Heidi
So Kristen, our friend Diana, and I drove to the Convention Center in Philly for the expo on Friday. Kristen drove (thank God because I CAN'T drive in the city) and we had a delightful ride there. We drove past City Hall and saw Billy Penn and found the parking garage without any issues. So far, so good.
Loved how the parking attendant had a checkered flag...
We walked about a block to the entrance to the convention center and found where we needed to go. First, we had to find our corral number and get our race bibs and timing chips. I had to pick my son, Justin's up since he was in school where he was taking four tests. Poor baby. Anyway, no issues with that. Just had to show our ID and we had our stuff. Kristen has been training so hard and she was able to change her corral from 13 to 7. No proof needed as to how fast she was. They just put a sticker on her bib and she was good to go.
On the Red Carpet...
Thought this was cool. We also received Run Boston bracelets.
So next we moved on to the t shirt area. Kristen and I liked our shirts so much (which is strange because Kristen never likes her race shirts) we decided to wear them on Sunday for the race. They were red... my favorite color!! Poor Diana had to exchange her shirt. She got a woman's cut and they ran extremely small. Note to self, if I ever run another Rock and Roll race, get the men's shirt!!
On to the fun part...the booths. Brooks put on a really great display. They had some really cool shirts, fleeces and hats (which I bought to add to my collection.) They also had Run Happy Island. You could go into this area and get your gait analyzed, ride a mechanical running shoe, and try to win some cool stuff. I chose not to ride the mechanical shoe (could you imagine falling off that thing after all of this training and not be able to run the race??) However, I did win a pair of running shoes while my friends only won bags. Sorry about your luck friends. Ha Ha. I was totally surprised and so excited. I still have to go online and pick out my shoes.
Me with my shoe coupon.
Mechanical Shoe you can ride on...
Cleanest Port A Potties ever...for changing your clothes. Ha Ha.
After we had some fun shopping in the Brooks area, we went to the booths. We bought GU's (they had salted caramel woo hoo) and head bands and socks. If I had more money I probably would have bought a lot more. Good thing I didn't bring too much. We looked for other races for the future and what we found was AWESOME!!!!! HOT CHOCOLATE RACE!!!! It is in April for Philly and I decided weeks ago this would be my next big family run for next year. We did the Color Run this year. We got chocolate covered marshmallows at the booth and I think I convinced Diana and Kristen to run this race too!!! Can't beat a race that serves you a fondue of chocolate to dip yummy stuff in at the end of the race, can you?? Well unless it is unlimited beer. That would be better.
By the time we went through all of the booths, we were starving. Well kind of because we did eat plenty of energy bar samples and chocolate covered marshmallows. The Convention Center is just a block away from the Reading Terminal Market. It is basically a farmer's market full of delicious food. I really wanted a cheesesteak but settled for a really good turkey sandwich. We saw some very interesting things while we were walking around aimlessly trying to figure out what we wanted to eat...
Chicken Feet in case I need extra feet after the race.
A new set of lungs in case I can't breathe after the race.
These items may have come in handy after a half marathon. Who knew??
Overall, we had a great day. The expo was one of the better one's I have been to. (I must be honest and say I really have only been to two or three others.) The bonus was...I printed out a parking coupon to get us half off. When we scanned our ticket there was no where to scan the coupon. Me being the chicken I am, would have paid full price. Luckily Diana hit the attendant button and out of no where the attendant showed up and gave us half off. Hooray Diana!!! Score for us!! Now onto the race....UGGHHH
If only that was my real time!!!
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