So, the painful memories of Napa Valley Marathon dissipated pretty quickly although, the remnant of the running plagued for several days! Blisters from the marathon lingered around my feet but I also got more. Ugh. Turned out, I had the wrong type of shoes for my wide feet. I needed more stability than motion control. Anyhow, I was directed to the "right" shoes by my new favorite shoe guy at the Sports Basement. Hello, Mizuno Alchemy 8! I ran on it a few times and it's SO much better!
Two Sundays ago on March 8th, I ran my first free race ever: The Sports Basement 5k in Sunnyvale. There was a 175 cap on the runners and it was definitely a fun run. There were bibs but no timed chips, although our finish times were recorded as we crossed the finish line. Nothing fancy but definitely a run I'll do again. Mega points for free t-shirts and great swag for a free race! My official finish time was 24:35! Not bad considering my PR for a 5k was 24:15, when I weighted 10 lbs less and it was the first time I ran after Napa Valley!
This past Sunday, I ran my first 12k at the Emerald Across the Bay 12k in San Francisco. It's one hilly ride but a beautiful course and well worth the pain. I also got to run it with Maritza, Tara, Kristin, Sandra (she was in an earlier wave) and my good friend Michaela. We all ran a fantastic race and I'm really proud of my 1:04:56 finish. That is a 8:48 min average pace... which for me, is pretty decent. In all honesty, I was disappointed that I didn't run faster but really, I'm pretty happy with what I did. As you can see, I looked very happy running it, too. I'm such a ham in front of a camera! (Did I mention it rained the WHOLE time??)
While I was up in Portland last week, I also got to do a Tweetup with fellow runners: Christine and Michelle from Running Chicks in PDX (top)and Amy, Alisa and Justin (bottom). :-)
Oh and did I mention I have now joined "The Fellowship of Garmin"? Or the "Church of Garmin"? I bit the bullet and threw down some serious cash for the Garmin Forerunner 405. If you remember from my previous post, my Nike+ Sportband died in the rain. And I was so hearbroken, I couldn't get another one to replace it... So I decided to upgrade to what the "serious" runners use. I had issues setting up "Kermit" the first day but I soon figured it out and now we're happy as can be.
And guess what? I was asked to pace the San Francisco Marathon in July!! I didn't have much choice but I am pacing the 4:45 finish group. I don't really care about the time, I know I can do 4:45 easy. I get to run my 5th SFM for free!! Woot!I also ran the Mermaid Half Marathon (a women's only event) this past Sunday. I thought I was ready for a PR but turns out, I wasn't. There were some strong gusty winds in both directions and towards the end rain... again. AND mud. Lots of mud that felt like I had 10 lb ankle weights on both legs! Below is me, our friend Shelly and Tara at the start. Oh things started so well... We started off at sub 8:30 pace and I soon petered out. I finished at 1:58:35. Not my best finish but considering, not bad! We also saw Audrey at the end but we didn't get a pic together. :-(
By the way, thank you ALL for your encouraging and supportive comments on my Napa Marathon post. I got choked up thinking how lucky I am to have such an amazing running community behind me.OH and we had an unexpected surprise Saturday morning! My sister delivered 3 weeks early. Averie Eunhae Lopez showed up at 11:15am weighing 5.8 lbs and 18" long. Thankfully, my sister had a wonderfully short labor... less than 2 hours and pushed for only 15 minutes? I hope that's all genetic! Here's Averie at Day 2! Both mother and baby are doing wonderfully!! (More gushing about niece to come!!)
