Lagoon Valley Half Marathon

It got wet out there at Lagoon Valley. Wet and muddy. It was also very cold. Mother Nature had fun watching us freeze, slip and slide today. To say that I ran this race would be a big misnomer. I trotted along with another fellow Brazen walker. What I love about Brazen is the early hiker's start. This allows the turtles like me to finish the race in a timely manner. I'm trying to work my way back to pre-Titanium form, and one day, I will run again. For now, I will plug along with the other walkers and hikers. I love being with my peeps in the back of the pack, but I do also miss running the race as well.

I registered for Lagoon Valley because I wanted that creature from the black lagoon medal! Oh the things I will do for bling. Had I known that this would turn out to be a mud bath, I would have draped myself in Hefty bags. This was a very tough but fun race. Half way through my misery, fellow Brazenite Chris Jones showed up. I remember seeing this guy's Facebook post that he was running a different race that morning, so it surprised me to see him run up the hill. He explained that his race got canceled so he zoomed over to Lagoon Valley to help sweep the course. That didn't bode well for me because that meant that the sweeper was on my tail! It worked out in the end because this Chris is pretty funny. I hung out with him after the Modesto Half Marathon so it's not like he's a complete stranger to me. I get really nervous around sweepers.

Having Chris around was pretty hilarious. This guy takes pictures and videos during the race. Lots of pictures. Normally, I would be all over it, jumping into every photo. However, Mother Nature didn't really make it too much fun for me. I was cold and covered in mud, and climbing those mountains nearly killed me. Fortunately, my sweeper injected some fun and a lot of humor into this otherwise miserable and laborious muddy chore.

At the end of the day, I got the job done. I finished dead last once again, but that's ok. My finish time would have been a lot longer, but thanks to the my sweeper's instructions to slide down the hill toboggan style, I saved myself about 10 minutes! That Chris Jones cracks me up. I can see myself hanging out with that dude. In any case, after I crossed that finish line, I hosed myself off, changed into some dry clothes, and I proudly displayed that creature from the black lagoon medal!