Brett and I drove up to Sacramento to stay with friends the night before the race. The morning of the race we piled in the car at 5 am. Me and Brett in the front seat (he drove since I’m the better navigator), and Zona, our friend Spencer and his dog Davis squeezed in the back. We arrived at the race site with plenty of time.  I was worried about registering and setting my stuff up on time.  This was such a small race, the registration when very smoothly and my stuff was set up in no time.

I was able to hang out with Brett, Spencer, and the puppies for a while before I started squeezing into my wetsuit.  I chit-chatted with other athletes, the atmosphere was awesome, compared with big races where everything always seems tense in the transition area.

We made our way down to the water, the race director went over the course instructions and then attempted to very confusingly describe the swim course.  Looking at the water it just looked like there were random buoys  scattered around the water with some islands poking out in between him. “does he want us to go behind the island?”  ”are we going clockwise or counter clockwise?”  ”what do we do about the buoy in the middle?” people were semi-panicking about the unclear swim course, so the race director had  a jet ski drive around the course for us to watch. I always figure I’m not going to be first, so….I’ll just follow people.

There was a little count down and then we all just shuffled in the water over the timing mats.  There was about 2 feet of dock under the water, as soon as the dock ended it was just piles of SHARP rocks about 4 inches under water……ummm…I couldn’t just dive in…..but the rocks were cutting the *%&$ out of my feet.  I finally got in deep enough to dive under. WHOA! THAT’s COLD! WHOA. OH GEEZE. OK. MAN THEY WEREN’T being babies when they said it was cold.  OK, SWIM HARD. I CAN’T FEEL MY FACE! OUCH. I HATE THIS. WHY DO I DO THESE. I HATE cold water. UGH.  I seriously said all that in my head until at least the first bouy.  Those of you who have ever swam with me know I HATE getting wet.  I love to swim….and I’ll gladly swim in cold water.  But I HATE the initial act of getting wet.  At swim practice EVERYDAY, I dip my toes in and dance around on the edge until someone threatens to splash me or Coach Jay tells me to get in.

I started warming up, it was so nice having room to swim and not feel crowded by people.  I started enjoying the brisk water, and the beautiful sun shining across the water.  I started to love racing. I was practicing all my swim techniques that Coach Jay is always working with me on.  Relax my arms in the air, reach and grab the water.  I was remembering how he tells me I’m good at chasing people. So that’s what I did. I started chasing people. One by one.  Before I knew it I was rounding the last buoy and heading into the exit.  I wasn’t looking forward to stepping on those rocks again, so I swam almost until my belly was scraping the bottom.

I ran out of the water, with minimal foot damage. I was thinking, that felt FAST! whoo!  The girl just ahead of me was jogging up the ramp, as I ran past her she was complaining to her boyfriend about how slow she was . “was I totally in the back”, “is everyone way ahead of me?”, “that was awful”.  Whine, whine, whine.  Ugh. I really wanted to beat her.  It felt like it took and eternity to get my stupid wetsuit off. I felt all jumbley and flustery in transition.  Brett was filming, and I was wondering if I looked fat. It’s hard to suck in your tummy while transitioning.

Finally on my bike and out of transition, I felt so excited to be out there. The weather was so nice. Aaaaah. Whiny-girl went past me. Ugh, great.  At least she wasn’t saying how poorly she was doing again.  Ok, so this first part is all up-hill huh? Ok, just settle in. I decided I wanted to get  a cliff-bar down in the first 10 miles, as this was  big nutrition practice day for me too. I kept thinking I’d eat when I got to a flat part of the course. Welp, it was definitely up for the first 10 miles.  Then there was a little down, and more up.  Down, up, down, up, big up, big up, down.  I was starting to think there was no way I was going to PR, and I clearly needed to eat on the ups and not wait for flats (flat doesn’t exist there). I kept checking in on my heart rate (since I’ve never actually trained and raced with a HR monitor before). I was pretty excited to see I was staying in or around Zone 3 and not feeling like I was blowing up.  The miles ticked by, and I was feeling great. The scenery was beautiful, the weather was warm, but not too hot.  I was just LOVING the day! I was hoping to go sub-3 hours on the bike.  I could tell at the last turn-around at mile 28, that it wasn’t going to happen.  I was still feeling good about my pacing and effort though, knowing that this was a much more difficult course than my PR course.  My total bike time ended up being 3:09:53.  According to the results page, there were some problems with several peoples chips, mine included. They only have me in and out of transition for the swim and the bike.  So my swim time is listed as 34:39, but that is including transition, and bike time included using the bathroom in transition.

Looking at the other girls times, I think I swam about a 29 to 30 minute swim,  which is a great time for me. I think my garmin said 3:04 or 3:05 for total bike time.

On to the run, I was surprised to feel pretty great after such a hilly bike ride.  Unfortunately the run was the bike course.  Only 3 miles out and back times 2, so it was up & down, and up & down, and up & down, and..you get the picture for 13.1 miles.  I felt pretty great until the 2nd loop, I was starting to get really hot and my legs were feeling the hills.  On my way out on the first loop I was running about an 8:30 to 8:40 pace, on that pace I was thinking I’d be pretty close to a PR despite my non-PR on the bike course.  Unfortunately that pace didn’t stick I ended up running a 2 hour 1/2 marathon to finish with a 5:42:22.  This was good enough for 6th place over-all woman and 2nd place in my age group. 1st through 3rd place in each age group won  a bottle of wine, and supposedly there’s a plaque in the mail.  I still haven’t received it?

Oh, and I beat the whiny girl. I passed her on the bike around mile 4 and she stayed right there right behind me like a good whiner.

I don’t have any pictures from the weekend, but Brett did some video of me so maybe he will help me put together a video clip of the race. *hint hint wink*

Click here to view the embedded video.

So, naturally, one of my favorite times of the year is Halloween, because there are so many opportunities to dress up!  When dressing up and working out collide I almost don’t know what to do with myself.

Today was one of those days!  The Fresno State Triathlon Team hosted the Halloween Dog Jog!  Talk about FUN!.  I threw on an old ROCKY BALBOA costume I made a few years ago,  and ran out the door with Zona.     Zona hasn’t really proved to be the best running partner.  Either she tries to trip me, eat the leash while flying through the air in front of me (also results in tripping), flops on the ground and refuses to go, or drags me down the road at warp-speed.

So today was a big day for Miss Zona.  I thought worst case scenario she can sit in the car and wait while I race….she seemed so pumped to run though,  and it was a small race so I thought it was a good opportunity to break her into the running scene.

First of all, she really needs to work on her pacing….she BOLTED from the start-line barking and dragging me.  I have to say I was a little nervous.

Then she became enthralled with the cows on the Fresno State farm, I was worried I would have to end up dragging her down the course away from the cows.  Before I knew it, a person passed us, and my girl shined like a little competitive running super star and wasn’t going to let the pass happen.  Really, she probably only chased the person down due to the fact that this person looked like a HUGE TOY!  Halloween runs can be very exciting for dogs, let me tell you.

So, Miss Zona and I ended our day with a MEDAL for 1st place in my age group.  I got to dress-up and I got to run, so I’m a happy girl.   On another note, I did my VO2 max test yesterday (I wish I got pictures of that) and coach is working on my Training plan for November YAHOO!  Look out IM CDA!

I made it.  I made it to the NIKE women’s marathon and I made it THROUGH the NIKE women’s marathon, well half-marathon.  This race is very near and dear to my heart because it was my first FULL MARATHON way back in 2005, wahoo!  I loved ALL of it,  I always wanted to come back to race it again!!! Many of my BIG dreams started there!  Maybe I COULD qualify for Boston? Maybe I COULD race and Ironman?!

This year’s race was supposed to be very exciting and fun.  I was planning to race at NWM (that’s what I’m calling it because I’m tired of writing it ok?)….back to the story….I was planning to race the full marathon this year.  I got really excited because…

1. I was going to get to race this race again, plain and simple.

2. This was going to be my first SOLO-marathon (marathon without an IM attached) since 2006!

3. Including my two IM races this would be a marathon distance run every year for the past 5 years!

Now, don’t those three things sounds exciting?!?!?!?  I was JAZZED! Then I found out I had a racing buddy doing it too.  Life couldn’t get better.  Well, a couple hundred-ish miles of running later, we all know the story of my stinkin’ plantar fascia and it’s plans to ruin my life.

After battling with The Fascia (I’m calling it that), I almost immediately wrote the full marathon off, but for a LONG time still planned to race the 1/2.  I mean, c’mon when “The Fascia” started acting up, I was already running 13 mile long-runs. Piece of cake right?  Well…Lefty over there (I’m talking about my left foot) didn’t agree.  Race day was fast approaching and I wasn’t running AT ALL.  Like ZERO miles for the past month and a half. gasp!  I was, however, water running, elipticaling, and cycling up a storm (more stories on those things to come), oh and not P90Xing (more on that too….I know I know…where are the HOT-Katy pictures? I don’t want to talk about it).

Suddenly it was race week, and I started panicking.  I REALLY wanted my TIFFANY’s necklace….and they always have great race shirts….but could I trust myself to NOT RUN…to save my foot?  Could  I walk a half-marathon…..how long does that take anyways?  It sounded REALLY boring. Almost torturous….to go to a RUNNING race and WALK and watch everyone else LOVING being able to RUN. UGH!   What had I done to deserve this!?

I went over every possible plan with Brett, about how I would/could walk this race.  Really, I didn’t think I’d be able to run the whole thing AND I thought it would be better for my foot to walk it.   So I talked about alternating running and walking  a mile at a time, then running three, walking one, etc, etc.   Literally, I think my wonderful Brett sat through me saying each and every possible scenario of how to run walk 13 miles (thank you!).

Race morning, my plan was to run three miles then see how I felt and then jog/walk the rest of the way.  Well,  I LOVE RUNNING!!!!!  So…when I got to mile three, I kinda decided that I should probably run to mile 6 since that was where the hills were.  Then at mile six, I decided to just run THAT hill….then the next one was so small that…..then I before I knew it I was at mile TEN….so I just kinda finished the race without walking.  I did stop and take LOTs o’ Pictures.  My foot feels the same (if not better) which is weird, but I’m totally ok with it.

My pictures from the weekend don’t really “go with” the actual blog so I’m just posting them here at the bottom.

Just Us Girls La Femme Sportive

Sporting our new gear!

Beautiful views looking back at the Embarcadero from the top of mile 6ish.

These signs were so fun to read on the hills!

Looking down on the finish line from mile 9.

Celebrating with Kristen and Cheree

Kristen ran the full marathon and Cheree ran the 1/2

(but only because she ran a full last weekend!)