Wednesday, August 18, 2010

T-Shirt Tuesday & The Race to the End of the Race: Eighth Royals Game of 2010 in Review

Yesterday I went to my eighth Royals game of the year.  My friend Lane and I took advantage of another deal on tickets and got some good seats cheap (Field Box, third base side).  It was another T-Shirt Tuesday which meant another free T-Shirt.  Aside from a fitted hat, all my Royals gear has been free (I got at games or during Royals chapel).  Can't go wrong with that at all.

The funny part about this game was this:  So Lane and I got to the stadium just as the gates opened.  We got our T-Shirts and went to our seats.  We sat down and were looking around.  We see this guy with a headset on and a Royals polo shirt walk over and ask us if we'd be interested in doing one of the games between innings.  We were like sure.  He said it was the Inflatable Slugggurrr race.  Basically it's these blow up suits that look like the mascot Slugggurrr and people are to run two laps out at the Little K (small ballpark for kids) in the suits.  He asked us to stand up to check our heights and he told Lane "Yeah you're great." and he looked at me "You'll be okay" because the preferred height for this was 5'5" to 5'10" (and I'm 6').  So he had us sign a waiver and said meet over by the Little K in the middle of the 2nd inning.

Middle of the 2nd inning we walk over and meet up with the guy.  He has us go onto the field of the Little K and look into a camera there and wave to the camera so they could tape us and the fans could see our faces since we'd be in the suits during the event.  At about the end of the 3rd, they strapped out feet into the suits put a thing on our backs like a backpack and started getting us into the suits and inflated them.  I was in the "Royal blue" Slugggurrr while Lane was in the "Powder blue" Slugggurrr (there usually is a 3rd suit but it's out of commission right now).  The middle of the 4th was when the race took place.  The real Slugggurrr was there along with Tim, the "host" and also several members of the K Crew (who help with giveaways and entertainment stuff).  He tells us beforehand to "run as hard as we can and have a great race".  When the time comes it's a countdown and then we're off.  I start slow the first lap mainly because I'm having to look down a little because the line of sight is lower than I am and I was still trying to get a feel for the suit.  I round the cone that I started from to complete the first lap and I started to pick up speed.  When I rounded the cone to start the home stretch I just ran as hard as I could in that suit.  When I got to the end I was a little tired but I found out I won the race.  I could look out and see Slugggurrr standing in front of me waiving the flag and then he bopped me in the head gently with it.  They then got us out of the suits and I was handed an envelope for winning and Lane for runner-up.  I got back to my seat and opened up the envelope.  It had a couple of coupons for KC Masterpiece products and a $25 dollar gift card from Hy-Vee.  Not bad at all. (The race to the end of the race in the title is a reference to Homestar Runner in case you didn't catch it)

The game itself was pretty good.  Zack Grienke pitching is always a good night and he got a quality start.  It was another low scoring game but two solo home runs made the difference.  Soria came in for the save and it was good times.  Royals end up winning the game 2-1.  The other highlight was they were playing Cleveland which meant Trevor Crowe was playing, our favorite Cleveland Indian player.  He did get a double in the game so that was cool.

Overall the Royals are now 4-4 in games I've been to (3-0 when I wear the powder blue jersey, last night wore the royal blue jersey so it's 1-0) and for teams I've rooted for the record is 6-2.  Good times abound!

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