS said .1 miles to go so I sprinted....and then it said 3.1 reached 28:34...BUT the finish line was still at least 2 blocks or probably more away. ACK...green shirt guy was gone so red shirt guy was my new pacer and I literally was single file behind him (enough not to be too creepy) and I just willed myself to keep pounding the feet.
I gave my signature dorky tiny waves to all my imaginary admirers as I finished. My official race results were 29:46 and my GPS said I ran 3.4 miles! I thought it was due to a satellite error while under Wacker Drive. It turns out lots of runners were saying the course was slightly long, but that also could be because everyone's GPS did the same thing? Hubby's GPS told him 3.36 and Gramps said 3.38. That just means hubby did the best job running in the straightest line!
Proud of my time no matter the final distance! I didn't feel as well trained as recent months and was hoping for sub 31 minutes. I chatted with a gentleman named Bob near the water as we both waited for our family members near the finish. I can't help being a chatter. You can probably tell that by my journal.
Hubby came in at 36:10 and Gramps at 35:47. Both were happy with their runs so it was a happy outing all around. I feel the course must have been long though based on the times these two normally get. And neither walked any steps up the hill of doom, so they did better than me on that.
And then the best part...CHOCOLATE!!!
All of Grant Park was full of race finishers holding big mugs full of chocolate goodies. We headed to the finisher tents and handed in our little finisher ticket that ripped off our paper race bibs and were given these really cool plastic snack bowls that looked like giant mugs. Inside was a round holder for a cup of hot chocolate and then a holder for chocolate fondue and then the rest of the space was filled with goodies to dip in the fondue. Banana, marshmallow, cookies, rice crispy treats, pretzels...and wet wipes. It was the tastiest thing right at the time when I could eat a horse. I'm a bit of a choco snob and this was GOOD! I was jealous of the 15k finishers with their really cool medals that looked like chocolate bars so maybe I'll have to work my way up to that distance for next year. Yeah...definitely going to do that. Anyone want to run with me and help me to the finish?
In conclusion the only thing I would change is having them give out bags for people to carry their messy mugs home with them...or portable sinks to rinse out the chocolate before it hardens. I know with Chicago weather the bags might be a better option. Next year I will stuff a bag in my pocket. It's a nice keepsake and although probably not microwavable or dishwasher safe...I still took mine home to use as a snack bowl for chips and things. I don't want to mention how many people I saw throwing theirs away because it made me sad.
I HIGHLY RECCOMMEND this race and it was a good close to the season...until Marathon Weekend...or until I find some turkey or santa race I have to do
Tomorrow is race day! Here's a pic of my race expo swag and I'll write up a report tomorrow after I actually run this thing!
).
