Yesterday I ran the Color Me Rad 5K at the Las Vegas Motor Speedway… that wasn’t really 5K. A friend I ran with had her Garmin on and she clocked the course at a little over 2 miles. We got short-changed! However, since I didn’t wear a Garmin and never looked at anyone else’s device and the race claims it is a 5K, I’m assuming I did a 5K.

This is my second color-themed race and I can’t help but compare the two. The Color Run was held at Fremont Street/downtown Las Vegas, it was a more fun environment. The organizers at the finish line for this race though seemed far more energetic and the color bombs happened a lot more frequently.

I thought this would be like the other race where they just threw a color powder on people. But when we went through the color zones with the powder, the throwers weren’t very aggressive. I stood right in front of one of the people and she still didn’t throw anything on me.

On the flipside, they also had some people with liquid color. They were spraying it on people, which made some cool patterns. Unfortunately when we went through one of the liquid color zones some race volunteer picked up a bucket full of the green liquid and threw it on me… that was cold and made me feel all soggy for the rest of the run. I was wearing a pair of shorts I’m not particularly attached to that are kind of big, and having them soaked made them feel like they were falling down!

The official race t-shirts were nice, soft and gender-specific cut, one that I will actually wear around later on. But the funny thing is that they were a dark charcoal color instead of white. Then at packet pickup they were selling white ones to wear during the race. They were selling socks, shirts, bandanas, extra color packets, etc. Nice little racket to make money!

All participants were given a pair of sunglasses with bright frames. If you recall when I talked about LifeKraze I mentioned the funny green glasses I got from them? Well, these are the same glasses except they say “Color Me Rad” on the side. And I still love them. I picked ones with red frames. They had yellow, blue, pink, green, red… you could pick out your color at packet pickup. Plus it’s a nice way to protect your eyes without worrying about getting color powder all over more expensive glasses.

They included a temporary tattoo at packet pickup. I put it on my leg… but it’s definitely not a design I’d be tempted to get inked on permanently!

I carried my iPhone throughout the race in an Aloksak Bag I picked up at REI. I used it to take pictures during the race and it worked great to keep the phone protected and the photos turned out pretty decent.

I left the baby at home with my husband while I ran and I definitely felt guilty. I shouldn’t feel bad about making him play a role of parent as well… but I do. She cries when she’s left with him. Plus the fact that he was sick made me feel a little more guilty. I know I need to take the time for myself for my mental health. I told the husband I was going to take at least an hour each Saturday and Sunday for myself, but I haven’t done that regularly. I guess taking a few hours for a race isn’t going to be the end of the world, especially since this won’t really be an option come busy season (CPA hubby – January to May). So I should take what I can when I can without feeling guilt.