running – Running Free

Pre-Training and Purple

I went for a run last week in shorts and a tank top.

And I wasn’t cold.

I wasn’t even cold before I started running.

I’m sure I should be happy about that, especially considering if I were back in Boston lart weekend I would’ve been bundled up from head to toe.

But low 60s? That’s not what I asked for for Christmas. I want sweaters and snow and hot chocolate which I’m told is in possible in the Bay Area. My coworker told me about when he was a kid in the 70s and they had snow. He sent me an article about it and, even though it was a paltry display of snow, I would gladly take it. So if we could make that happen in the next three days, that would be great!

You see once Christmas has passed, I really don’t care anymore. In fact, I’ll rather enjoy going out for runs in February in just a pair of a shorts and a tee shirt. I have a lot of runs ahead of me and knowing that the weather will be nice will give me the extra motivation I need to get out there.

Technically training hasn’t started yet, thank goodness because I wouldn’t be off to a very good start. Lately my runs have been more sporadic and pretty short on distance; however, I am hoping that taking it easy now will leave me feeling refreshed when training starts in couple of weeks. That’s what I am telling myself at least.

So for now I am still in the pre-training phase. And I’ll tell you, it’s a pretty great place to be because:

1.) You know that you are about to do something amazing, and
2.) You don’t have to deal with any of the responsibility and work yet.

For instance, I received my Project Purple t-shirt the other day and, well, the tree was already on, sooo…

I only have so many days left until Christmas so I am using the tree as a back-drop as much as possible

And that’s what happens when I drop my phone while taking a picture. It’s like abstract Christmas.

As you may recall, I am running the Big Sur Marathon for Project Purple. Their mission is to raise awareness and funds towards a cure for pancreatic cancer so I will be including a fact or stat or two in these posts as I go along.

First up, what is the pancreas anyway? The pancreas is the organ located behind the stomach that helps the body digest and controls blood sugar levels.

I’ll be back with more runs, pictures, and facts after the holidays, but in the meantime, click here to learn more and to make a donation.

Just a wee bit further

I had every intention of writing this post on October 27th (the actual 2 year anniversary of the picture). It was even a Thursday so it would have been perfect. Unfortunately, I only had it half written and in the weeks that followed Thursday would come…and go…and I still hadn’t gotten any further. So here we are. A quasi-TBT…on a Monday.

Ok I’m cheesing a whole lot in this picture. Why am I so happy?

I was in Ireland
I had just run my very first marathon
I managed to not look like a sweaty mess in the “after” picture, a feat at any distance really. (At this point you might expect that I would thank the Irish climate for that, with its ample cloud cover and cool, breezy days. Well, even two years later I remember that it was 68 degrees and sunny that day which is decidedly not Irish weather.)
I was in Ireland (yes, that merits a second mention)
I had 0 miles left between me and pint of Guinness

That’s right, I had run a marathon. Which is nothing short of shocking for anyone who knew me as a kid, as a high schooler, even as a college student. To this day, I can’t remember when the idea struck me that I should run a marathon. I bring this all up now not just to relive my glory days (but seriously even my arms look kind of fit, go me!) but because I am lacing up my sneakers again. Come April 30th, I will be running the Big Sur Marathon. It’s going to be my first marathon on this side of the Atlantic Ocean, although strangely enough I’ll be staring at the Pacific the whole time. Whoa, I wonder if I’ll ever run a marathon on the other side of the Pacific. Or is Europe the other side of the Pacific? Hmm..

In addition to the marathon taking place here in the good ol’ US of A, there is one other thing that makes this different from Dublin above: fundraising. Big Sur is one of many marathons that offers the option to fundraise for a charity of your choice and after perusing the page full of options, I decided on Project Purple. I signed up, received my welcome package, and set up my fundraising page which thus far looks really, really sad. But for the next four months, in addition to training, I will also be sharing facts and stats, and training-related pictures (and hopefully minimal training-related complaints though I can’t make any promises).

At this point, I’ll be honest, I’m not sure which aspect of this whole thing is making me more nervous.

On the one hand, this is my first venture into fundraising and I have a hard enough time simply asking people for directions, never mind money (even if it is for a good cause).

On the other hand, I am currently writing this post while eating a handful of Christmas sugar cookies topped with leftover chocolate frosting. I’m clearly miles away from running a marathon (get it? miles away).

Fortunately, real training doesn’t start until after the holidays so I still have plenty time to actually train for the race, and post lots of (hopefully funny and motivational) training-related posts, and get the hang of fundraising.

After eating lots and lots of cookies of course.

TBT: Ten Thousand Santas Can’t Be Wrong

I’m a big deal. No seriously, I hold a world record. Okay, technically I share it with about 10,000 other people, one of which is Lauren (hey-oh, shout out to us!) But I am part of a world record and I will be for at least another ten months.

It all started with a dream…and a sign in the metro. La Carrera de Papa Noel. Running? Santa Claus? Well, that’s all I needed to hear. So here’s the deal, the whole purpose of the race is to have the most people running while dressed like Papa Noel (or an elf if you’re a kid). And, of course, to have fun while doing it. So you sign up by paying an incredibly small fee and they give you a Santa suit to wear on the day of the race, complete with hat and beard.

You also receive a swag bag full of magazines, food and the glorious, felt Santa suit. I think there might have been protein powder too. Whatever, I was too focused on the Santa gear.

Race day rolled around and Lauren and I joined the pack of Santas. And, gosh, did we look good doing it….

By the end of the race we were exhausted because it’s hard work to run three miles and look good.

But it was all worth it because we were rewarded with post-race goodies, including this little guy.

He’s just a tiny Coca-Cola reindeer; however, when the time comes, I kind of want to pack him in my suitcase and bring him home with me. He can be a reminder of back when I used to break world records for fun.

Blinding confidence, now brought to you by Coca-Cola.

Running Mad…rid

All of my posts so far have shown me outside of Madrid. For some reason I’ve been putting off writing about actual Madrid. I don’t know why but it’s hard to write about; how do I start? Destinations are easy. I went here; I did this; look, pictures! Everything fits so nicely in one post. I’ve been in Madrid for almost three months now; that’s a lot of words and pictures to fit into one post. So what’s the best way to break things up? Where do I begin? Well, let’s start with running. That is the general theme going on here so I’ll start with me running Madrid. Not running Madrid (although I did see the king’s hand once!) but literally running the mean, hilly streets (and parks!) of Madrid.

When I first arrived to town, we lived in Lavapiés so I pretty much had El Retiro in my back yard and quickly learned to get lost (and then found…wow, I’m so deep) in the labyrinth of tiny pathways, all the while admiring the small fountains, the scattered monuments and the golden colors of autumn.

The following month, Lauren and I found our permanent home in Madrid which happened to be right next to the Parque ~~Deheaven~~ Dehesa. Okay, okay, I’ve made that joke elsewhere but let’s just look past that and let me have my fun with words. But seriously, doesn’t this kind of look Iike heaven?

Those views are worth running for if you ask me, but then again so is beer. And so I find myself at that time again: training season. The time of year where Liz and I decide that it’s a good idea to run 13.1 miles (there was that one time that we thought 26.2 miles would be a good idea) motivated only by visions of beer and a medal. If you’re thinking ‘that’s not enough motivation to train for a half marathon’, well, you would be right. By the end, training almost always ends up being replaced by talking about training while looking at motivating pictures. But it turns out that beer and medals are just enough motivation to run 13.1 miles on a Sunday morning while the rest of the world is still sleeping. Although somewhere along the line, we ~~got old~~ learned that mimosas are actually much better rewards. So, eleven weeks from today, that’s where you will find us: chugging up one of Madrid’s many hills and chanting “medals, mimosas, beers…medals, mimosas, beers.”