Race Recap: Hustle Up the Hancock!

2 races down, 10 to go! Today was the Hustle Up the Hancock race, which, true to its name, requires you to get yourself from the ground level of the John Hancock building in downtown Chicago all the way up to the Observatory at the top of the building using just the stairs. That's 94 floors: a total of 1,632 steps.

It is a TALL Building.

And it looks even taller when you're right next to it.
Yes, I had to lie on the cold ground and hold my feet up in
the air to take this silly picture while the Michigan Ave
tourists stared at me strangely, but it was worth it. 

I arrived really early for my 1:30 pm wave start, so I headed over to the Post-Race Party & Expo to see if I score some free snacks and Gatorade-ish liquid, which I did - but the real treat was that the Athletico trainer people were offering free stretching sessions where you lay down on the massage table and they move your limbs around for you. This sounded like a great idea, so I signed up and enjoyed my 10 minutes of a nice cute lady stretching me out, despite the fact that it was intended to be a POST-race recovery activity.

Then I hung around the concourse level of the Hancock, with approximately 5 million other athletes who were all hanging around talking loudly to each other - for  a moment of quiet I headed into the Aveda store. Did you know they give you a tiny free cup of tea when you walk in? Check it out sometime. At 1:15 pm I was allowed in line, which snaked back and forth in the concourse before heading up the escalator, then around a few corners, and then all of a sudden, there you were at the bottom of the stairwell and someone said, "Go!"

When I started at 1:30 pm (in the very last wave) people had been starting to climb up the stairwell every 8 seconds since 7:00 am, so yes, the bannisters were perhaps a bit slimy and since hot air rises the climate of the last 10-15 floors was sort of like a stinky rain forest. But they had all these great motivational posters every few floors (that were sponsored by businesses - the one that motivated me the most was from Chipotle and simply had a giant picture of a burrito on it) as well as sweet middle school students with pompoms who were cheering all the climbers on. My lungs started to burn before my legs did - it is incredible how much air you have to suck in to climb! I started too fast, as everyone always does, and had to really slow down to keep going - but I never stopped, just kept putting one foot ahead and up from the other, and eventually I heard music and cheering and my name being announced on the loudspeaker and I had arrived at the Observatory!

Done!

I finished with a time of exactly 23:00 minutes, near the middle of my age group, and really enjoyed the views of the city - - - we have such a beautiful place to live.

There's Oak Street Beach, where I'll do my triathlon swim training! 

The funny thing is, it took me 30 minutes of waiting in line for the elevator to go back down to the bottom of the building, 7 minutes longer than it took to climb up.

It was a great race, one I'd consider doing again, especially if I had some buddies to do it with. Any takers? :)