On Sunday morning, the Lima crew woke up at 5:30 a.m. to eat some breakfast and drink coffee. We then called an Uber to take us to the start line so we could grab our shirts and race bibs. We had plenty of time, so we walked to a gas station to drink some Gatorade and relax for thirty minutes before we warmed up. At 7:30, about a hour until the start of the race, we headed out to warm up. We ran about 3 miles and then split up to use the bathroom again and do our own pre-race drills and stretches. Finally it was 8:30 but the speaker was still still giving his speech so we started our race closer to 8:45.

Tyler took the lead of the race for the entire time and without much surprise, he won the race! Paul followed behind and took second place. Calvin wasn’t feeling his best but he still ran very well and finished in third place . As for me (Curtis), I finished in the top 20 and ran well, especially after being sick all week and only training about 15 miles the week before the race. Overall the race went well for everyone.

Afterwards, we ran a cooldown which we had to end quickly because we had to make it to the award ceremony. Tyler, Paul, and Calvin all ended up on the podium and once they got off all the Peruvains there wanted photos of us – of course we let some take photos but eventually it became OVERWHELMING and we ran to continue the cooldown in the direction of our hostal. Once again we took some awesome hot showers.

After the showers we all called our moms to share our race times and experience and before we knew it, it was 12:00 and we were hungry. So we left the apartment and walked to meet some of Tyler’s friends. We grabbed some lunch at a nice seafood restaurant by the beach. We all ordered different foods to taste including ceviche and grilled octopus – these two were the favorites! Finally we were stuffed and could no longer eat so we left and walked by the beach. I had never been to the Pacific ocean before so I just had to run in – it was awesome. We then looked at our watches again and it turned out to be 2:30 so we had to leave the beach and go to the Internet café to grab our boarding passes for the plane. Then we walked through a few of the nicer areas of Lima and again the time flew by and we were getting closer to flying back to Pisac. So we went back to the apartment, grabbed our luggage and went to the Lima airport once again. We flew right back to Cusco and found a taxi to take us to Pisac for a good price. We arrived back in Pisac at 8:03 pm and it was perfect timing to sing Jenny happy birthday. Next we listened to Lauren give her Strive talk.

Now it’s time to hear about the Pisac crew’s story. They woke up in the morning to celebrate Jenny’s 21st birthday they ran 21 kilometers from Pisac to Calca. Then they went to the Blue Llama to eat all-you-can-eat pancakes, which sadly they were out of. So they had to order regular pancakes which they enjoyed even with the disappointment of missing the all-you-can-eat deal. After, Katie still wasn’t tired and she decided to attend the Pisac animal fair. She found multiple crazy things there. One of her favorite sites was the women dancing with horses. As Katie watched these dances, Scott worked on his hype video of the boys’ workout which he filmed on Wednesday and is excited to upload once we regain WiFi in the hostal. Later in their day Scott got a sweet haircut and everyone relaxed again, until the whole crew (minus Tyler) met back up at 8:03pm. Monday, the interns went back to work starting with waking up in the morning to run, then going to work at the school, eating lunch, then teaching at Strive Center, and finally running with the running club.