A Vacation and a "Half"

So, we had a "working" vacation earlier this month. We headed out to Colorado for a few days last week and had a great time. Luckily enough we got to spend some time with some great people we don't see often enough and do "touristy" things in Colorado. The initial motivation was to run the Rock in Roll half marathon with Jake's sister and Jake's friend Richard, but in the end it was a great vacation.

We have both been to Colorado frequently in the past, but it is always at a full run to get to the mountains to go skiing. While we were there we skied until we couldn't walk, and it was winter so the weather was always crappy. This time, we had a bunch of time and the weather couldn't have been any better.

As with most of my posts, this one will be primarily about food and exercising.. You do what you like, and I like to eat so I need to exercise. I love having stuff at restaurants that I wouldn't usually have. When I think of Denver, I think of awesome Southwestern type of food, especially green chili. It's a favorite of mine and not very common(or at least not any good).

We started out flying into Denver super early on Thursday morning. We are only a quick 1.5 hour flight from Tulsa, so that is pretty awesome. We jumped off the plane and headed to Downtown Denver for the day. We had breakfast at a place called "Snooze". Pineapple upside down pancakes were my first fun Denver food with an awesome amaretto latte... So then I needed a nap. But instead we headed to the museum of Science and Nature. It was great. The best part was the 3D Hubble Space Telescope IMAX show. It was awesome. I hate space and 3D (in general), but I loved it. The planetarium show was super boring, or at least the two of us thought it was because we both fell asleep. I guess that is what happens when you have a 7 a.m. flight. Luckily we rallied fantastically for the KSU/KU watch party in Colorado Springs with Jake's sister. That was the world's best football game ever. We watched every last minute.

The next day we got up and headed to the Air Force Academy for a tour. It was an amazing place. The chapel is amazing, and learning more about the academic and service requirements really brings to light the level of commitment these 18 year old kids make when they apply to the Air Force Academy. We then went back to Denver for the Expo for the Marathon and Half Marathon. It was a total fiasco with a million people and every woman participating brought at least 2 kids and a stroller. All the kids were running around nuts because they had been eating all of the energy blocks, energy shakes and whatever other "energy" foods they had for sample at the expo. Those people knew what sugar-rific energy crap those kids were loading up on and just stood by and let them do it. Ridiculous. Friday night ended with the greatest pizza of all time at a fun little place in Colorado Springs. It was outside, the wine was great, and it was perfect.

Saturday morning we headed downtown in Colorado Springs, had delicious green chili omelets that were awesome and then headed to the Garden of the Gods. It was super amazing and freaking freezing with a north wind at about 1,000 mph...and then I fell off of the sidewalk. Yep, it happened. I took my eye off the damn thing for one second and I catch the edge, twist my right ankle and skinned the crap out of the outside of my whole left leg. It was ridiculous. We then headed to Manitou Springs to look around. It's an awesome little town where the Pike's Peak train takes off from, and home to the stairs made of railway ties that ascend a full mile straight up. Yep, that's a full mile straight up. Luckily we had a race to run the next day, so we talked ourselves out of doing it for the sake of "conserving our energy". We will go back and conquer those stairs, we will... There was a super awesome dinner with steak with Jake's parents back in Denver, then back to the hotel for a nice restful night's sleep. Or a Mexican wedding reception one floor below us that went on until midnight. Not exactly a relaxing and rejuvanating way to spend the evening before you plan to run 13.1 miles.

So the next morning started at 5 in the morning. We got all ready and headed out. There was major traffic jam and Jake had to do some quick thinking, but got us there AWESOMELY. Jake's parents were super. We parked at their hotel, they held all of our junk during the race, and took us out for brunch after the race. They were real troopers. It really couldn't have been that interesting.

The race itself was really interesting. I hadn't ever run that far (I had made 11 miles before in good shape), but had been doing well with my runs. I hadn't run at a mile of altitude either. Putting those two things together made for a not great end of the run. The altitude factor was much worse than I thought it would be. I knew I was in trouble when I got winded climbing a flight of stairs the first day we were there! The worst part is that there really is no way to prepare for it either. I really thought I would run about a minute faster per mile, but there was no way I was going to be able to do that. But, not bad for the first one...and, I did beat Jake, so there's what really matters.

There were 16,000 people running the race and the atmosphere was amazing. It is a fantastic feat to put on an organized activity like that for that many people, not to mention all the people the bring along with them. All in all I am happy with the fact that I made it through it. I am all about doing another one.

There was a whole additional day and a half to this vacation, but I am too tired to write about it right now. Real quick though: Fort Collins, Iranian food, inability to walk right down any stairs, another awesome green chili breakfast, Estes Park drive, Estes Park Brewery, Boulder, Denver airport, home at midnight, trip over.. Whew. It was awesome, but explains why I am still a little tired.