Race Report: Hot Chocolate 5K - Dallas

When RAM Racing announced their newest race series, the Hot Chocolate 5K/15K, billed as "America's Sweetest Race," all of my running friends were abuzz with excitement.  Even I, not being a huge chocolate fan, found myself swept up in the enthusiasm.  So, my BFF Carrie and I both signed up for the 15K in Dallas, which was being held two weeks after Tink.

After we got home from Tinkerbell and "the crud" (as I have deemed it) continued to have an iron-fist-like hold on me, I started getting worried about the 15K.  Finally, I decided to see if I could switch to the 5K.  I sent the race team an email and they told me I should be able to switch at the Expo if there were spots available.  So I had my fingers crossed that there would be!

Packet Pick Up

I drove down to Fair Park on Thursday afternoon, and was able to successfully switch races and pick up both Carrie's and my packets and jackets - yay!  As race weekend approached, the weather forecast for race morning looked COLD!  And, in fact, the night before the race, the RD sent out an email advising slower runners in the 15K to switch to the 5K (without penalty) to limit their exposure to the elements - crazy!!!

I had been coordinating with some of my fellow Galloway Group runners, and we all planned to meet up before the race and run together, so we managed to assemble ourselves within the corrals (which were a little halfhazardly put together) and start together!

Galloway Girls!

There wasn't anything spectacular about the course - the area around Fair Park is not exactly Dallas' most scenic area - but it was fun to be running with my Galloway friends again after an almost 2 month break!  We ran 1:1 intervals and kept up a decent pace for the 5K.  After crossing the finish line, we headed straight back inside to warm up, because we were frozen!!!

Post-race goodies!

So we picked up our post-race goodies, which included warm chocolate ganache for dipping, and hot chocolate.  I didn't care that it was a lot of chocolate, especially for me, it was WARM and tasted so good after running!  We sat inside, eating and chatting, and waiting for our friends who were running the 15K to finish.  Once Carrie arrived, we hung out a while longer while she relaxed and enjoyed the festivities, then we headed back to the car to go home.

Considering there had been some VERY negative reviews and press of the Hot Chocolate races around the country in the months leading up to the Dallas race, we were concerned about how it was going to turn out.  With the exception of the confusion in the corrals, it was ok - definitely nowhere near the clusters we'd heard about elsewhere - so that was good!

BFFs with Hot Chocolate!

Surprisingly, I had a pretty decent finish time - considering my much slower paces in my longer races recently, and "the crud." All in all, it was a fun race to do once, but we probably won't participate again next year.  But if you want to do one, it's definitely worth doing once!

5K results:  3.14 mi; 40:19 min; 12:46 min/mi