In the morning I drove into Downtown LA and parked at the Pershing Square underground parking just across the street from the Biltmore Hotel, the location of the packet pick up. It was a flat $7 for the entire day. After picking up my bib and pullover long sleeve race shirt, it was time to go get an early lunch.
Lucky bib number!
For lunch, I walked over to Little Tokyo to eat some ramen at Orochon Ramen. The restaurant was located on E 2nd St in between S San Pedro St and S Los Angeles St. It was located on the second floor and was pretty easy to find. I got there about 10 minutes before they opened. There was a group of people there waiting by the time they opened up. After being seated, I ordered their shio ramen level 4, added an egg and extra meat. On the menu was a chart that showed you the amount of spiciness for each level. Level 4 was right in the middle of their scale and wasn't spicy to me. I also ordered a half order fried rice. The ramen wasn't bad at all even though most people come here to get super spicy ramen and the portions were pretty big. If you're used to the fatty tonkotsu style ramen, you might want to try elsewhere. Their soup base was pretty clear. Also their ramen here was more like the Chinese style ramen. The fried rice was decent, nothing spectacular. Chopsticks and napkins were self service by pulling out the little drawer on the side of the table.
Half order fried rice
Shio ramen level 4 add egg and extra meat
After lunch I thought I'd check out the Angel City Brewery which was nearby also in Little Tokyo. They would be supplying the post race beers. The brewery was located in a somewhat seedy looking area of Little Tokyo. The place looked like a converted warehouse. In the parking lot/entrance area there was a food truck. There's a guy checking ID's at the entrance. Besides the bar, the place was pretty spacious with plenty of space to hang out. On to the beers! I started off with a pint of their Vanilla Porter. I do love my porters and I particularly like the vanilla variety. This one was good. Then I got a beer flight to sample the rest of their beers. For the 5 beers I picked: 1. Eureka! Wit, 2. Angelino IPA, 3. West Coast Wheat, 4. Amber Ale, and 5. Marilyn. I was impressed with the West Coast Wheat and Marilyn. Those two were not what I thought they would be like. I liked them. In fact they were all good, but I liked the Amber Ale the best. I then finished it off with a Imperial Chai Stout. I love stouts as well and this tasted good while packing a good punch. After finishing that beer, I decided that I should probably head out to the expo and just hang out there before the start of the race. Didn't want to get too buzzed for the race. :)
When I went to the restroom before leaving, I got to see the rest of the place. There was a dart board, corn hole games, ping pong table, as well as various party games (Jenga, Connect Four, etc). There was even a slide in the middle of the place. I'm sure it's much safer to slide down versus taking the stairs if you had a few too many. :)
Vanilla porter
Beer flight
Imperial Chai Stout
I went back to the Biltmore and found a nice spot to sit down and wait for the start of the race. The hotel looked really nice with their Christmas decorations still up. The race started earlier this year at 6 pm and as it got closer, I used the restroom one last time before walking a few blocks down to the starting area. After the short walk down there, I made my way over to the gear check to drop off my bag before heading into my starting corral.
The race started at the intersection of W 7th St and Grand Ave with the usual Red Bull arch at the starting line. I started the race in between the 1:40 and 1:45 pace group, so I was running just slightly under 8 mins per mile. I liked the little out and back into the 2nd St tunnel, but the air was a little stale in there. Once we started heading towards Dodger Stadium, the climbs kept coming. Some were not easy climbs, but it leveled out a bit after mile 5 where we got to run on the warning track inside Dodger Stadium. After climbing the hill back up to mile 8, there was a short dirt section before we hopped back on the road at Stadium Way. For some reason my right ankle was getting sore. I think I didn't tie the shoelaces tight enough. Once we had reached about mile 11 and was leaving Dodger Stadium, it was mostly a 2 mile downhill run to the finish line at Grand Park. My legs were shot so I could not get them to turn over very quickly. I was content with my results given the difficulty of the course.
1-3: 23:53 (7:57)
4: 9:20
5: 9:00
6: 8:23
7: 8:53
8: 9:23
9: 7:25
10: 9:35
11: 9:40
12: 9:33
13: 9:07
13.1: 0:48
Finish: 1:54:58
2014 - 1:58:02
2013 - 1:59:41
Each year, I have been getting faster at this race. Perhaps it's due to the small tweaks to the race course. I bumped into my faster friend in the finisher chute. He had to wait for his girlfriend, so we agreed that we would meet up at the beer garden. I then went looking for the gear check. The line for picking up your gear bag was ridiculously long. Apparently they had arranged the bib numbers based on finishing time, so everybody was lined up for the same bib range. Nobody was at the other table since they were all still out on the course. They'll need to fix that next year. The line would continue to grow. After putting on my jacket, I went to look for the bonus legacy medal. I had to ask a few people, but eventually I found the booth that was passing out the medal. Then I made it over to the beer garden. They were pretty strict with letting in only people that had their ID. Luckily for me, I always carry my ID when I race. I chatted a bit with some random runners in the beer garden until my friends showed up.
We then walked to the nearby Casey's Irish Pub. I've walked past this place on numerous occasions, but usually in the daytime. So since it was nighttime, I suggested that we check this place out. To enter the place, you take a flight of stairs down to where a couple of bouncers greet you and check your ID. They were some of the friendliest bouncers I've met in a while. We tried to find a table or booth or any place inside to sit down, but the place was packed! So we finally found a table outside in the "smoking section". The smoke didn't bother me too much but then again I'm an ex-smoker. There were ping pong tables out there.
Now for food and drinks, I started with a Deschutes Chainbreaker White IPA and I ordered their Bangers and mash. I would say that their selection of craft beers on tap wasn't too extensive which would make sense since most people going to an Irish pub would commonly drink a Guinness or a Kilkenny beer. The Bangers and mash was good, kind of hard to mess up and it came with a cup of peas. We had a few more beers before heading out. Our waitress was friendly, checked up on us, and was pretty quick for such a busy night. I definitely wouldn't mind coming back again.
Deschutes Chainbreaker White IPA
Bangers and Mash
No comments:
Post a Comment