Color Run

     There is nothing like running with one of your kids. And it is even better when you can have fun and get dirty at the same time. Taylor and I ran the Color Run in Ypsilanti, Michigan. We choose to follow their suggestion and wore as much white as possible. It was an early start for us! We left the house at 5 am and headed up north. We drove by and picked up Taylor's boyfriend, Kyle, who was going to be our official photographer.

    The race was sold out at 15,000 people. For those who have not run one of these races before, there is no time clock. I left my garmin at home. Which I felt like I was missing something the whole time I ran. It is sad how dependent you become to technology  Taylor mentioned that there were no mile markers either. They would start people off in waves of 1,000. We were lucky and got into the third wave. There is no reason for the wave except to try and thin out the 15,000 of us. According to the information I had read online, runners were to stay to the left and walkers to the right. Apparently, very few people read this information. I had to remind myself and Taylor that this was a fun run and not a timed event. It is more about getting people out and moving. I did find it a little annoying when walkers would span across the whole road and it was hard to pass them.
    There were several hydration areas throughout the race. There were four colors (pink, orange, yellow and blue) that we ran through. We discovered that if you stayed way to the left or right of the road, you get a lot of color. People lined up for the color but it moved fairly fast. Our goal was to get as messy as we could. A word of advice...no matter how much fun you are having, keep you mouth closed when you reach the color stations. Taylor learned this the hard way after having a lot of yellow in her mouth. Someone had set up a "Glitter" station. So we had to get our glitter as well.
    We had a blast. In fact, it did not feel like a 5K at all. It was a huge party and we were having lots of fun. As we were nearing the finish line, we did our normal thing. Run strong and hard to the finish. I looked over and there was Kyle sprinting a head of us along the finish line trying to beat us so he could get a picture. He did not make it before we got there.  Thank you Kyle for taking our pictures for us!

     At the post run party, we got to release the color packets that they gave us. There was great music and a party atmosphere. I did feel like a teenager again :). Taylor and I went into the middle of the party and at one point we could not see anything but a mass of color. It was beautiful. Overall, this is a great run to do for fun. No pressure, no PR, just lots of fun!!!