12 more days

This is from the “days until” app on my iPhone.  I love countdowns, so this free app was perfect for me.  In just twelve short days, my mom, sister, and I will be walking (quite briskly, I might add) the Disneyland Tinker Bell Half Marathon!

This isn’t my first time to the rodeo, but it will be my mom and sister’s and I can’t be more excited to get to share that moment of crossing the finish line with them.  My first ever marathon that I ran was the Nike Women’s Marathon up in San Francisco back in October of 2005.  It was a full marathon…as in 26.2 miles full marathon.  It took me forever to finish it (somewhere in the neighborhood of 6 and a half hours), but I finished it and it’s an accomplishment that I am proud of.  Since then, I basically vowed never to run another full marathon, but I’ve managed to get talked into running (I run intervals, so run/walking if you want to get technical) a few more half marathons since then.  The most recent was the Air Force Marathon here in Dayton, Ohio this past September.

My mom has always been a walker.  She walks almost every weekday morning with one of her friends, Mary, for as long as I can remember.  They live on the same street so they meet on the corner and briskly walk their 3 miles and get some talking in along the way.  So, when I got it in my head that I wanted to complete a half with all the women in my family, I figured why not take a break from running and try some speed walking?  My mom and sister were actually easier to talk into it than I thought…they were even excited about it!  And when I saw that the Tinker Bell race was at the end of January, I figured it was as good of an excuse as any to get the heck out of freezing cold Ohio and take a trip to sunny southern California.  And, my sister and I are pretty big Disney fans, so that helped out a little as well.

Let’s get one thing clear, my body is not made for running.  I get shin splints, I have hip problems, I am in general not very light footed.  If runners should be gazelles, I’m more of an elephant, so I think that walking is more up my alley anyway.  For this particular race there is a 3 and a half hour time limit, which averages out to a 16 minute mile pace.  That means that in order to walk the whole thing (all 13.1 miles) we need to get our butts moving and not stop until we’re done.  But, we’ve been training.  Me, in Ohio (dragging Dane along on my long walks, which can get boring), and my mom and sister in California.  We followed this 14 week training schedule (some of us more diligently than others…hey, it’s really cold here ok?!).

It hangs on my fridge (aren’t those magnets cute?  My future in-laws gave them to me for my bday…love.)  And, yes, the 13 mile walk isn’t crossed out because I didn’t actually walk that one, but we’ve been training…hard…and it all comes down to race day, which is in just 12 days!

This photo is a little ode to my favorite running shoes.  Here’s to hoping they can carrying me another 13.1 miles.

But, honestly, I have no doubt in my mind that we’ll finish and finish strong.  (If you are wondering what that tag is on my right shoe, it’s my Road ID, which I strongly recommend to anyone that does outdoor activities alone.  It has all the important info, like my name, blood type, and any allergies, so if you do, God forbid, get hit by a car or something, people will know how to help you.  Get your own here.)

Anyone else training for a race?  Ever finished a race with a family member and loved getting to share that runner’s walker’s high with them?