Color Me Rad – Burpees to Bubbly

This past weekend, I ran the Color Me Rad race, which was held out in Brockton, MA. When I first signed up for the race, I didn’t really pay attention to details because if I had, I am not sure I would have signed up for a race out there! Brockton is certainly NOT Boston, but luckily, Lauren’s friend Amy offered to drive us. Since it had been a crazy busy week for me, I felt completely unprepared for the race for every aspect except for the actual running part. I am typically a very organized (Type A, for sure) person who has all the details and times and locations mapped out and planned for accordingly, but for this race I just didn’t have the time or energy to be on top of it. Many thanks to Lauren for picking up our race bibs and packets and to Amy for offering to drive!

Friday night I packed my bag, laid out my clothes and sneakers and set my alarm for 6:45 on Saturday morning. Thanks to some blog readers, I learned to wear my crapiest workout clothes (ie: no Lulu and definitely not my newest pair of running sneakers!) and bring a twel for the ride home. My roommate was gracious enough to give me a white tank as I wanted to ~~shamelessly~~ promote my blog decorate it with a “Burpees to Bubbly” note. For putting this together in the car en route to the race, I don’t think it came out half bad!

I deleted the photo by accident and only have a copy from Instagram, but I couldn’t copy and paste it, so click on this link to see it: Color Me Rad Shirt

We got to Brockton just around 8am, which was plenty of time before our 9am heat started. What do you do with extra time before a race? Take pictures, of course! 😉

It turns out that they were not very strict about runners starting in the specific heat they were assigned to, which was awesome for us since we were there and ready to go much before 9am. After pre-race necessities were completed (finding safety pins, going to the bathroom, taking pictures), we got in line to start with the 8:30 heat.

Not long after we started the race, we went through the first color station. This station was throwing powder color at us- look how crazy it is to see all the color floating in the air! Not gonna lie- I was a little weirded out by it!

I didn’t end up getting much color on me at this station, but it totally got me in the spirit of the color run theme of the race!

I can’t say that the course of the race was overly scenic or fun; we ran partly through the fair grounds and then around a huge parking lot which actually made for the most boring race course I’ve ever run on. Luckily, there were so many walkers/runners that I was able to do lots of people watching to keep me entertained! Even though the course wasn’t interesting, the race flew by! Before I knew it, we were rounding the last bend and were handed powder color packets to open as we crossed the finish line!

Post race, we had to take the obligatory “after” photos. I didn’t get overly covered in color, but I can’t say I was that mad about it! While we walked to our meeting spot, I checked out some of the vendors. I was pleasantly surprised with how many vendors made an appearance at the race! Naked Juice, Vita Coco, and larabar (just to name a few) were all there so me, being the hoarder that I can be when free stuff is given away, grabbed everything I could grab! 🙂

After we finished getting our swag, we walked back to the car, tried to remove whatever paint-covered clothing we could and headed back to Boston. I can’t speak for the other girls, but I had a hell of a time getting the color off my skin when I took a shower! I had to use an intense loofa and I am pretty sure I ended up scraping off the first couple layers of my skin in order to finally get the color to come off! No wonder why I got a little bit of a sunburn when I laid out by the pool later that day; I took off all my base tan skin layers! 😉

Overall, I thought this was a really fun race! It was the first race I’ve ever run where there wasn’t a timer set up! For me, being the Type A, numbers-focused person that I am, this was a foreign concept! Why would I run “for fun” rather than trying to get a new PR (personal record)?!

Well, I quickly realized that it was because this race WAS for fun and that I would look silly going out there and giving it my all. With that being said, I tried to soak it all in and enjoy the experience and I think I did a great job at that! I ran without focusing on my watch to track my speed, without my music to keep me going and without feeling like I had to keep pushing myself since the clock was running. And, you know what? It made for a very enjoyable race!! It was a nice change to go out there with a carefree running attitude and it was fun getting to run with friends! Many thanks to Lauren and Amy for doing the race with me- what’s the next adventure going to be?

Questions for you: Have you ever run a color run? What’s the best “fun run” you’ve ever done? Do you like tracking your time while running or do you prefer running for fun?

I want to sign up for a Spartan or Warrior Dash- has anyone done one of those??? Which would you suggest?

Good morning! How’s everyone doing today? Even though I was on the road for part of the week last week, I still had a really great week of workouts AND I was able to teach all my classes- win, win! I’m traveling to Atlanta today and tomorrow and am hoping that after that, my work travel will slow down a bit. Don’t worry, I won’t try to run outside like I did the last time I was in Atlanta! I will go to the gym and that’s about it!

Last Week’s Workouts

Monday- I ran 3.25 miles before work and travel. I was having technical difficulties which frustrates me more than it should. My watch battery light was flashing so I used that and then also used Map My Run as backup in case my watch died before my run was over. I accidentally ended my Map My Run workout .25 miles into my run and had to restart it, so that distance was always behind my watch, but then my watch died 2.75 miles into my run so that didn’t matter anyway. Clearly, these are not life altering issues, but they annoy me!
Tuesday- I did a 30 minute hotel room workout that I will post on Wednesday! I know I usually post my class workouts in my Wednesday Workout posts, but I feel like people might like to see more workouts that can be done anywhere, and without any equipment- am I right?
Wednesday- All went well with my flight and I got to the gym super early so I ran 3.5 miles through Cambridge (along the Charles- the view just doesn’t get old) and then taught a new type of format in my UXF Burn class, which I think everyone liked! My hamstrings were REALLY tight the next day!

Thursday- I taught the same format in my SHRED class that I had taught in my UXF Burn class on Wednesday, just with different moves and then I taught kickboxing. It was the same routine I did last week when I nearly drowned in my own sweat, only this time I didn’t sweat so much!
Friday- REST DAY 🙂 Besides lifting my wine glass when I went to dinner with Athena and Ashley 😉
Saturday- I ran the Color Me Rad run with my friend, Lauren, and her friend, Amy. I’ll recap that race later this week!

Sunday- I went to the Wellington BSC and did 30 minutes of cardio on a machine (sometimes doing mindless cardio is exactly what I need/want) and then went to BodyPump. I wish I could have that workout in my schedule once a week- such a good way for me to take time to solely focus on strength training!!

This Week’s Workouts

Monday- I hope to have completed a nice 3-4 mile run by the time this post goes up! I will also do some abs to complete the workout.
Tuesday- I’ll be in Atlanta and will stick to just going to the gym or doing a hotel room workout this week! No running outside for me; I learned my lesson!
Wednesday- Probably some cardio before teaching UXF Burn. Any suggestions from anyone on what type of format you’d like to see or specific exercises/burpees??
Thursday- Teaching SHRED and kickboxing. I want to make a new kickboxing routine and download new music; I’m sick of all my current mixes!
Friday- This might be a rest day again. I have been enjoying Friday’s as rest days!
Saturday- Teaching kickboxing at the YMCA and then heading up to Maine for little Emma’s first birthday!!
Sunday- If I rest on Friday, I’ll probably do something when I’m home in Maine, but I may end up taking another rest day.

Questions for you: What type of workouts would you like to see more/less of? Ones I’ve taught? Hotel room workouts? No weights required? What’s your favorite burpee? Has anyone done the newest BodyPump release? I LOVED it.