Barking Mad To Run
INTRO
I am Scott aka Scottydog aka Scotty Dogg, runner since 1983, cancer survivor – caught very early, so I actually had a fairly easy time of it - retired Air Force, employee of University of Texas at San Antonio (UTSA), friend of dogs, fun-runner, and all-around punster and goofball. In 2003 I had spinal arthritis flare up and ever since then I’ve done the run/walk method since it hurts my back too much now to run continuously with no walk breaks. I’m on what I call my “2F Plan” which stands for Fun and Finish. My only goals for a race these days are finish everything I start, have fun along the way, and finish standing up with no ambulance waiting for me. At events that I now do for fun I carry my camera, chase “Great Legs” to help motivate my slow old man self to keep moving forward, and take pictures before, during, and after the race. Sometimes I even get a nice post-race sweaty hug from one of the Great Legs ladies. I then do a pictorial race report of my events. I also carry dog biscuits with me to treat any dogs I may meet at a run – unless it’s a mean dog; then the biscuit goes in one direction and I go in another. Hence my nickname “Scottydog.”
And a big thanks to runningahead.com for allowing me a “home” for my many many MANY race reports and photos. Great site, free training log; calendars; running routes; maps; conversation forums for runners; and much more
I don’t have great camera skills and take photos with a camera that is like me - old fashioned, lol - so sorry if a photo appears a bit blurry, etc. However, they are free to save, share, etc.
Here is yet another of my photo reports. Full report below.
Also, I put no photos below in the report. For this one I ended up with over 120 photos taken, so I won't bore you by making you scroll through them all. Instead, please go to one of the two links below to get a show of all the photos. I did put just a few below.
Link to photos only:
http://s166.photobucket.com/user/scottydog69/slideshow/2018%20race%20reports/2018%20Race%20Number%2085%20RnR%20Half%20Relay?sort=2
Link to photos with some comments on each of the photos
https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10156932983727082&type=1&l=66e9553b1c
BEFORE MY START
My 85th race of 2018 was held on Dec 2nd – the San Antonio Rock n Roll Half Marathon 2-Person Relay. I did the 1st leg and my wife Gail did the 2nd leg. Event was held in downtown San Antonio area, with the start near The Alamo and the finish on Alamo Street in front of Hemisfair Park and Tower of the Americas. Start time of 7:15 a.m. Gail and I arrived with about 45 minutes to start time and she caught the shuttle bus taking 2nd leg relay runners over to the exchange point. I found my assigned corral and milled around a bit taking a few pre-start photos.
In the start crowd with friends Still dark when we got put into the corrals
Ahead of us is Market Street, which everyone started down after the gun went off.
These folks came from Mexico City to do this one. Probably speedy for this one, living in the thin air in Mexico City
ON THE COURSE
I was in Corral 5. After the start gun went off it actually went quicker at this race getting to the starting matt than it was at my Rock n Roll 5K the day before, even though there were more participants for the half and full, weird. Maybe the half and full organizers have more experience in getting large crowds going quickly. We all started down Market Street – a lot of which was cobblestone surface – kinda made you not go out too fast, lol – and then we wound all around several various streets downtown. It was a beautiful day for an event, with blue skies, low humidity-and-dewpoint, and a temp in the upper 50s, low 60s when we started. My leg turned out to be 6.5 miles – sorry Doc, I know you told me not to do over 10k distance with my spinal arthritis, but had to get it done – and I felt pretty good the whole way, although I did make more stops than I usually do to take on-course photos. I ended up with a time of 1:15:47, and I was quite happy with that. Gail spotted me right off as I came into the exchange point and she was off and walking the 2nd leg. I got a few photos of some other participants at the exchange point and then went and stood by the course for a while, cheering on friends that I saw as they passed, doing their full or half marathon. After that, got onto the shuttle bus to head for the post-race goodies near the finish line.
My first walk break, about 1/2 mile into the course and we are all able to finally spread out a little.
2nd walk break, heading to Mile 2
My buds at Project Phoenix had a tent up early on in the course. Lots of veterans and their family members in this group that does several runs over the year and community service projects.
In memory of one of the members, a veteran who was tragically killed in a motorcycle accident at the young age of 30-something...
Musicians were all along the course
We had views of parts of the Riverwalk along the way
Several people carried flags
Mile 4...almost to the relay exchange point...2.5 miles to go
Tower of Americas - near the place where we started - in the background as we went down this street
Another flag carrier
Made it! The announcers at the relay exchange point.
AFTER MY FINISH
The after-party was all up and down Alamo Street and in HemisFair Park and primarily at an historic area called La Villita, which is now full of shoppes, food places, and the Arneson River Theater along the San Antonio Riverwalk. Stage was set up and a variety of musicians were entertaining the post-race crowd while beer and other drinks were being served to those that wanted them, and there was also a variety of foods available, including some from food trucks that were parked in various places. I wandered around enjoying some goodies and randomly taking photos here-and-there of various participants.
Back at the finish/party area and found the most important post-race folks...the beer servers!
Oh yeahhhh! Beer giving me the strength to carry Gail's bag she gave me to take back to the finish area.
After-party musicians. There were several different ones that played on stage over the day
With wife, Gail, after she finished the 2nd leg. She's got her 3 medals on (mine were in the bag). We each got 3 medals, one for the 5K, one for the relay, and one because we did 2 RnR events for this one.
Happy finishers and a closeup look at some of the medals. The guitar medal was the one for doing more than one event.
This guy did the half marathon carrying the flag
This guy also did the half...and told me by Mile 10 or so it was getting warm in that taco shell, lol.
With friend Tony, who did the half
EPILOGUE
This is a nice event that starts on Friday with packet pickup and an expo at the local Henry B. Gonzalez Convention Center and continues on Saturday with a 5K and 10K (Gail and I did the 5K) and then Sunday with the Marathon, Half-Marathon, and Marathon Relay. The Expo stayed open until 3 pm on Sunday and also at the finish area on Sunday, there were vendors selling all kinds of RnR memorabilia such as shirts, bags, get your medals personally engraved, and so forth. This year’s event seemed to me to be a bit better organized than last year’s; and we certainly had better weather than last year’s chilly and drizzly stuff. Nice quality race shirts, nice medals, and really nice after-party. I can’t run distance anymore so for me this is a nice event because of the shorter distance events offered and the half relay is great, allows me to be a participant for that day too. I would definitely do this one again and would recommend it to others. It’s not the biggest RnR event around – when I could do distance, I did a few others out of town way back when, many years ago, lol – but it is a very enjoyable one.
Mucho thanks to all the people who got this one put together for we participants, e.g., all the Rock n Roll company employees; all the many many many volunteers, both out-of-town and local who were all around for us; all the police officers who had to cover all those intersections – pretty much most of downtown was closed for the morning – and the EMTs patrolling around, to keep us all safe; and, of course, all the sponsors/vendors who supported the event and were out there for us too – as well as things to purchase, some of these sponsors gave away some nice ‘freebie” stuff also. If I missed anyone, apologies, and thank you very much too.
"Do what you can, with what you have, where you are." Theodore Roosevelt