Rock N Roll Las Vegas
Finishers: 22,114
November 30, 2012
I made the justification that I needed to stay in New York for Friday night, and then I dipped out on an early morning flight to Vegas... VEGAS! Thrilling, right? Not so much - Vegas alone is surprisingly not fun. But the fun thing is when you travel alone you don't care all that much about the frills and you just book things to get a good deal. An example of this is that I booked my hotel at a place that is now called the LINQ but at the time was called like...the Cube or something scary and it was going through some major renovations and I paid $26 a night. Twenty. Six. Dollars.
I landed midmorning with the time change from NYC and my room was not yet ready so since all I had traveled with was a backpack, I decided to hit the strip and check out what Sin City had to offer. Sin City has a lot of people paid to stand on the street and make snapping noises with what look like playing cards advertising for strip clubs and escort services. Great start....
I wandered to one end of the strip and decided to check out what the discount ticket office had to offer in terms of shows. The only decently priced option for the night was the Criss Angel "Believe" show at the Luxor. Once I had checked in to the hotel, I started to head that way to turn in my voucher for a ticket. I had totally underestimated the length of the strip and ended up basically run/walking because I thought I was late.
So I got to the box office and there were two teenage boys who were twins working the booth. I turned in my voucher and they showed me my option of seats based on the fare class I had purchased -- aka in the back. About halfway through their explanation, they stopped and said "Wait - are you by yourself?" A statement like this never fails to make you feel great - yes, I am a Party of 1. Evidently they felt bad for me and ended up giving me an aisle seat on the 4th row.
The show wasn't for another hour so I waited around and got a small meal at the hotel bar.
If you have a few dollars to spare, or some time to get on YouTube, check out Criss Angel. You will be giggling, confused and disgusted all at the same time. Because of my proximity to the stage, I was in the danger zone for crowd participation. Thankfully, I was not chosen. After the show I head back to the hotel and called it an early night catching the Bellagio water fountain show on my walk home. Early like -- first person in the city of Las Vegas to go to sleep.
December 1, 2012
Ready for another thrilling day, I got out early for a walk before the streets got to busy. The race expo was at the ginormous convention center. I had planned to spend a significant amount of time there but then realized I have been to this same expo 6 other times this year with all the same vendors. I wanted to not waste another day, so I bought a matinee ticket to the Cirque du Soleil show, Mystere, at Treasure Island. Exploring these hotels is fun so I wandered for a while and watched the pirate show outside before going to get my seat.
Those Cirque shows are the real deal. After the show I somehow ended up at the Toby Keith "I Love This Bar" restaurant in Harrah's next to my hotel where I ordered about 20 wings at a high top table alone where I watched some country music videos and then took my remaining wings back to the hotel where I stayed the rest of the night.
I am literally the most boring Las Vegas tourist of all time.
December 2, 2012
Race day! The oddest thing about this race was that it started at 4PM. 4PM? Well what the heck do I do all day? I stayed in bed for a while and then went to an all you can eat breakfast buffet at the Harrah's next door. I probably had about 3-4 plates which is the ideal thing to do the morning of a half marathon.
In order to not exhaust my body, I ended up just cooling it in the hotel until it was time to walk to the race start. I had spur of the moment decided to buy a long sleeve shirt and I'm glad I did because it was starting to get a little windy. The race started down by Mandalay Bay and then ran the strip down and back and ended at The Mirage. The walk down to the race start was fun because the strip itself was empty and all of the sidewalks were full of a migration of runners all heading south. We hung out for a while in the parking lot and thats when the wind starting picking up - quick.
It started getting dark just as it was about time to run -- because its winter. So we started the race and all of a sudden you realize how massive the strip is. This is one of the larger races in the country and they pull out all of the stops for it. They even have a RUN through wedding ceremony that you can do.
So I was cold and it was super flat and the abnormalness of running in the evening instead of morning (and maybe the chicken wings and all you can eat buffet) was seriously cramping my running style. My legs were playing that game where they feel like bricks and just don't feel like loosening up. I just sort of put up with it and kept going.
Running the strip at night was an awesome memory but once you get off the main strip and pass the Little White Chapel, you are in dark back streets of downtown Vegas and you feel 0% safe -- even running with 22,000 other people. We did a lot of winding up and down these streets -- again all super flat which sometimes is not good. And then finally I realized we had to turn around at some point which was at about Mile 9.
*None of these photos are mine - obviously...
The Mirage in the distance was just that. I could see all of the landmarks of the where I needed to get to but the more I ran, the more it felt like I was standing still. Nothing was getting closer. Mind tricks on top of brick legs and the cold night time race? I was obviously having a great time. By the time we got back into the real Vegas strip, I was in "I for real may need to walk" debate mode but opted to continue shuffling along instead.
I had no kick available when I got to the finish line but got a space blanket and just sat down and pouted for a few minutes about how much pain I was in and questioned if I would ever make it back to my hotel -- 2 blocks away.
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| OFFICIAL RACE PIC - 12 states down, 38 more to go! #DREAMBIG |
Just your average Ashley weekend. See ya next year!
12 states down, 38 more to go!
#DREAMBIG
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