Color Me Rad 5k Calgary Aug 3, 2013

Calgary sold out in 3 days when it first went on sale in February, more spots were added for the afternoon and they also sold out.  We were expecting great things after all the hype!  I convinced 9 other people from work (and Kev) to do the race with me.

On Wednesday evening I picked up packages for 7 of us out at Olympic Park, it was extremely quick and painless.  The only problem was deciding on what to buy, next year I will load up on color bombs.  Merchandise was very reasonable, from tutus to bandanas to booty shorts!  I loved the different colored sunglasses, there were 7 colors so we took one of each.

Saturday 

Race day is bright and sunny, there is not a cloud in the sky.  We are running in wave 3 at 9:40 am.  Kev is the only guy with 10 women, poor sod.  We pick up 3 of our teammates and park at 69th Street where the shuttles (school buses) are waiting to take us to the race.  This is super easy and we don't even have to wait.  We hang out at our meeting spot and the rest of our team shows up early, I am impressed.  We have plenty time for a photo:

Before

We come straight out the photo booth and head for the start line.  The course is gorgeous, through trees and grass past the bobsleigh track.  It soon becomes clear I work with crazy people.  These guys are enjoying every minute and every color bomb.

We pass through liquid and powder color stations (yellow, pink, purple, red, green) where people (ie. my team) are doing all kinds of stuff to get colorful, body surfing and flashing to name a couple.  There may have also been handstands.

Can't take him anywhere...

There is also a bottled water station out on the course which is great as the sun is hot even this early.  Some of our team race ahead but they re-join us at a bend so we can finish together.  This is the goal race to walk 5k for some of our awesome ladies.  They killed it.

We see the color bomb station right before the finish line and load up!  There is a Go-Pro camera above us:

Time for another photo!

After

After that some of the team go on the zipline (not me, hell no) and the rest of us hang out by the stage for a while.  There is high speed zumba happening and a final mass color bombing after a countdown from 10.  There is a guy spraying people pink with a fire extinguisher.

Are we dirty enough yet?

Yep.  We head back to the shuttle, again there is no wait.  When we arrive back at 69th Street I have no idea where we parked and an Amazing Race scenario unfolds as we trek aimlessly around the lot.  Finally we spot the thing.  As far as the car goes, the seatbelts end up pink but the painters plastic ($2) we draped all over the interior works perfectly.

We all had an outstanding day, this is one of the best organized events I've ever seen.  Way to go team Run HR Run!  Next year?