GOTR Community Service Project

As most of you know I’m coaching a program called Girls On The Run (GOTR). The program is for girls ages 8-11 and it “educates and prepares girls for a lifetime of self-respect and healthy living”. We go through a number of exercises and activities each time we meet, and the program ends with the girls running a local 5K.

The season has 24 lessons that focus on three main topics:

1. All About Me – Getting to know who I am and what I stand for

2. Building My Team – Understanding the importance of cooperation

3. Community Begins With Me – Learning about community and working on a community project

Community Begins With Me

We started on “Community Begins With Me” a couple weeks and began discussing what a community is, what communities the girls are a part of, and what it takes for a community to run smoothly. We then started talking about the community service project with them and had them start thinking about what they would like to do as a group for their community project.

Developing The Project

We brainstormed with the girls last Tuesday to help them come up with a great community project idea. The project had to be something that we could complete during one session (one hour time limit) and at our regular meeting site (Carmel Valley Community Rec Center). This ruled out anything that took a lot of time, or involved us having to go somewhere else to complete the project.

Some of the ideas that they came up with were:

• Create puppets for a puppet show to benefit a local hospital
• Create holiday cards for the elderly and homeless
• Collect clothing for a homeless shelter
• Make cards for a local hospital
• Collect shoes to donate
• Collect toys/canned food/clothing for a shelter

We took a secret vote for the above ideas (eyes closed, hands raised so no one’s feeling was hurt if their idea wasn’t chosen) and the winner was.....

Creating holiday cards for the elderly/homeless!

One idea that I didn’t move onto the voting stage? “Going to a hobo village and giving out food!”. Umm… hobo village? Ha ha. What? Wait, I think there is actually one right around my storage unit downtown. No jokes… it’s a bit colorful down there. I informed the girls that “hobos” isn’t really a nice name for homeless people and that they probably shouldn’t call them that. They seemed a bit confused … apparently K-12 education has updated their lingo since I was last in school.

Anyways, we then went around the group of girls and had them all list something that they would bring to help make the cards. We had a long list of items including: envelopes, markers, colored pencils, glitter, pipe cleaners, construction paper, stickers, crayons, gel pens, and envelopes.

I then needed to figure out a place that we could send the cards. I figured a hospital or senior home might not want a random package of cards to show up on their door, so I looked to see if there were formal charities or organizations set up that would fit with our project. Luckily, I found two! While doing my research I found two programs that I thought the girls would enjoy, and decided to present both of them to the girls as options to see which they liked better. While they weren't hospitals or senior centers as they were originally hoping for, they were great options that would work for our project.

Option 1 - "Holiday Mail For Heroes"

http://www.redcross.org/holidaymail

This is a program put together by the American Red Cross which allows Americans to "send a touch of home" to US service members and veterans across the country and abroad.

Option 2 - "Make A Child Smile" (MACS)

http://www.makeachildsmile.org/index.shtml

This organization provides emotional support to families whose children suffer from chronic or life-threatening illness. Most of these children are chronically ill and some are terminally ill.

There were a few guidelines for both of the programs, they both prohibited glitter due to health concerns, they also both recommended leaving our religious references or specific holiday greetings (since not everyone celebrates Christmas), and for the children’s cards they sadly asked that the cards did not contain the phrases “Get well soon” or “Get Better”, since many of the children in the program have illnesses with no known cure and unfortunately never were going to get better. Wow.. so sad. :o( The site suggested instead to say things such as “Wishing you well”, “Praying for you”, or “Thinking of you”.

Executing the Community Project

The girls showed up last Thursday armed with supplies and a ton of energy. They were ready to get their markers out and start their cards and I struggled a bit at first to calm them down and get them to stop and listen to the guidelines. DOWNER ALERT! Nothing erases the smile of a girl holding markers and pipe cleaners than someone telling them that their card should be cheery but not say things such as “get well soon”, because these children that they would be sending cards too most likely were NOT going to be getting well soon. Yes, call me Eeyore.

The girls perked back up quickly though when I said that I had profiles of 14 different kids which included pictures of them, information about their condition, a list of their favorite things and interests, and information about their siblings if they had any.

I honestly thought that the girls would be split between wanting to make cards for the military versus the kids. I was wrong! All of the girls immediately started yelling “I want a kid!” and grabbing for a profile. Since I only had 14 profiles and we had 24 girls, some of them had to share a kid or some started on their cards for the military first.

The other coaches and I walked around while the girls were creating their cards to give them ideas on what to write, make sure that they were following the guidelines, and to help share the load of supplies between the girls. I broke up two fights over a book of stickers but besides that the girls shared very well.

While the girls were making their cards one of the girls was really excited to make her card for her “new friend” because the girl’s birthday was the same month as hers! Then she noticed that the girl was actually born the same year as her. Then the sad realization set in .. “wait….” She said. “This girl is only a little bit older than I am…” …. And I think I know the part she was thinking but didn’t say. “And she’s dying..”. Yes, so sad. :o( The girls really got into making the cards and there were so many cute ones created. In total the girls created 35 cards. We had 11 for our military service members and 24 kids for the Make A Child Smile Program!

Pop-Up Present Card

PC Happy Holidays Card

Cards For The Military

Disney Themed Card

Present Card

"We Have A Lot In Common" Cards

I think our community project was a great success and I think the girls had a lot of fun completing it!

Four Days In N'Oleans

I spent four days this past week in New Orleans. This was my second trip here, both times being for tradeshows for work. New Orleans, along with many others, are on a long list of cities that I’ve been lucky enough to see thanks to my job. Thank you marketing jobs! I love you!

Welcome to New Orleans!

Arriving In The Big Easy

I spent most of Wednesday traveling, and soon after arriving we had a company dinner and meeting. Not much of note happened that night. Well, aside from the fact that I had the weirdest hotel room ever! Okay, so the room wasn’t that weird, it was my bed. I initially walked into the room and admired the size of it. It was larger than normal, almost as big as a suite, and had a bar area over to one side. As I glanced around the room I thought “Cool! A bar!” (Not sure why, not like I was going to be mixing drinks or anything.) My eyes finally settled on the bed, and it took me a minute to realize why the bed looked so weird. It was on the floor! The boxspring was right on the floor! I tried to think of why you’d want your bed on the floor and couldn’t come up with any theories (handicapped? senior citizen? NO! A bed on the floor would be worse!) and thought oh well, whatever, at least I still get a nice big room!

My Weird Floor Bed

Oysters, Rabbits, and Frogs – OH MY!

The next day our tradeshow opened and it was into a suit and heels and onto the show floor for the day. Luckily it was a short day. Only 9:30am – 7:00pm. Can you sense the sarcasm? That is a REALLY long time to be on your feet. In heels. I have perfected an icy look of disdain for all the men who complain about how much their feet hurt after a day at a tradeshow. Oh really? You want to talk about foot pain? Put on a pair of of heels! After the show closed we all went out to dinner at K Paul’s. I had been to K Paul’s on my last visit to New Orleans and remember the menu being full of flavorful seafood and spicy creations.

K Paul's Louisiana Kitchen

The menu must have changed a lot over the years, because the primary theme I saw throughout the menu this time was DEEP FRIED. Insert frowny face. Literally 90% of the menu (appetizers/entrees) was deep fried! The only two options that weren’t deep fried were the pork chop and the two steaks. Even the chickens were deep fried! I reluctantly ordered a steak but didn’t enjoy it all that much. There were a few other interesting things on the menu – fried frog legs and fried rabbit. Yep, Kermit and Bugs Bunny were on the menu. Poor little hopping creatures! Not to totally escape the blame of eating cute creatures, I took the recommendation of the waiter and my local colleagues and ordered the Turtle Soup to start out with. Mmm mmmm good! I of course tried not to think too much about my former pet turtle Greensleeves. I had little Greensleeves for several years, until finally my dad suggested that we let him move on to another family. After watching a turtle sit on a rock for about 5 years, I didn’t put up too much of a fight.

Celebrity Spotting #1

The next day it was back to the tradeshow! Luckily on Thursday we had normal hours: 9:30am – 5:00pm. For lunch we went to a restaurant across the street called the Grand Isle Café. Amusingly, when our Louisiana sales manager recommended the place to me I heard “Grand OWL” café, and texted that very name to a couple people to meet up with us. Oops! Luckily it was just across the street and easy to figure out.

This restaurant had a couple interesting items on the menu including alligator sausage. They also had turtle stew and the waitress convinced me that even though I’d had turtle soup before, turtle stew was a lot different and I really needed to try that as well. I did, and was not that impressed. To make matters worse I didn’t realize that eating turtle stew is along the lines of eating shark fin soup. Great.

As we were leaving the restaurant my boss said “Hey, did you see that we just passed George Foreman on the way out?” What?? NO! I missed him! I walked back a bit to see him through the window. After a second glance I’m still not sure I could pick him out of a crowd again. But I was excited to see him. The inventor of the George Foreman grill!? Amazing! Just about every person I know has owned one of those at one time or another, and my dad is one of the biggest fans of that cooking contraption. I immediately called my dad to share the exciting news. “Guess what dad! I just saw George Foreman!” My dad seemed decently impressed and asked if he was with one of his sons, also named George. Apparently he has 5 sons and they are all named George. Okay, that’s weird.

George Foreman & Grill!

I chatted with my dad for a bit about New Orleans and he asked if we had gone to dinner at the restaurant run by “That famous chef, the really big one”. I remembered seeing a picture of K Paul on the seasonings they sold at the restaurant and asked if he meant K Paul. His response? “You mean the guy that dresses up like a lady?”

HUH?

Oh wait… are you referring to Ru Paul? No! Not Ru Paul, K Paul is someone else. Guess that’s not who my dad had in mind. David suggested later that my dad was probably talking about Emeril. That makes sense, “big” as in really famous, not “big” as in the size of a house. Whoops! Sorry Paul, but you’re a bit on the large side.

RuPaul vs K. Paul

Would You Like To Buy...?

We went back to the tradeshow and finished out a few more normal hours at the booth. Normal except for one person's question! As a Marketing person at the tradeshow booth, I'm used to getting the non-dollar-generating questions and inquiries shuttled over by the sales reps. Most commonly:

• Where can I get this information for my website?
• Do you distribute products in my country ___? Who can I contact for more info?
• When will you be launching product ___?
• Would you be interested in advertising in the publication ____?
• I'm from the __ dental society/group/club/cult. Would you be interested in sponsoring a booth there?

So I saw one of the reps starting to walk a man over to me and heard her end with "Monika can probably help you with that." I was expecting him to be asking about advertisements, product videos or the likes of that. Instead, he immediately asked " Would your company be interested in purchasing cadaver heads? We have very competitive pricing!"

Ummmm..........

Um... did he just say CADAVER heads? EWE! Oh wait, they do practice dental surgery on cadaver heads. But ewe, why is he asking me? Oh yeah, that's something our corporate office would handle.. if we did. But I don't think we do. Don't the universities usually handle that? We just have dummies with simulated materials. (All this time of course staring at him with a frozen smile.) I finally recovered enough to let him know that I was not the person involved with that but knew who was, and I'd pass on his information.

EWE.

Moving on....

Dinner at GW Fins

On Friday night we had reservations at an upscale seafood restaurant named GW Fins. Wow, the food was amazing there! We started out with the best crab cakes I’ve ever had, savory clams, and sizzling seasoned oysters. (Okay, I’m on the flight back right now typing this and I’m getting hungry again just thinking about that meal!) After that I had an amazing Chilean Sea Bass and my coworkers had a variety of other great looking dishes. To finish it all off we had sorbet and crème brulee. So yummy!

Sizzzzzling Oysters!

GW Fins Dinner Group

Jazz Hands!

After dinner we rolled ourselves down the street to the Ritz Carlton lounge to check out a local live jazz band. Ever want to see people who love their job? Come watch this jazz band play! The way they were shaking their heads and tapping their feet and belting out the music, wow! It really made you feel like you were really in New Orleans. We hung out there for the rest of the evening and finally called it a night around 1am. That translates to about 5am in Monika’s book! I’m usually in bed by 10pm!

Jeremy Davenport - Ritz Lounge

Live Jazz Video

The last day of the tradeshow was Saturday and was luckily only a half day. I stopped by the “Riverwalk Shops” next to our hotel/convention to pick up a few souvenirs and I spotted something that will go down as the first Christmas gift on my list. (Sidebar – I can’t believe we’re halfway through November already! Only a few weekends left to do Christmas shopping. Yikes!)

Celebrity Sighting #2

By Saturday I was tired from the night before, my feet hurt, and I was ready to go home. I had a quick flight from New Orleans to Charlotte (US Airways hub), and then Charlotte to San Diego. As the flight was boarding I got into my window seat and was happy to see that the trickle of people boarding the plane were all passing me and it looked like I was going to be so lucky as to have no seat neighbors. Whoo hoo! It looked like everyone had finished boarding and I was stretching into the next seat a bit working on my crossword when I saw a last minute person get on the plane. Uh oh! I hope he wasn’t going to end up sitting next to me! Wait a minute… this guy looked familiar. He kind of looks like one of the Baldwin brothers! You know, the blonde one with the rounder face that isn’t all that famous. Not Alec ... what are the rest of their names? Stephen? Was that him?

Baldwin Brothers
What are the non-Alecs' names??

As he passed the flight attendant and the people in front of me were whispering “Did you see who that is?? That was one of the Baldwin brothers!” I was running through my mind trying to remember the other brothers names. Stephen? David? Brandon? Why couldn’t I remember the non-Alec Baldwin names? I think other people have this problem too. I’m glad I’m not know as one of the “Carlson Sisters” whose first name no one can remember. Total benefit of being an only child! High five to me! A quick Google image search on my Blackberry revealed that this was indeed Stephen Baldwin.

Stephen Baldwin!

After that celebrity sighting, the rest of my trip was fairly uneventful. Well, besides the grumpy lady next to me in first class who has been drinking wine the whole flight. I hope someone’s picking her up and she's not driving home. Cheers lady!

My trip to New Orleans was short but fun. Some of the food we had was great, but some of it left me feeling like I needed to only eat raw vegetables for a week while I detoxed. Maybe at some point in the future I’ll get to travel back just for fun and can see a little bit more of the city.

Marine Corps Marathon 2009

This past Sunday David and I ran the Marine Corps Marathon in Washington DC and Arlington, Virginia! This was David’s first full marathon and he did great! We trained together virtually on an 18-week training plan that was loosely based off of Hal-Higdon’s Intermediate Marathon Training Plan.

Running For A Reason

When we signed up for the race we decided that we would fundraise for a charity throughout our training. We wanted to pick a charity that either had a personal connection to us or our family, or that directly impacted a group in the area local to the race. The Marine Corps Marathon is a huge fundraising event and I was amazed to find out that there were EIGHT charity partners associated with the race.

We ended up choosing an organization called Back On My Feet, and raised a total of $625 over the course of 10 weeks. Thank you so much to everyone who contributed to our fundraising! We really appreciate it!

Marathon Expo

On the Saturday before the race David and I headed over to the expo to pick up our race packets. The expo was being held at the convention center which was conveniently located right next to a Metro station. It was pouring that day and we were lucky to be able to walk directly from the Metro station into the convention center without ever having to go outside. On the way to the expo I was reading updates from the Marine Corps Marathon twitter account which was announcing various booths that Miles the marathon mascot was visiting and handing out prizes if you whispered the secret phrase to him from the tweets. Unfortunately we didn’t see him at a booth during one of these prize activities, but we did catch him for a quick photo opp!

Miles the Marathon Mascot

Cute Fitting Rooms

Quick RV Visit

David’s parents live near Charlotte, NC and recently bought a RV. They decided to take their first trip in the RV last weekend when they came up for the race. Compared to some of the other RV monsters in the park theirs looked pretty small, but once you got inside it was really nice and actually a perfect size for two people! The driver and passenger chairs looked like lazy boys, the dining table and kitchen were well sized, and the bedroom in the back just fit a full bed. We made a quick visit to the RV to say high to David’s parents, and then we packed our overnight bags and headed back to Arlington to meet David’s brother for dinner.

The Allen RV

Carbo Loading Time

Since David’s brother lives in Arlington (only a few Metro stops away from the start line), David and I were lucky enough to get to stay over at his place the night before the race. We also went out to dinner to get our carbo loading on with Ken and his girlfriend Devon at a really cute place down the street from his apartment. We stuffed ourselves with pasta and bread, and then headed back to Ken’s place to lay out our stuff for the next morning and develop a game plan for the morning, the race, and the post-race celebration. David and I both laid out outfits out for the next morning, put our race numbers on, set aside our clothes for after the race in the gear bag that we'd check, and gave Ken maps of the course and the spectator guide so he would know where to find us along the course and after the race.

Race Day Outfit

Race Morning

On Sunday the big day had finally arrived! Marathon morning! We got up around 5:15am and I started making coffee and my pre-race breakfast of oatmeal, toast, and egg whites. I ate the first in the apartment, the second on the Metro, and I also ate a banana and a Cliff bar when we got to the race. Oink, I know. In total I had an 800 calorie breakfast. Huge I know, but I try to have a 600-800 calorie breakfast before any run that is further than 16 miles. I don’t really like having to eat while running (even though it’s a necessity after a certain distance) so I try to get in as many calories as possible before I run, to limit those that I need to replenish while I run.

Beautiful Morning in Arlington, VA

Metro Riding Runners

David and I took the Metro over to the race and were amused to see that just about everybody that was up and out and about at 6am on the Metro was heading out to run the race. The platforms and cars were absolutely PACKED with runners, which seemed to increase the excitement in the air as we headed towards the start location.

David With His Arm Warmers

Start Line Photo Opp

When we finally got to the start area we went to drop off our bags with our post-race clothes at gear check and then headed over to the portapotty lines to empty the tanks before the race. TMI right? The only reason I mention this is that at every race I’ve done I’ve had to wait 10-40 minutes in line. It’s the main reason I arrive early before the race! The lines usually take FOREVER! This race however was incredibly well planed and equipped. There were portapotties everywhere and we probably didn’t wait longer than 5 minutes! Yay!

First Half of the Race

We headed over to the starting corrals and jumped in to the 4 hour finish area. This put us about 10 minutes back from the start of the group which made the start somewhat of a slow shuffle, but the crowd wasn’t so thick around us that it held us back too much. We had agreed to run between a 8:30 and 9:00 pace for this race knowing that we’d lose some time slowing down at each water station along the way.

There were two hills on the course, one at mile 3 and one at mile 8. Aside from that the course was pretty flat. In the past I’ve really struggled on hills and in all of the races David and I have done together I’ve been a whining dead weight on even the slightest of hills. For this race I did at least one or two hilly trail workouts each week, all ending with a run half-way up the steep hill that I live on back to my apartment. This training definitely helped! We cruised up the first hill without a problem, coasted back down, and then cruised up the next! I felt great! It was such an amazing feeling to feel my training paying off. I’m sure David saw each hill and was anticipating my normal whine of “slow dooowwwwn”, but it never came! Yay me!

I felt pretty good in the first half of the race and felt okay staying on pace with David up until about mile 16. At this point I started to tire a bit and could tell that I was having to push harder to stay next to him. A couple times I asked him to slow down a bit for me which he immediately did, but after the second time I asked I really started to feel bad for holding him back. By mile 18 I was more tired and decided that at mile 20 I’d tell him to go on without me so he could finish the marathon with a better time alone than he could with me by his side. By mile 19 I couldn’t keep this idea in my head anymore and blurted out “just go ahead without me, I want to walk for a minute”. David refused to leave me and we walked for a minute and then started running again, then a bit later we repeated this with me continuing to plead for him to go on. He was running so strong and just as fast at mile 19 as he was at mile 1! I on the other hand needed to change to a lower gear by then and run a little slower. He said again that he wasn’t going to leave me and that actually he wasn’t feeling all that great either. Upon realizing that he was absolutely going to stay with me, I sucked it up and started running again so I didn't ruin his time any further.

Approaching Mile 20

As we approached mile 20 I was still struggling a bit but pushed on. We crossed the 14th Street Bridge and broke through “the Wall” … and plowed on to mile 21. At this point I started to realize that we had 21 miles behind us, and only 5 to go! Coincidentally a few of my favorite power songs came up on my iPod. Metallica’s Master of Puppets, and A-Ha’s Take On Me! As I kicked into cruise control and rocked out to my favorite tunes in my head a shocking thing happened. David started cramping up! He called for me to stop and he walked over to the side of the road and started stretching his legs out. I was absolutely shocked! I suffered from severe leg cramps in my last race and knew exactly what he was going through. He stretched a bit and was feeling better so we started running again, but for the next 5 miles we’d run for a bit and he’d be okay, then the cramps would kick in again and we’d stop while he walked or stretched, and then we’d keep going again. I offered him what Gatorade and water I had left, and at each water station we passed through I’d fill up on fluids to carry for the both of us.

As we got to mile 25 we were in one of our walking stretches when to my surprise who did I see on the sidelines? David’s dad holding a big neon sign for me! From my dogs! As soon as I saw David’s dad Rich I called out to him and also got David’s attention so he’d see him as well. On the other side of the road was his mom holding one of the signs that I had made for David. As we started to come around the curve and run down the hill Rich started running along side us with his neon sign proudly waving above his head. I don’t think I’ve ever smiled so big in my life! And speaking of on the course support – David’s family ROCKS! They showed up at miles 10 and 16 (back-to-back viewing locations on the course) as well as mile 25 and the finish line! We saw them with the signs at miles 10, 16, and 25.

Signs I Made For David

Not too long after we passed David’s parents we then came upon Ken and Devon who were also proudly waving signs! This was really a great little pick-me-up during the hardest part of the race, mile 25 to 26.2. Okay, so that’s more than a mile, you know what I mean!

Signs For Me From David's Parents

As we got closer and closer to the finish line the crowd really started to fill out. My favorite part of any marathon is when you’re running in that last quarter mile to the finish with hundreds and hundreds of people around you and you feel like everyone is there cheering for you. The energy from the crowd and the experience of running through an area so thick with excited, screaming people is really something else. David and I blew through the crowds and charged towards the finish line, and finished side by side. (Technically per the race reseults I came in a second faster. Whooh hoo!)

Official finish time? 4:17:24

Receiving Our Finisher's Medals

Awesome Finisher's Photo

Our original goal was 3:55 so we were both a bit disappointed to not have met that goal, but we still had a great race and considering all of the cramping and walking towards the end, I still think we did pretty well. AND … David finished his first marathon! And better yet, I got to be by his side the whole way! I don’t mean to be totally cheesy when I say that its been my dream since my first race to have someone to race side by side with. Everytime I’ve seen racing couples I’ve always felt a bit jealous. I wish that I had someone who shared my same passion for running and who’d want to train with me for a race, discuss the minute details of running and training on a regular basis, and run with me side by side for hours. Well you know what? That dream has now come true! I’m a simple girl with simple dreams. But honestly, thank you David! It was a great experience.

Aching After The Race

BEST Race Support Ever!

The Carbo Loading Kids

Post-Race Chow Down

After the race we met up with David’s family in the finisher’s area and headed back to Ken’s place to shower and change to get ready for a group lunch at my favorite Mexican restaurant …. CHEVY’S!!!

My cousin Sandy and her husband Justin and their son Wyatt were joining us, and so were my Aunt Elsa and Uncle Stanton, and my Aunt Judy who I haven’t seen in about 10 years! Lunch was great and it was so nice to catch up with family.

Mini-Family Reunion

Allen Family Reunion

After lunch I was hoping for a nice nap to recharge a bit. That didn’t exactly happen though since David was arranging a little family reunion over at his brother Chad’s house. David, Ken, and Devon and I headed over there and met up with David’s parents and sister as well. We hung out and played with the kids for a bit before going out to dinner nearby. Didn’t we just eat a couple hours before? Yep. Did we sit down and eat again? But of course!

The Allen "Kids"

Future Marathon Runner

The whole race weekend really turned out to be a great time. Not just the race but the events before and after, and all of the family time we got around the activities. As usual I’m in that crazy period the week after a race where I’m just about recovered and starting to get antsy to start my next training plan. I’m not sure which race I’m going to do next, but I’m so anxious to pick it now so I can get started on training! I hate to admit that marathon training is a true obsession of mine. I’ve acknowledged after this race though that I need to change up my training method. Adding hill workouts really did help me, but in order to decrease my overall finish time I think I need to focus on more speed/temp workouts. Whatever, I’ll figure that out in the next week or so.

For now, hats off to you David for completing your first full marathon!

And thank you so so much Allen Family for your incredible support along the race course and during this whole weekend. It really made the day special.

Me & My Favorite Racing Partner

Ready To Race

I was planning on yesterday being my last running day before the marathon this Sunday, but I'm at a total of 398 training miles and I just want to get past the 400 mile mark, so I'm going to hit the gym for one more quick run.

I've been logging my training on the Daily Mile website (www.dailymile.com) which has been a fun way to log my training and to keep tabs on the activities of my friends. I just looked at the chart of my overall training for this race and was excited and proud to see the total miles I've logged over the past 18 weeks. I haven't been able to stay on schedule as much as I'd would have liked due to work, travel, and life, but I think I've logged enough quality miles to have a good race.

My training summary:

• 18 weeks of training
• 398 miles covered
• 154:32 spent running
• 124,503 calories burned

One more quick run right now and then I'm off tomorrow ... and then the big day is Sunday!

Updates will follow the race of course. :o)

Back On My Feet

You should know by now from half of my recent blog posts that: “David and I will be running the Marine Corps Marathon this coming Sunday October 25, 2009 in Washington, DC. This will be my 11^th and David’s 1^st full marathon!” I’m a broken record, I know.

We have been running 4-5 days a week for the past 18 weeks and together have run a total of 744 miles. How far have YOU run since June huh? Just kidding!

Obstacles With Training

As with many plans and goals, there are things that go wrong along the way that set you back. Bad weather, personal commitments, work commitments, long travel days, sick/sore days, and days when we've just been plain too tired to get up and run are some of many reasons that we've skipped a day or two of our training over the weeks. But dealing with setbacks in marathon training is fairly similar to dealing wtih setbacks in life. When things go wrong you can stop, acknowledge what went wrong, decide how you can get back on track, and try not to let it happen again. We've been doing this for the past 4 ½ months and have both stuck pretty close to our original training plan!

Running For A Reason

About 6 weeks into our training we decided that we wanted to make our training miles more meaningful by fundraising for a charity. We looked at the numerous charities formally associated with the Marine Corps Marathon and decided that we wanted to pick a charity that we either had a personal or family connection to, or one that would directly affect the local community that we’d be running in. After researching the various charities for a couple weeks we landed back on one charity that originally caught my eye: Back On My Feet.

Why we chose BOMF

We first learned about Back On My Feet from an article in Runner’s World. The story was really compelling and really showed how something as simple as running and bringing people together in a group to run could drastically improve people’s lives.

About BOMF

Back on My Feet is a non-profit organization that promotes the self-sufficiency of the homeless population by engaging them in running as a means to build confidence, strength and self-esteem.

Back on My Feet does not provide food nor does it provide shelter, but instead provides a community that embraces equality, respect, discipline, teamwork and leadership. There are no labels, no stigmas and no stereotypes. At Back on My Feet, all members - regardless of race, education or socioeconomic status - join together to move their own lives forward as well as the lives of their teammates.

Why I Want To Help

I've spent the majority of my life in major metropolitan cities which have all had large homeless populations. I've struggled over the years with wanting to help but not wanting to give money in the form of handing over cash. I really like knowing that the money that we are raising for this program is directly helping someone in need who actually wants the help, and the help is provided in a structured program with proven results. I feel that the greater Washington DC area and communities in Maryland and Virginia are giving me a great place to race and are providing a setting for a world-class event, and in turn I’d like to give back to people whose life and world the race is in.

How You Can Help

If you would like to contribute to our fundraising efforts, you can do so by going to our fundraising page (click here). If you aren't able to at this time, that’s okay too. Instead please think of us this coming Sunday from 7am to 11am EST. Think positive thoughts for us and send good vibes for a great race and great experience! We’re really happy with the amount that we've been able to raise so far, but of course are hoping to contribute a bit more before the week is over.

Thank you in advance, we really appreciate your support!

The Lone Runner

David and I will be running the Marine Corps Marathon this coming Sunday October 25, 2009 in Washington, DC. This will be my 11^th and David’s 1^st full marathon! We have previously run two halfs together and are looking forward to our first full together!

For me, running marathons has been many things good (increased self-confidence and improved physical ability to name a couple) and some things bad (my feet are hideous and my quads are freakishly huge), but one thing that comes to mind as we approach this race is that in these past 5 years that I have been training, running marathons has really been lonely. Aww, come here and give me a hug. You know you want to!

I started out training for my first full marathon with a local running group in Phoenix called Racelab. I’m pretty sure that without them I never would have made it through the months or training or even made it through the race. I’m immensely grateful to that group and everything that they taught me. While running with this group I also gained a group of running friends who I felt a sense of community with. I did speed workouts at a track with the group on Tuesdays, and sometimes did my long runs with a partner or group on Saturdays. Meeting up with the group was a bit inconvenient because of the location and as my job became more demanding it was easier for me to just train alone. So from marathon two through ten, I have trained alone.

Speed Workouts At The Track

I don’t mind running alone and many of my long runs have allowed me to take time to reflect on my life, myself, my friends and family, and my goals. I enjoy the time with myself most of the time and running has been an outlet for me to think, vent, plan, and regroup.

Going through training for a marathon alone though is what is lonely. Being the only one you know who is getting up early to run five days a week for 3-4 months is a bit isolating. Being the only one of your friends who can’t go have fun on a Friday night because she has to get up at the crack of the dawn is just downright sad at times. Aside from a few other runners that I know, there weren't people in my immediate circle who knew what I was going through and who I could discuss the ins and outs of my training with without making their eyes roll back into their heads. I think that training for a marathon is like having a second job, and if you had no one to talk to about the daily ups and downs of you job, wouldn't you be a bit sad?

Enter David Allen into my running life!

David had never run a road race before I talked him into the Run and Stride With Pride 5K in my neighborhood last June. He talked a big game before the race and was completely convinced that he’d beat me because A – he’s a guy (guys just run faster than girls), and B – he’s always been an athlete. (And probably C – I’m pretty clumsy and uncoordinated and the word athlete doesn't exactly come to mind when you look at me.) Sure, he knew that I had been racing for years and had run short and long races with decent times, but still, he was convinced he’d beat me. Guess what? I kicked his butt!

David After The 5K (Not Happy!)

He ran off and on casually after that but it was several months later that he said that he’d like to train for a half-marathon. I was so excited and quickly made him a schedule, we picked a race, and started and crossed the finish line together! (Technically my foot hit the mat first, but with my non-chip shoe, so he came in before me in the official race results. Darn!)

Austin Half Marathon Finish

After running his first half he had the bug for a full, but it wasn't until after he came to watch my last marathon (Rock N Roll San Diego – June 2009) that he was ready to go for it. We looked around for a while to pick a race and finally decided on the Marine Corps Marathon in Washington DC in October. At the time that we had decided to run, registration for the race wasn't open yet. We put the date on our calendars and on the second day that registration was open we registered for the race. Good thing we did, it sold out all 30,000 spots by the fourth day! Wow, talk about a popular race. The Marine Corps Marathon is totally the new pink!

The Marine Corps Marathon

Vermont Teddy Bear

I put together an 18-week training schedule for us and off we went on our training! It has been a lot of fun over the past few months to train together and talk endlessly about running. We discuss our morning runs, our strategy for our long runs, what we ate before and after, what we wore, what the weather was like, what interesting running news we saw that week online, what cool new running shoes are coming out, what the difference is between the various colors, flavors, and mixtures of sports drinks, etc. Bet you’re sure glad now that I’m not boring you to tears with these topics! (In case you want to read my thoughts on various running fuels, check out this entry: Fueling For The Long Run)

We are now on our last week of training and I’m really looking forward to putting all of our training to the test. One of the things I love and hate about the marathon is that no matter how much you prepare for the race, race day can throw something at you’re that you’re totally not prepared for and make your race wonderful or miserable. I’m really hoping for “wonderful” for this race and I’m pretty confident that it will be since we will be running together. I finally have a marathon partner after all these years and this lone runner will no longer be racing the 26.2 miles alone.

Thanks David! I can’t wait for our race on Sunday.