I've always wanted to do a beer mile. It's gotten so popular lately, that it seems like a lot of people are doing them. I hadn't heard of any actual organized beer mile races, in my area. I know there are some around the Raleigh area. I'm sure there is one or two in Charlotte, but I guess I'm too lazy to look into it. Being the offseason and all.
Anyways, my buddy Paul told me that they have a low key one every year. This year it was announced to everyone in our MSA swim group. I actually was almost excited about it when I first heard about it. One of the woman in our swim group hosts it over in Waxhaw. This year was the 5th Annual.
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| Me, Paul, Laurent, Karen, and Jen |
It happened to be the weekend after the Charlotte Marathon Relay. So as I was not in any sort of real shape, I didn't expect much. At least I had gotten in a hard 6.2 mile run the weekend before. Still, as the race got closer, I could barely contain my excitement and went to twitter:
The "race" was scheduled for 1pm. I arrived at 12:45 pm, and parked a block up on a side street. I talked to some people I hadn't seen in a while. Like Steve. I swam with him like all of 2015, but this year he was MIA. People started slowly streaming in. Paul had gotten a Keg of 'Golden Boy' from Triple C Brewing. So this was not ordinary beer mile swill fest. We had good beer.
The course was just and out and back from the cul-de-sac. So 1 lap was supposed to be 1/4 of a mile. Beer, then a lap. Do that four times. Sounds pretty straight forward. Karen explained the rules to everyone. They were giving a prize for the top overall. They also had a kids juice division. We had to wait for the mail carrier to come through the cul-de-sac, then we got ready to go. They had red solo cups setup on a table filled with beer. Everyone had a cup with their name on it. A couple people were going to be filling cups as the race was going on. Carolann was the official starter and timer. I put the cup in my right hand and put it up to my mouth. I put my left hand up with my Garmin, so I could hit the 'start' button and begin drinking at the same time. A countdown, then the GO!
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| Garmin Tracking |
So I started Chugging. I wasn't doing too bad, but some people really knocked down that first beer. I was definitely in the middle of the pack as I downed that first brew. And off I went. So at the end of cul-de-sac we're at the lower end of a slight downhill. So we start off running uphill. With a beer sloshing around your stomach. It was much harder to get the legs churning than I thought it would be. Still, I managed to gain on people and started passing as I came back down.
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| Elevation, Pace, Cadence |
Beer number 2 was harder than the first to get down. The uphill was about the same. It was similar as I gained on people going up the hill, made the turn at the orange pylon and then passed them on the downhill. For some reason, beer number 3 went down smooth as silk. I passed Jeremy at that point which put me into second behind Laurent. I pushed as much as I could on that lap to bring me home for the final beer.
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| Don't mind that crazy straight line, I accidentilly hit Start later in the day. |
Admittedly beer 4 was a struggle, but I didn't want to lose second place. I downed it, gained my bearings and took off on the final lap. I was too far behind to catch Laurent, so I pretty much cruised home in 2nd. Laurent definitely won it on the beer chugging. He is originally from Canada, so there's that. My Garmin had 6:37 for 0.94 miles. Maybe we can get a more accurate course next year. That calculates out to a 7:02 pace for a mile.
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| Good Crowd for the 5th Annual Beer Mile |
So I was a bit loopy after the race. Well, do the math: 4 beers in 6-1/2 minutes will probably do that. Karen had food setup on their back patio, so everyone hung out for a while and ate. It was great to hang out with everyone with a little competition thrown in. Next year I will know what to expect. Hopefully I can bring home the Win. For America. #makeamericanbeermilegreatagain
