One of my traditions before a half is my beer...I know I wasn't running but I didn't want to break my tradition and it did involve a half marathon!
Traditional Beer
Race morning, I'm up at 3:30 am to get ready and Ginger arrives at 4am and we take off. It is a bit of a drive. We were sad it was so dark because we were driving thru Virginia Wine Country and it is beautiful. We leave pavement road and travel down gravel roads for about 20 minutes and we come across this sign...chicken crossing! Lol
Chickens Crossing?
Beautiful Sunrise
Ginger and me at Water Aid Station #4 (6 Miles)
The Hiddencroft Vineyard people were super nice and funny. They let us sample the wine, a few times! Lol. For the most part everyone in our group (the ones in the yellow shirts) were helpful and friendly, but the Lululemon Team, well, let's just say they are really good at holding signs. Thank goodness the EMT people saw that we were struggling to fill water glasses when the 2 hour to 230 group came through and offered to help!
I really enjoyed watching the runners come through. They were all super thankful for our volunteer efforts. As a runner myself, I know that races can't happen and run efficiently unless you have the volunteers! I can't tell you how many times runners stopped and said "Thank you". It was so nice to be appreciated.
The Lululemon group...they needed the wine for their hard work at holding signs. Also note they didn't have to wear the volunteer shirt...I get it...they were promoting their gear.
After we cleaned up our aid station we headed to the wine festival to check it out. When we arrived we weren't sure how we were supposed to get in so we went to the wine glass tent to ask. We were rudely informed that volunteers don't get a wine glass unless we bought one, which was not an option when we registered and we were told we could not buy it the day of because they only ordered a set amount. So we were about to walk away when a man pulled us aside and asked us to help hand out wine glasses. So we did... and when we were done, one of the ladies working the tent said they were probably going to have 100 or so glasses left over and if we came back in 15 minutes she would get us one. We came back in 15 and the guy that pulled us in to help started yelling at the poor girl for wanting to give us a wine glass. I felt bad for the poor girl. At the same time I saw the Lululemon group head towards the tent and I could hear them talking about how they were told they were getting wine glasses. About that time we decided the wine glass was not worth the time and effort. So I am not sure if the Lululemon people got their glasses (they probably did). We were about to walk away and head home (it was noon at this point and we had been up since 3:30am) when the lead volunteer coordinator yelled at us, "You 2 start taking down tables and cleaning up" to which Ginger replied, "Sorry but we are leaving we have been at aid station #4 (we only signed up for aid station) and wine glass tent."
The wine festival looked fun but I guess I will never know!
The gateway into the Wine Festival..it looked fun... :(
It was really a beautiful race and the runners were awesome and so thankful. I really wish the coordinators of the race would have appreciated and at least thanked us for our time. The 3 things Ginger and I took away from this race was 1) Lululemon people are good at holding signs 2) Thank the volunteers at every race we participate in and 3) Don't wear a white tank top in the heat..don't ask!
I was asked if I would volunteer again and the answer would be "YES" I really enjoyed the runners and I know they were able to enjoy their day because of all the volunteer work that goes on behind the scene. :)
Beautiful Virginia Wine Country
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