Uiryeong

This weekend saw us road-trippin' south with many of the wonderful folk we work with, plus friends made while running, for the Sangil Marathon festivities. A four hour drive on the school's bus took us to the mountains of Uiryeong County. A bit of evening-before shenanigans at a prototypical Korean love motel, bibimbap in lieu of pasta for a pre-race carbo load, and a good night's sleep found everyone ready to go on Sunday morning.

There were three different distances, all of which headed straight up the mountain to a halfway point, then turned around and came all downhill from there. Except for the last kilometer, which somehow managed to be uphill (and against the wind) both ways.

A fantastic day for the Sea Bass Running Club...Shannon, Marcia, and Kimberley dusted off the 5k race in great times. Ian, Volkan, and HyoIl found great success over 10k. Kevin, Mark, Tonya, Bokhwa, Deanna, Rebecca, and Michelle all took on the 23.6k to the 800m summit, and all came in with big and well-justified smiles on their faces. I acted as official photographer, but ended up spending much of the day being greeted and photographed by gaggles of giggling teenagers.

In great Korean race-day fashion, an odd assortment of door prizes were claimed at the end. Deanna won a 4kg bag of rice, which she promptly regifted to an elated Bokhwa, the world's smallest most prodigious rice-eating human. A quick trip to the 7-11 for beverages and snacks, pizzas delivered to the bus, and a ride back to Seoul with a lot of laughs and some great new memories wrapped up a highly enjoyable weekend.