Point's of Interest in Amanda's Life

So today I ran the Rock and Roll Marathon today. It was such a great accomplishment, but one of the most difficult things that I have done. My goal was to finish in under 4hours and 30 minutes, but I ended up getting a time of 4hours and 46 minutes. I was a little bummed, but I definitely worked hard for that time. At the beginning, I was holding myself back from running faster, which I think was ultimately my downfall. I tried to stay with the pace teams for 4:30 instead of running ahead. Here's kind of the story of how it all went down:

It started on Friday, Tracy and I went to the Health and Fitness expo at the Convention center. We picked up our bib numbers and t-shirts, then proceeded to get a whole bunch of free stuff. It was a lot of fun. My knee had been hurting for a while, so I got tape on my it bands, which I think helped. There were so many free samples of stuff, it was a lot of fun.

After the expo, Jeff and I went to Tracy's house and she made a high carbo dinner. We ate pasta with really yummy chicken meatballs and a salad. We watched a documentary about Marathon runners in the 2005 Chicago Marathon. It was a great movie and really inspiring. It made me think about all the things I have enjoyed about the training process and how amazing a sport running is.

The next day, Jeff and I went to my parents house for breakfast and to say bye to my brother who was heading back to Louisianna later that day. After some potatoes, toast and fruit (with a little bit of egg), we went to my work's 5 year anniversary party at Stone Brewing Company. The food was excellent, all organic and local. I ate a whole bunch of bread and salad and pasta. I was so full by the end of it, then they brought out chocolate cake. Needless to say, we didn't eat dinner the night before my marathon...but I didn't need it. I was stuffed until we went to bed. I also started feeling really sick the night before. Sore throat and stuffed up. I was coughing a lot too. This was really making me anxious about my performance in the race, so I stressed out a bit and kept having heart palpitations. I was a nervous wreck!

The next morning (or, this morning rather) I woke up at 4:30 and felt better...not great, but better. I had my stuff all prepped the night before. This is a picture that Jeff took of me right before we left. We picked up Tracy and he dropped us off at the starting line.

Speaking of starting lines...It was a zoo! There were 40,000 people in the race. This picture was taken after they let the first 10,000 people go, and there were probably another 20,000 behind us. Crazy!

There were a lot of spectators and a lot of people dressed in crazy outfits. Some of the best were the fleet of running Elvis, Superman and super woman and fred and wilma Flintstone. It would have been fun to dress up, but I didn't have time for creativity.

The route started on 6th avenue, and went up into Hillcrest, then over to park Blvd, into Balboa park, then downtown, through petco park, then down to the Harbor. Then we ran down Broadway to the 163 freeway and ran down it. The next video was taken (yes, I brought my phone with me to take pics) as we were entering the 163 freeway, which was about mile 9.

We ran on the freeway to Friars road, and there I saw my friends Amrie and Jessica from school. They had signs, and Amrie ran with me for a while and talked. It was so neat to have friends there along the route with signs!

At around mile 15, Tracy and I lost each other. Let me preface this by saying we both had very different goals for the marathon. She just wanted to finish, and I wanted to run it under 4:30...so I kept counting the time and saying things like "we are loosing our pace, we need to run the next mile faster!!" So she said she needed to walk and gave me her blessing to go ahead. At this point, all I wanted to do was walk to, but I pushed through. Had a really upset stomach from just eating jelly beans, gu, and cytomax energy drink all morning. I kept feeling like it would come back out, but it didn't.

At mile 18, Jeff, my mom and Dad were there. I went to the side to say hi, and Jeff came and walked with me for a little bit. It was just what I needed to make it the next couple miles.

The last 6 miles were on Fiesta Island...AKA, the island that never ends. It was so difficult...probably miles 22-25 were the roughest. It felt like there was pressure on my brain, and my legs just didn't want to move. I had to remind myself how to run. Definitely tough. I made a rule after I left Tracy, that I would only walk at water stations, and only walk the distance of the water station. If I didn't do that, then I would have had a really long time. I seemed to get a second wind at mile 25, and I passed by the aid station with out the short walk. I started passing people left and right and was so excited to finish. I started thinking about all the obstacles that stood in my way over the past 6 months of training, like my car accident, and almost breaking my ribs on my bedframe. It made me really emotional, and I kept tearing up as I was running past all of the supporters...but then that made it hard for me to breathe, so I had to stop crying.

At the finish line, Jeff was there with the camera...And there was a maze to get out, so I told him to meet me at the end of the pathway

well, I couldn't find Jeff at the end of the maze, so i tried calling him...but everyone was using their cell phones, so we couldn't contact each other. It was pretty scary because I was a little disoriented and getting stiff, wandering around alone, without cell reception. After about 30 minutes, I finally met up with Jeff and my parents as well as my friends Amrie and Jessica from mile 12 :-) It was great to celebrate with them. I was also finally able to reunite with Tracy. She made it about 20 minutes after me, so she still got a good time, and pushed through the cramps and pain to run to the end.

It was just such a great experience, the training and the races leading up to the marathon, and then the experience of the marathon itself. Tracy has been such a great running partner and so motivating, I have been so blessed to have her in my life. It has been so much fun getting to know her and talking to her about EVERYthing. We are hoping to continue running together until she moves (if she moves) to Oregon.

I don't know if I will do another full marathon again, but there is a chance I will. I think for the meantime I am going to stick to half marathons...it is much more manageable and less taxing on your body. Starting Tuesday, Jeff and I are going to start training for the America's Finest City Half Marathon in August. Should be fun fun fun!! Next bucket list item is to bike the pacific northwest, so next June, my dad, Jeff and I are planning a trip to bike the Oregon/Washington border to San Francisco. Should be fun! Need to train for that too.

On Monday, 4/5/10 around 11:45, I was going from school at SDSU to work at Dr. Bressler's office, and lost control of my car on the freeway on ramp. It was raining and the road was slick and I hydroplaned into the cement divide. Luckily no other cars or people were involved, but there were a couple close calls (it was around a blind turn, and a couple cars had to swerve to miss my car).

It was very scary, and I am very lucky that I was able to walk away from the incident with just airbag burn and a scratched cornea. Here are pictures of my car as well as my face.