solar squirrel

This Sunday was my Birthday, and we celebrated our 3rd annual Halloween and Birthday Bash - here’s a link to the web photo album!

Halloween 2008

http://picasaweb.google.com/AScarpitti/Halloween2008#

Well kids, if you hadn’t heard this past Sunday I qualified for Boston for the first time!

Thanks to Elizabeth for catching this action photo!

I woke up early and had already had planned what I would have for breakfast - a turkey burger on a whole wheat bun with ketchup.  I know it sounds weird, but when I was training for the winter 50k earlier this year I had a turkey burger for breakfast and I had great energy and no stomach issues.  Todd and I both had our turkey burger breakfasts and were prepared for a good run!  One thing I’m going to have to change for the next marathon I do is that I will need to figure out what I can eat during the race.  The only nutrition I took in during the marathon was a swig of my stashed Heed at mile 15 and 2 salt tablets- one after about the first hour and a half and the second at about 2.5 hours.  I think this could have been the reason why I started to fade at mile 22…

My plan was to run just fast enough to qualify for Boston.  I didn’t want to risk running too fast and then bonking.  That meant that I needed to run a 3:40 at the slowest, 8:24 pace.  That was the plan for all 3 of us.

Janet, Bridget and I started off together, but Bridget was recovering from bronchitis so she didn’t do as well as she could have so after the first few miles it was Janet and I.  Wow were we consistent and Elizabeth was right - the first miles felt SO easy - it was incredible, my legs felt so fresh and I didn’t even feel like I was running, or walking even.  Even though I felt good I knew better than to try to pick it up - I forced myself to go at the planned pace, which Janet and I decided should be somewhere between 8:10 - 8:24.  The first half marathon was a piece of cake and as we made the turn around point at about mile 20 I still felt decent.  At least good enough that I knew that I would be able to keep running at my planned pace of no slower than 8:24.  The weirdest thing happened around mile 22, though.  I walked through the aid station to drink some water and then my dumb legs didn’t want to start running again!  I was tired and knew I had to start running soon because Janet was getting further and further away and I didn’t want to run alone especially when I was so spent.  I forced myself to pick it back up and got back to my pace, but wasn’t able to catch Janet or the posse of people that was running with Mel.  The one guy (I can’t remember his name) was so awesome, though, he slowed down and waited for me to catch up to him and was so encouraging!

When I got to mile 26 I looked at my watch and saw 3:37 and knew I only had 3 min to run .2 of a mile so I was cutting it close, but I made it!  My final time was 3:38 and I even managed to get 3rd place in my age group.  (Mel beat me by 2 seconds at the very end!!  Way to go, girl - I didn’t even realize I had caught back up!)  I got this cool little picture of the towpath as a prize.  I love stuff like that.

I am so happy that I had Janet to run with.  She basically talked the whole time and it made the miles go by so easily and quickly.  I really loved the course and the volunteers.  The weather was perfect and afterwords we just hung out and chit-chatted.  My legs were sore and I was tired but definitely didn’t feel awful.

Here are the splits!

1    8:18
2    8:13
3    8:16
4    8:20
5    8:18
6    8:16
7    8:12
8    8:11
9    8:13
10  8:13
11  8:15
12  8:12
13  8:08
14  8:14
15  8:11
16  8:24
17  8:15
18  8:17
19  8:12
20  8:16
21  8:20
22  8:18
23  8:14
24  8:25
25  8:28
26  8:20
.2   3:23

Total time:  3:38
Pace:  8:18

Boston, here I come!

The past few days have been action-packed and full of fun.  Here’s a quick review:

My weekend started on Thursday night because I decided to take Friday off of work.  I got out of class and took my time getting home and when I got home I stayed up later than usual laying around and watching episodes of The Office that I’ve rented on Netflix.  I slept in on Friday and got some errands done and then around 7pm got ready for my own personal ’spider walk’ with Todd.  Todd does a spider walk for the public every year, but I had to miss it this year because of class, so Todd promised me my own personal spider walk.  I decided to invite Joe F. from work and his family since they didn’t get to make it either.  We had a fun time wandering around the park in the dark and finding spiders:

This one is an Argiope that is actually pretty common.  Elizabeth took this picture today, but we found it on Friday during our walk.  It’s so fat!  We even got to see it poop!  I didn’t even know spiders pooped!  LOL!  Friday night ended pretty early because Todd and I had to get up super early (4:30 a.m.!!!) for the Akron Marathon.  Todd did the full marathon and I was part of an all female 5-person relay team - Five Fast Femme-Fatale Freaks.  I was hoping for our team to come in top 3 (we got 2nd place last year).  I had the 3rd leg - a 10k - and I was hoping for around 7-min miles.  For some reason I wasn’t thinking strait and Janet got there earlier than I was expecting so I had to hurry up and drop my stuff and sprint to the relay exchange point.  (Seems to be a common theme for me this year…)  Anyway - my 10k went pretty well.  I was hoping to be sub 7 pace, but it wasn’t happening and I ended up with a 7:04 pace - which IS a new PR for me!  We took 2nd place female team overall and celebrated by hanging out in the awesome weather and drinking the free beer.  Todd looked awesome at the finish and had negative splits the 2nd half.  (I Think his time was 3:27 - and he felt great and didn’t even try).

I’m finishing up this post 2 weeks late but stay tuned for the Tow Path marathon recap coming soon!!!!!