Monday, July 14, 2008

Less than 3 weeks to go!

Yep, less than 3 weeks to go until the SF Marathon! I completed 20 miles on Saturday, last of my long runs. From here on out, it's all about tapering baby! I'm actually thrilled that I only have to run 12 miles next weekend! (What's wrong with me, thinking 12 miles is light running???!!) It's a good thing, too, since Saturday is my bridal shower. Yay!

D and I ran the 20 miles starting from the AT&T Park along Embarcadero, Fort Mason, Marina Greens to Golden Gate Bridge and back. This is one of my favorite runs in the city and I'm very familiar with it! Not only because it's part of the marathon route but because I ran this route quite often when I used to live in the Russian Hill area of the city. Actually, the route that I mentioned is only 18 miles so we doubled back to Mariposa (on 3 Street) to get our additional 2 miles. The weather was absolutely perfect (mid 60s) and a bit overcast, which is just how I like it. The usual hills at Fort Mason and up to GG weren't as tough as I remembered but still, wasn't easy by any means. And there were TONS of people out running and training, too. The Avon 2 Day Breast Cancer Walk was in full swing on the GG and it was tough dodging and weaving the pink-clad women (and some men). But to see so many people supporting such a great cause was really heartwarming. We also saw the Aids Marathon training group running and the Nike Women's Marathon training group along the route, among others. It was quite encouraging to see so many other runners out there and made me feel like part of something bigger than me.

We started our run a little before 7am and not sure exactly what time I finished but my Nike+ said that I ran 20 miles in 3:35 at about 10:45 pace. Which isn't the best time but I'm happy I finished the run. So at this point, I may not look like I'll be running a sub 4 hour marathon but I'm going to try my best to run it close to 4 hours as possible! By the way, I found out that in my age category, I need to run 3:40 marathon to qualify for Boston. Next year, when I go up to the next age category, I would have to run it under 3:45. That might be more doable...

As for the wedding cake, D must really really love me because he told me today that I could go with my new favorite cake maker Amy Peeples!! So we're going to Peeples Baking, afterall. No sheet cake. But, I may get a small grooms cake for D from his favorite bakery. It will be a nice surprise for him. :-)

5 comments:

  1. Way to get in the last 20 miler! Have fun on the taper. You are going to rock it.

    Great news about the cake too! You are going to have so much fun at the wedding.

    Thanks for link on the water bottle belt!

    Blogger Aron is running SF too! http://runnersrambles.blogspot.com/

    ReplyDelete
  2. Congratulations and enjoy your Taper.

    UBC stands for the Ultimate Bodyshaping Challenge. It's a 6 day a week; 10 week kickboxing/resistance program offered by martial arts studio. I go in Petaluma, but I'm sure you can find a dojo in San Jose.

    Check out the contest winners:
    http://www.ultimatebodyshaping.com/ubc.php?s1=national&page=winners_addtl
    (the site is pretty cheesy, but it does work!).

    I have seen people transform before my eyes (when I casually went to kickboxing and others were doing the UBC). It's pretty amazing.

    ReplyDelete
  3. d10! I left a msg with Aron. Thanks for letting me know! :-)

    ReplyDelete
  4. hey!! thanks for stopping by! i am so excited to find another sfm runner!

    i did a similar route to this on my previous 20 miler! i love running in sf.

    what is your goal for the marathon? i am shooting for around 4 hours but i dont know since its a TOUGH course. you have run it before right? any advice? i thought i could for sure do 4 hours or less based on my previous training runs, but once i did the runs in sf i realized how tough it was going to be. eek! i am so excited though! i am in the 5:55 wave - how about you?

    so funny about see jane run! we were so close to each other!

    congrats on the wedding too!!!!!!! i LOVE weddings :) my dream job is to be an event planner. where are you getting married at? so fun!

    ReplyDelete
  5. good luck with the marathon julianne... I just did a 15k and it seemed endless... I still can't imagine going another 17 miles further! maybe you will inspire me to htfu and try to get my weekly long runs longer. enjoy your race! like your blog design too, classy...

    ReplyDelete