Volunteerism

Today, the weather was absolutely perfect. Perfect for a marathon run, for instance. Just two weeks late. Oh, well. Crystal blue skies, temps in the 40's at 7:00 and warmed to maybe 60 by noon. Just gorgeous.

This morning, I volunteered to help at the King of Jester races here in our neighborhood. I was assigned to the registration desk, and was very busy from 6:30 until 10:30. King of Jester is a series of races, actually, starting with a 5k (actually 3.2 miles) race on extremely tough hilly terrain at 8:00. Then, there's a hill ascent up a steep 17% grade hill for just over a half mile, running. Then, there's a "human powered" hill ascent on roller blades, unicycles, recumbent trikes, skateboards, whatever. Then, last, there's a bicycle ascent over the same hill. Think L'Alpe du Huez, but just for a half mile. All the courses are ugly, extremely ugly, stagger through the finish and barf ugly. Anyway, volunteering for the race alleviates any responsibility for me to attempt the races. Whew!

I had a pretty fun time with the whole deal, and ended up watching a little of the bicycle climb. It's just a crazy race. There was a special King and Queen of Jester title for the man and woman who had the best combined times in the three events, and they got these cool neighborhood street cruiser bicycles. The sponsors put on a good show, there was plenty of good food and entertainment, and it seems everyone had a good time.

I should volunteer for races more often, by the way. I should pick a race about every 3 months or so, when I won't be racing, and help out. Lord knows I've run enough races and enjoyed the volunteers at those races!

My hamstring (left) is a little tweaked this morning, probably because I was too aggressive with yesterday's run. I've iced it and stretched it and put a heat pack on it. And repeat. I'll either back way off of tomorrow's run or call it a rest day instead. Best to get well now and not mess around with injury already.

Anyway, a good day, and now I'm going to try and avoid watching the Oscars.