Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween everyone!! Finally we have Halloween on a Friday, not on some other week night, but now the weather has turned rainy! There will be a lot of wet and cold ghosts and goblins out there trick-or-treating tonight!! I'm not really a big fan of the dressing up part of Halloween (the candy part is another story!)-- even when I was a kid I never got very excited about it. I remember a few years where I was either a Hobo or a punk rocker, two very easy costumes! The last time I dressed up for Halloween was two years ago, and that was only because we had a Halloween themed TNT run and I was invited to a Halloween party. Last year Halloween came just two short days before I was off to New York City for the NY Marathon and my time was taken up getting ready for that. This year I'm not doing anything that requires any dressing up so I'm happy about that :D

Last night I went on a run with Amy. I really didn't want to go... it was cold and rainy out and all I wanted to do was go home and get under the covers! I was half hoping that it would turn from a drizzle into pouring rain so we could cancel, but also telling myself to just do the damn thing :) I knew that as long as I could get myself out to the run, I'd probably have a pretty nice run.

Our run last night was much faster than our leisurely run on Monday... the trail was also MUCH less crowded! Monday night we took it easy and ran at a pretty steady pace. Last night we ran much faster... I think that Amy figured out that we took about 30 seconds per mile off our time. I think it was one of the best runs that I've had in a long time and I think the cooler weather was a big part of that-- I knew we were running faster, but I felt like I could have just keep going and going. I forgot how much I love running when it's colder out! It's harder to motivate myself to get out to the run in the winter, but once I'm running I always feel really good!

I hope everyone has a happy Halloween and a wonderful weekend. I also want to wish Phil GOOD LUCK on his half marathon this Sunday!!! Don't let a little rain bring you down (I'll do a no-rain dance for you anyway)!

The end of our Indian Summer

Although it hasn't turned really cold yet, at least during the day, I think that we've seen the last of the summer-ish weather that we've been having. :( It's starting too cool down and I think there is even some rain forcasted for later in the week. This last weekend though the temperatures were at the almost-record-high of 85 degrees! It was the perfect weather for a day in Sonoma wine tasting with the girls.

Claudia and I got an email from Cline a few weeks ago notifying us that it was time to go pick up our wine. Since this last weekend was our first free weekend, we decided to make a once-every-three-months Sonoma trip on Sunday. It ended up being just a girl's trip with Claudia, Lindsay and I. We headed out to Sonoma around 11:00 after Lindsay ran the Lafayette Reservoir 10k and by the time we got to Cline we were all starving! We did a little wine tasting, picked up our wine, and then ate our picnic lunch out on the lawn. The weather was just perfect... sunny and warm, but not too hot. We stuffed ourselves silly and then headed over to a few other wineries. We went to Buena Vista and Ravenswood near downtown Sonoma. I really like the white wines at Buena Vista, not the reds so much. And even though I'd been to Ravenswood before, and remembered liking the wines, I didn't like them as much this time.

You can see in the pictures that the three of us all have on our Nike necklaces. Well, a few people commented on our necklaces and then mentioned that the lady who "won" the marathon, but didn't really win, had been into those wineries. We were stalking her, just a week or so too late :D

After we left Ravenswood, we decided to head for home. Our bellies were so full from lunch and the wine we tasted, we didn't think we could fit anything more in. But when Claudia mentioned going to Domaine Carneros for a little sparkling wine tasting, I didn't say no :) We finished off our girl's day with light, but still too filling, dinner at a new mexican restaurant in Danville. THANKS girls for a wonderful day!!

More Nike pics

After hearing that the Nike pics were up, I went online to search for mine. Claudia and I saw tons of photographers, so I was expecting a bunch of photos of us... there ended up being not as many as I thought there would be. And thankfully there were no pictures of the finish line trip :D

I think this one was taking along the Emarcadero... probably around mile 4 or 5.

I think this is about the same spot, just a different photographer

Our finish line sprint!!

Nike Race Report... Finally!!

Nike race weekend officially started on Saturday. I slept in on Sat. morning and lounged around a little before getting all my gear together. At 2:30 I made my way over to Oakland to meet up with Claudia and Rocky. They had already packed the car up with their stuff, we shoved mine in (btw... the car looked like we were leaving for a week's vacation!) and then we took off to the Oakland airport to pick up Claudia's dad who was coming up to cheer Claudia on. Next stop... TNT Pasta Party!

The Pasta Party didn't start until about 5:30 but Rocky's team was meeting at the Moscone center to take some team pictures. We got over there around 4:30, took pictures, chatting with everyone, and then got in line so we could be first in when they opened the doors. The minute the doors opened, you could hear the manic cheering! I think it was even louder than last year!! TNT staff, coaches, mentors, cappies and other volunteers cheered us on as we walked through the entry, down the stairs and into the pasta party. Getting cheered for at the pasta parties is always both a little exciting, and a little embarrassing. I was just hoping that I didn't fall down the stairs in front of all these people!!

The pasta party was, as in years past, HUGE! The food was pretty good, and the speakers were also good. John "The Penguin" Bingham spoke again and was, as usual, very funny. I missed the honoree speaker because I had to make a trip to the bathroom, and then a side trip to the TNT booth to pick up some TNT gear :D


After the Pasta Party, Claudia, Rocky, Claudia's dad and I headed off to Rocky's parent's house in Daly City. They were nice enough to put us all up for the night so we wouldn't have a long drive to the race start on Sun. morning. We all got our food, clothes, etc. laid out for the next day and then basically went to bed. I slept pretty well but was not ready for the alarm to go off at 4:45 Sunday morning :( We all shuffled out of bed, put on all of our race gear, ate breakfast, and then all 6 of us piled into Rocky's parent's car to head down to the start line at Union Square.

Once down at Union Square, we met up with Coach, Mama Lisa and the rest of the team for shout outs and some last words of encouragement. It still hadn't really hit me that we were doing a half marathon... I was more nervous before my 8 mile run a month ago!! Right before the start we all went our separate ways to line up... Rocky, Claudia and I went to the same corral (even though Rocky's WAY faster than we are) and we were soon joined by Amy. Unlike last year, they didn't have anyone policing the corrals... you could really line up wherever you wanted to, and I was worried that this meant we'd have to slog our way through a bunch of walkers for the first few miles. We heard the announcer start the race and... nothing. We stood there for about 15 minutes before our corral started moving forward. We walked around Union Square and then started running at the start line. We were OFF!!!

While we were lined up at the start line, I thought I had to go to the bathroom. Since I had just been about a half hour earlier, and hadn't been drinking any water, I thought it was just the usual pre-race excitement. But after we started, I realized that I need to pee for real. Claudia did also so we waved to Amy and then headed over to the porta-potties around mile 1. I'm glad we did because 1) I did have to pee, 2) It was the only set of porta potties that had no line and 3) We ran into Raji!!! She was out there to walk/run part of the half course. It was SO nice to see her and it gave me a huge mental boost!

For the most part the race was pretty uneventful, which was good :D The first few miles on the flat part of the course through the Embarcadero went really well. Despite the pretty much open corral system, we didn't get stuck behind too many people (or at least any more than usual). Since Claudia and I have run this course for 4 years (the first year used a different route) we know what to expect, that's why it was such a surprise around mile 5 when we took an unexpected turn! Usually we go through Aquatic Park to the Marina, but due to some construction going in, we had to detour around Aquatic Park. Unfortunately this included the addition of two more hills :( But since they were (relatively) small ones, we decided to run up them. When we got to what is normally the first hill, we ran up that one too. Those were the only hills we ended up running :D

Since that small detour added on a little extra mileage, I wondered where they were going to take off mileage. The detoured us again around mile 6, bringing us up the first major hill a different way than we usually went. For the next 4 miles or so we walked up and ran down the hills through the Presidio and Sea Cliff areas. We got to see Claudia's dad and Rocky's parents a couple of times, our friend Phil and his family, and other friends cheering people along the course. Even though Claudia and I had only done an abbreviated training schedule for Nike, I think we were both feeling pretty good. Our joints weren't used to the hills and all the pounding though so we were both feeling some aches in our hips and knees. Nothing too painful to keep us from continuing though.



As we came down the last big hill near the Cliff House, I was happy that we only had 2-3 miles left :D Once we hit the park, I was drained. We were close to the finish, but not close enough. The road through the park has a slight incline and even though it was nothing compared to the hills we had already climbed, it was making me drag. I told Claudia I needed to walk for a bit and thankfully she didn't keep on running and leave me in her trail! We walked for a couple of minutes and then started running again. Once we veered off from the marathoners to head back through the park towards the finish I felt a little better. We got a slight downhill (when you're already pooped, any little down slope is a blessing!) and I knew the end was close. We ran into Mama Lisa and she ran with us for a little bit. Then we finally got to the end of the park, turned onto the Great Highway and saw the finish line. Every year I get this surge of energy when I get to the end of the park... you can hear all the cheering and you know the finish line is just around the corner. I it always gives me goosebumps and gives me a little extra power to sprint to the finish line. Claudia was right there next to me speeding up too and we crossed the finish line together! WOO HOO! And then I tripped. :( No joke, but thankfully I didn't fall down and hopefully it wasn't caught by the finish line photographers!

All I wanted to do after crossing the finish line was get my Tiffany's necklace and finisher t-shirt. I LOVE this years necklace and only semi-like the finisher shirt. It's a brown color (more gender neutral than last year's pink) and made out of the same material as last year. Technically it's a running shirt, but it feels more like a cotton t-shirt and it isn't anything I'd actually run in. Oh well, I have 3 other Nike Marathon shirts I can run in :)


After picking up our stuff and visiting the TNT tent to grab some food, Claudia and I headed off to find the parents, while Rocky went out to cheer on some of his mentees who were still on the course. We found Rocky's parents and Claudia's dad and spent a little time chatting with them and eating the food we had grabbed. The overcast, cool weather that had been so nice to run in was not so nice to just hang around in! We drove out towards Lake Merced to pick up Rocky and head back to Daly City. We showered, changed and packed up the car and went out to lunch at a Salvadorean place in the Mission. I think it was the best post-race meal ever! I was so beat and full I nodded off on the drive back to Oakland. By the time I got back to Walnut Creek it was about 4:00. I unpacked all my stinky running clothes and spent the rest of the evening stuck on the couch... My knees were so stiff and achy I didn't want to move for anything!

Today I'm feeling almost back to normal... just a little stiffness in my quads but that's getting better every day. My final time was 2:52. Not my best Nike time (2006: 2:45) but not my worst either (2004: 3:09). For not doing much training at all, I felt really good during the race and also pretty good after!

Goofing Off

I'm working on my Nike race report and am hoping to get some pictures to add in before I post it (I was lazy and didn't bring my camera-- SHOCK!!) To summarize for all those who are dying to know... I finished, I'm still walking, and I'm proudly wearing my new Tiffany's necklace! WOO HOO! I'll post the full report will all the wonderful details soon. In the meantime, check out what I've been wasting my time on:

Is it weird that I find this completely hysterical?!

Ready to run... I hope

Well, the time has come. The Nike half marathon is just two days away. Am I ready? I think so... I hope so! I spent yesterday evening in the city, checking out the Expotique, picking up my race packet, and doing a little shopping. The Expotique was, as usual, VERY crowded, and this was only Thursday! I shudder to think how crowded it's going to be tonight and tomorrow once all the out-of-town runners start arriving.

The packet pick up went very smoothly and then Amy, Jeanette and I spent a little time walking around checking everything out. They had the usual manicure area, iPod engraving and gait analysis stations, and also had a new photo booth, and button making area. There were lines for pretty much everything except for the oxygen station so that's really the only thing we did. I felt a little silly sitting there with this tube up my nose inhaling Sex On The Beach "flavored" oxygen, but it was kind of fun :)

After partaking of a free glass of wine, some cheese and crackers, and a mini-sized Jamba Juice, Amy and I headed over to Niketown to see what kind of trouble we could get into! I usually avoid putting spending too much since Nike's clothes only seem to fit very small people, which I am not. But this year we had heard that their clothes were fitting a little roomier, and truer to normal sizes so I was both excited, and nervous-- excited for me and nervous for my bank account! Turns out that I didn't do too badly... I limited myself to a really cute blue t-shirt and a teal long sleeve running shirt that will come in handy running this winter. There were a bunch of other things that I WANTED, but definitely didn't NEED-- I think I'm going to wait awhile and see what they end up putting on sale!

Tonight I have nothing to do but laundry, carbo load and get ready for the race. I am so excited to have a night with nothing to do and no trip into the city planned (I also had to go to the city on Wed. for our Winter Season Mentor/Cappy Training)! Tomorrow I can sleep in, and then I'll pack everything up for the weekend and head over to Rocky and Claudia's in the afternoon. We're all going to the TNT Pasta Party tomorrow evening in SF, and then staying in Daly City so we'll be a little closer to the starting line on Sunday morning.

GOOD LUCK to everyone who is doing either the Full or Half Marathon on Sunday! Enjoy the wonderful weather, scenery and remember to RUN LIKE A GIRL!!!

Gala

Last night I got to be Amy's date to the Marine Mammal Center's Annual Gala! Jeanette brought Claudia as her date so it turned into a girl's night out! The gala was at the Ritz in SF, which I had never been to... SO pretty! We got into the city a little early and had a cocktail before cocktail hour :)

Claudia and I

Amy, my date, and I

Jeanette and her "date"

The girls all dressed up :)

The gala itself was very fancy and a lot of fun. First we got to enjoy some champagne and appetizers while we visited with some of the other party goers and then we moved into one of the ballrooms for dinner, a presentation and auction. The three course dinner was amazing... we started with a salad with pistachio crusted goat cheese and raspberry vinaigrette, then the most delicious braised short ribs, horseradish mashed potatoes and green beans, and finally an apple-raisin pastry for dessert. YUMM!!

How cute is this little seal?!

The live auction was a lot of fun too... I'd never been to an auction before and I had to hide my paddle so I wouldn't be tempted to raise it, just for the fun of it! Plus, I couldn't afford any of the auction items-- the bids for each started in the thousand dollar plus range! :(

Pretending to bid

The whole night was incredibly fun... THANK YOU Amy for bringing me as your date!!

Girl's Nights

Last night I met up with Claudia, Jeanette and Lindsay for a Girls dinner night. It's been way too long since we did our last Girl's Night (Havana's and Sex and the City) and it was time to get together again! We just did dinner this time... we went to Pizza Antica in Lafayette... yummmm :) We met up at 6:00 and spent the next three hours eating, talking and catching up!

Tonight is another Girl's Night... I get to be Amy's "date" to a big, fancy gala for the Marine Mammal Center at the Ritz Carlton in SF!! Her, and Jeanette's, company had some extra tickets so Claudia is going as Jeanette's date, and I get to go as Amy's! We get to get all dressed up and spend the evening sipping cocktails and eating fancy food! Amy, Claudia and Jeanette went last year and had a fabulous time so I'm excited to be able to go this year also!!

I just took pictures from this weekend off my camera so now I can share them :D

Claudia and I at the Rockit Room Friday night

Rocky, Claudia and I at Now & Zen

Sugar Ray (Mark McGrath in the white tank top)

Gavin DeGraw

A "Rockin'" Weekend

Well, I managed to cram a lot of fun into the weekend, but no running! Whoops! Friday night Claudia and I met up in Oakland and had dinner before heading off to the Rockit Room in SF for the MotherHumbuckers CD Release Party. We got out there super early (no traffic!!) and ended up going with Rocky, Ollie and Jose to a Thai place down the street... they got dinner and Claudia and I got dessert :D When we got back to the Rockit Room, the first band was already playing. We listened to the rest of their set, and watched all the MotherHumbuckers fans, friends and family start pouring into the club. By the time the feature band went on, there was a pretty big crowd there! They did a fantastic job, and even played some new songs that I wasn't familiar with! After they were done playing we hung around visiting and listening to the other two bands that came after MotherHumbuckers. We didn't leave until around 1:00, and I wasn't tucked into bed until around 2:00 am. I haven't stayed out that late on a Friday night for a long time! It was well worth it though!

Claudia and I had decided that instead of getting up early to run on Saturday, we'd give our self a few hours to recover and then run together around 5:00. Umm yeah, that didn't happen. I think we were both still tired from the night before and just wanted to relax. I was going to make dinner for Claudia, Rocky and I after we ran but we just skipped the running part and did just dinner instead!

Sunday we were all up early so we could get out to the city for Now & Zen. We had scored some free tickets (and ended up having a few extra) and I was super excited about going! We went to Whole Foods to pick up some sandwiches for lunch, and then drove into the city. When I first walked out of the house around 8:45am on my way to Oakland, it was freezing, and I was so happy that I had bundled up. I even brought along some gloves and a fleece hat in case it was really windy or cold, seeing that the concert was outside in Golden Gate Park. Of course it ended up being sunny and warm and I was burning up in my long sleeved shirt! The concert started at 12:00 and they started letting us in around 11:00. Already I could feel that it was warming up and by the time the second act went on, I was getting uncomfortably warm. I ended up buying a 1999 Now & Zen shirt they had there for $10 just so I could change out of my long sleeved shirt :D

The bands were all really great... the first one to go on was Lenka, then Sarah Bareilles, Sugar Ray, Gavin DeGraw and finally Duffy. They were all amazing live performers and even though I didn't know all the songs from most of the artists (except Gavin DeGraw and Sugar Ray, who mostly played their old hits, with a few news songs sprinkled in), I really enjoyed each one. After over 5 hours of sitting in the sun listening to music, I got home around 6:30, tired and sunburned, but happy. It was a great weekend :D

No time to run...

... life is just too busy right now! After bailing on Amy on Monday, I'm also bailing on our run tonight, next Monday AND the following Thursday :( With Nike coming up, and a new season of TNT starting, there are too many things interfering with my run schedule :( After Nike I think the running schedule should be back to normal, at least until I start the Winter TNT season in early November! I did manage to fit in a run with Claudia on Tuesday and that went okay. Neither of us where in a running mood but we were good girls and went for our run! It was pretty warm out too, which didn't help us at all, but at least we did the damn thing, as Coach Al likes to say :)

Tonight I'm missing our run to attend an Info Meeting for the upcoming Winter Season of TNT, which I'll be a mentor during. Yep, after many seasons of captaining, I'm going back to being a Mentor. I got a little burnt out of captaining, and I'm looking forward to being able to "mentor" a group of new participants!

This weekend is going to be a very busy one... tomorrow night it'll be a late night out in the city at the CD Release Party for Rocky's band, the MotherHumbuckers! It should be a lot of fun, but not really the best thing to be doing the night before a run. Instead of running Saturday morning, I think that Claudia and I are going to run later that day in the early evening. That way we can sleep in and recover from the party before doing 6 miles :D

Time to taper

It doesn't seem quite right that we're in taper mode now, when I've only really been training for the past couple of weeks! But, tapering we are! Right now, tapering just means that I'm bailing on a few weekly runs due to other commitments and this weekend I'm only running about 6 miles :)

My weekend started out nicely... my parents were driving through Walnut Creek on Friday afternoon so we met up for an early bird dinner after I got off of work. We went to the yummy new burger place I had gone to last week (it was one of the only places I could think of that might be open at 4:30 :D) and I had a very good, and running friendly, chicken sandwich. After a too-quick dinner, my parents had to head back on the road again and I went home to get everything ready for the 10 miler the next day and just hang out.

Claudia and I had decided to meet up at Heather Farms and run our 10 miler there. We figured that would be good spot since we could run out and back one way for 2.5 miles, refilly our bottles back at the car, and then go out 2.5 miles and back the other way. Mentally we thought it would break the run up nicely into two more manageable sounding distances :D We needed all the mental help we could get!

We started out around 7:30 and both had expected it to be on the cool side. It actually started warming up and there were no signs of the clouds we thought we be out. The first 5 miles went really well... we chatted and ran at a very comfortable (not too slow or fast) pace. Once we got back to the car we refilled bottles, refueled and then headed back out onto the trail. During the second 5 miles the clouds started rolling in, which brought us a welcome break from the sun. I think we slowed down just slightly, but we were still running the entire time (except for some short breaks waiting for the light to change at the cross streets). We finished our 10 miles in almost exactly 2 hours and we both felt really good. I feel much more confident now about the Nike Half Marathon in two weeks-- I know it's not going be my best half marathon, but I feel prepared to be able to do the distance without dying along the way! After our run, we went out to breakfast to reward ourselves with some pancakes and waffles :D Yumm!

After a quick trip to Target, I went home, took a shower and took a LONG nap :) I woke up and was surprised to find that I wasn't hurting at all (other than a little chaffing... ouch). I love how after long runs I feel completely justified doing absolutely nothing for the rest of the day! Sunday I didn't do a whole lot of anything either... it was so nice outside I sat out on the balcony and read, and then got sucked into The Starter Wife on USA. Ahh, another unproductive day :)

Last night I had to bail on my run with Amy (SORRY AMY!!) because my parents were driving back through town again and wanted to hook up for another early bird dinner :D I don't get to see them a whole lot and it was nice to be able to have a quick dinner with them! We went to grab a bite (and some wine) at Va di Vi and I heard about their weekend down in San Jose and Santa Cruz. My mom was taking a class on doing voice overs and then got to have a recording session at a studio in Santa Cruz. (Shameless plug to follow: If anyone needs someone to do a voice over, my mom's available!)

Am I ready?

Our biggest run before Nike is happening tomorrow... the 10 miler! Claudia and I are meeting up to run together... we've figured out a double out and back course so that we can stop back at the car halfway through and fill up our bottles if necessary (since we won't have the benefit of water stops :( I'm not as nervous about this long run after doing 8 a couple of weeks ago... I know it's not going to be easy, but I know we can get it done! Wish us luck!!

Last night I met up with Claudia and Amy in Danville at the Iron Horse Trail. Even though we all have slightly different paces, it's nice to have that accountability when you know you're supposed to be meeting people to run. I think we all figured that we'd start out together and then as people felt speedier or slower, we could all settle into our own pace. Well, that didn't happen... we actually all stuck together! Since we were heading out North on the trail first, we got a nice downslope. The weather was perfect and there was no huffing and puffing, but I wasn't sure if the decrease in exertion also meant we were going slower. Nope, we were actually going faster than Amy and I had during our last run! On the way back our exertion levels were higher, but that was mostly because we were running on a slight upslope. I think our return pace was the same, or even a little faster than our pace for the first half! It was a great run, and it's nice to be feeling a little more in shape... after each run I feel more and more like I did when I was running regularly with Pam and Amy. Hopefully that means I will be more prepared for Nike too!

A friendly PSA

You've all registered to vote, right? And if you're registered, you're planning on actually voting, right? I hope so :) I for one am very excited about voting. I just got all my stuff in the mail and am planning on reading it all over and filling out my sample ballot like a good little voter so I'll be all ready for the big day! Every year we're inundated with voting PSA's reminding people how important it is to vote-- I always kind of ignored them and was very late in joining the voting bandwagon. Most PSA's are usually pretty lame and cringe-worthy, but that's not true about one that I stumbled across today-- it's pretty motivating, and even funny in parts! Check it out:



On a running note, everything is going very well. I skipped out on my Monday night run with Amy because I had a nasty headache. Claudia wasn't able to run on Tuesday so I asked Amy if she'd be able to run on Tuesday instead of Monday. She was, and so we met up last night to run together. It was really warm out, and for some reason the air was really crappy, but we had a pretty good run. We both felt that we were running much slower than last week's run, but once Amy looked at her watch she saw we were actually running faster! We were still out of breath at the end of the run, but it was nice to know that we weren't dragging as much as we felt we were! I'm really hoping that the weather starts to cool down though, especially for this weekend's 10 miler!