Picture Time!

Pictures pictures and more pictures. Finally - an opportunity for me to filter through my pics and show you some of the better ones. Granted, *I* look nice and chubby but it is all part of remembering the experience, right? :)

Team pic from the night before the race

Dianne and I at the start line

The sea of people

One of the best signs out there (besides the "GO TEAM!")

Coming out of the park onto the Great Highway and seeing that water...it was beautiful!

Me and my "Entourage" of encouragement

But I finished! And as mentioned before, in less than 3 hours. In fact, my official time was 2:53:54 where I placed 5,395 overall (out of 5,817 finishers).

As crazy as it sounds, I just found out tonight that TNT may be participating in the Disneyland Half Marathon in September.

So maybe this blog isn't over with yet...you'll just have to wait and see. :)

I DID IT!!!

After 3 months of training, I completed the Kaiser Permanente Half Marathon in San Francisco, CA earlier today. And what an adventure it was!

I promise I'll post pictures tomorrow, but I had to write this before I went to bed while it is still fresh in my mind (sort of...my brain is *really* mushy right now). :) With close to 10,000 people participating in both the half marathon and 5k, I was able to finish the 13.1 miles through Golden Gate Park and along the Great Highway in under 3 hours. UNDER 3 HOURS!!! That's about a 13.75 minute mile. From my original hope of something around 15 minutes per mile, I smashed all of my little personal goals!

To give you a sense of how it looked, here's a picture of the course map:


(not to scale, but pretty darn close!)

I wanted to give a quick shout out to the some folks as well (finally! I get to give my acceptance speech! ha):

To my running partner, Dianne - thanks for being there and for pushing me along. And especially for being patient with me as I took those extra walk breaks. Without you (and your Garmin!), the journey would not have been as enjoyable.

To the TNT coaches, Tim, Hao & Kris - a huge thanks for kicking our asses each week at Tuesday night clinics and for giving me to tools to do the training right. A lot of my injury prevention/minimization is because of you. And a special thanks to Tim & Hao for being there during the race and to Tim for reminding me about why I was doing this. For Karen.

To the TNT Training Captains, Community Captains, Mentors & Simone - thanks for being the cheerleaders that you are. To have a few of you run with us along the course and hold some conversation makes a world of difference.

To TNT in general - it is awesome to hear you cheer for anyone in a TNT shirt. Little things like that mean a lot.

To the Honorees - you are why I do this and I thank you for sharing your stories and encouragement with us.

To Josh & Kyra - I love you. And I know you love me. That's all that matters and everything is right in the world. Thank you for your support in all of this.

And lastly (but not least), to CYN & SMNB - for hanging in there and completely this with me. You are both supremely strong women and I have to give you major props for walking back and then running a bit with me to the finish line. I thank you from the bottom of my heart for being there and seeing this through.

And thank you. Yes you. For you, the reader of this blog, is who I write for (well, a bit for myself too so I can remember these types of things) and I hope that I inspire you to do something like this someday. At least once in your life. Just once. :)

'Twas the night before...

Just a quick note to capture what I'm thinking. After spending a long and wonderful day filled with laughter, tears (the Honoree stories just hit you in the right spot), and great food, it is the night before the race. So to commemorate, here's a little poem:

'Twas the night before the final race
And all through ARN's place
We watched 'Music and Lyrics'
With a smile on our face.

It was a way for us to relax
It was a way to cut the stress
Thinking about what's coming up
Thinking about our clothing, our dress

Tomorrow's the big day
It's finally here!
Thank you for all your support
Thank you for all of your cheers.

I'll try to write again after the race, but don't wait with baited breadth. 13.1 miles is going to be the longest I've ever ran in my life.

And I know it won't be the last time. :)

Butterflies

"Finally I'm a beautiful butterfly!"
- Heimlich (from Disney/Pixar's 'A Bug's Life')

Hee hee. I'm not talking about Heimlich as a butterfly (but he is hilarious!)...but the little rascals that are fluttering around in my stomach as I think about the big race! I can't believe it is only 3 days away. Friday. Saturday. SUNDAY!!!

I know I keep saying that, but it's true. :)

I've been trading emails back and forth with my friends around the logistics of both Saturday and Sunday. Needless to say, as we start to firm up plans, the little buggers in my tummy start flitting around more and more. My brain has shut down, but my body is ready to go!

I think I'm most excited about saying, "I DID IT!" To shout out to the world that I did what I set out to do. I *am* turning into a beautiful butterfly (but with bigger wings), just like Heimlich.

Remembering the last official Long Run

Today marks the official last Long Run for us before the actual race (which is just a week away) - EEEEE! I have to admit that it was a bittersweet moment. The run was actually quite beautiful. We ran in Santa Cruz from Natural Bridges to the Boardwalk then back and the entire time, I had my camera. I made a conscious decision to pack it in my pocket to commemorate this momentous event and to see if I can carry it so I can take pictures next week, too!

So here are some pictures from the day...


(some breaking sun through the overcast)


(my running partner, Dianne - the Garmin Guru)


(CYN joining us at our pace to "take it easy :) )

And, have I ever mentioned that on the long runs, they mark the course for us? What's brilliant is that some of the captains run earlier than us and mark the course with chalk arrows and mile markers so we know how far to go and where to turn around at. Like this one:


(proof that I made it to the 4 mile turnaround - hee hee)

But the best ones to see are the motivators which look like this:



Not too bad, huh? To have a few pictures (there are more but I'm afraid of making this post too long!) to remember what transpired. I think I'm one of those people who is OK living through the lens. Perhaps it is a fear of not remembering or maybe it is that I love cameras (I *am* Japanese, after all - ha!) but for today, I'm glad that I had it and I think I'm going to have it next week.

So, one more week. Two send-off/commemoration events. One Tuesday Night Clinic. And lots of days of rest! The countdown is on!!! :)

Weird Science

I'm feeling compelled to write as I think about what more I need to buy from one of my favorite stores, Sports Basement. (See? I like it so much that I even hyperlinked it! Ooohh...Ahhhh...) . This all goes back to an earlier post about how running long distances is all about experimentation. Literally. What to drink and eat that won't make me cramp, have to pee every 20 steps (I know, I know, "TMI! TMI!" but don't worry - there are much worse things I could have written - ha!), or hallucinate. Yes. That does happen to some people.

For some reason, I want to share with you what hasn't worked for me. Emphasis on *FOR ME* as I've already shared that everyone's bodies work in different ways.

• Fruit punch Gatorade - Really, this should be any non-lemon or non-lemon-lime Gatorade. Just too sweet and too much. I seem to be OK with the lemon based ones. Probably a throwback to my childhood where that was like the only flavor available and all of the parents thought they should give it to us when we were playing sports. Remember AYSO days? Yeah...you know what I'm talkin' bout!
  
• Gummy Candy - Man, I learned a lesson about that. I need salt/electrolytes, not sugar or else HORRIBLE headaches later in the day. But those darn little bears just look at me at the aide stations saying, "Eat me! I'm nice and sweet!" Evil, I tell you! Just evil! :)
  
• Only water - I know. Strange. But after my headache-y long run, I realized that only water doesn't cut it. It just goes right through (so back to the "every 20 steps then pee comment") and that's not good. I need some water but other things too.
  

So, what exactly does work?

• Drinking electrolytes - Definitely during a long run, but here's the tricky part. What kind? Watered down Gatorade (lemon-y, of course) seems OK, but I'm hoping something else will be better. Maybe cytomax? Maybe Nuun?
• Eating - My snacking will need to be something salty like pretzels or for that something sweet and satisfying desire, Cliff Bars - cut into tiny pieces. I'm also going to buy and try the little Luna Moons. The gummy treat with carbs, sodium and potassium! All.."yums" :)

I'll keep experimenting. Only 3 weeks until the big run! I actually got teary eyed thinking about crossing the finish line last night. Go Team!

It's Taper Time!

I've completed 12 miles!!!!!!!!!

Who hoo!! That means that yesterday, I completed enough mileage to make me feel even that much more confident about my ability to finish a half marathon and so, for the next few weeks, my long distance mileage tapers down to shorter long distances (like 6-8 miles, 4-6 miles) in preparation of the main event. :) Can you believe that I'm actually saying a "short" distance is 4-6 miles???? OMG...I can't believe it. Remember, a half marathon is 13.1 miles so yesterday, I only had 1.1 miles left (a little over 4x around a track). Soooo do-able!

Thank you. Thank you. I'd like to thank the Academy, my agent, and oh yeah, Team in Training and my running partner, Diane. There was (and will be) some pain (OK, a *lot* of pain), but there's been no tears, no blood (thank goodness!) and a lot of sweat but boy do I feel good. So in homage to all that is great and good, here's something just for all of us.