Michigan - State #9

Dang...once again I've fallen behind on blogging.  I applaud all of you that do it...and work full time...and take care of a family.

So, here's a quick recap of our race in East Lansing, Michigan:

We drove up on Friday after my husband got home from a quick meeting at work that morning.  I swear we stopped a million times before we even hit the state line.  Bathroom break - change drivers - lunch stop - bathroom break....but we still made good time.

Checked in to the hotel and unloaded all of our stuff.  Its not far from the campus of Michigan State and since Michigan State is playing Notre Dame (just a tiny little football game!), our per night charge is outrageous considering how "tired" this hotel is.  But that staff have been very friendly and accommodating.  I needed to borrow an extension cord and they gave me heavy duty construction type one...no questions asked.  We got two free drink tickets and so we headed down to the hotel bar and my husband began his carb loading via Mich Ultra.  Its a pre-race tradition for him.

Got up Saturday morning and headed to the Expo.  There wasn't much there to speak of so after grabbing our race packets we walked the short distance to the capitol building and checked out the sights.

 

We dropped our race stuff off at the hotel and then drove to the Michigan State campus to check it out.  I think my husband was secretly hoping to find a bunch of college kids tailgating but we didn't see any.  All of the lots were blocked off and you needed a pass since the game was that night so we insanely paid $15 to park when I knew we wouldn't be there that long.

Walked around campus but didn't want to be on our feet/legs too much since that half marathon was in the morning.  It was a nice campus - from what we saw.

I somewhat begrudgingly took this picture of Magic Johnson.  I will ALWAYS be a Larry Bird girl - ALWAYS!

Dinner at Applebee's and then to bed.

Sunday (race) morning was the usual routine for me.  It was just a short drive to the start area and we didn't have any trouble finding a place to park.  SWEET!  Since you could also pick up your packets that morning the Lansing Center, we were able to use good bathrooms and stay in there until closer to the start time.

This was a good course.  You start downtown and then run east toward the MSU campus.  All of that is about the first 3 miles, then you start running along the Lansing River Trail, Scott Woods and Hawk Island Park. It was all very scenic, mostly flat with just a few rollers in there.  Some of the trails were narrow so if this race had been much larger it could get really crowded.  It finishes near the Adado Riverfront Park.  It was all spread out and my husband didn't have any issues waiting for me to finish.

They served the usual post race food but I'm usually never hungry when I finish.  I think I might have pounded down two chocolate milks though!  Sadly, there was no finishers photo area but did find someone to take a picture of us.

We were able to get a late check out from the hotel so we didn't hang around post-race too long.  Drove back, took our showers, packed up the car and headed home. 

Another state crossed off the list.