10k Race Recap - It was actually an 8k, also, the "Death March" and essence of fish.

So.

Angel signed up to run a 10k early on the morning of February 4th.

That's normal.

This race was closer to home than his recent races have been, and I told him that if he placed, he should come home and pick me up for the award ceremony. I didn't think he was likely to place since only the top three overall were going to get trophies. Angel, on the other hand, told me he was thinking about "winning" the whole thing.

At 7:40, he called me and told me to be ready to get picked up, because he'd come in second place.

Turns out, when he started the race he knew he was in 4th place, and the guy in 1st place took off so far ahead that Angel never saw him for the rest of the race. The other two stayed in sight, and as the miles passed, Angel passed them, for a 2nd place finish at 34 minutes 5 seconds. Wait a minute--that doesn't sound right for a 10k time! Angel's fancy new watch revealed that the race course was only 8 kilometers, and talking with the other winners confirmed that the race track was significantly shorter than expected.

Oh well, these three certainly weren't complaining about a short race, given that they won it! What was a surprise to us was, along with the trophy, Angel received a "hamper" full of food items as part of his prize. This has never happened at the races we've attended before!

Angel and I found the music choices for the award ceremony highly amusing, as they ranged from "Let it Go" to "Get Lucky," "Fight Song," and "YMCA." The winners of the 6k race received their awards to the tune of the "Death March" from Star Wars and it gave the whole affair a certain air of intensity that I don't normally associate with 6k fun runs.

Investigating what was actually inside the gift hamper was a great deal of fun for me. We always see these sorts of hampers in the grocery store around major holidays (Chinese New Year is quickly approaching!) but have never bought them as a gift because they always seem to include such odd items in their packaging.

This one contained: Ferrero Rocher Chocolates, Durian-filled chocolate, dried cranberries, 4 bottles of essence of fish, strawberry candies, sparkling grape juice, candied nutmeg, green tea, tomyam-flavored peanuts, and almond shortbread biscuits (these were wrapped inside a box that didn't say what was inside, but merely proclaimed: "The Best Gift Ever" in gold lettering all over the box).

The essence of fish is the most mysterious item in the hamper as far as I'm concerned, because I can't imagine the circumstances under which one would desire to drink anything with such a name. The instructions on the bottle say that children should have half a bottle twice a day, and adults should drink a whole bottle twice a day. It's a health supplement, but one that I think I'll have to pass on.

Since we'd already stayed for the whole award ceremony, we decided to stick around for the "Lucky Draw" or raffle. If you've read any of my race recaps in the past, you may have noticed that Lucky Draws are a big deal at races. There are often LOTS of prizes to be given away, so the odds of winning something tend to be pretty high. This race said they had 35 prizes for the lucky draw, but in reality, there were a good many more than that, because many of the 35 gave away multiples of the same prize.

Probably because there were so very many prizes to give away, the lady announcing the numbers was rather feisty about trying to speed along the giveaway process. After she announced a number, and she'd see someone begin to get up out of their seat and make their way toward the stage, she'd start yelling in any one of three languages: Mandarin, Bahasa, or English, based on which language she thought the person spoke. I know enough to be able to translate the Mandarin and Bahasa for Angel, and I was cracking up as she'd be yelling out: "Hurry up!" "Run Faster!" "You've had an hour to rest already, faster!" "Why so slow?" "Run! Run!" "Don't walk, run!"

I learned over to Angel and told him that if his number  got called, he better hop out of his seat and RUN to the stage if he didn't want to get heckled. He took my advice when they called out his number, but we didn't know what he'd won until he returned to our seats with the envelope:

It's a gift certificate for a free lunch buffet at a very fancy local hotel...a free lunch buffet for ONE. Who goes to a buffet by himself? Seems to me that meal prizes ought to be for two...but we were very excited that he managed to take 2nd place in this race and also win a random prize. One of the lucky draw prizes was a motorbike and I am very, very glad indeed that he didn't win that one! Lunch is far safer.

I think race day always leaves Angel with a bit of a runner's high, so once we got home in the afternoon, he signed up for a race on March 10th. Which is 6 days after my due date. I let him sign up on the condition that if I'm in the the hospital, he is NOT going to the race. No matter what. I don't care if you think you can "win" this one. The "Murphy's Law" part of me suspects that because of the race he signed up for, we can now plan on baby being born on March 10th, exactly.

Did you have any adventures this weekend?