Race: Kona Chocolate Run
Race Date: Sunday, Nov. 17th, 2013
The Kona Chocolate Run had a costume contest for this race so I had to think of something. Costume categories were: chocolate, superhero, or holiday.
I couldn't think of a superhero that I wanted to be. Cat woman, Wonder Woman, and Bat girl costume ideas didn't really make my skirt fly up.
The chocolate theme had potential and I looked at quite a few tutorials on how to make a Hershey Kiss costume.
But the holiday option - now we're talking. So many options! I knew I wanted to go with Thanksgiving instead of Christmas because hey, it's still before Thanksgiving, gosh darn it.
I've gotten a kick out of my turkey hat in years past, so I was thinking about what to do with a turkey hat...be a turkey dinner! Of course! The options for decorations are endless.
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| Front... |
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| ...and back! |
The costume took a couple of weeks to put together. It's not hard, but takes awhile due to the glue needing to dry between steps. Here's what went into the costume:
Structure Materials:
2 x 30" by 15" foam core
Tacky Glue
2 rolls of White Duct Tape
Scissors
Decorations:
Turkey hat
Plastic plate
Silverware
Tablecloths
Fake food
Plastic glass
Candle holders
Candles
Decorative leaves and fruit
Cloth napkin
Place mat
I put together an Instructable on how this was made. It's pretty easy!
One of my favorite things about this costume was how easy it was to customize. Looking for usable items for the table in thrift stores was half the fun.
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| Delicious fake food! Mmmm gravy. |
To support the table, I ended up pinning a bag stuffed with a blanket to my chest. It helped and allowed me to rest my arms at times, but I realized that I would not be able to run normally as a turkey dinner, so I adjusted by pace. My arms were sore the next day from holding the table, it ended up being quite the workout!
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| Karyn and myself pre-race! Photo by Karyn |
There was a cold rain at the start, which did a number on the glue on my glass and corn, and my taper candle didn't survive the race with my weeble wobble running. Still, I'm impressed that everything else stayed on!
Near the very end of the race, a woman in front of me said "I can't be beaten by the turkey dinner!" So I sped up a bit and when she turned around I was right there. She really took off after that! I wasn't going to pass her, just trying to help her in her final kick. Motivated by a turkey dinner.
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| Almost to the finish line! Photo by RunMichigan.com |
My time ended up being 39:03, 12:35 mile/pace.
The race was huge - 6,000 runners and walkers! - and the finish line was pretty crowded as the 10Kers and the faster 5Kers had already finished. People were really nice and let me, the big ole table, navigate my way through the chocolate line crowd.
This was the inaugural Kona Chocolate Run and it had a few minor bumps, one of them being that the chocolate line was incredibly long. I heard later that it was a 45 minute wait. My brother, his girlfriend, and I skipped on the chocolate because of the wait time, but the Kona folks have already started working on improvements for next year, including better chocolate line traffic flow.
My costume was one of the winners! There was a super cute gingerbread girl I saw in the costume judging line in front of me. I hope she won too, she was absolutely adorable.
Not my fastest time, but it was certainly one of the funniest!
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| Finish line! Photo by Greg Sadler |
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