Last Friday we went to a bar in Utrecht called Stairway to Heaven where they were hosting Rock Karaoke. Basically, there was a band with a list of songs they could play and no lead singer, and you could sign up to sing on stage. I'm not nearly brave enough (even after a few drinks) but my dear friends Laura and Linda had enough guts for not only one, but two songs! Check 'em out!!
Go to 12:53 to see our stars!
This past weekend Sander and I took part in the Batavierenrace. It's a 185km relay race from Nijmegen to Enschede. Here's the approximate route:
Basically this is how it works: there are three shifts and each shift has 9 or so runners. There is one person on a bike for the whole shift going alongside each runner and there's someone driving a van carrying the rest of the team. The van meets up with the runner at the end of each distance to switch runners. Our team had a tandem bike so we could have two runners out a time. This saved a lot of hassle for our drivers because we only had to stop in at every second checkpoint.
Our shift started at midnight on Friday and we ran all night long (we even ran through part of Germany at one point). I completed my leg of the race around 2am, and I was very happy with my time. I ran 8.5km in 44:08 which works out to about 11.2km/h. We had some really amazing runners on the team who were able to average around 14.5km/h which is absolutely beyond insane. Needless to say, we kicked some serious ass and at the end of the shift, our team was in 25th place out of 382 teams!
This was the lovely night team!
Me at the beginning of my distance, though I'm sure you could tell on your own based on the smile I have on my face. I can tell you for sure, that smile was gone by the end.
All in all, the Batavierenrace was amazing. I had so much fun and I would jump at the opportunity to do it again. While training, I vowed to myself that this was my last race of the year because I'm sick of running, but the whole experience has done the opposite. It has inspired me to keep running and train harder. I plan on doing at least one more 10km race before snow hits the ground.
This weekend was also the biggest national holiday in The Netherlands. On Sunday/Monday we celebrated Queen's Day. It's really just one giant street party with live music and other entertainment. Another huge tradition of Queen's Day is the Vrijmarkt (free market). To sum it up, it's the Dutch version of spring cleaning: you empty your house of all the crap and then set up a stand and sell it on Queen's Day! It's a brilliant idea, really. The novelty of rummaging through peoples junk wears off fast though, and after a few hours, Sander and I were happy to meet up with Laura and Pio to go kayaking through the canals in Utrecht. We had beautiful weather, delicious beer, and overall a really fantastic time.
Oh yeah, and I forgot to mention that everyone dresses in bright orange and decorates themselves with the most tacky and ridiculous hats they can find.
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