Tag Archives: marathons

Before I get to the marathon, I am going to start with the week leading up to my half marathon.

After Tuesday’s killer workout, it was time to taper.

Wednesday: rest, ice, wear ankle boot, roll out foot

Thursday: run 1 mile to Exhale Music Flow class (got a free Exhale shirt which I had been eyeing forever!), run 1 mile home

The tee looks like this:

Friday: 25 minutes on the bike. Lots of walking and cleaning, more icing, compression socks and rolling.

Marathon Prep:

I spent Friday preparing by buying essential marathon supplies (most of which Frank requested)—gu, G2, bib belts, peanut butter, bananas, bread and diet coke (75% of which said diet coke was for me).

One of my many stops was Jack Rabbit.  They quickly helped me find a bib belt. Then I need to find gus, Frank requested chocolate mint, but there were none to be found.  I got kind of stressed about what could possibly be a good second choice and apparently a clerk noticed my concerned face and asked what was wrong.  NO CHOCOLATE MINT!  He went to the back to try and locate the elusive flavor, he came back with a free sample of peppermint stick.  Free and mint, I will take it.

I hauled my goods home:

Then I made sure to pack all my clothing, tons of plastic baggies and oh, some clothes to wear during the weekend. I charged my ipod, updated my playlists and booked a Jitney home.  Packing wasn’t easy because it was pouring out and looked like it might do the same on marathon day.  Fortunately, my coach sent this email:

Weather for tomorrow:

So, it looks like the weather could be “iffy”  but the temperature seems to be ok. You are probably wonder what to wear
right?
In this weather you will dress fo the temperature,  no need to wear extra layers to keep you dry, you won’t, and the more you wear the heavy, more chafing and more wet you’ll get.
Wear the same you’ll wear to run in 65-72 degrees with no rain.
I do recommend:
-wear a hat of visor so if rains you can actually see ahead of you
-bring extra clothing for after the race to change into dry clothes, that includes from shoes, socks, to lower and upper body .

After I was packed, I did 5 loads of laundry and vacuumed the domicile.  I had just enough time to fold before I left for Penn Station.

Due to a seriously insane work schedule, we missed our intended train and had a to take a train that left 23 minutes later, but took 45 minutes longer. After a semi-harrowing journey on the LIRR (it actually takes longer to get from NYC to Montauk than from NYC to Saratoga!), we arrived in the Hamptons greeted heartily with darkness and rain. Fortunately, we quickly found a cabi who chatted us up to our hotel—The Panoramic View.

As we know little of the Hampton’s, we requested dinner suggestions at the front desk and our concierge generously offered that we go to town and walk around. Said suggestion was not met well by us as it was pitch black and pouring. But we decided we would figure something out. Our room was very nice and even had a kitchen! But the giant balcony overlooking the water was the real star.

By this point, I was very close to hanger and we quickly decided to go to a place called Harvest for dinner, and after another $16 cab ride, it was time to eat. Harvest was family style, but that didn’t deter us from ordering enough for eight and destroying it.

They brought homemade bread. I heart carbs.

This was the appetizer tomato mozzarella flatbread.  I’m all for no carb left behind, but we wrapped half of this monster to save room for the main course.

Swordfish with spinach in buerre blanc with toasted hazelnuts.  This was amazing. The hazelnuts provided the perfect texture contrast.  Delicious.

Um and we may have even had some gelato as well….

We called a cab who said it would be 10 minutes, 20 minutes later, no cab.  Finally we called another cab company that also said 10 minutes.  50 minutes later we were finally in an (expensive) cab.

By the time we got home,it was only about 6 hours until our shuttle picked us up for the race.  I slept like a baby in the giant bed. We woke up at 5:54AM and rushed to get ourselves together—somehow we always take forever even when we pack the night before. As we were making breakfast of toast with pb and banana.  Frank said, this is blogger style.  I was like, how did you know that?  He said, I’ve been around your blogs long enough. Since I’ve never had this breakfast, clearly he may be a secret reader of your blog

We boarded the shuttle and flew through the hampton’s to the start line at an alarming speed, the sun just breaking as we arrived at the start area. Finally I caught my first glimpse of the Hampton’s—The Springs Elementary and Junior High School.

I must mention that despite all odds, it was not raining! This thrilled me! I was sad I didn’t bring my phone or camera.  I think Frank was just thrilled to have 2 solid hours where he wouldn’t have to respond to the call of the batphone (aka the blackberry). I’m sure he would gladly run in pouring weather for that rare opportunity.

We had over an hour to put on our bibs, collect our swag, stretch, use the porta potties—no race will ever have enough porta potties to fulfill the needs of runners pre-race. Then I saw Ali, just as I had hoped!  She was dying to go!

Loved this!

Then we got some sage advice from the fabulous Coach Ramon Bermo:

“The gun is going to go off, the people will start running, follow them and just keep doing that until you cross the finish.” True story.

He also told us to take the first 7 miles easy, push harder from 7-10 and then give whatever you have left for the last 5K.

Here I am pre-race:

We started out in a cloud of moisture, no rain, but tons of humidity. As I looked ahead the train and runners disappeared into the fog as if the Hamptons were Brigadoon. The race started and my legs felt like lead. I tried to push but just couldn’t get into a rhythm. Finally around mile 3 I started to feel okay. While I have been running 18 miles sans ipod, today I needed it. I turned on party rock and started to push myself. I generally hold back, so I decided to just try and run hard the whole time and if I had to walk the last 5 miles, I would be okay with that.

The Hampton’s route is generally through the woods, so it was only broken up by the occasional farm or pumpkin patch. Along the route I saw my coaches, who screamed: “you’re awesome, you’re awesome, you’re awesome” every time I ran by. Love them. It’s nice having a lot of team members on the course and I waved to everyone in a Determination shirt. We also had some nice fan clubs cheering along the way.

When I got to mile 7, I wanted to really turn it on to full effort, I flew through mile 7 and was amazed to see mile 8. Apparently, when you run fast, you finish quicker.  Around this time my watch died—forgot to charge it!  This made it a little harder to keep my pace up.

The MAJOR falsity of the Hampton’s Half was that it was flat. I am not sure where this myth was started, but I am pretty sure that person has not run this course or that person was from San Francisco. The course had hills or as my coach said inclines. Most were mild, but there was a bad boy every 2 miles.

When the going gets tough, my go to is blasting Girl Talk. Enviably I will unconsciously start singing along. Until the dirty looks come that is, people don’t generally appreciate randomly hearing lines like “going 100 on the highway, so if you do the speed limit, get the f out of my way” and “ugly girls be quiet quiet, pretty girls rock out like this.” With this as motivation, I made it to mile 11. This was the most scenic part of the trail with water on either side and tall grasses creeping out of the dunes. This was also a turn around point, so I got to enjoy it twice. Finally, I hit mile 12 and rounded the corner that put us on the path to the finish, I noticed two people cutting across the turn rather than running around the cones. Seriously? I couldn’t help but say lame under my breath.

The final mile…

But at this point, I was spent. I couldn’t care about cheaters. I couldn’t let the people walking get me down. I just needed to get to that finish. I saw my coach ahead and he pepped me up and told me I looked great. He said I had 5 minutes to go. There was nothing to do but win the mental game. Finally I saw the turn into the school and the yellow finish line and ran through it. A medal was put around my neck and I was wrapped in a race foil as if I had won the marathon. It felt great.

Next up was chugging water and heading to the Determination tent to claim my pin.

At this point, the sun was shining and the DJ was blasting Imma Be. This made Frank very happy.  We headed to the food stations and stocked up on hummus and terra chips—um did they know I was a blogger or does everyone really love hummus?

Our race had come and went, but I was thinking of Ali, just knowing she was rocking the full marathon! In a little over a month that will be us. For now, I am happy enjoying the rest of my short stay in the Hamptons!

By the time we got home and to lunch it was 12:30PM and I was so ready for lunch.  We went to the hotel next door Gurney’s.

The menu looked good

We started with a salad:

I got the veggie goat cheese panini and fries

Honestly, it was just okay, but I didn’t leave hungry.

Frank got a burger.  It was an interesting lunch in that I was on my laptop and Frank was on  a business call, but hey that’s life.

Afterwards we walked around and I remembered how much I adore the beach. The sound of the waves is so relaxing, there’s nothing like it.

My official time is 2:14:14, not my best, but over 6 minutes better than the Queens Half, so I have to be happy with that!