DoomBuggy Runner

This past Saturday, April 26th, I ran the Country Music Half Marathon in Nashville, TN.  I found that my race recap for tomorrow was getting too large, so I decided to break the race expo out into a separate recap.  We traveled to Nashville on Friday, April 25th, and arrived to the race expo about 1:15 PM CST.  The race expo was held in the center of Nashville at the Music City Center, which is next to both the Bridgestone Arena (where the NHL Nashville Predators play) and the Country Music Hall of Fame.  We also pass through this area on race day as a part of the course.

One thing to note if you are driving to the expo.  There are several different lots & garages available for parking nearby for the Music City Center.  However, they are all very crowded, and require payment.  There really is no free option.  We paid $10 to par, and we were about two blocks away.

The expo was huge and very crowded.  If you are local to the race, it is recommended that you go to the expo on Thursday.  It was similar to the race expos at RunDisney events at Walt Disney World.  While I am speaking about RunDisney, and my blog has a lot of focus on RunDisney events, I must give a shout-out and note to my fellow RunDisney racers.  As we were walking the expo we came to the RunDisney booth.  They were giving out RunDisney shopping bags to everyone (of course with a RunDisney pamphlet & button).  However, it was kind of chilly this day, so I had on my 2014 Disney Goofy Challenge race shirt for the expo.  Jokingly, I asked one of the cast members, “Hey do I get something free for having on a race shirt?”  She said, “You sure do!”  How awesome!  She went in the back of the booth, and came out with a RunDisney back pack.  What! Something FREE from Disney!  Score!

Now, back to the expo.  When you first walk in, you walk straight into the bib pickup area.  It was super organized, and you could easily identify where you needed to go.  Once you picked up your bib, you went to the next section and received your race shirt, and bag.  Only then were you able to see and go into the expo.  Of course to get to the expo, you had to go through the merchandise area.

Brooks was a large sponsor for the expo, so they had a very large section at the expo, with a Hawaiian theme.

I even got to met Meb, winner of the 2014 Boston Marathon, at the Skechers booth.  Well, not exactly….

After walking around the expo about an hour, I returned to the KT Tape booth to get taped for the race.  They will typically tape one issue for you for free.  If you want more, they just ask that you buy a roll of tape (which is normally $20).  I just got them to tape my IT Band.  You will see in the race recap, that it worked really well.  I had no pain in my IT Band.

Stay tuned to Doombuggy Runner in the next few days for the recap of race day.