There are many races like the graffiti run and they are mostly all the same.\u00a0 Everyone wears white and you throw ‘paint’ before you run, while you run, and after.\u00a0 If you are hoping to get in and out of this race and be clean, you SHOULD NOT attend.\u00a0 The paint is more like chalk dust that gets everywhere. <\/strong><\/span> It was very fun in the moment, not so fun afterwards.<\/p>\n The Race <\/strong><\/p>\n My friend, Thomas Elio, and I have have both been training for the Colfax Half Marathon.\u00a0 So when I signed up for this race, so did he.\u00a0 We trash talked about it for weeks of who would win.\u00a0 When we made it to the starting line, we waited for the usual 10-15 minutes while they sent out waves of runners.\u00a0 I was already feeling kinda yucky: my lungs felt full of chalk, my mouth was dry from it and I felt like I was looking through sand.\u00a0 We had only begun the paint adventure.\u00a0 While you are running the course, you run through ‘color zones’ and earn a new color each time until you make it to the end. In the first color zone, a kid volunteer threw and entire handful of ‘paint’ right at my face and it filled my entire mouth. I was then spitting pink to clear my mouth.<\/p>\n ONCE AGAIN, the miles were not marked.\u00a0 How hard is it? This is the second race I’ve run with NO MARKERS.\u00a0 Thank goodness I was running my Nike+ app and knew how far I was.\u00a0 Thomas and I stayed together for the first mile or so.\u00a0 Then I got caught in a group of people that would not get out of the way.\u00a0 Do they know what a race is? I quickly lost sight of Thomas and knew I’d lost.\u00a0 I tried to just have fun running the distance, seeing the sights, and trying to avoid huge chunks of paint.<\/p>\n When I reached mile 2.5 I knew something was off.\u00a0 I could see the finish line but still had almost a mile to go!\u00a0 But……the race was only actually 2.8 miles, not a 5K.\u00a0 Wait to go Graffiti Run.\u00a0 Major Fail. But I ran the race fairly quickly considering how many people were in the way and still lost to Thomas.<\/p>\n Tips<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n Cover Your Mouth <\/strong>– While registering for the race, you could purchase a face covering and I thought “Bah! Who cares!” You will care.\u00a0 Trust me!\u00a0 Thomas was nice enough to bring an extra handkerchief and I would have died without it.\u00a0 I inhaled SO much chalk through my mouth and nose that it was hard to run sometimes even with my mouth covered.\u00a0 Seriously, you’ll want to. My boogers and ears were black for two days.<\/p>\n Wear Glasses <\/strong>– Same reasoning as above.\u00a0 You’ll want to keep as much debris out of your eyes as possible.\u00a0 While I never felt like I had to take my contacts out, it was sometimes hard to see.<\/p>\n White Will Dye<\/strong> – Someone warned me about this before the race.\u00a0 ANYTHING a light color or white will get dyed.\u00a0 Including headphone cords.\u00a0 So if you don’t want it dyed, don’t wear it.\u00a0 I wore a yellow sports bra that is now kinda green in some places because it’s all I had.\u00a0 Immediately after this race I bought a cheap-o bra for events like this so I don’t ruin a good bra again.\u00a0 Even parts of my skin where I sweat, like arm pits and toes were dyed for a few days.<\/p>\n Shoes and Pants Ok <\/strong>– I purposely wore my worst pair of shoes and pants that were too big in case they got ruined.\u00a0 However, my black pants were just fine after one wash.\u00a0 Either it didn’t soak in or you just can’t see it.\u00a0 My shoes, which were mostly gray, came out too.\u00a0 I clapped them around afterwards and most of the paint fell right out.\u00a0 Anything that get’s wet WILL DYE.\u00a0 I also brought an extra pair of clothes so I could strip in the parking lot before getting in my friend’s car.\u00a0 THINK THIS THROUGH before you leave the house!\u00a0 They gave us car seat covers at registration, but they turned out to be mostly useless.<\/p>\n Fun! <\/strong>– The race was definitely fun for a one time event.\u00a0 However, it was quite messy and I’m not very good at messy.\u00a0 By the time I’d showered and felt human again, the race took up the whole morning and afternoon.\u00a0 Just remember to plan extra time to clean up afterwards.\u00a0 I would do a race like this in the future, but not anytime soon!\u00a0 I’ll stick with fun that can be cleaned up faster!<\/p>\n![\"11174869_10206763837365113_7163818040745858356_n\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/yogapantsdiary.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/11174869_10206763837365113_7163818040745858356_n.jpg\")
<\/a>We also went with my friend Melissa and her hubby.\u00a0 My hubby was demoted to photographer since he injured his foot.\u00a0 He was SUPER disappointed not to run with the rest of us. The race was at Mile High Stadium in Denver through the parking lot.\u00a0 Parking sucked!<\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n