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Sunday, June 9, 2019

Rock n Roll Half Marathon San Diego: Race Re-cap

On Saturday morning, May 25th Yuan and I made the trek from Houston and Kansas City to beautiful Southern California to run the San Diego Rock N Roll Half Marathon. I have never been to San Diego before and was instantly blown away by how beautiful it was! We met up in the airport after landing, dropped our stuff off at the hotel and walked over to the Expo center to hang out a bit and pick up our race packets. The expo was run very smoothly (a HUGE thank you to the volunteers there! You guys are WONDERFUL). When we entered there were computers that allowed us to find our bib numbers. We wrote them on pieces of paper there and took them to the corresponding line for the packet pickup volunteers to give us our race bibs. From there we went into the main portion of the expo, picked up a few pieces of merch (a tit dye running hat for me and a pair of tie dye shoes for him) and our bus passes. Little tip: pre pay - it will save you from waiting in a LONG line! I also got to meet a friend from Instagram who was there to run it too, which was really cool!

When you see a giant tie dye shoe, you take pictures with it! Haha
There were so many cool booths set up at the expo

The lines to buy a shuttle pass. The near line with one person in it was for the pre-paid passes.
Be like that person - pre-pay.

Free (really good) vegan ice cream and a photo booth! 


After leaving the expo and dropping our packets off at the hotel, we walked around the city a bit to explore and grab some food, then laid our race day flats and got to sleep early for race day.

We got upgraded, and our room had an amazing view!

Some of the ships in the bay

San Diego has some of the coolest looking shops!


Checking out the big ship (suggested by my dad, who was stationed around the area in the Marines years back).

Race day came before we were ready (and really, who is actually ready for that 4:30 am wake up call- ugh). We got ready and walked the small bit from our hotel to the bus line to catch our ride in to the starting line area. After waiting in the port o potty line we tried our best to get up to corral 10 (I'm not sure how many corrals there were, but my guess is something around the low 20's), but the crowd was so thick we made it to corral 11 by the time we started. Originally this didn't seem to bad but even in the single digit corrals there were walkers. This race was similar to the Rock N Roll San Antonio in that regard, so my tip is to get as far up as you can, because we were having to work extra hard to get around walkers for the first few miles.

I don't have any photos of this course because I wanted to actually run it and not meander around. It was a fun course! It was flat in sections with hills thrown in. Hills are still really hard for me, but my boyfriend encouraged me and I am so proud to say that I didn't get frustrated and stop to walk. Another fun part(s) of this course include people who came outside of their houses to set up their own cool stations. There were also bars set up with things like beer, Fireball, etc. that people could stop to take a shot or a drink of. I'm not much of a drinker and that would have been disastrous, so I didn't stop at those, even though many runners did. We went through subdivisions, as well as some really cool streets lines with different shops, then we circled around, down and up some hills.

We collected our shirts and headed for the beer line and main stage.


How cool is this art piece!?

By the time we got done and picked up our medals and some snacks and drinks, we made our way down to a large grassy area around where the main stage was set up, got our tech shirts and stood around what I call "beer jail" for a while sipping a beer. It's really more of a beer garden, but it was all caged in. It was fun though. We found a cool art piece close by, then walked back to the hotel to shower and nap a bit before making our way out to discover more of San Diego.


Race medal and cat cafe after - pretty cool!






We stopped by a couple breweries. I'm not a beer person but it was fun seeing how different they were. There was one that was down the street form a ball park and we spoke to a runner there who was recovering from an injury.

Sitting on the porch of a brewery post-race, chilling out.

Brewery with a view of the ballpark! There was a game going on, so the area was pretty busy.

Ramen was our food of choice that day, maybe because of its saltiness, but whatever it was it was delicious. We had a bowl of Ramen for lunch and after much walking, another bowl for dinner lol!

Ramen bowl #1 for the day lol!

This appetizer was like pure heaven!
:)

Brewery #2 and Cards Against Humanity. This place was fun!

After flying back to Houston I realized that this weekend passed way too fast. With the move happening that next weekend I wished with all my heart to make time slow down, to have one more weekend at home with life as I know it, but as far as I know, time keeps rolling right on. That was a really great weekend/adventure! Another tip - it's Southern California- wear sunscreen lol!

I see you! LOL

The flight home had an upgraded seat and a beautiful sunset. Who could ask for better? 


The Rock n Roll San Diego is DEFINITELY a race to be run - If you haven't, go sign up for 2020. If you have, go again. Some races I focus on the course, and some on the general weekend, and this one had both to admire. Both this race and the city has me wanting to come back as soon as I can. Right now I'm going crazy battling the tail end of a cold, so I haven't started up running and training again, but hopefully soon. Until then I'll be treating it with soup and lots of rest. Wishing you all a wonderful start to your Summer! Does anyone have any races planed?

The San Diego explore the town dance. Ahhh we're crazy.


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