Half crazy in Little Rock--tour guide Quirky with race review

Last year I got myself talked into signing up for the Little Rock (Half) Marathon.  I've had the full on my radar because of the giant medals (are women really the only ones interested in the large medals?).  I had hoped to be up to power to do the half and was hoping, when I registered, I could do some running.  The docs still say I shouldn't be running. Since I've lost so much of my fitness level over the last eighteen months since the collision, I am okay with that.  After Tulsa Williams Route66 in Nov I pretty much didn't do much treadmill walking.  I started January thinking I'd try to do at least five miles on the treadmill a day, but three on the treadmill. Let's face it, walking is slower than running and there's only so much treadmill time any of us can do.  I use to put in long runs in the winter/ice/rain on the weekends on the treadmill watching a Jet Li movie or documentary, etc, but I haven't found my groove yet with walking.  And there I go, getting off topic.  I was hoping to be able to run some at Little Rock, but instead I walked.

Road tripping:  I was debating on driving to LR and was convinced to fly instead.  (After a conference later in March, I think I'll stick with the "drive under twelve hours" philosophy).  I flew in on Friday, got the rental car and headed over to the hotel.  I didn't actually research Little Rock before heading there, something I normally do. This lead to discoveries like "Little Rock is a tiny big town".  I was expecting it to be on the scale of Omaha, or Kansas City or Chicago, but it is smaller than Des Moines! (193K versus 203K population). It's easy to navigate. We stayed at a hotel west of downtown as we wanted to be able to use a hot tub after the race and there are few hotels in the city that have a hot tub.  Luckily, a race hotel was nearby and we took a shuttle from there on the race mornings. Race morningS you ask?  Yes, LR has the option to do a 5k or 10K on Saturday with the Half or Full on Sunday.  Since surviving 13.1 on Sunday, when my feet haven't done much in the last few months, was my goal, and running a good time in the Full was my friend's agenda, we did the 5k together. We headed to packet pickup, got our items and planned to head out to do some things.  

Chihuly glass artwork at the race expo convention center
http://www.chihuly.com/

"Peace" by Lori Acott
This was outside the parking ramp when we headed to the expo. Unfortunately, with all the buildings around it was hard to get a great photo of the statue.  Late afternoon, the sky, clouds, and contrail (jet plane vaportrails)
http://www.arkansasonline.com/news/2015/jan/26/12-foot-sculpture-added-lrs-redeveloping-main-stre/?print

Inside the expo, there was a lot of good looking candy decorations. I'm sure I'm not the only racer who was glad these were decorations and not real sugar the day or two before a race!  

I want candy.  I want candy.

At the expo, I was asking locals, "If there was one thing you'd have an out-of-towner do for the one day they're in town, what would it be".   Answers ranged from Presidential Library, to a park, to head out of town, party at the nightclubs and several people were stumped with what to suggest. When I picked up my friend from the airport, she said "Little Rock Central High".  I was surprised no one locally suggested it, especially since it's a National Park Historic Site.

The end of our first day had us shopping at some one of a kind stores, and finished with a late dinner at Outback (why are we eating at 8pm?) which is one of the safe staple restaurants I can count on in a large town/city :-) Back at the hotel, we set out our running attire and retired.

Saturday morning the phone app said it was cool and suppose to warm up.  We walked over to an official race hotel (with a shuttle bus) and headed downtown. It was a gorgeous morning, about 36ºF at the start, but the sun was out, shining, and it warmed up.   The bus dropped us off a few blocks from the starting area where there was water and photographers.  I wanted to get a photo of the sign:

At first, I was hoping the two officials/workers behind the sawhorses would move so I could get a good shot, then I just asked if I could go behind the sawhorses to take a photo. The woman said yes, the (tall) man said no.  The woman again said yes, the man said no. The woman said, "I'm a race director and it's fine". Cool, I talked to one of the race directors. She was very nice on the morning of the mini race day.  

The 5k/10k was great. The only thing I was surprised by was the number (few) of people who were there.  There were about three thousand people on Saturday, but I remember being surprised at how few people were doing a Saturday run with a Sunday run.

Posted Tree
Metal Tree
Tongue Tree
Handle Tree
Teapot Tree

Any other possible names? 

After the race, we cleaned up and then headed out to explore. By explore, I mean explore! Let's forget that we have a long race tomorrow. Let's be on our feet all.day.long (okay, we were in a car too).

First stop:    Little Rock Central High School Historic Site 

Little Rock Central High School. This place is HUGE 

Like really huge. Over 2400 students are enrolled today, and the top floor and parts of another floor are not used today.  My K-12 school was smaller than one wing of this school.

Via the National Park app, we knew that Central High was a National Park place. We parked and walked into the visitor center when the Park Ranger inside told us of a tour being conducted over at the high school, so we hurried over to catch up to the discussion.  We went past the historic/preserved gas station and to the center of the sidewalk at the high school. We learned about Elizabeth's walk. We learned more about the Little Rock Nine. We learned about what they had to endure. We learned about the completely different high schools (the whites had a high school as we know it, the black/African American school was essentially a trade school).

We headed back to the Visitors Center and did the Jr. Ranger program. Apparently, a lot of parks let adults do these do!  A lot of information is in the booklet.

This is a definite place to visit when you're in Little Rock.

If these doors could talk.

 Next, we headed out of town, stopping at Wendy's for lunch and on the road to Hot Springs we went.  As I mentioned before, I had not looked at the map beforehand and I had no idea that Hot Springs was just about an hour away (and Crater of Diamonds State Park was about 90 minutes away). 

How different an early 20th century gym looks from an early 21st century gym. 

The gymnasium had some 'clubs' of a sort along the wall. The description of how these were used (different weights) reminded me of today's kettle balls.

At the end of Saturday, I looked at my watch and said, 'oh yeah, not bad at all (eye roll) for a 5k day and a half tomorrow'.  

Sunday morning started out at 40ºF.  Had we turned on the tv to the news/weather, we might have learned something about the day's forecast, but going off the phone app, we said "Oh, it'll be even better than yesterday!".  

(insert laugh)
We were *so* wrong.

40ºF, windy, rainy.  

Did I mention wind?

At least it wasn't like the year the race had rain, sleet, ice, and was shut down during the event.

I looked at my winter run jacket and decided to not pack it (mesh center back for air circulation). #WhatWasIThinking

Thankfully, I had the Tulsa Williams Route 66 mylar blankets in my luggage and we each took one of those to the start.  I thought I'd  toss the blanket at some mile marker and be out in the wonderful sun, enjoying the sights.  We got to the start and it was chilly and sprinkling, and so we headed to the expo/convention center.  It was warm in there, plenty of restrooms, paintings to see (which I'm sure most people walk past without seeing) and places to rest/sit.  

When we went back outside, to the starting area, it was nice to get in among the throng of runners for the wind block.  After a while, I thought it really was warming up, and I tossed my gloves someone on the sidelines without any. By mile three I regretted that decision.  The first mile we started down the street and went up and over a bridge into North Little Rock. I shed my outter layer of throw away shirts, but having learned in Detroit, don't toss a throwaway shirt unless you're positive you won't need it again!  Pretty area to run around. Firestation workers were out along the course cheering, including the first female firefighter I've seen in real life (not on the news). We headed east for a long stretch and I managed to tie my mylar blanket together in three spots so it wouldn't blow away, and it wouldn't gap open in the middle.  I stopped under an overpass to put on the throwaway shirt and a bystander helped me adjust my mylar blanket again (pull it down in back because I wasn't wearing it as a bolero jacket.

We crossed back into Little Rock via a tall bridge (it seemed steep when one is walking it) and the wind was brutal. I felt for the people who were able to run.  The first bridge joint I didn't look down, but the one in the center of the bridge, high above the river, I did and it was an unsettling experience. I do *not* recommend doing that.   Back in LR we traversed President Clinton Blvd and I saw this yogi rabbit, and I had to take a moment to enjoy this whimsical piece of art with a purpose (It's art,and meant for children to climb upon).

"Rabbit Reach" by Tim Cherry
http://m.arktimes.com/ArkansasBlog/archives/2006/07/28/a-rabbit-for-river-market

We continued on and ran past the very modern architecture of the Clinton Library and then past a very old building in the same 'block' of property. There were some local breweries out on the course some with music, some with samples (and a security guard).

We walked out by the airport with no windbreak whatsoever. 

Why can't an airport have big giant windbreak trees around it?  (kidding--that'd be a bad idea!)

The course was mostly flat, or nearly with some gentle descents and gentle climbs. We ran past the Governor's mansion and past some big giant sugar:

P.Allen Smith's landscape truck was nearby and I couldn't resist:

I don't watch his PBS shows often, but I do enjoy his show/landscape work. A woman I had been walking with earlier saw me take the photo and was surprised that I'd know of him (we had discussed where we were from). She shared that his farm is not far from Little Rock!

I felt like we were almost done with the half when we ran past Central High School, and the wonderful band playing at the historic gas station.  The rain had stopped, the wind had let up by this point, and the sun was actually a little more visible.

We walked over the interstate, the ground was mostly dry, I was warming up, and I tossed my mylar blanket around mile 11 or 12.  My hands were all silver/black. I looked like I'd been playing in lead pencil shavings.   About mile 12, we were given full size lipstick by one of the support tables along the course.  Several of us thought that was hilarious, including the older man in the race.    

I was so excited to see the finish line and wanted to run, but since my low back was very unhappy with me at Tulsa when I was like "I'm going to run the last twenty yards, I just kept on walking--faster though!    I was happy with my finish time. I had wondered if I would go faster than hilly Tulsa, and I did :-)  

With walking in the morning, from the shuttle to the expo, back to the start, I had a lot of steps in for the day so far, but I wasn't done with that!  Of course not! 

The half marathon medal, and the double medal for having done one of the races on Saturday, too.

The after party had some stuff, but not enough for a celiac/gluten free chick with a soy issue. (Pasta with sauce, fruit in jello, bananas, beer, milk and OJ).  I grabbed a milk and OJ, sat down (on the floor) and stretched for a bit, while listening to the cover band playing, and then headed to the hotel to clean up. Saw other folks get up from tables and go back for more milk and juice (which made me laugh out loud when the 5K director last weekend included "the finish line food is not a all you can eat buffet").  Back at the finish line waiting for my friend, I enjoyed the beautiful flowers, saw Bart Yasso who was announcing finishers, and chatted with a couple--she had run the marathon (and others), he had run his first ever marathon--and then another woman, who ended up telling us about the race app new this year. She looked up our racers on the course. It was quite accurate with "this person is at ___ mile. Expected to cross the finish line at ____ time".

There was not much fruit out at the finish line area and since I'd been in the expo before waiting for my friend, I knew there wasn't much left in there either, so we headed back to the hotel. Rested, ate some fruit, meat, and cheese we had gotten the night before, and headed to the swimming pool/hot tub.  It turned out the hot tub was being cleaned/refilled and would take about an hour. The hotel man was actually filling it, from having cleaned it, when we walked in--bonus on knowing it was a clean whirlpool!  My friend hopped in the very warm pool and slowly moved in the hot pool water (It was like 90ºF), I stayed on the sidelines and talked to someone who had run the marathon.  Bonus on waiting for the hot tub (versus going back to the room) is that the jets hitting the hamstrings might not feel the best at first, but it really makes a difference having that nice water massage on the muscles!  

By the end of the day my Garmin was like this:

Definitely would recommend the Little Rock Marathon weekend. There is a lot to do locally in LR, even if the locals can't think of things off the top of their heads ;-)  You can easily make it a week vacation with time in Hot Springs and looking through dirt for diamonds in the rough.  The thing to know is that if you do the Marathon, you need to take your medals out of the luggage for the T S A xray machine.  Also, if you take some yogurt and Mamma Chia along for something to eat during your travel day, you'll be given a search you just wish you'd worn a bikini for.  (Apparently new T S A rules went into effect and it was a bit of an invasive search. On the plus side, at least they scanned my food containers --Ft Myers FL T S A didn't feel that was necessary).

As for flying versus driving. I wish I had just driven. I did a two stop trip and when I got to Chicago my husband was like 'you're not coming home tonight'.  Say what?  So he sent me a nice photo of the red/yellow storm cell that was the complete height of Iowa (top to bottom). I asked the gate agent about any delays and was told no. I showed the photo and was told "There's no weather in the area". Right, not in Chicago, but the fact that this weather was between Chicago and the destination apparently didn't register to the gate agent.  Our gate was changed, and then delayed and delayed before being canceled at the time we should have been landing. The storm finally came through Chicago around midnight.  Most people used the cots the airline/airport set up, but I did get a hotel room at a Holiday Inn Express--they have UDIs bagels or muffins for breakfast. I finally got to the hotel around midnight (because the Holiday Inn Express I was heading to didn't have the address on the side of the bus so I missed looking up at the top--plus the bus driver parked the bus not at the correct door for pickup and hid in the second lane behind other vehicles. I was out of Tanka bars and yogurt and was HANGRY by this time. The nice desk man got me an UDIs bagel to have before I went to bed :-)    Back to the point, it took me sixteen hours to get home from when I got to the airport in Little Rock. If I would have driven, I'd have been home in under ten.

When I was at the Melanoma Advocacy Day conference the following week (in D.C.), a couple east coast folks said they will never fly if the trip can be made under twelve hours. I completely concur after that trip.  I rented a car anyway in LR, I could have rented one at home and put miles on that car, and been tucked in bed the night after the race.  

July, August and September running

July, August and September races

JULY

I was at the hometown in July for the hometown days then and participated in the fun run, timed--but not seriously timed--"5k-ish" race.  My watch actually said it was 3.2 miles. Maybe it should be made into a 3.1 by finishing at the bar instead of on the elevator scale ;-)


(And, my face is *always* red after I run, no matter how long, hard, or weather! However, it's never red when I'm actually running).

I did the awful thing that day though, of running all my miles. I was supposed to run ten, so I went out and ran five, then went to the house, re-fueled, and ran/walked into town for the race. The Mike came in before the race started and got some pictures, but none I think are web worthy. Not to mention I wasn't completely feeling 100% since I had ice cream the day before when we took in the Jocelyn Art Museum and stopped at Dairy Queen on the way to the homestead  :-)   When you have dairy and sugar you're not use to, the performance level isn't going to be there. Amazingly though, my time wasn't much different from the previous year I participated (it was really hot and humid that year).

Dale Chihuly
piece at the Jocelyn

AUGUST

I have no photos from my August run.  It wasn't an actual "race" but rather a fun run to raise funds for a Veteran and paying it forward to others.  I actually had forgotten about the event until I walked to a food establishment that day and saw Taylor getting out of car.  I had been thinking earlier that day that I just would not run an August event. Not only was this a night run, which I had never entered before, it was also a glow stick event. Everyone who entered got at least one glow stick, and then helpers were handing out multiples as we waited for the start.  Others bought their glowsticks at stores and came for the costume event.  Definitely fun, definitely different and definitely want to do this event again. You could choose to run or walk.  The path was lined with glow sticks every foot or so. On the darker parts of the course, the glow sticks were end-to-end around curves and the like. It was very cool to run in the dark along those areas.   The only thing I wished was different would be not allowing people with flashing/strobe lights. Those were really hard to run with in the field of vision.  Some people had them on their hands as rings, others had them in their hair.  It was okay to see at the start when we still had street lights. Hard to handle when we were on the trail. . .then again, maybe my eyes are just getting (eek) 'old'.   One of the great things for this event was having so many veterans there and others who had prosthetics.  Many also ran with us. I wasn't sure if they all started the race, or if some positioned themselves along the course. I saw a couple who had been off on the side and then got onto the trail to run.  The sound of the feet on the ground was interesting and a great rhythm. At one point I was thinking, "this is a good pace" and then all of  a sudden the guy got a burst of energy and he was off! Afterwards there was water, cupcakes and gluten free cupcakes!  I ran/walked back to where I parked my car and a neighbor came up. He had never done a 5K before and was amazed at what all was involved. 

SEPTEMBER   

I had a hard time deciding which races to do this month.

There is the standby, Park to Park, that I've done for several years. It is fun. The race director is awesome. You can stand around and chat with the elites afterwards. Great music, great food, massages, and it's in a state park near a small lake, so it's beautiful as well. It is run on all trails in the area.

There were others I wanted to do as well.  The half marathon in my home town, the Quad Cities half marathon near the end of the month, and a few others.

I decided to run Park to Park and the Wabash Trace half marathons as training runs. I knew I wouldn't be going "all out 100%" but that I could use the people, the atmosphere and the energy to carry me a little faster than maybe I'd do in a training run on my own.

Park to Park was mentioned in Runners World this year as one of the top picks for a half marathon due to its trail run, awesome race director, beautiful weather, etc.

Enter race day and the humidity was high, the heat was already present, making the combination feel a big muggy. Then, a few minutes before race time, a cloud went overhead and we had a bit of a shower.  Ugh. More mugginess!   There were people not able to get in to park and were having to be bussed up to the start line. Due to the number of people still needing to get bussed to the start, the director made the very tough call to delay the race. He has never had a race start late.  Some people were disappointed, others loved the delay and used it to go to head to the portapotties. The folks with the mics reminded us to think of if we were in those folks' places/shoes. . . then schooled us in a brief 'cliff note" version of a classic. 'if you don't know what compassion is, read To Kill A Mockingbird.  As a person with an English Ed degree, I LOVED that!  In light of a contest the festival had on Facebook, I won an entry to the VIP tent, which meant I had a smaller gear check area, food waiting for me afterwards, a place to meet up with some friends who were also in the VIP tent, etc.   This was also the first race that hubby wasn't going to hang around, ride through the woods on dirt trails and take pics of me randomly!

The race started a bit before 8am, an pavement still slick with the short shower.  The Elites went off and did their amazing fast stuff while I wondered if I had what it took to do 13.1 today, let alone 26.2 in a few weeks in Detroit.   If you hadn't read some of the other running posts, my training has been off this year due to fatigue, lethargy, coldness and just plain not feeling "ON" this year.

I knew most of the course and knew there were some turns and scenic areas, but I also am use to running the trails with some WIND, or breeze of some kind. I am operating, this year, on the run/walk method and due to the heat, the race director had bicycle patrol out checking on racers. It seemed everytime I was at a walk break point there'd be  a bicycle go by to see if I was okay!   The air was fairly still until about mile four or five when the course opened up to a southerly direction and a wonderful breeze there. I caught up with a friend's sister at this point (or rather, she caught up with me) and we talked a bit and then she picked up her pace a bit.  Knowing the trail is a good thing and something I forget when I go to other towns to race. Sometimes I drive the course and sometimes I don't . It's always a good thing though!  I knew that when we came to the "end" of one trail, we had to turn left to do a short loop and then come back to the pedestrian bridge we could all see.  I also knew that the curvy road on the way out was our way back to the finish. I'm sure some people have the curves counted. I am not one of those people.My body pretty much screams with joy when I see the "TURN AND SPRINT" sign.  Instead, I focus on the steps at the given time and try to find a way to motivate myself to the end.  

I had been quite hot when running, and kept hiking my tank up to the chest to get the belly some air to try to cool down the body. In the last section before we had to turn left for the quick loop, I was walking more often.  After crossing the river, I knew there wouldn't be a lot of people for a mile and a half or so, so I just took off the tank and ran. I wasn't around a lot of people at this point and only felt comfortable (ha ha) doing it because of the trail/trees.  As I got closer to the park entrance of the trail, I put the shirt back on and then did the "try to catch" so and so routine.  I had been trying to "reel in" my friend's sister as I could see her on the trail ahead of me in the last mile every so often. In the last few curves I could see her ahead and thought, "I'm going to catch her!   

Alas, it wasn't to be had.  She crossed the finish line just as I had turned the corner to sprint.  Finishing about nine minutes slower than what I had wanted for this training run. . . the highlight--> hubby WAS at the finish line for me!  He had just gotten back from his bicycle group ride!   

After the race, walk around, cool down, enjoy the VIP tent.  Pizza, bagels, chocolate milk, cookies, potato chips galore.  I went to the regular food tent for the gluten free food--found some chili and lots of Larabars to enjoy, along with the chocolate milk!   While biking to the race is fun, it's always the riding the bicycle home that's the issue!  We broke up the ride home with a stop at the local mexican restaurant


The next training run/race was the Wabash Trace Nature Trail Marathon, Half Marathon, Marathon Relay in Southwest Iowa.  Great former railroad bed trail and we were running it on the descent. They had packet pickup on Friday night, with dinner and a speaker from Runners World magazine.  There was also packet pickup on Saturday morning, which was FABULOUs since things went south on Friday and hubby wasn't able to go with me, which meant I left town later than I had planned/needed to in order to get to the pick up then.   Since the race was point to point, they had busses running from the finish town to the marathon town and to the half marathon town early in the morning. It worked out well that a relative was riding the bus, so his car was in the finish town for us afterwards. My car would be in the start town and we could store our race packets/shirts in the car. I headed into the town early to get the packet and get in some prerace running per the coach.

There were a few areas of climbing and enough to make your bum notice, but not enough to make one struggle. . .that's how I recalled running the trace before However, in the race, it was different --as racing always is, right?  We started in the small town, went about twenty feet, turned and immediately started up the snow-sledding hill of the town, then we meandered around until we were at the Wabash Trace on the north side of town and we ran south to Shenandoah for the race. We almost had a 5K under the belt by the time we headed out of town.  It is is nice running a path you've run before, and knowing the surface--gravel/worn asphalt in the town, crushed limestone most of the way on the trail, and with 3 or so miles left it turned to asphalt trail and concrete streets.   It was nice, too, to know I was running this as a training run and not as a race so much. Thus, I didn't mind stopping to pick up the 47¢ laying on the trail !

Various folks were out on the trail, at intersections with roads, cheering us on  and seeing so many friendly faces!  One fabulous woman (WKS) wasn't able to race, and she kindly offered to pick up some oranges for me for a mile marker stop, and then she had grapes too!  It was awesome to see a friendly face, as well as her adorable son with a great cheerleading signs! One was:  

The Trace is mostly tree lined from a time when Earl May and Henry Fields nurseries had train cars moving with seeds in the cars (and some would blow out).  Every once in a while the trees would open up and we would get the nice brisk wind coming from the south.  As we crossed the highway, we passed mile marker 9, traffic was stopped by the sheriff's department, then we had an aid station and a seemingly 'straight shot' to the  finish line. . . I didn't realize we'd come into Shenandoah and turn to the east side of town and we had some climbing to do back there, but still it was a "fairly flat" course regardless of those four or five blocks. As we made a turn and headed north I knew we had to be getting close to the finish line on Sheridan Avenue.  I asked which way we turned at the diagonal street and knew the finish was near so I just kept going past other people, even though I knew I wanted to rest---there'd be time for resting in eight blocks!   An announcer stood at the WCTU historic water fountain and then we turned the corner and pounded pavement for a few more blocks. Great finish line area with 'railroad crossing arms'  for decoration.

Feel free to check out some photos of the race here on Facebook.    I am so glad I didn't run this race last year. I wanted to, in its inaugural race, but wasn't sure of my ability to run a 'training race' with limited time before the Omaha Marathon last  year. I'm glad I didn't as I found out that runnign downhill just makes you want to go faster all the time!

The finish line is near the old Depot in Shenandoah, which is now a restaurant--refreshments for runners were outside and I went in to get a LARGE milk for getting sugar and protein in the body.  Also open, but I didn't get in that day, was the Everly Brothers museum (restored childhood home).

Next on the agenda is a run/walk (walking) Pancreatic Cancer Purple Stride event to honor my mother.

In October, the main goal is Detroit Free Press Marathon, running Detroit, USA and Windsor, Canada.  I have my 'passport card' and am ready to roll. . . or so I think, part of me is still screaming (EEEK) that it's less than a month away!