From Skirt Magazine:

Marathon Men Make Our Hearts Race

When a friend asked Jack Fultz to help him train for a marathon, the 1976 winner of the Boston Marathon had no idea he’d still be doing it nearly 20 years later –– or that he’d be wearing a skirt! –– as head coach of the Dana Farber Marathon Challenge team. The team (of men and women) is 550 members strong this year and aiming to raise $4.5 million for the Claudia Adams Barr Program in Innovative Basic Cancer Research through the April 21 race from Hopkinton to Boston. Watch for their blue shirts (we’re not sure if they’ll opt for skirts that day) and cheer on (left to right) Larry Hanson, Fred Warburg, Jack Fultz, Tyler Hart, Ben Quick and Matt Whitcomb. How does it feel to wear a skirt? "It’s very sexy," says Jack. "We’ve always wondered, and now we know."

No wonder my legs are so sore!

Here's the elevation map thingy of our run yesterday:

I better write this now while I'm not too sore and can still be positive...

1 Zipcar, 1 peanut-butter and jelly sandwich, 9 Sports Beans, 8 water stops, 4 mint chocolate gu's, lots of awesome volunteers (Thank you!!!!), 1 Channel 5 News guy (and 1 horrible video of my butt as I ran away from him), 22 miles (yes, you read that right!), 1 bagel, 1 great shower, a 4 hour nap, 1 pizza, and 1/2 a pint of ice cream later... and it's TAPER TIME!!!!!

Today was my longest run ever and my last really long run until the marathon!  With a 22 mile run under my belt, I finally feel ready for the marathon both physically and mentally, which means I can go confidently into my taper and really focus on taking care of my little nagging knee pain (which I am happy to report, with the exception of the first few miles this morning, hasn't bothered me today... maybe I'm miraculously healed?)  I'm still in a bit of shock and, despite my 4 hour nap, still quite tired, so I'll write something more exciting later.

Happy Tapering!

Stopping to tie my shoe (if I'm smart)

Upon admitting to a sore knee problem at BeerWorks lask night, Jack told me a little analogy:

A small nagging injury is like having your shoe come untied during a run. You have two choices: you can stop, tie your shoe, and continue on with your run, losing only a short amount of time. Or, you can keep running, your shoe will eventually fall off and you will lose much more time having to go back and retrieve your lost shoe.

Moral of the story: Stop, take care of your injury now and be sidelined for a short period of time, rather than try to run through it and have your training derailed for much longer because you forced the issue.

Makes sense, right? Then why am I having so much trouble convincing myself that not running the hills tonight is the right thing to do? I certainly know better than to question Jack's advice, and I certainly don't want to injur myself further... but at the same time, it is KILLING me thinking that I might skip the hills. To be honest, I was hesitant to even write my blog about this today- somewhere in my crazy head I had come to the conclusion that maybe if I just didn't acknowledge the little twinges in my knee and I conveniently "forgot" that I had discussed not running with Jack last night, that I could just continue on with my Thursday run as planned, guilt free. Why am I so bound and determined to run the hills tonight? Maybe it's because while I was in Florida I didn't get many good runs in, or maybe it's because I can feel the pressure of the race building each day as April 21st gets closer and closer, or maybe I feel like I can, as Jack so eloquently put it, "put a few more pennies in the fitness bank." I'm not sure what it is exactly, maybe a combination of all of those things, but whatever it is, it has created within me this crazy, maniacal need to run.

The thing is, I'm really the only one stopping myself from running tonight. No one is going to get out there and physically stop me from hopping on the T and riding it out to Woodland and my knee doesn't hurt so badly that it will prevent me from running back into Boston. I know that the smart thing to do tonight is to stop and "tie my shoe" -hit the arc trainer at the gym and hope that whatever this thing is that is wrong with my knee will clear up with a little quality time spent off of the roads. I really can't say for sure if I will actually do the smart thing... we shall see. But, I can tell you one thing for certain- whether I'm out on the roads tonight or confined to the gym you can count on the fact that I'll be at Crossroads for beer and pizza once I'm done...

Let's hope it's not hot and humid on marathon day...

I know, I've slacked on the blog this week. In my defense, I was in Florida visiting family. "Florida?!" you're thinking, "Well that must have been lovely! Warm weather! Sunshine! Family! I bet you got some good runs in down there!" Well, dear reader, you're thinking wrong. Yes, Florida was warm, and even sunny sometimes. Yes, I saw a lot of my family which was nice considering I don't get to see them nearly as often as I would like. But the running, or lack thereof, left a little something to be desired.

Let me tell you something: Florida is HOT, and my God is it humid! and HOT+humid= not fun running conditions. Normally I go to Florida with the best of working out intentions. My running gear is packed and ready to go in my bag, but the moment I arrive in the sweltering heat all motivation to run, or do anything much more than flip over on the lounge chair to tan my back, goes straight out the window. "Not this time!" I told myself, "This time I'm training for a marathon! No silly heat is going to stop me!" A nice thought in theory, but the heat is a formidable opponent, and one that I am not used to facing. On the first morning when I attempted to take a 8 mile run around the neighborhood, I ran 4 miles outside and then high-tailed it to the gym to run on the treadmill in the relative coolness of the (very minimal) a/c. My runs on the rest of my trip went similarly, and ended with me only completing 6 or 7 miles each day. Then, to top it all off, my knee started bothering me. I wasn't even running that much and now my knee decides to start acting up! UGH!

I was frustrated to say the very least, but on my last day, I woke up bright and early, had some cereal, a little bit of coffee, downed a bottle of water and rode my Grandfather's bike over to the gym. Considering how the rest of the week had gone, I really wasn't expecting much from my stupid body, but I wanted to get in a little gym time before spending the majority of my day smushed in an airplane seat, not to mention I was feeling pretty guilty about missing the track workout that night. I hopped on the treadmill for a quick 1 mile warm up and then switched over to the Arc Trainer. The humidity was already beginning to take its toll on me and my knee was sore from the treadmill, but I was suddenly very determined to get a good workout out of this. I decided to create a "track" workout for the arc trainer (basically copied an old one that we did at the track with Jack). I'll be honest, it didn't feel so great while I was doing it, and people kind of looked at me like I was a crazy person, but when I was done... wow did I feel good. I even forgot about the fact that I would be missing the actual workout later that night (which may seem like a small accomplishment, but a day earlier I was almost ready to shell out 200 bucks to take an earlier flight so I could make the track... crazy, I know).

Anyways, I got back to Boston last night and I am happy to find that the weather is still cool and crisp, just how I like it. Let's hope it stays like this for awhile and doesn't heat up too much in the next couple of weeks because, that's right, the big day is just around the corner... less than a month to go (yikes!).

Fundraising News: With the addition of a couple of checks that I still need to send in, my fundraising total is now just over $9000!!! With just one month to go until the big day, I'm in great shape to make my goal of raising $13,000... thanks everyone for your support!

A number is worth a thousand words...

The BAA posted our bib numbers for the marathon yesterday. It's funny how within 12 hours of the announcement almost every DFMC blogger has written about their number and found some special significance hidden inside those 5 special numerals. Now, I could say that everyone is just being silly... the numbers are assigned at random, and in some desperate attempt to attach further meaning to our marathoning experience they have over-analyzed and read too much into it. Yes, I could say that... but of course, that would be a bit hypocritical of me considering I did the exact same thing.

22289- that's the magic number.  Let the over-analyzing begin:

Now, I know 22 is the corral number for Dana-Farber... but more importantly 2 was my mom's favorite number.  22 was her even more favorite number because there are, you guessed it, two two's.  Throw another 2 in there for good measure and you've got a whole lot of 2's.  You can call it a coincidence, but I'm going to look at it as a sign... one more thing that's going to remind me on marathon day what I am doing this for and who I am doing it in memory of.

8- honestly, at first thought, the number didn't hold a whole lot of significance for me.  So, instead of just leaving it at that, I consulted the internet.  Turns out, in numerology, the number 8 is "a carrier of dynamic success and power" (let's hope that's true) and its character reveals a perfect balance between the world of ideas and the world of action.  Also, in the Bible, the number 8 signifies regeneration and resurrection.  This is especially significant to me in that my running the marathon in memory of my mom is, in part, my way of moving on from the loss of my mother.  

And 9.  9 is a number that represents intellectual power and our influence over situations and things.  This will most certainly be important to me on marathon day as I have quickly learned that running is more mental, especially for me, than it is physical.  My body is capable of running for as long as my mind is able to convince myself that I can keep going.

So there it is, my over-analyzation of my bib number assignment. Maybe it is just a random number, but maybe, just maybe, it is the number that I was meant to have.  Regardless, I will wear 22289 proudly on April 21 and I will carry with me all of its meaning, far fetched or not, for all 26.2 miles.

There's something fishy about New Bedford...

... and I mean that quite literally. The place reeks of fish. Why was I in New Bedford? you ask. It most certainly was not for the shopping (I don't think there is any) or the beautiful beaches (much too cold) or the charming townspeople (no offense to those who might be from New Bedford, but with the exception of the incredibly friendly mayor and a few spectators there weren't many New Bedford-ites I would refer to as charming) or even the whaling museum (despite Jeff's assertion that it's a must-see because of the whale skeleton). No, I went to New Bedford to run in a big, ol' 13.1 mile circle. Yes, that's right, I ran a half marathon yesterday... and it smelled like fish.

Fish odor aside, it was a great day. Five of us smushed into Tyler's car (huge thanks to him for driving) and departed Boston around 8 am, arriving in "beautiful" New Bedford at right about 9 (T-2 hours until race time). After picking up our numbers and other race materials in the cafeteria/gym of the elementary school, aka race central (I'll admit, I only called it that in my head), we set up camp on the floor and tried to relax a little in the time before the race. The relaxing thing didn't exactly happen for me... I convinced myself that I might be feeling sick, tied and untied and re-tied my sneakers about 50 times because I was sure that they were too tight or not tight enough, I took alternate outfits out of my bag several times, pondering whether or not I should change my clothes, I put my gloves on, I read a map of New Bedford, I took my gloves off, I ate a Luna Bar and drank some Propel, I then worried that maybe I shouldn't have had more to drink, I took my necklace off, then put it back on thinking maybe it would give me some good luck, I tightened my shoe laces again. Basically, I was a fidgety basketcase, but it made the time go by and next thing I knew we were headed down the hill to the starting line.

I'll skip the majority of the boring details of the race itself except to say 4 things. 1) The beginning of the race was terrible. I felt like the world was running past me at lightening speed and I was moving in slow motion. I, in no way, mistake myself for a speedy runner, but I also don't think I'm the slowest person in the world, I mean, that's a lot of people to be slower than... but that's what it felt like for the first 2 miles of the race. 2) Hills are not fun. They are not fun at the beginning of a race, they are not fun at the end of a race. Period. 3) Having a buddy to run with makes a world of difference. Case in point: my new friend Paul, also a DFMC runner but one I have never met before. He kept me on pace and pushed me through the final hill to the finish, not to mention kept me company throughout some less than scenic sections of New Bedford. And, finally, 4) There's nothing better than coming down the final stretch of a race and having your (much faster) running buddies there waiting for you at the finish (and making a whole lot of noise, I might add) Thanks Lindsey and Jeff!

So, that was my race... I finished in 2 hours and 10 minutes, which I was pretty happy with. I think, had I not felt so absolutely horrible at the beginning, I could have done better, but it was my first half marathon, so I can only get better from here!