"Local Celebrity:" Soldier Field 10mile recap

I got my first job weeks after turning 16.  LifeTime Fitness in Algonquin had just been built and it only seemed natural for me to work in a fitness setting.  For those unfamiliar with LifeTime, it's basically a health club that has everything: indoor pool, outdoor pool, free weights, cardio equipment, group fitness classes, basketball courts, rock wall climbing, cafe, hair salon, child car...everything.  My job was to work the front desk: greet people, set them up with the Membership Advisors, and make sure they get a nice "have a good day!" on the way out.

One of my favorite Membership Advisors I ever worked with was named Kurt.  He was as sarcastic as me and was just getting into running, so really actually enjoyed hearing about my high school racing (as opposed to others who just chatted to chat).  After a few months of working together, he gave me the nickname of "Local Celebrity" as he had seen my name in the paper in the Prep section a few times.

Being 16/17, I thought this was the coolest thing ever...I mean, who doesn't want to be some sort of celebrity?  (again, I'm 16/17 here)  But that phrase stuck with me even when I'd come home for college breaks.  

And Saturday, May 25th I found out the meaning of "local celebrity."

At 7am on Saturday, May 25, 2013, I took off for the craziest 10miles of running I have ever experienced.  But let's back track just a tiny bit as this race almost didn't happen...

On Monday, May 21st, I decided to ask Coach Bill if running the Soldier Field 10mile would be okay with my BIG 70.3 just weeks away (June 9th).  Given how well I've been able to recover, Bill said, "let's DO this" and I proceeded to sign up.  Long story short, Ryan picked up my bib on Wednesday but it was not an Elite Athlete Start, so I was a little concerned as awards are based off of gun time and not chip time (trust me, this can make a HUGE difference in a tight race as I knew this one would be).  I emailed the race director with help from a few friends and was told to pick up my new Elite bib on Friday.

I went to pick up my bib and was asked in a rude tone, "YOU'RE an elite athlete?"  I do sometimes overreact to things, but this time I promise you the tone was just as I present it.  I was looked at up and down when the lady said this, so I felt really stupid.  I showed the email correspondence to prove that I wasn't just some Joe Schmoe claiming to be an Elite, but really just felt humiliated.

Don't get me wrong.  I know that I do not have the standard running body (I honestly never have)...I enjoy eating way too much...but for whatever reason, that really hurt.  I texted Ryan as soon as I got my packet, telling him, "I'm giving it everything I have to win tomorrow.  I'll show them I'm an elite gosh darn it."  

**The reason I mention this is because I plan on blogging about running misconceptions soon, as SO many close to me have had their running suffer due to stereotypes and trying to fit them.  Stay tuned for that.

Back to Soldier Field.

I stayed at my brother's place on Friday night since his roommate was pacing a friend the next day.  Nic gave me his set of keys so that I could go out and get some food on my own time.  I went to Jak's Tap for a burger and beer (pre-race ritual), watched the Cubs game and headed to bed.  Somewhere throughout the night, Nic and his roommate separated so Nic called me to get into his place.  When I woke up for the actual race, I felt exhausted.  Not good.  Ryan had commented that maybe I should use Saturday as a "sleep in" day since I rarely get those, but being the stubborn person I am, I signed up for SF10 instead.  At 5:30am on Saturday, I was really regretting that decision.

Nic drove me to Soldier Field and I weeded my way through the crowd of runners.  I spotted Mary and Andres while plowing through the bathroom line, said a quick hello and had barely enough time to get a 5min jog in.  I was a little nervous until I spotted Coach Bill, who told me to, "Just use the first few miles to get in your groove, treat it as your warmup."  Probably the best thing he could have told me as I was a little nervous about my legs at this point.

At 6:55, the Elite Corral opened up and we did a few strides before the gun went off.  When the gun went off, a sea of green passed by me (Fleet Feet Women's team) and I latched onto the pack. I settled in and began feeling pretty darn good, just like I had at U of I for the 1/2 marathon a month earlier.  

Mile 1- 5:54.  I felt pretty relaxed, and we had a pretty darn good pack: my Saucony teammate Columba Montes, Fleet Feet runners Pam Staton, Melissa Hardesty, Rachel Velarde and New Balance team runner Kristen Heckert.  All of these girls are phenomenal runners and I had raced each one except for Melissa, so I knew we would have a tight group for quite some time (I predicted at Mile 5 we'd cut our group down a little, and by Mile 7 we'd be looking at the top 3).

Mile 2- 5:57.  Dave Schaefers, Mick Brown and Joe Vukits (DPFT teammates) were all right by us, pulling us through.  Staying tight.

Mile 3- 5:53.  Rachel and Kristen were leading us with the pack of guys, but it was hard to get around or reposition at this point.

Mile 4-5:57.  I planned on taking my gel at Mile 6...and had to open it now.  I don't know what was going on with my legs, but I just wasn't feeling it.  Mind over matter.  Stop over thinking things.  GET MOVING. Start taking your gel and get over it.

Mile 5-5:49. OOPS.  Well, as predicted, this is where we lost a few of our pack.  Crossing the timing mat at Mile 5, Kristen and Melissa and I were starting to run 3 across with guys behind us and in front of us.  Teammate Rich Siok was a great target and super positive throughout (thanks:)).

Mile 6-5:55.  I sipped more of my gel before throwing it away at this point.  I know it's 100% mental, but MAN did my legs start feeling better after each sip I took.

Mile 7-5:56.  Just before we hit mile 8, I got clipped and thought I was for sure falling.  Luckily, I was on the outside on the right so didn't interfere with Kristen or Melissa, but I was seriously close to falling.  My stride altered a bit, which made me nervous for the remaining few miles.

Mile 8-5:59.  This mile was one of the bigger struggles.  At the beginning of this race, I had planned on staying in a pack and trying to take off after mile 8 if I had felt okay.  I knew at this point that I couldn't take off and that it would probably be a sprint finish, which scared me a bit.  I told myself to not stress, let the other girls dictate the pace, and just BELIEVE.

Our pack just after mile 9.  I'm pretty sure our faces say it all.

Mile 9- 6:05.  Our only mile over 6.  Clearly we were all starting to feel it at this point (combined with the lovely shift in wind that we had been dealing with ever since the turnaround just before mile 5).  I knew that at 9.5, if not sooner, things would be getting ugly.

At 9.3 miles, Melissa took off.  Crap. Do I stay and hope I can out kick at the end or do I just go now? With no time to waste, I went with her.  I knew we were going at a much faster pace--sub 5:50 for sure.  I just wasn't sure if I could maintain this for the last .7miles.  The cheers kept getting louder and louder, which only motivated me to push harder and harder.  Melissa and I kept bumping into each other--THAT'S how hard we were running.  

I could see where we would be turning in to go into the stadium before being dumped onto the 50 yard line and knew what I had to do.  I sprinted just slightly ahead, took off once we got into the tunnel, and just ran like it was the last race of my life until I hit the 50 yard line.

And I did it.  I broke the tape.  Melissa finished 3 seconds behind me (gun time, 1 second, and that's what results/awards are based off of), that's how hard we worked.

Our last mile was a 5:47.  This was the same exact last mile I ran at the CARA Lakefront 10 earlier in April, but boy did it hurt much more this time around!

59:31.  The top three females all broke 60--it was unbelievable.

This race has the best prizes ever (if you're a Bears fan): personalized Bears jersey and a flag that's flown over Soldier Field.

 Top 5 men and women.

 LOVE this picture with Mark!

 High school classmates Megan and Amy ran too--it was so fun to catch up!!!

 Personalized jersey.

 Thanks for a great cool down, ladies:)

 4 of the award winners were Illini alum!!!

 Running buddy Joe:)

Pretty much sums up the race.

To tie in my beginning (Local Celebrity thing)... after the race, I swear I was talking to people until my ride called me to say it was time to go.  I met so many new people and caught up with so many others.  It was incredible and time just flew by.  I felt like a celebrity with everyone wanting to talk to me and hang out...it was such a cool feeling.  

Everyone had such kind words to say and I seriously left in tears of happiness for such an incredible day.  THANK YOU to everyone for all of the sweet messages and for making me feel so great.  I am such a lucky girl:)  Congrats again to everyone who ran this race!  And congrats to my husband who was in Elgin, winning his own 10mile race:)

One of the best parts of this race had to be the medals.  We were given medals from active service men and women.  Seriously gave me chills and made me remember the reason we are celebrating this weekend.

On that note, HAPPY MEMORIAL DAY everyone.  Let's celebrate those who keep our country safe!

2013 Debut (outdoor) Triathlon: Galena.

At some point, I figured I should probably actually do a race that involves swimming, biking and running since that's all I've been doing since January.  Saturday, May 18th was that day.

Ryan and I left after I was done with school on Friday for the 2.5hour drive to Galena.  I swear, this drive always seems so much longer than it actually is.  For some reason, we never seem to think Galena is that far away....until we are in the car at hour 2 and realize we still have over 20miles to go.  

In any case, we made it to Galena and picked up our packets with a few hours of sunlight to spare.  We decided to ride our bikes for a bit just to make sure things were working okay.  Good thing we did.  Ryan pumped up our tires and less than a minute later, his popped.  We joked how hopefully this meant it wouldn't happen to us on race day before heading out for an easy 15minute ride.  

When I say "easy 15minute ride," I'm referring to it how Ryan would.  There was nothing easy about it for me.  My legs felt so incredibly tired and sore.  My IT bands never loosened and my hamstring (yeah, the one that crushed my marathon dreams in 2012) was tight throughout the ride.  Ryan joked with me that I was finally sore because I hadn't raced last weekend....which I actually think could be true.  I have done a race every weekend since mid-April and had never been this sore, so it was strange to think that after not racing last weekend, I now felt like I had been "run over by a truck."  

I was confident in my swim and run, but in almost any triathlon, it's about the bike...which I clearly was not ready for.  I had tears in my eyes during that "easy 15minute ride" just thinking about how all of this hard work wasn't going to pay off, but also telling myself that this race is just an outdoor triathlon experience to get ready for the REAL race on June 9th.

In retrospect, I should have realized that I was on Hard Week #3 of 3 and just completed the hardest bike workout of my life on Wednesday followed by a hard tempo on Thursday, so SHOULD have been as sore as I was, but all I kept thinking was how badly I wanted Galena to be a good "debut" race for me.

In any case, I stopped my sadness and got in the car to ride the course with Ryan before heading to dinner.  The course hadn't changed too much in terms of the roads we ride on, but we did avoid one of the biggest and most challenging downhills thankfully.  Ryan got up to 60mph on this hill two years ago and it has a decently sharp turn that could really cause an accident.  Luckily, they changed this part of the course....and we ran down it instead. More on that later.

We went to our favorite pre-race place, Spike's in Eagle Ridge, where Ryan had the pasta bar and I had my standard bison burger...and some delicious raspberry beer.  We headed to our cute hotel, Stoney Creek, and met up with John and Oscar before crashing for the night.

DELICIOUS!

This year, the Galena Triathlon changed the course so that it now had TWO transitions.  Yep, you swim in the normal lake, grab your bike after throwing all of your stuff (wetsuit, goggles, swim cap, etc) into a bag labeled with your bib number, and ride your bike 17.5miles to Transition 2, where your running shoes are at.  This caused a LOT of headache for not only us, but many other triathletes on race morning.

PowerBar was a sponsor of this race, so despite the late (9am) start time, Ryan and I still had to be at the finish line by 7am to get his stuff set up.  We saw the shuttle bus (as promised) at the finish line when we arrived, and were told there'd be another one coming in about 30minutes.  7:30am catch the bus, arrive at the water at 8am, Ryan take off at 9am....sounds perfect, right?

If the bus was on time, it would have been.  However, we waited from 7:20-8am for a bus.  We saw at least 10 pass us as they headed to Remote Parking, and never came back for us.  Our friend Alejandra (and the three others who we met waiting for the bus) still had to drop their shoes off at T2, so we were getting pretty nervous.  Luckily, the volunteer that was with us got real mean after 30minutes of us waiting and called the race director to yell at her.  A bus was stopped in front of us 5minutes later.

We arrived at the race site at 8:40am....no time to test out our bikes (we left them overnight) or do much of anything besides get body marked and put on our wetsuits.  My wave wouldn't start until 9:30, but I just felt so awful for Ryan.

After seeing him come out of the water in a pack of 5 (6th/7th overall) and do an awesome flying mount on his bike to immediately take the lead out of transition, I chatted with a few friends, met my teammate Emma (coached by Bill as well) and headed to the water with my Sammy's teammate Dani.  

I never really get nervous for races, except for when they're triathlons.  My heart was beating a million miles per hour and I just wanted to get this thing over with.  Luckily, when the gun went off, I rushed into the water and was immediately in the middle of the pack (good for me, considering I would start at the back in previous years with my slow swim).  

I surprised myself and kind of got angry in the water.  Girls were hitting me and kicking me (all part of the sport), so I'd speed up and go around them. Many girls kept going off course, so I made sure to stay on the inside and make a line closest from buoy to buoy.  This strategy seemed to pay off as I came out of the water with only 5 girls ahead of me, and in a time of 9:44 (for me, for a 660, that's really good).

Transition 1 was full of large rocks and gravel.  I literally walked to my bike because I was almost crying in pain.  My feet are really sensitive, so this was pretty tough.  I learned from Jen Harrison (PHENOMENAL local triathlete) that I can just put a pair of slip on shoes out by the water and slip into those.  This will be SO beneficial and save me at least 30seconds I bet.  *always a learning experience*

I came out of transition surprisingly fast for walking, and only had 2 girls ahead of me.  I passed one (who I would continue switching places with throughout the bike; I'll call her Gatorade Girl as she wore a Gatorade uniform) right away and eventually got around another girl by mile 5.  My teammate Dani also passed me around this time, which was frustrating but motivating.  We later talked after the race and she gave me valuable advice, so I'm thankful for how things worked out during the bike.

I'm not sure we ever had a "flat" section on this bike.  It felt like we were either going up a hill or down a hill the entire time, and I was struggling as bad as I had been on Friday.  2012 Jacqui would have given up.  Thrown the towel in and be content with hopefully placing in my age group.  2013 Jacqui is tough. And doesn't give up.  I kept telling myself that everyone was struggling and that I was doing fine (not looking at my mph as I'm sure that would have just caused me unnecessary stress and panic).  My power was where it was at in Alabama, so I had to be doing okay.  Going into T2, I knew Dani was probably 60-90seconds in front, and Gatorade Girl was just in front of me.  It was now MY TIME to race.

T2 wasn't pretty.  My left shoe just wouldn't get on, and the insole kept flopping around every time I tried to put my shoe on.  I grunted in frustration, which made someone chuckle (I would have too--why am I getting upset???).  I was so frustrated that I took off FLYING out of transition and almost completely face planted going up the first grass hill.  

I could see Gatorade Girl just in front of me, but she looked like she was flying.  Granted, she was easily 3 inches taller than me, so she obviously looked like she was running faster, but in my frustrated mind, this did not help.  The first mile has a GINORMOUS uphill that many peopled walked up.  John was right there, banging his drum and yelling at me to GOOOOOO.  Dani was only 90 seconds ahead of me and John was determined that I could catch up.  

When someone gives me a goal or tells me I can/can't do something, I go after it like no other.  I passed Gatorade Girl during that uphill and surprisingly ran a 6:49 first mile (if you've done Galena, you know how challenging that hill is).  

Mile 2 had that HUGE downhill that was part of the bike course in previous years, so I was not surprised when I clocked a 5:47.  I passed Jen Garrison (the eventual winner) at this point, but since triathlons have wave starts, she ended up beating me by 4minutes!  I was in the first wave, so knew I had to haul the entire time as there were girls behind me that could bike faster and my run was my only saving option.

Mile 3 came and went uneventfully in a 6:01.  It was getting pretty hot out, and I was feeling discouraged that I couldn't see Dani yet.  Just before mile 4, I saw her.  When she passed me on the bike, she was so encouraging that I can only hope I was the same around mile 4.  I split a 5:58 and sprinted the last half mile to the finish with the support of the crowd.

I met up with Ryan and talked with his grandparents (who had come to watch!) for a bit before heading over to talk with Jen Harrison and her friends.  She gave us some good pointers and helped me feel a little more confident for Eagleman.  She's racing it as well, and has done it many times, so it was nice to kind of prepare myself.

Ryan, John, Oscar, Dani, Alex (her fiance and fellow Sammy's teammate), Nate, Trina, Alejandra and I hung out under the PowerBar tent and relaxed and just had fun before heading to get our bikes.  What a  headache this turned into.  Long story short, I don't think Galena will be having two transition areas next year with as many complaints as I heard.  It was such a mess.

After picking up our awards (free 2night stay at Eagle Ridge!!!!), we strolled around in downtown Galena before calling it a day.  Galena sure is relaxing, but it's good to be home:)

 The gang post race.

 Sammy's represents!

 My stud of a husband with his award:)

Sammy's Tri Team: Alex (1st male Du), Dani (3rd female Tri), me (2nd), Ryan (1st)

This race helped me put things in perspective.  This race had a lot of good females in the field, and I held my own.  I now know I need some work on transitions and my bike (although a small taper might help that as well), and am more prepared than ever to get after it at Eagleman.

3 WEEKS FROM TODAY!

I hope everyone was able to enjoy this beautiful weekend (running a race or otherwise) and am SO glad it's finally past winter!:)

Double race weekend part 2: PRs. (Race That's Good for Life 5k recap)

To follow up from my last posting, 90% of this running thing has to be mental.  I truly have no other explanation.

I've been racing the Oak Park Race That's Good for Life 5k for probably 5 years now.  Ryan's cousin and his wife (two of our good friends) live in Oak Park, so it started out as more of a fun get together the night before.  Then we started doing the mother/daughter and father/son competitions and, well, now we're hooked.

This race is one of the fastest 5k's in the Chicagoland area.  Flat, fast, and draws great competition.  Many of my friends and teammates have their 5k PR's on this course, so it's hard to say no to it.  Unfortunately, this race had to take back seat to the Shamrock Shuffle this year....every year this 5k is the first Sunday of April, but with Shamrock screwing with everyone always changing their race date, Race That's Good for Life chose to make their date the last Sunday in April.  This would have been okay for us...except for the fact that we had tentatively planned on racing U of I 1/2 marathon.  We sign up for it every year in hopes of actually going down, and FINALLY pulled through and went this year (see previous blog post).

Ryan and I talked on the way back and decided that we were going to suck it up and run the 5k.  Would we be sore from the 1/2?  Probably.  But would it be fun to see if we could help our parents pull off a mother/daughter father/son victory? Absolutely.

I knew my mom and I had a chance at placing top three based on last year's results when I raced with bronchitis and we finished 4th.  I also knew the top spot was virtually impossible to reach since mom had been unable to train for the past two weeks with taking care of my dad (long story short, he had foot surgery, it got infected, and every spare minute she had, she spent taking care of my dad.  He's a tough guy, but it's VERY hard for him not to be able to move around much--he's the guy you see riding his bike to the train station, yep that's my active dad!).

Anyway, I told my mom I had no idea what to expect, but would be going for as fast of a time that I could run to help us out the best I could.

This is the part when I refer to my first sentence: running is a mental sport.  I put it in my head that I raced many of the girls doing Race That's Good for Life a few weeks ago on DEAD legs at Shamrock Shuffle (Ryan and I raced the Double Oak Duathlon in Alabama the day before, drove back, raced on 2hours of sleep).  If I could compete decently at an 8k, a 5k should be no problem.  I told myself to stop being a wimp and just push as hard as I could so mom and I could be top 3.

And it worked!

We had a pretty good group for the first mile or so.  We went through the mile at 5:42, which was much slower than 2 years ago, but also was something I was okay with.

Just before the halfway point, Pam and I opened up our gap a bit (I could hear the lady in the lead vehicle saying that) and we went through the 2mile in 5:47.  I didn't have any idea what pace we were running and didn't look at my watch until the end.  I saw our time on the clock, but didn't even compute our mile split (which is weird, since I am SO into that normally--it's the nerdy math teacher side in me).

With 3/4 of a mile to go, I decided to take off as I know Pam can kick.  I figured, worse case, I would break 18 and best case I could maybe win this thing!

I definitely underestimated myself.  Looking through my watch splits, I closed in a 5:33 and ran the last 0.1 at a 5:17 pace.  I truly attribute that to my crazy encouraging teammates.  It was UNREAL to see SO many guys in orange/yellow/grey singlets cheering for me (in addition to the spectators).  Imagine running through a giant crowd and EVERY single person calling your name.  That's what it was like.  I have goosebumps just thinking about that moment as I felt like I was a celebrity.

I ended up running a 17:40, a 5second PR.

However, that wasn't even CLOSE to being the best part of my day.  I shook the other females' hands until the clock hit 19minutes and went running back to find my mom.  I cheered her in and pushed her to a sub-26 finish, which was what she was going for.  She really started pushing hard when I told her we had a quarter mile to go and to kick it in, and that helped her get her goal time.  Truly an amazing feeling.  And one of my lovely teammates captured that moment:

Seriously in love with this picture.

 Top three ladies.

 Females finish.

 Total no-no in racing.  I failed.

 The start of the race.

Check out that sea of red!

Oh...mom and I ended up getting 3rd.  She is more motivated now than ever to get her butt back into running shape and wants to even win next year! It is incredibly fun for me to watch my mom get excited about racing again and truly made this race my favorite one to date.  

90% mental. U of I 1/2 marathon recap.

Two Fridays ago, Coach Bill came and swam with Ryan and me.  He worked on us with our form and pointed out things that we can do to help us get faster.  We had a workout to do consisting of 2 sets of 7x200 with :20 rest the first round, :10 rest the second round. Bill had told me times to hit, and, while I was hitting them, it was obvious I was getting tired.

He changed my second set to 100s instead and had me do those at a slightly faster pace.  He told me I had it in me to hit sub-1:40, but that I needed to believe it and really push myself through it.  He told me I was getting comfortable and pushing more at tempo speed than race pace, and that's not the point of the workout.  So, a bit angered by this comment, I KILLED those 100s.  And then he was happy.

While I may have come out of that workout frustrated and annoyed at Bill, I have to say the lesson has worked miracles on my training.

Last weekend, I ran the Lakefront 10mile. I ran most of the race with my teammate Columba, which was great.  On mile 5, she pulled a little ahead, and I just kept telling myself I'd catch back up to her if I just focused on good form and staying positive.  I did, and we ran together for almost the rest of the race.

Ironically, a very similar thing happened this weekend at the U of I 1/2 marathon.

As I've mentioned here before, Bill has our cycle divided up into four weeks: 1hard, 2harder, 3hardest, 4recovery week.  This past week was our recovery week, so we had briefly talked to him about possibly racing the 1/2 at U of I as it had special meaning to us.  Not only did we both go there/meet there, but I knew I had the potential of getting the course record (1:19:59) and that made me pretty excited.

On Wednesday, I threw some pickups in during my run and felt AWFUL.  Like seriously awful.  I told Ryan to can U of I and that we'd just do the recovery week as planned.  He reminded me that we'd be fresh going into this and that I still could PR after seeing what I've done so far this season.  I had just seen Earl on Tuesday to fix my hips as I could tell during Saturday's 10miler that they were out of alignment again.  Sure enough, he showed me that they were off...and adjusted them to make me feel good again!  Friday I threw some pickups in again and told Ryan I didn't want to race.  He didn't listen and we drove down to Champaign anyway.

It took us FOREVER to get there as I had to drive to the city to pick up Ryan from the event he was working before we could head down.  I was starting to feel antsy and think that our late arrival would worsen the feeling of my legs the next day.

We arrived, dropped our bags off in our (SMOKING) hotel room (yuck), and headed out to eat.  A restaurant that I had worked at, Jim Gould's, had been replaced and they had BISON--my preferred pre-race meal.  Ryan and I pulled in the parking lot and spotted the Polar rep's car, not connecting the two until....we were probably 20minutes into dinner and I realized, as talking to Ryan, that our former teammates Brian and Tim (plus their Polar rep friend, Tim) were sitting right behind us!  Brian realized it just as I did and called out to me.  It was a pleasant surprise and super fun to catch up.  This made me a little more excited about racing the next day.

5:30am Saturday, we left our hotel room to make sure we'd get parking and a proper warm-up in before hitting the 7am start.  When we went into the athlete's room, I saw my running friend Julie Ralston and was able to catch up with her for a bit, which is always nice:)  As we were leaving to do our warmup, I ran into another running friend, Marisa, who's fiancé would be racing (and eventually winning) the marathon.  I was so excited to get to catch up for a few minutes with these girls!

Ryan and I warmed up, did some drills and strides, and headed to the start.  Right at 7:00, the gun went off....and so did the girls.

Mile 1--5:52.  Downhill start, everyone's going fast.  Whatever, no big deal.
Mile 2--5:56.  Umm, probably shouldn't be running sub-6's this early in the race.
Mile 3--6:00.  I'm okay with this.  At this point, our group of three girls turned into a group of two girls...who were lucky enough to run with probably 8 other guys.
Mile 4--6:02.  Feelin' my groove.  Not sure who this female is that I'm running with.  Must not be from Illinois.  Hmm...
Mile 5--5:53.  This is when the girl (Christina) started to pull away a bit.  This is also where Columba started to pull away from me last time.  "She's going to drop back/you're going to catch up.  We started off too fast and it's gonna only hurt your legs by keeping up with her." Downed a chocolate PowerGel here in hopes of some instant energy--I'm thinking it worked.
Mile 6--5:51.  Yeah, um, she for sure ran a 5:45 for this mile.  She is definitely out of my league.  Stay within striking distance though; ya never know.
**I looked at my watch at 6.25 to see 37:10...and immediately told one of the guys I was running with (a running friend, Paul Erickson) "that's cool, I just ran a 10k PR in this 1/2 marathon. neat"
Mile 7--6:05.  That darn incline got me out of my groove.  Stay tough, you've GOT this. (Christina is about 30seconds ahead at this point).  Heyyy, all I have to do is run 6:10s and I'm gonna get a new PR. Yeahhhh, this is amazing!
Mile 8--5:59.  Right back in it.  Both of us are running the same pace, I can close the gap.
Mile 9--5:56.  Running through "Statues Park" felt great, but the turns probably cost me a little time.
Mile 10--6:00.  Keep it up! 5k to go.  Holy crap, 1:00:04, I just ran a 10mile PR! Yikes!!
**Fellow U of I alum and track/xc member Dan Walters (cheering on his wife Allie) passed me on his bike at this point, yelling to me to catch the girl...Dan, thank you. I needed that push.
Mile 11--6:02.  She's less than 20seconds in front! GO legs GO!!!
Mile 12--6:04. Dang it! 15 seconds! Why can't I run any faster?!?!?!?
Mile 13--5:52.  Seriously giving it all that I have.  Almost tripped here, twice. Embarrassing.
.1--1:13 (5:35 pace).

Final time--1:18:53.
First place female's final time--1:18:41.

There is NOTHING worse than watching someone else win something you have wanted SO badly and that means so much to you.

BUT, as heartbreaking as that was....the look on Ryan's face made me forget that I was 2nd.

He was STUNNED that I not only broke 1:20, but also broke 1:19.  And shattered my old 1/2 marathon time by 2min 5seconds.  And then he told me he WON and I about lost it.  Seriously almost started crying happy tears.  I was SO incredibly proud of him!

Have to also give a HUGE shout out to my friend Julie Ralston who made a KILLER comeback and ran a 1:23 1/2....incredible.  Another shout out to Julie Wankowski for her huge comeback as well-- after enduring a stress fracture, she bounces back and runs her 2nd fastest marathon ever.  A big congrats to Camille Herron (Facebook friend who I finally had the pleasure of meeting in person!) on her marathon win in a blazin' 2:45!  And finally, to my favorite relay team out there--Megan Hode, you guys (and birthday boy Todd, who ran the 10k Friday and marathon Saturday) freakin' rock!

I've discovered a few things from this weekend:

1. Swimming after last week's Lakefront 10 had to have done wonders on my legs.  Well, that plus the type of training we do.  But the swim for sure flushed out a bunch of junk.

2. It's possible to run PRs within races, which is pretty cool.

3. Running with people makes everything a million times easier than running solo.

4.  Triathlon training has turned me into a faster, stronger runner.

5 (and most importantly).  If you're strong mentally, you can do ANYTHING physically.  I just proved that today.

Thank you so much to all of my friends and family who support me like crazy.  I seriously would not be able to run (and I guess bike and swim:)) like I have been able to without your support and encouragement.

PICTURE TIME!

 With my love after the races.  LOVE being in Champaign<3 p="">

 It was a little sunny out.

 My speedy husband with his awesome 1st place trophy

A huge reason that I enjoy weekend races: post-race breakfast:)

Lakefront 10mile recap

This past week had been pretty rough.

Last Friday night, Ryan and I swam with our coach.  We had some all out 200s and 100s and during one, I inhaled a bunch of water through my nose.  I still had 75m to go, so I wasn't going to stop as I felt I was swimming fast (this is a rarity).  When I finished, I felt probably the worst sinus headache I've ever had.  It continued throughout the night, as did the sneezing and runny nose.  Saturday and Sunday were the same, and come Monday I went through an entire box of tissues at school alone.  Physically I felt fine (and actually ran and rode great workouts!), but it was just an annoyance of constantly blowing my nose.  I finally started taking some Cold & Sinus on Tuesday in hopes of improving.

Monday was incredibly emotional with the bombings in Boston.  Ryan and I both got home from work, not wanting to do anything, until we realized that we should be celebrating and working out because we are able to.  We continued to follow the story while biking/running in hopes of some resolution, but would have to wait a few days for that.  Thank you to all of my friends and family who texted to see if I (or anyone I knew running the marathon) was okay.  Monday again reinforced for me that we cannot take things for granted, something I would plan to use in my race strategy for Saturday.

Me, Ryan, John and Ryan's dad after Boston 2010.

Tuesday, I proudly wore my 2010 Boston Marathon shirt and jacket and discussed the marathon with my students.  They were so intrigued; some had family members there, some hadn't heard the story, some were impressed that people can run for 26.2miles without stopping.  I ended this day with an awesome "minuter" workout on the Cary March Madness 1/2 marathon course, getting down to 4:30 pace for the later half of the workout.  I was feeling pretty darn good.

And then it hit me.  About an hour after my run, I couldn't breathe.  I blew my nose...which led to sneezing and a runny nose.  My mentor had told me since Monday that it would be okay if I needed to take a sick day, but being the person I am, I felt too guilty doing that to my students.  I had put together sub plans just in case my nose caused me other issues, and decided since I couldn't breathe, it was time to call the sick day.

Wednesday, I slept in and woke up feeling like a new person.  I was able to breathe, and I only had to get up one time to blow my nose throughout the night, so felt very refreshed.  I hadn't swam since Friday, so thought maybe I'd try today since my nose felt a million times better, but the thunderstorms ruined those plans (LifeTime Fitness closes their indoor pool if there's lightning).  Just another sign that my nose needed another day to recuperate, no big deal.

Thursday I woke up and ran some mile repeats: 1mile at goal 10mile pace (6:00), 1mile just faster (5:56), 1mile at 10k pace and 1 mile at 5k pace all with 90sec between.  I felt amazing and ready to race on Saturday.  I swam after school and felt strong and fast in the pool, too....that day off really seemed to have helped!

Then Friday hit.  We had an Institute Day, which was good since school might have been canceled anyway with all of the flooding.  My sinuses started acting up again (possibly due to the temperature changing every few hours?!), but I only had cold medicine.  I rarely take medicine, but was pretty sure I couldn't focus in our Institute Day if I didn't do something.  About an hour after taking the medicine, I started feeling exhausted.  Like can't keep my eyes open exhausted.  Yep, you guessed it....the medicine I took was nighttime medicine.  Awesome.  I seriously didn't think I would be able to make the drive home, that's how knocked out I felt.  Luckily, I made it home okay....and fell asleep for almost 3 hours.  My swim workout never happened, which again was probably a good thing, but I was pretty upset that the sinuses were still an issue.

I thought about re-evaluating my race plan for Saturday, but decided to make the call on race day.  I woke up Saturday feeling pretty darn good.  I took a Cold & Sinus just in case, seeing that I had been in this situation before and had watched things turn ugly.  I warmed up with Ryan, Nic and my old running partner Joe before heading to the start line.

As I was heading into the corral, who do I see but Tera Moody.  You know, the lady who just ran a 1:12 half marathon a week ago.  I had been feeling pretty darn confident on my good days leading up to this, but seeing Tera immediately erased the "maybe I could even win this thing" thought.  Instead, I told myself how cool it would be to run out of my mind and say that I placed second to Tera Moody in a race--I mean, how many people can say that?! [For the record, she ended up running a 56:xx...insane]

I knew I'd be running for awhile with my teammate Columba, as we had run 4 of the almost 5miles of the Shamrock Shuffle together two weeks ago.  The gun went off and so did we.  The first two miles flew by and I was feeling fresh.  I couldn't believe how much of a change this was from Friday.

Mile 1--6:12. This and mile 2 were all about not slipping on the ice.  Yes, ice.  In mid-April.
Mile 2--6:11  This is where we encountered "Cricket Hill," which wasn't nearly as bad as people had made it sound.  Maybe it was the snow covering it, or my love for cross country, but whatever it was, Columba and I just flew up.  Coming down, our teammate Meg was cheering like crazy for us, which brought a huge smile to my face.
Mile 3--6:11 (nothing like being consistent, right?)
Mile 4--6:05
Mile 5--5:59....I knew we had picked it up, and had even considered slowing down a bit myself because it felt hard for me.  As soon as I saw my watch, I knew we'd have another 6:0x mile and I'd be okay...it might have just been the crowd that got us going a bit on this mile.
Mile 6--6:04. Perfect.  Feeling alright again.
Mile 7--6:13.  We had the turnaround at this point and just plowed into the wind. So that was fun.
Mile 8--6:17. This was a lot of weaving winding and going on/off the path that the runners heading out were on as well.  I felt like we were slowing a bit, but couldn't get around to help pick up the pace as we had to stay on "our" side of the path. This probably explains the next split. Oops.
Mile 9--6:02.  We could both tell that the last mile was slow (and received confirmation via our watches) so this one picked up the pace.  The path FINALLY split so that we could spread out more and I got ready to step in front.
Mile 10--5:43. Just after we hit mile 9, a volunteer yells out, "only one of you can be second!" and Columba just took off.  Naturally, I followed her and we were just hauling.  With probably 0.75-0.8mi to go, I could hear that she wasn't with me anymore, so hoped she was okay.  I found out after finishing that she hit some uneven ground and had a funny feeling in her ankle but was okay.  Glad to hear that, but still felt bad for her as we had just run so much together.
(my extra part since I sucked at running tangents--:27, at 5:30 pace).

 Columba and I near the start....yep, that white stuff is snow.

 Heading up Cricket Hill.

 early on....you can kinda see the ice on the path...stinkin' weather.

 2nd place overalls!!! So proud of this guy<3 p="">

Top 3 women:)

It was an awesome feeling, seeing a 5:43 ending mile.  I knew I had more in me, but it was hard for us to pick up the pace from mile 8 on.  It was so awesome to run again with Columba as there's nothing better than having that constant encouragement throughout the race.  While we obviously knew "only one of you can be 2nd," we worked together in hopes of achieving our sub-60 goal.  We fell a little short, but we also had some ice patches in the beginning and lots of weaving during the second half of the race that I certainly hadn't anticipated.

All in all, I know that I can continue that 6:05 pace now for a 1/2 marathon.  I'm not sure I'll have an opportunity to do that before we race our 70.3, but just having that confidence is a good feeling.

A HUGE congratulations to all of my teammates who ran this weekend....PRs happened in multiple cities and multiple states, and it is SO cool to be part of such a talented and complimentary team.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a pain session with a massage therapist.... :/

Double Race weekend (April 6/7th)

After adding all the numbers up, it's official.

I ran for longer than I slept last weekend.
I drove for longer than I slept last weekend.
I biked for longer than I slept last weekend.
And, let's be honest, I probably ate for longer than I slept last weekend.

While I would never recommend doing this, ever, it happened to work out in my favor.

(race recap from April 6-7 weekend)
Ryan and I race in Alabama every March to qualify for the World Duathlon Championships.  With Easter screwing everything up this year  being so freaking early this year, the Double Oak Duathlon was moved to the first Saturday of April (normally the last Saturday in March).

This was okay....until we realized another race we had signed up for, Shamrock Shuffle, was the next day.  So, we decided we would make a decision as to what to do the Thursday before the races as we know from experience how exhausted we are after putting on the Egg Shell Shuffle.

For whatever reason, this year wasn't as stressful or tiring as the past two with putting on the Egg Shell Shuffle, which is strange considering we were out of the country for the 6 days leading up to the race!  Regardless, our bodies recovered nicely and we were HUNGRY for some racing come Thursday.

Our plan was to leave Schaumburg right after I got out of school on Friday, drive until dinner time and then switch off driving every 2 hours until we arrived in Alabama.  This initially put us there at ~1am, which was okay as we had just planned to get up at 6:30am and would be sleeping in the car.

Not surprisingly, we hit traffic (I know, it's hard to believe that there is traffic in the suburbs on a Friday afternoon).  We didn't arrive at our hotel until 3:00am.  All we wanted to do was lay down for 2.5 hours.  Instead, we spent 15minutes waiting outside the hotel lobby for the Front Desk guy to wakeup? let us in the hotel. We arrived to an incredible hotel room....I had wished we could have actually spent time in the room as it had everything you could have wanted for a weekend trip!  [sidenote: the hotel was a Residence Inn by Marriott for all of you looking for an awesome hotel]

I had no doubts I would pass out right away...except that I didn't.  I kept closing my eyes and tossing and turning, having nightmares that my alarm wouldn't go off and our trip would be wasted (if we didn't race, we obviously wouldn't qualify for Worlds).  The alarm did go off, at 6:17am.  We got ready and headed to the Elite meeting at 7:30am just before assembling our bikes and putting all of our stuff in transition.

At 7:55am, all of the Elites were introduced and at 8am we were off!

The run course had changed slightly from last year, something I was suspicious of as my "5k" time seemed off.  On the first mile, you go straight up hill, which has been the same start since I've raced here.

We go up this probably 0.25mile hill and then straight back down it, just to go up another one, run some more til we hit the mile (6:01!) then go just a bit further to the turnaround and back....only we don't go back down the hill we originally went up; instead we head into the woods for some trail running....

This is the section that had a part added onto it.  I didn't think anything of it until I came at the 5k mark in almost 20minutes.  I realize that the trails and hills would slow me down, but last year I ran a 38minute 10k on this course, so to run half of that in 20minutes seemed a bit off to me....especially since I KNOW my run is better than it was last year.

Nothing I could do about it besides accept the fact that the 10k would be long, so I decided to push harder to widen the gap between myself and the second place female.  I ended up almost doubling my lead, but unfortunately she caught right back up on the bike.

The eventual winner was the Alabama state Time Trialist for biking (something like that is what Ryan told me, but basically what it means is that she's one of the fastest riders in the whole STATE of Alabama).  I knew coming into this race that 2nd place would have to be the goal as, after looking up the winner's races, my biking wasn't nearly as good as the first place female's.

However, I ended up biking 5minutes and 2seconds faster than I did last year, so I walked away from the race extremely happy and confident that my training with Coach Bill is paying off.

 At transition. Check out my sweet new bike!

Double Oak Duathlon top three Elite females.

I finished my 5k in 19:xx....., which is the pace I run for marathons, so I was pretty sure that was long as well.  In any case, I accomplished my three goals coming into this race:

1. qualify for the Duathlon Worlds team

2. have the fastest 10k and 5k runs

3. crush my bike split from last year

After the awards ceremony, we went back to our awesome hotel to clean up and grab a bite to eat before heading home.  Ryan had suggested the night before that we just leave straight from the race and  shower when we get back to his parent's house in Schaumburg, but I nixed that idea as I did not want to be sweaty in a car for 12+ hours.  

Bad idea.

Instead of leaving at 11:45 (right after awards), we left at 1:00....and almost immediately hit traffic.  We know to try to avoid I-65 if at all possible as the last three years there has been some sort of accident that caused 2+ hour delays.   My GPS showed us only being on I-65 for a little while before meeting up with I-24, so we figured it would be okay.

Wrong.

We ended up barely moving for THREE hours.  Yep, you read that right, we were pretty much sitting in traffic going 15mph tops for 3 hours.  About 40minutes into this horrible experience, I googled "traffic on I-65" and explored a few websites before finally finding this awesome chat board.  I was able to post questions and see what mile markers were bad.  One awesome person wrote what exit to get off and then the detour they took to avoid about 2 hours of just sitting in traffic.  Unfortunately, we had another few miles to go before we could get to that exit.  

We were supposed to arrive in Schaumburg at 1am, giving us approximately 5-6hours of sleep plus whatever we did in the car.  With the detour and huge traffic jam (which we found out was caused by an 18-wheeler that tipped over), we arrived in Schaumburg at 3:50am.  We didn't even bother taking our contacts out, as we'd just be getting up in less than 2hours anyway.

I had seriously thrown out the idea of just not racing the Shamrock Shuffle.  However, Ryan was dressing up as a "green guy" with his best friend, so I figured if he was going I probably should too.

We headed into the city at 6am, painted Ryan green and tried to jog over to our respective corrals.  It probably took us an hour to do this as EVERYONE wanted pictures with "The Green Guys."  

It was SO nice to get into the corral and tent with my teammates.  It made me recognize that my decision to come and run the race (despite not feeling like I wanted to, with only 2 hours of sleep and racing the day before) was a good one.

The Shamrock Shuffle makes all runners get into their corrals 15minutes early.....which doesn't make sense to SO many runners as we just spent this time warming up and loosening our muscles, just to come stand in a roped off area where we can't do drills or strides to stay loose?  So, we just considered this team bonding time and just hung out while waiting for things to get going.

My teammates (Columba Montes, Shannon Teunissen, Jessica Langford and Emma Keenan) and I used this time to strategize and decided to go out for the first mile at 6:00 or just under.  Sure enough, we saw the first mile split come in at 5:56.  Perfect.

Columba, Shannon and I ran together for the first 1.5miles-2miles of the race, which was SO nice!

 How sweet are our new uniforms?!

 Pushing forward with encouragement from Columba and Dave.

Columba just kept powering through and began passing people left and right.  I figured I'd stick with her for as long as I could as I knew my legs would fatigue at some point.  At about mile 4, there's a slight incline, and that's where I lost it.  My body finally realized that I had done a Powerman race less than 24hours ago and proceeded to sit in a car for 14 hours and sleep for 2 hours. 

 Luckily, I was able to hold it together and still finish in a PR worthy time.

The best part was seeing this guy at the end:

Ryan waited for me and I'm pretty sure his jaw actually hit the ground when he saw the time I ran.  

At Snow Fun Run (a 5mile race in Lake Geneva in January, with a few hills), I ran a 29:5x....so to run a 29:21 ("gun time"....real time was 29:15) after the craziness that had occurred in the past 24 hours was just ridiculous.

Again, I would never recommend doing this to anyone as situations don't normally (and shouldn't!) work out this way, but I was very lucky.  I credit a lot of this to my new training.  Bill has us beat up our bodies for 3 straight weeks before getting a week of recovery (still running, swimming and biking, but no actual workouts).  Bill LOVED our idea of doing both of these races (though he, like us, thought we'd actually be sleeping the nights before our races!) as it is the kind of racing that fits perfectly into his plan.

Overall, it was a super fun weekend, but it took a few days for my body to recover.  My workouts this week were still actually really good and I swam some 100 PRs, but I felt just exhausted throughout each day.  

Lesson learned: sleep helps speed the recovery process and should never be avoided if possible!

Honeymoon to Egg Shell Shuffle recap

Let's face it.  I hit the jackpot, in many aspects of life, but I was again reminded of this during our honeymoon.

Ryan and I got married in October, but did not take our honeymoon right away because I had just started my amazing teaching job.  My uncle had offered his timeshare in Cabo San Lucas to us when we got engaged, so we of course said yes right away.  As soon as I was hired, we looked at my Spring Break date and had my uncle book his timeshare for us for that week.

About another week passed before either of us made the connection that my Spring Break would have the final days of Easter....which would mean that the last Saturday of Spring Break would be the 3rd annual Egg Shell Shuffle 1/2 marathon and 5k.

Crap.

We thought about our options: postpone the honeymoon until summer or have my dad be the race director for this year.  We looked into flights (I had travel vouchers, so we clearly were using those since it's a tad pricey to fly to Mexico), and realized that we would leave Friday after school and come back Thursday before Egg Shell Shuffle.  Realistically, we wanted to come back Friday as we knew that we would have everything prepared and ready for our race, but there were ZERO flights on Friday.  Not even any ones with connection to eventually get us to Chicago.  SO frustrating.

After talking over every single aspect, we decided that our best option would just be to fly home Thursday.  It was obviously a sign that we needed to be in Schaumburg for our race as there were no flights on Friday.  It definitely would suck to not be able to stay at my uncle's place (all-inclusive, in Cabo, who wouldn't want that?!) for the full time, but at the same time.....it would be worse to disappoint our friends, volunteers and participants in our race.

We put so much into our race as not only a way to raise funds for our charities, but also as a way of giving back to the running community.  It would not be right for us to not be present at our own race (even though my dad clearly would do a phenomenal job as he's been working the Cary March Madness 1/2 marathon for over 20 years now!).

So, we left on Friday right after school for our honeymoon.  My uncle's all-inclusive place (Dreams Los Cabos) didn't begin for us until Monday, so we stayed at Playa Grande the first two nights.


SATURDAY:
Playa Grande is pretty close to the marina, which is where all of the action takes place.  Hundreds of restaurants, shopping, beach activities, etc., that we really just went on recommendations.

A friend from school recommended a few places, one of them being Pancho's.  WOW was she right.  The chicken tortilla soup was the best I've ever had (and I make a pretty darn good one!), the salsa and guac hit the spot, and my tuna steak was to die for.  The place was packed, but we were treated as if we were the only ones in the restaurant.

SUNDAY:
Sunday we splurged and paid the $10 fee to workout.  Yep, unless you're under the all-inclusive plan, you PAY to workout.  BUT, safety was more important and 16 miles were on the agenda, so running around the marina (3mile loop tops) was not an option.

After working out, we went into the marina and hung out at my uncle and school friend's recommended Medano Beach....we just enjoyed relaxing in the sun and watching the crazy/funny Spring Breakers participate in silly contests.  Pretty much any place you go to has a deal where you purchase food or drink and you get a lounge chair to sunbathe/relax on.  Ryan saw a guy wearing an Ironman visor, so we talked to him for awhile...turns out he's the Ironman doctor!  We told him we were planning to qualify for Kona this year, and he told us we looked like Ironman athletes, which only made us even more excited for our attempt!!  Finally, we had to take up a vendor on the Beach Massage offer.  We bartered with her and got 2 20minute massages for her original 30min asking price of $35.  Worth every penny.

We ate lunch at The Office and had some of the best seafood we've ever eaten.  This place is to die for, seriously.  After lunch, we just lounged around for awhile before heading back to our resort to get ready for dinner.  We went to Hacienda Cocina y Cantina, which is rated #1 on TripAdvisor, deservedly so.  The food was AWESOME.  We had the molcajete (recommended) and the churros.  While the food was great and all, the experience was even better.  Our table was literally IN the sand, and we had authentic Mexican blanket things to wrap around us when it got colder.  We were feet from the ocean....highly recommended for anyone traveling to Cabo.

 Churros!!!

 Courtesy of TripAdvisor....part of the restaurant is literally on the beach!

Molcajete. YUM.

MONDAY:

The next morning, it was finally time for us to go to my uncle's all-inclusive place, Dreams Los Cabos.  WOW, was it nice.

Our room was ready right when we checked in, so we put our stuff down, our swimsuits on, and headed to the pool for some almuerzo and cervezas.  We absolutely utilized the swim-up bar and ate way too much at the lunch buffet. 

 Looking out once you arrive...swim-up bar to the right.

The view of the swim-up bar with resort in back and hot tub in front.

It was nice, too, to just relax and have the servers come around and get our drink and food order. All of the staff was super accommodating and really nice.  We decided just to hang out here for the night and try out the fancy Italian restaurant, Portofino's.

 Bartender took our picture at the swim-up bar

Dinner at Portofino's.

TUESDAY:

We decided to hang out at our resort for the whole day today.  We woke up and ran on the highway for 10 lovely miles. We knew a few people who had raced the Ironman the week before we arrived who had said that there were HUGE shoulders on the roads and that, as long as we were paying attention, running on the shoulder should be no problem.  We didn't have a single scare and actually ran up and down quite a few hills, which was nice!  After showering, we hung out at the pool ALL day....and even swam some laps:)  My aunt had recommended getting massages from the places on the beach, so we just had to take her up on that.  Plus, $30 for 70 minutes is a hard deal to beat! We went to the Japanese restaurant at our resort for dinner and watched the Magic Show after.  We went to bed early as we had a big day ahead of us...

WEDNESDAY:

After running the opposite (less hilly) way on the highway, we showered and headed out to catch the bus.  Our resort had a shuttle, but we needed to be in town at 8:30am and the shuttle didn't leave our hotel until 9:30am, so I did some searching and found out there were plenty of bus options for us.  Let's just say, while safe, these busses are NOT like the ones in Chicago! 

We arrived at 8:30am for our brunch Whale Watching boat tour.  While it was AWESOME seeing the whales (we saw a mama and her baby!) and the Arch and Lover's Beach, the crew was rude and I would NEVER recommend this company to anyone.  Even Ryan wanted to write a review on TripAdvisor about this company.

 The Arch

 My Love

Mama and baby whale!

After our boat tour ended, we hung out at Medano beach at our favorite spot, Billygan's (recommended by my uncle!) and just relaxed.  We ended our time downtown by going to Mi Casa (an adorable restaurant recommended by my school friend) and Happy Endings (#1 bar on Trip Advisor).

We headed back to our resort to shower and get ready for our last dinner:(  We went to Oceana, the adult-only restaurant at the resort.  It was the best restaurant we ate at....primarily due to the OUTSTANDING cappuccino's we were served in wine glasses!  

On Thursday, we woke up and ran, then ate our last breakfast by the beach before heading out to catch our shuttle to the airport. 

The second we got on the plane and could turn our laptops on, we were in race mode.  We wrote out an hour-by-hour schedule for things we needed to do when we arrived back home.....and we got everything done.

Without sending out a post-race email yet, I only have the feedback from our Facebook page and emails we've received....but I feel confident in saying that we pulled off another successful Egg Shell Shuffle.  

When some people heard we were going on our honeymoon the week of our race we put on, they seemed skeptical, which is to be expected. Ryan and I knew that we needed to be 100% in race mode once we got on that plane ride back, and we did just that.  

Thank you SO much to our volunteers, friends and family who helped out in many ways, and of course to all who ran.  We are already writing down ways to make next year's event even better (including not going on our honeymoon the week of the race:)).