When Saturday morning hit I knew I wouldn’t be snuggling back into my bed until late Sunday night. It was really hard to get out of bed and get going but I was still very nervous about the weekend. First up was the kids run at the Aquarium of the Pacific. We’ve been working with them since I came on board for the kids run and I knew it was going to be awesome. There was so many things going for the run and by August we had doubled our numbers from the previous year. We were giving out medals and finishers certificates to each finisher and the medals were ADORABLE.

When we arrived Saturday morning it was drizzling out and we were a little concerned about the kids running on the concrete and slipping. So we tested out a few different areas, started setting up tents and getting everything ready. I realized that we didn’t have a print out of the 1,600 kids that pre-registered but thankfully the Aquarium was open early enough and I was able to sneak inside at 5 am and print off the list.

People started arriving at 6 am to pick up their kids bibs. HOLY COW PEOPLE! It wasn’t suppose to open until 7:30. People are anxious! So we shoo’ed them away until 7:30. 7:30 the onslaught of people came and the line grew and grew and grew. Most were thankfully preregistered but there was some crazy long lines and they grew quickly. Parks and Rec brought over 250 kids and some other small programs were bringing kids by the bus load as well. I got really overloaded in the sign in tent and there were some angry parents letting me know about the line. Finally we split up the line and got everyone signed in and ready to go.

The start of one of the waves at the kids run.

The Aquarium had their special Cockatoo bird lift it’s wings to start the race!

All the kids taking off!

Make sure to check out more pictures here!

One of the most important things about bib pick up is signing up kids to have their parents sign a medical release and that was holding up the lines a lot. Once we figured out how to expedite the process, the line was gone and the angry mob of parents were off to the starting line. Thankfully, as soon as they had their bibs they were very happy. When a lot of them quickly got to the front of the line after we changed the pick up process, the few that were yelling at me and borderline hysterical in line wouldn’t look at me because I could tell they felt bad. Ohhh the nerves of their first child running I guess.

Once the line was gone, everything ran really smoothly! People were happy and the kids loved the medals and everything went pretty smoothly from there on out. After the kids run ended at 12 and we cleaned everything up until 1 it was back to the expo to help everyone out over there and then before I was there for long we had to go over to get the carbo dinner set up. That was started and I finally got to eat. Actually more like gorge myself. I ate so much pasta and it was delicious! I was surprised. That was over about 8. We went to 7-11 to get coffee on our way back to downtown. It was weird because we both looked at each other and said, “Man there’s a lot of people out and about right now!” Then we realized it was only 8 and we both thought it was around 11.

Coffee was downed and then it was back to the Expo to clean everything up and pack more stuff up. We finished that around 10 and went over to the festival area to check on the crew guys and see how that was all coming along. After discussing the plan to meet in the early morning hours, we left around 11 and went back to the hotel, showered and watched TV for about 40 minutes and packed up all our bags and left the hotel for the last time. I had a granola bar and we met everyone out on the festival area at 1 am.

One of the most scary things I’ve ever done is go in a portapotty to go to the bathroom in the pitch blackness of night.

Tomorrow it’s the big race recap!

xoxo

View Original Post at chicrunner.com

• Filed Under:  
• Marathon, Running, Sports