Behind the Scenes at a Go Girls Race

As loyal followers of our blog will know, a number of Go Girls recently participated in Harry's Spring Run-off. We had a great showing at the race, and I promise to post details soon. But first I thought it would be appropriate to salute all the people behind the scenes at races and in our own club. To the volunteers at all races: thank you! Without you, we could not participate in races. Thank you for getting to the race site early and staying late. Thank you for pouring water and removing our timing chips and handing out race kits. We appreciate all that you do and the Go Girls hope to return the favour by volunteering at a race soon.

Volunteers, we salute you!

Now, what you may not know is that the Go Girls has its own "behind the scenes" support crew. We refer to our support crew as the Designated Husband or "DH". Normally, the role of the DH is to save tables for us at whatever coffee shop or restaurant or bar we happen to be frequenting after a training run or race. For example, on Saturday mornings, Alain saves tables for us at Timothys. At races, the DH does a little bit of everything. I thought I would show you all the ways that our DH supports us at our races. At the end of this post, you will understand why we are so grateful to our DH.

At Harry's SRO, our DH was Joanna. That's right: when the Toronto Go Girls race, even our DH is a Girl...er, woman. So meet Joanna...





Joanna came to Harry's SRO with the sole intention of cheering us on and holding our stuff. She could have stayed home, in bed. But she didn't. For that, we are very grateful. Thanks, Joanna!!









So what exactly does a DH (like Joanna here) do before, during, and after the race? Read on to find out.

One of the things that our DH does is take photos for us. Here is an example of our DH's photographic skills:

As you can see, the DH has great photographic subjects to work with. (Not!). So the DH must be content with taking photos of feet with timing chips and before and after race shots. (Stay tuned for the before and after shots: coming soon to a blog near you!)

Photography is just the beginning of the DH's duties, however. A far more important duty is the official "stuff holder". There are moments before or after a race when we runners need someone to hold our stuff. Like when we all head to the bathrooms...everyone, that is, except for the DH, who must wait with us in the line for the Port-o-Loos (close to the icky, chemical smell of portable potties)...

The Canada Running Series slogan should be: "Race with an empty bladder and clean hands! We bring portable hand washing stations with our johns!"

While we use the johnny-on-the-spots, our DH holds our stuff. It's not an easy task. How much stuff can four runners have? You'd be surprised.










The DH accompanies the runners to the start of the race, where the DH makes sure we enter the right corral and wishes us good luck.

Our DH is on the left, wearing the blue back pack (only one of many things she will carry on race day). She is drinking coffee (or maybe vodka), trying desperately to stay awake (or amused, as the case may be).

The DH sees us off at the start of the race. She even tolerates the piping in of the runners. (Yes, that is a real live bagpiper and no, we do not know what he wore under his kilt.)

And because the DH is lucky, she also gets to see Toronto's favourite metrosexual, Jack Layton following the bag piper. Ah, politician sightings: the morning was not a total loss!

After all this excitement, what does the DH do? Well, she waits.

The race begins. The DH watches the runners go by. First, there are just a few runners.

But soon, there are a lot of runners. And in this mass of runners, the DH is expected to pick out the Go Girls and cheer them on. It's not an easy task. The runners stream by.

There are runners in green shirts.

And there are runners in Hawaiian shirts....and in green shirts underneath Hawaiian shirts.










There are runners in suits.















And then there are some runners who look like they could use some money to buy a suit.















There are runners wearing fur...















There are even bananas. BANANAS!

And as all of these runners pass the DH, she waits...

And she waits...

And she waits. Until she cannot wait any longer. All she can do is dream about her runners...and running Bananas. Ah, to sleep and perchance to dream...

But soon enough, it is time to head to the finish line, where the DH will cheer us in and then later meet us to celebrate our victory.

Yes, this group of runners -- this motley crew of runners, with medals proudly hanging from our necks -- this group is the group that our DH supported. But by now you must surely know the truth: we're not the ones who should be given a medal.

Our DH deserves the medal.

A very special thanks to our DH for taking photos, holding onto stuff, waiting, cheering, then waiting again, then cheering, then waiting and waiting and waiting, and then finally taking more photos. We couldn't have had such a great race without you.

THANK YOU.