Kalamazoo Spectating Recap

This weekend my beloved Florida frenemy Harold, his girlfriend Cate, Spike, and I all headed down to Kalamazoo for them to run the Borgess Half Marathon. On the way we stopped over in Lansing so they could experience the amazing cupcakes I always rave about from the Sugar Shack and also to stock up on gu at the running mecca of Mid-Michigan, Playmakers. 

We arrived in Kalamazoo mid-afternoon and hit the expo for packet pick-up; we also finally got to meet Jordan, though he tried to throw us off by shaving his beard. (How do you expect to be the bald and bearded runner if you lack a beard?!?!? I'm thinking Spike should hijack your blog name until you've earned it back! LOL!) After a turn of the expo, we grabbed a bite to eat to tide us over before heading back to the hotel to relax until dinner. Kalamazoo is the home of Western Michigan University where my cousin attends school so he met us for carb-loading later that evening and kept us entertained with stories of drunken debauchory and bad decisions.

Harold and Cate were stoked to "sleep in" for this race, as most races in Florida start hella early to avoid the hot angry sun. They were also excited about the cool morning temps, a mere 50*, which is down right chilly to my thin-blooded friends. We all got a good laugh at how overdressed they were in their throwaways in comparison to the local running population when we arrived at the race; and they were excited to learn that there were seat warmers in the Spike-mobile.

Butt warmers FTW!

Soon enough it was time for them to line-up; I wished them all good luck and hustled out to the course so I could cheer them heading out. They were all smiles and so was I because Harold let me use his fancy-schmancy camera to play paparazzi!

My trio of runnerds all waves and smiles!

With the halfers gone, I finished making my way out onto the course so I could be in place to cheer them in; once there I spent the next two hours or so ringing a cowbell like it was my job (it was) and cracking all the 5k and half finishers up with my sign:

I got a lot of, "I knew I was good at something!" responses. LOL!

I swear time flew by and before long I saw Jordan speeding his way in to a top 25 half finish! Not too long after that I spotted my trio thanks to Spike's orange hat bobbing in the distance; a quick glance at my watch told me the boys had done an excellent job pacing Cate in to a HUGE PR and sub 2-hour finish! After they raced by I was also able to spot a few other friends as I headed back towards to the finish to find them. Man what an after party K-zoo puts on! The finish area was crazy, I eventually found them, and we snapped some post-race pics with their medals in front of an awesome backdrop provided by the race. What a great idea! I'm definitely putting this race on my radar for next year.

Unfortunately we weren't able to stick around very long because we had to get them back to the hotel and showered so we could drive straight to the airport. Boo! (With a quick detour for Sweetwater donuts, of course) The weekend went by way too fast and we were sad to see them go so soon. I swear every time I get a visit from my Florida peeps it makes me miss them all that much more! 

Congrats to all those that raced the various events at Kalamazoo on Sunday; near perfect weather and a beautiful course, what more can you ask for!?