Wharf to Wharf 10K Recap

Barbara and I - after more than 30 years of friendship, about to run our first race together!

Pre-race picture right near the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk - I love this area!

I survived the Wharf to Wharf 10K! It was a lot of fun, but definitely not a "running" race - there were just too many people to be able to consistently run, unless you were an elite runner and got to begin at the start of the pack.

We chose the front of the 10-minute-mile pace area to start...after that it was the walkers. What, nobody runs an 11 or 12 minute pace? Or maybe they just ran out of signs. Yeah, that must have been it.

Anyway, due to my experience at the Armadillo Dash of it taking about 30 minutes to get into the park for the start of the race, I was a bit anxious to get to the race early. Barbara indulged me in that, so we arrived around 7:40 am - her husband dropped us off quite close to the starting area (thanks, Dave!). Holy mackerel - there was a ton of people there! I knew that the race was capped at 15,000, and it was full, but wow. That was something to see - just a wall of people all around us.

People in front of us......and people behind us.

While we were waiting for the race to start, gigantic beach balls came tumbling down the street where we all were waiting. Music was being played - it was a party atmosphere for sure! Getting closer to crossing the start line!

Around 8:30 am the race started and we were off! ambling toward the start line - it was pretty funny to see some people try to run...really, that just wasn't happening. I was surprised that just as we crossed under the rainbow of balloons marking the start line that we were actually able to run - now it was getting exciting! Whoops...spoke too soon - exactly half a mile in, the four lanes converged into two AND started to curve and we came to a dead stop. Time for a photo op, right?

Half a mile in - still fresh as daisies!

This was when I realized that we were just going to have to go with whatever the race threw our way...stop, go, climb a hill, whatever.

There was a ton of entertainment all along the way, ranging from:

kilted bagpipers and drummers, to ukulele players,to the Santa Cruz chapter of the San Jose State marching band alumni (I have a soft spot for marching bands what with Sam and Jeff both having been in one)

There were also a lot of bands with ages ranging from kids to some really old people. The course was full of spectators - this felt like the social event of the year!

This is the first time I've run with my camera - we had fun taking pictures along the way:

First water stop - 2.5 miles inI ignored the sign!

There was a really cool peace sign (which I am successfully covering up) next to the "2010" drawn in the sand (the glare plus sunglasses made it difficult to see what you were taking a picture of - we were lucky to get as many good shots as we did).This place used to sell homemade fudge and all kinds of candy when I was a kid...now it's a cafe.

Click on this picture to see the line of runners - it's really amazing!

Loved this shot of the encouraging sign, along with the two runners who had not only finished the race, but picked up their goody bags and were heading back to Santa Cruz!

Then we crossed under the official photo op camera and found Barbara's daughter Theresa and her sister Sandi! We ran over for a quick picture - Theresa was in the middle of making us a sign and was a little disappointed that it wasn't finished...

Quick shot and then it was downhill to the finish line!

Done! We finished in 1:19 (Ricky Bobby time) - not too shabby considering all the stops (forced and voluntary, lol)

After we crossed the finish line, we had to keep going to the beach, where we picked up our goody bags with the OFFICIAL FINISHER'S SHIRT. Now, I have to tell you that this shirt was really promoted on the website - along the lines of how exclusive it was, only runners would get it, etc. So we both opened our bags right away to look at the shirt...and it was the same one as they were selling at Fleet Feet before the race! What the heck??? I tell you, I was getting fired up! I mean, seriously...what happened? Then we realized that in little letters below the logo, the shirt said "Runner 2010" - the other shirts just said "Santa Cruz" - so fine, it was an official shirt. I guess we were both expecting something proclaiming how awesome we were to have run from Santa Cruz to Capitola...hmmm, high expectations, ya think? LOL

The "Official Finisher's Shirt"

We put our shirts on, went and watched the announcement of the race winners (the fastest man, Shadrack Kosgei of Kenya, finished in 27:01!) and then headed back up the hill to find Theresa and Sandi. Our sign was finished, so we got to take some pictures while other runners were still finishing the race behind us!

"Peace Out, Peeps" - the official phrase of our visit, thanks to Theresa. :)Runner's pose!

Our gorgeous sign! Thanks, Theresa - we loved it!

In case you haven't gotten enough of this crazy race, you can click on this YouTube link to see more (and get a sense of what it was like to run with so!many!people!)

It's so funny to me that the last time I visited Barbara, in April 2007, the idea of me walking, much less running, this distance was not even in the outer corners of my mind. I was well over 250 pounds and was living a completely different lifestyle. It's times like these that make me realize just how much I have not only turned my life around, but opened myself up to doing so many more fun things...all because I took that first step on May 14, 2008, toward losing weight and getting fit. Best decision of my life, really.