We arrived at Town Hall Brewery early. This wasn't entirely my own fault. It's my fathers, and I'm merely the victim of genetics.
We were able to walk right up to the registration table, sign away our life in exchange for two t-shirts and matching numbers 2612. We dutifully pinned the numbers to the front of our tshirts. After walking the new "
Great Urban Race" t-shirts to the Subie. We sat outside in anticipation of pre-race announcements. It was 11, we were set to start at 12 pm.
Soon more participants arrived. Some were like us, in matching t-shirts. others were in full costumes of varying tastes and efforts. Obama and McCain joined forces on the race which was nice to see some unity, although I'm sure noone cheered for them to win. We served as a case study for the power of suggestion. As we ordered drinks immediately after we saw two racers with a bloody mary and a screwdriver. Raeann and Mark found us. After they signed in, they joined our table. As I was approaching the bottom of my second screwdriver the race announcements started and the clue envelopes were handed out.
The race is set up that you're given 12 clues to 12 separate destinations in town. Each is different. Some require you to have your picture taken in front of a place, person, thing, others send you to a park and ask you to complete a stunt.
We worked together to solve the clues and quickly decided to head for our first destination. Eliot Park. We were pretty sure we knew where it was, so we ran right for it. Unfortunately, the park we thought was Eliot Park was actually Franklin Steele Square. After a few phone calls and bit of running we found Eliot Park, Phew! This clue "closed at 1" and we made it with 10-15 minutes to spare. At Eliot Park each teammmate had to balance an apple on our head and walk 10 yards without touching or dropping the apple.
After completing this stunt we worked on our next clue. This one was a cryptogram involving the movie, "Fargo". We deciphered without completely solving the clue that we needed to take our picture in front of a sign on a parking ramp used in the movie. Again, we consulted friends and family who uniformly had us heading to the Daytons (now Macys) parking ramp. We ran a few blocks and were informed that in fact it was the Minneapolis Club parking ramp. We ran back a block and snapped the picture.
Next we were off to our 3rd stop. This clue was something like, "Take your picture next to the statue of the person mentioned in the hit Weezer song." That wasn't hard. Had to be the Mary Tyler Moore statue. What out of town based contest couldn't have picked that? Again here a photo of both of us with the bronze MTM.
Next clue we tackled was getting a photo of 4 people doing cartwheels in front of Candyland. We could have opted for this or getting a photo of 12 people in front of the orpheum. Since there we already some people doing cartwheels and we were there this was easy. Or, I guess to be fair, easy for me. Shawn and Raeann had to do cartwheels.
Next we were off to GameWorks to find a Game called Monkey Ball, and get our picture with it. We stood in a short line of racers and got our photos snapped. We also had to get 3 tickets from any game. There was a guy handing out tickets from skeeball. Not sure if he worked there or was just a bystander helping out. Either way we were out of the quickly.
The next clue we tackled was a riddle. It went something like this, "Juan like Dr. Pepper, but not Coke. He likes Strawberries but not Watermelon. He eat Cheese but not Milk. He likes pepper but not salt." We then were instructed to take a photo of both teammates in front of a street sign that Juan would like. We noted that old Juan like things with double letters, like pePPer, beRRies, chEEse, etc. So we took a picture of ourselves in front of a Hennipen Avenue street sign.
I'll have to say it was nice to have Raeann and Mark with us as we were able to get our photos taken quickly and didn't have to get bystanders or wait for another team.
We were off to Loring Park. As a team we had to hop on these skis that had ropes attached and walk them 20 yards or so. We made quick work of this and quickly went to the next stop.
The sculpture garden. Again, what out of town hosted race couldn't resiste the allure of the spoon and cherry sculpture. The clue was to have your photo take in front of the sculpture picture on the GreatUrbanRace website. Check!
Next we needed to scoot on up to Golooneys pizza. Before we got to Galooneys we had to have our photo taken at the park across the street from the pizzeria. We were instructed to count the benches in the park and hold up the number of fingers equaling the number of benches. I don't recall how we solved to go this park, but Shawn figured it out and counted the benches.
Now! On to Galooneys. The task here was to have one teammate feed the other a slice of pizza. Shawn fed me a bite and a bystander took our picture. Deliciouso! I devoured the rest while we waited for bus to take us back down Hennepin. Man the pizza was GOOD. We hopped the bus, this was the only bus ride for us.
Our next and last stop was to get our picture taken in front of the name and address for the Campbell Mithun building. We ran 9th to the building with Mark and Raeann. Took our last picture and ran back to Town Hall Brewery. On this run we somehow lost Mark and Raeann. I think they may have taken a slightly different route. Shawn and I zig zagged through Twins traffic and mercifully made it back to the finish/start.
Since we were allowed to skip one stop, we deleted the picture of us holding the number of benches (although we found out we got it right). After a review of our photos (yeah no errors!), we sad down outside for refreshments. Kevin and Heather joined us. It sounded like they had a great time as well! Beer, sweet potato fries (SWEET) and goat cheese nachos (wonderful!). It didn't take long and we got a bit cold. So we moved inside for more beer and a bit of warmth.
We bought a growler of oatmeal stout on the way out and listened to the awards. We were disappointed we didn't get top 25. I think we would have it we hadn't had the mix up finding Eliot Park, but whatever. We had fun, and beer and food. I think Team Mabusi would do it again if they return in 2009!
And we got in 9 miles!
After throughly testing the machine throughout the top floor of Dicks Sporting goods in Bloomington, riding the bike to and into the elevator, riding out and a another lap of Dicks 1st floor; he was convinced. After Mom and Dad paid for the orange beauty he rode it through the front doors, to the car in the parking lot. This now reminds me of his Uncle Pauls first car. Ask him about it, he loves to tell the story. Also ask him about Tang cake.
