My fellow Fulbrighter, Karen Siklosi, and I ran the Flora Women's Mini-Marathon on the June 1st bank holiday. The name is a bit of a misnomer since the race is only a 10 Km. The expo where you went to pick up your numbers was a trip! With 40,000+ running the race, the expo was geared for women shoppers. This was the first race I've been to where there were only two running vendors in the whole expo. We were greeted upon entry with a stage area and seats where a make over was being done. Lots of makeup, dresses, jewlry etc. I did like the free food and free drinkers including Bulmer's Pear Cider! The day of the race was beastly hot--I never thought I'd say that about Ireland. It was in the mid 20s--we had to arrive in the running shoot 30-45 minutes ahead of time. Fortuantely there were ambulance volunteers handing out water while we were waiting--if not, I'm sure we would have fainted before the first kilometer was over. There were lots of volunteers out with hoses which helped a bunch. We both finished under one hour--and we're happy about that given the weather. It took us 3 minutes just to get to the start line and another 2 k to begin to even get our running feet under us. I still have a black and blue mark from a sharp elbow I received in the arm!
Dave got a photo of the winner--sho finished in 35 mintues!! We were able to get free massages afterwards--the entire massage school was there on St. Stephen's Green. We all went out for a bite to eat afterwards and then home to a cool shower. An amazing experience that I'm glad to have done. We were next to a woman who had taken the bus down from Mayo that morning--four hours just to get to the race! I had not realized it was such a big event.
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