It's over :(

So I did it!!! I finished the race... everything I have been training for is done and I'm back to my normal, non fundraising, non-training life.

First of all, the race was amazing. The group I went with was SO FUN. My mom came with me to be my support, my co-worker Meredith, who always seems to go with me on these trips and her friend, Justina. We had a blast, starting from the early morning car ride to the atlanta airport. When we arrived, we checked into our hotel and ventured out to explore the city. We visited the Casino where I lost $2 playing the slots and then the expo where I lost $80 buying stuff. The Expo is like, my favorite part of any race because you get to see a bunch of cool running stuff that you rarely find in your local running store.

I bought a couple of headbands that I really like and a Brooks running jacket. It was kind of expensive, but 1) it was Brooks so you know it's nice and 2) it has Rock 'n' Roll Mardi Gras 2011 so I thought, it's a souvenir, I'll get it. It looks like this:

but it has the rocknroll logo on it. We also got our stuff from the American Cancer Society and Team DetermiNation. Fundraisers could write names of cancer survivors or cancer patients that we wanted to remember. I wrote one for my grandmother, Jane and my friend Karen Gandley.

More about the ACS later, but that was our first little taste of what was to come.

We spent most of saturday sight seeing, and while weren't supposed to walk around a lot, we did anyway. It's hard to not want to see everything. Saturday morning, we got up and jogged to the Louisiana state museum and took a yoga class int he museum. That was pretty cool, but since my butt was sore on sunday, I was thinking that might not have been a good idea. It was also kind of hard to stay hydrated because I didn't want to buy bottled water because it was expensive and the plastic is bad for the environment, but the tap water also wasn't super delicious. I did the best I could.

Race day... we woke up around 4 am. We had to meet at the Astor Crowne Plaza at 5:15 and I wanted time to use the restroom if needed. (I think most runners know what I'm talking about). Our race day breakfast was a piece of whole wheat bread, peanut butter and a banana. We rolled out our legs, drank some water, ate our breakfast and headed to the hotel. I don't know how many people actually raised money for the event, but it seemed like there were about 100? I put a question mark because I am bad at guessing quantity. I forgot to mention that we had a Team DetermiNation dinner which was neat because we got to see how much money everyone raised (one lady raised 11k on her own and a team raised like, 40k). Anyway, the day with the ACS started off great. They had all kinds of breakfast food for us, fruit, milk, etc. I didn't eat anything because I was too nervous, but was impressed with the spread. The best part was the Jazz band. These guys led us down the streets of New Orleans playing jazz music as we walked to the start line. It's like, 6 am, and the music is loud. People are hanging out of the windows waving and cheering us on. Some of them looked like they had just woken up and some looked like they had never gone to bed. I looked at Meredith and said, "I love New Orleans". We had private porta poddies at the Team DetermiNation tent which was nice because the lines were outrageous in the race area. We waited around for what seemed like forever since it was cold, walked over the our corral number and waited again for the gun to go off. I was standing next to Abby Rike from the biggest loser,

so that was a fun celebrity moment. The race started and I felt good. We did the run 4 minute, walk 1 minute thing and right away, I felt like I was behind. That was when I said, ok, i'm just not going to focus on time, I'm going to focus on running through this beautiful city, listen to the bands and enjoy myself for the next 2 and a half hours. I did not use an iPod since I wanted to hear the bands. I felt good the whole time. I noticed that my butt was sore from yoga, but for the most part, they didn't feel too heavy. I think around mile 6, they started hurting and were tired, but it was never anything that bothered me too much. Around mile 9, I noticed that my achilles tendon was hurting very badly and at one point, I had some sharp pains so I stopped and stretched my lower calves on the curb. I ate my GU every 45 minutes and I drank water at every water stop. As we approached mile 10, I thought, OK this is where I always hit my wall. I thought about Jeanne saying, we're so proud of you Wendi, You're doing great, and I prepared myself for the mental torture that was about to happen.... it never showed up. I just continued my walk/run, tried to apprecate my surroundings. When we hit mile 13, a member of Team DetermiNation ran with us and pumped us up for the finish. She told us we were doing great, they were proud of us and we were almost done. Meredith and I crossed the finish line together and walked to the Team DetermiNation tent where we met my mom. I was happy to finish close to my goal, I was happy that I could walk and I was happy to be a part of a team.

 All in all, it was an awesome experience and reminds me why I love running. I definitely want to do this again and next year and I definitely want to raise money again. Being a part of Team DetermiNation was awesome and made the experience so much better.



Race Week

It's finally here. Everything I've been talking about and building up to for the last, I have no idea how many months. I've raised my money, I've run over 9 miles at least times, but I think more like 4. I've trained and followed the program to the tee... minus a week of snow... so I am hoping that i'm ready.

My goal time is 2 hours and 15 minutes
I hope I can AT LEAST finish in 2:20 if I can't hit my time. I haven't finished with a 10 min mile yet, but you never know how you'll feel on race day. My last post, I talked about how my 12 miles was hard, i was hurting, and i didn't have any energy. I took a look at the week before and saw a lot of things I did wrong in order to prepare. So this week, I'm have a goal to hit each day.

1) eat healthy... I eat pretty healthy anyways, mainly lean protein and lots of veggies but I tend to go a little overboard on the sweets. That week, I REALLY went overboard. Like, I ate a couple of desserts a day. That ranged anywhere from a snickers bar to brownies to cake, I mean, I was all out. So this week, I am trying to reel that in a little. I did eat some cookies last night, and those little mini candy bar things... so day one, i didn't hit my first goal, haha. But I still have 5 more days and so far, I'm on track for Tuesday!

2) Drink PLENTY of water. The week before the 12 mile run, I did NOT drink water the way I should have, especially towards the end of the week. It's so hard for me to remember to drink, especially in the cold. I'm trying to remember to drink at least 2 of my cups (the one I have at my desk which is probably about 30 oz) at work, and then drink 1 liter before I go to bed. I think I was a little slack on the water during the day, but I for sure drank a liter before bed last night. I made myself do it and then my tummy was really full when I went to bed, but I got it in!!

3) The Stick

The stick is my friend. I am going to use this on my legs every night before I go to bed. Last night was the first night and I did it, I am so very proud! I rolled each part of my leg for 30 seconds, or really, me counting to 30-who knows how accurate that is time wise, it's basically 30 back and forth rolls with the stick. I even did the sides of my butt, haha, trying to get my piriformus tendon. That's really kind of hard to do, so I got my husband to rub my butt too. What I really need is one of those foam rollers. I think they're better for that kind of stuff. Maybe they'll have one at the Expo!!!

I'm also going to the chiropractor (visit Dr Rob at the Joint at McBee Station downtown - he is awesome and he works out, so that somehow makes him more of an expert to me!!). Whenever my sciatic nerve is bothering me, going to the chiro helps.

4) The last thing is I'm going to yoga. Yoga helps me stay flexible and helps me not get injured. So I'm trying to go every day. On http://www.livingsocial.com/, I bought a month of unlimited yoga from 90 degree yoga for $30. It's nice to be able to go anytime I want, and the heat helps me loosen up more than if I just too yoga at the Y. My calves stay amazingly loose.

5) I guess I said the last thing above, but that wasn't the last thing. The OTHER last thing is that I'm doing some easy jogging. I am running in the morning, just an easy pace for about 45 minutes. I'll probably do that again either friday afternoon or saturday morning and that just keeps my legs, again, loose. The week before my 12 mile run, I did not run at all and I think it was a shock to my system, ha. My legs were tight and they were aching and that's usually what happens when I don't run.

So, I am hoping that sunday morning, I'll get up, have my usual pre race meal, get to the start line, run the race, feel strong, be happy, be able to walk when I'm done and have a new PR. I'll let y'all know how it goes!!