I have always wanted to do a color run but never thought I could do it because I was never really a runner. And I have too much pride to walk. Granted, I also didn’t realize that walking 3 miles (The Color Run is a 5K, a 5K is 3.1 miles) was as do-able as it was. But I started training for the LA Marathon last fall as as soon as I realized how easy running 3.1 miles was I immediately started looking for the next opportunity to sign up for a color run.
In February I signed up for The Color Run on June 21st, 2014 and I couldn’t wait! I tried to get others to sign up with me, but it ended up being just me. That made me a little nervous because from all the pictures I’ve seen on Facebook (which made me want to do this in the first place…that and my enthusiasm for the Indian holiday Holi) were of friends running the race together and getting all colorful and smiling and having a great time. And when I first arrived, all I saw were people with family or friends. But being stag ended up ok in the end; I had to ask a lot of people to take pictures of me, but being by myself didn’t detract from the race at all.
I checked in early so I had all my Color Run race gear: a shirt, a sweatband, some temporary tattoos reading “HAPPY” and “The Color Run,” a bracelet, and my bib number. I went all out and wore everything on race day. I put the temporary tattoos on my cheeks in the morning, but the “HAPPY” tattoo was too big for my cheek. The “H” didn’t stick on, so my cheek read “APPY.” I was going to wipe it off but instead I just rocked the “APPY” with pride. Weird looks be damned! (The “Color Run” face tattoo came out great.)
I arrived as early as you could, 6:30am, to Dodgers Stadium. I had book club to get to at 10am (which ended up being cancelled) so I wanted to be in the start queue right at 8am so I could race, do all the activities, and still make it to book club. I think I was the fourth person to park their car. I had checked in the previous day so I was all set and ready to go (most people who came early still had to check in). There were a few vendors and I took advantage of their free stuff (I think I ended up with 3 free dinners at Wahoos). There wasn’t much there so I sat down for a bit in front of their party main stage.
Of course, then their MC came on the mic and started urging us to “SMILE! DANCE! NO ONE IS ALLOWED TO STOP DANCING! THIS IS THE BEST DAY OF YOUR LIFE!” It was rather annoying, because I just wanted the race to start. They had warm up Zumba set to the toppiest top 40 songs and although I participated to get warmed up I REALLY just wanted to start the race. I decided to head over to the start line to await the race and I was happy to see I wasn’t the only one. Of course there was another MC at the starting line, just as annoying. We were encouraged to “HASHTAG! DANCE FOR SOME FREE SWAG!” Just let me run already…
And finally, I got to! And let me tell you, the course was a little tough. It was around Dodgers Stadium and it is hilly. Very hilly. So the uphills were awful. But I was glad I was able to take advantage of the downhills. There were 5 color areas: Blue, Pink, Orange, Purple, and Yellow. They were spread out around the course. As I came upon the first color, blue, I was pumped! Volunteers cheered as I came upon the color station, so I cheered with them. Mistake. The dried colored paint went right into my lungs. It tasted awful and I’m sure it wasn’t good for me. I swigged some water and spit it out to wash out my mouth. The next color, pink, I breathed in through my nose while passing through the color. Again, mistake. I eventually learned to not breathe or open my mouth through the color. I tried to take some pictures of the volunteers squirting color at us from plastic bottles, but I wasn’t very successful.
The course was beautiful. There were awesome views of LA which made for awesome pictures. And of course, it was SO MUCH FUN to get all colored! Motivation to get to the next color pushed my feet forward. I finished quickly…too quickly, and when I looked at my running app I noticed I only ran 2.5 miles. So not a true 5K color run…kinda not cool.
At the finish line, all colored up, they gave you a packet of the dried paint (mine was blue) and told you that over by the main stage there would be a color throw soon. I stopped by some booths for some very cool photo ops; the Zappos booth had drums with dried paint on the top some when you drummed on them a cloud of color flew in the air and Shout had a 360 degree camera where I jumped in the air and was texted a video that traveled 360 degrees around the moment. Then I made my way over to the stage.
The crowd there was dancing and responding to the MC and I danced a little (though I never listened to what the MC wanted us to do dancing wise. I know, REBEL!) and I was just really looking forward to the color throw. “Soon! It will be soon! Get ready!” I kept hearing over and over. “Let’s just do it!” I thought. People randomly started throwing their color, overtaken by excitement and impatience. I ended up throwing my color (blue and orange, which I got from the Shout booth) with a bunch of other people at once, but it hilariously enough wasn’t when we were supposed to. Oh well. I was able to take a video on the actual color throw though, since I was colorless, which I was grateful for. Then I was hit right in the face by a huge wad of blue paint. It went all up in my mouth and lungs. And then I knew it was time to leave the crowd.
I took my official race photos. One photographer told me to stick out my tongue and make a silly face. After the picture he said I looked awesome because my tongue was all different colors. “Great,” I thought, “That’s probably not healthy.” It was time to leave for book club and so I made my way to the Shout clean off tent. A man with a leaf blower blew all the extra paint off of you so that you didn’t track excess paint into your car. The workers of that tent were impressed by my blue, Smurf-like face. I got to my car, put some trash bags over my front seat, took some final pictures, and then heard a large bang. Not five feet away from me, a girl turned her car into a large truck and destroyed the whole front of her car. Not five feet away. It was crazy.
I drove home and jumped right in the shower. I was blue all over my body. I scrubbed hard but barely made a dent in getting the color off my body. But I didn’t care. I was happy. It was awesome. I posted a bunch to Instagram. All in all it was a great experience and I can’t WAIT to do it again next year!
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