Per the usual, shortly after coming back from my morning walk, I got ready to hit the road for another weekend race. This time, it was a half marathon out in Laughlin, Nevada. I have not been back there since our family road trips back when I was a kid.
Pit stop #1: Tesla Supercharger in Barstow, CA (92 miles)
The first stretch took me out to Barstow which I covered in about 1 hour and 20 minutes. I plugged the car in for a charge and headed over to the nearby Dunkin' to get some breakfast. I ordered a sausage, egg, and cheese croissant and holiday blend coffee on the mobile app. My order was ready in a jiffy. I found a table to enjoy my food and coffee. Once I was done, I used their restroom before heading back to my car. Their restrooms are for patrons only. I had to get one of the employees to unlock it for me. Once the car had near full charge, it was time to hit the road for Needles.
Sausage, egg, and cheese croissant and holiday blend coffee
Pit stop #2: Tesla Supercharger in Needles, CA (148 miles)
The second stretch brought me out to Needles where I pulled in to charge the car. I covered this stretch in about 2 hours and 10 minutes. This was one of the smaller charging stations with only 4 stalls, so I'm always glad when I pull in and don't have to wait. After plugging in the car, I went inside to use the restroom and to purchase a couple of drinks. I got 2 Arizona teas for 99 cents a can.
Arizona tea x2
Pit stop #3: McDonald's in Bullhead City, AZ (30 miles)
There was a time change when I crossed the Colorado River over to Arizona. They were an hour ahead as they do not observe daylight saving. Once I reached Bullhead City, I stopped in at the McDonald's to get lunch. I placed my order on the mobile app where I used a buy 1, get 1 free deal to buy 2 Quarter Pounders with cheese.
Encanto
After I was done eating my two burgers, I hopped back into my car and headed for my hotel. I crossed over the Colorado River again, this time into Nevada. Originally, I had booked a hotel in Bullhead City, but a couple of days leading up to the trip, I changed my reservation over to the Tropicana Laughlin. Thank goodness I had done that, that way I won't have to worry about the different time zones. Having said that, Laughlin was close enough to the state line that the cellphone kept jumping from one time zone to the other.
After parking my car in the free self parking garage, I headed to the check-in counter. You had to go down to the ground floor in order to enter the casino. While waiting in line, I bumped into my friend Robert. I was assigned room #885 in the Promenade Tower. He parked in the open lot just outside, so I went with him to park his car in the parking structure since I needed to get my bags from my car.
Casino elevators
Hotel map
The final instructions said that packet pick-up was from 5 pm - 8 pm in the Pavilion room. However, it looked like they were taking people early. Robert texted me to let me know that there was a long line of people already, so I went downstairs and joined him in that line.
In line for packet pick-up
Pavilion room
Race shirt
Goodie bag
After dropping off my race packet in my room, I went down to my car to go pick up dinner. I drove back to the same McDonald's over in Bullhead City. Along the way there I thought I saw a McDonald's sign at one of the hotels that was along the river. I looked it up later and there indeed was one in the Aquarius Casino Resort. Oh well, maybe next time. Per the usual, I placed my order on the mobile app. I used a buy 1, get 1 free deal, this time to get two double cheeseburgers.
Double cheeseburger x2
Where I parked
After I finished off the two burgers back at my room, I laid out my flat runner for tomorrow's race. I then took a shower before calling it a night.
Flat runner
Saturday 12/4
The shuttles were scheduled to start leaving at 5:15 am. I met up with my friend down at the casino floor. We couldn't really find the location of the shuttle pick-up, but eventually we found someone that pointed us in the right direction. It was outside at the southern end of the casino. We boarded the shuttle and it departed at about 5:30 am.
Hotel shuttle to race start
The ride over to the high school took about 15 minutes. Once we were dropped off, we headed inside the warm gymnasium. They provided coffee, hot water for hot cocoa, and music. It's always nice to not have to wait outside in the cold as well as being able to use real restrooms instead of portapotties.
Laughlin high school
Gym
As the 7 am start time approached, more and more people started heading outside. The back of a Toyota RAV4 Hybrid was used as gear check. Just as we were asked to get into the starting area, we took our traditional pre-race Half Fanatics photo in front of the starting line.
Gear check
Half Fanatics
Start line
Before the start of the race, a girl played the national anthem on her clarinet. She was supposed to be accompanied by other bandmates, but they didn't show up. What a trooper. I've never heard a clarinet solo before. After that it was time to run the race!
The race started off fast with the first mile all contained within the high school. However after getting off of the track and heading west on Spirit Dr, the climbing would start and continue on for about 2.5 miles.
Half marathon course map
Lap around the track
Once we approached mile 4 and made that right turn onto Laughlin Highway, it was a nice long 3 mile stretch of downhill. I made sure not to get too crazy during this downhill section. I needed to save some of the legs for the late climbs. At about mile 5, we veered left onto Pyramid Canyon Dr/Davis Dam Rd. The course would flatten out at about mile 7 as we start to climb up to Davis Dam. After crossing into Arizona, we ran across the dam then continue up the road until the turnaround at about Katherine Dr. I always love out and backs, as I get to see my friends both ahead and behind me out on the course.
About mile 7
At about mile 9.5, I made a left turn into the Heritage Greenway Park for a short little loop. Then at about mile 10, I made a left turn onto the Riverwalk Trail. This was a nice 1.5 mile stretch along the Colorado River, but my legs were starting to fade as I zigzagged past some of the stragglers in the 12k race. I tried my best to hang onto the runner just ahead of me. It was a gradual uphill climb up to the Laughlin Highway overpass at about mile 12. Physically my legs felt spent, but I kept reminding myself that it'll be all downhill for that final mile to the finish line once I cross the overpass. It was pretty nice running down an empty Casino Dr towards the finish line!
About mile 9.5
About mile 12
Finish: 1:52:01
Click here for my Garmin data.
After crossing that finish line, I got my finisher medal. I noticed that the lanyard said top 100 finisher. Nice. I'm always surprised when I receive something like that as I don't think I run fast enough these days to get some type of award. The only race that I used to run for a top 250 age group medal was the Carlsbad 5000.
Top 100
I waited for my friend to cross the finish line as I knew that she wasn't too far behind. Her husband was also at the finish line to greet her. We then walked over to the post race area to get some snacks and drinks. We stopped by the table to get our Colorado River Challenge medal for having run the Havasu Half Marathon earlier in March. We then went our separate ways.
Post race food
Colorado River Challenge medal
When I got back to my room at about 9:15 am, I found my room door ajar. Uh, checkout time was at 11 am. It's nice that their housekeeping staff was in such a hurry to clean rooms, but they might want to shut the door if guests have not yet checked out of the room. It was pretty obvious that all of my stuff was still in there and I had not yet checked out. I do not appreciate such a lack of security and concern for guest's property. Thankfully, everything was still there.
I put on the Watford v. Man City match. I got cleaned up and prepared to check out of the room. I needed City to do well as I had Dias, Bernardo, and Jesus on my FPL team. While Bernardo did well and they won easily with a score of 1-3, unfortunately they were unable to keep a clean sheet.
Watford v. Man City
I loaded my bags into the car and headed over to the front desk to drop off the room key as well as to get a receipt for my stay. Along the way, I saw the video arcade. That sure brought back a lot of childhood memories. My parents would leave me and my brother in the arcade with a bunch of quarters while they went off to gamble.
Double Double x2 with Neapolitan shake
Before hitting the road, I stopped by the post race area to say hi and goodbye to my good friend who was doing the race announcing. The race staff was beginning to tear things down and pack things up.
Pit stop #1: Tesla Supercharger in Needles, CA (26 miles)
The car navigation routed me on Bullhead Parkway which looked to be a more direct route than staying on the Mohave Valley Highway for the entire way. I still had a decent amount of charge left when I arrived at the charging station in Needles, but I'll need a full charge in order to reach Barstow with a more comfortable margin. While waiting for the car to finish charging, I perused the Shell food mart aisles before purchasing another can of Arizona tea.
Tesla Supercharger Needles
Might have to give this a try
Pit stop #2: Tesla Supercharger in Barstow, CA (148 miles)
During the drive over to Barstow, I finally engaged the autopilot feature for the first time since I started driving this Tesla. It's a pretty nice feature as it has both adaptive cruise control and autosteer. However, the autopilot will disengage if you don't continue to hold onto the steering wheel. It could come in very handy if I ever get a bit too drowsy during a long stretch of driving. I rolled into the charging station at Barstow with about 22 miles left.
Autopilot
While waiting for the car to finish charging, I placed an order for an iced coffee on the Dunkin' mobile app. I wanted to use the restroom before my drink was out and the employee informed me that the restrooms were for patrons only. I had to convince her that I had placed an order on the app before she opened the restroom for me. The final stretch home took about 1.5 hours.
Original blend iced coffee
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