I won’t lie. I was nervous about this race. My last training run hadn’t gone very well, and since I was in the last corral, the risk of being swept was very high. Add in that Anaheim was experiencing higher-than-normal temperatures and humidity, and I was really not confident.
Kirsten had arrived Saturday evening, so we went out to Downtown Disney for dinner and shopping. It was good for me to get my legs moving so they wouldn’t cramp up before the next day’s race.
Bed early again, with the alarm set for 3AM. If I wasn’t still on Eastern time, it would have been brutal; though I was eating meals at local appropriate times, so my body was a bit confused for the whole trip.
Up, and ready to go in the morning. And, we got to the start in good time.
Kirsten decided to slum it in Corral G with me so we could hang out a bit longer. She was in denial about running a half marathon, I was delirious and seriously worried about finishing. It was still relatively hot and humid, and today was 13.1 instead of just 6.2. Here we are hanging out in the corral…the smiles were probably not real.
While talking with some of the other folks in the corral, we heard rumor that once we reach mile 10, we were essentially safe. I wasn’t sure if that was true, but, honestly, thinking about it kept me going through a good part of the race. I didn’t have to worry about pushing for more than 10 miles…I felt like I could do that. If it wasn’t true…well, I just decided that if they swept me at mile 11, then they were just bastards.
When we got up to the start, we heard that Richard Simmons was in our Corral. Weird.
And then, before we knew it, we were off. The first few miles were through the two Disney parks, so they were fun.
Again, I was running miles for people. I had also planned out a playlist that had songs for each person on my list that should play during their mile. Mom, Thea, Lorna and Brooke got me through the parks.
My lifeline, AND the bane of my existence, were the sweepers and the pace bicycle. At Walt Disney World, I was not in the last corral, and I must not have gotten close to being swept, because I didn’t have reminders along the way of how far ahead (or behind) pace I was. For this race, though, there was always someone at the mile markers telling us how far ahead of pace we were. I think that spurred me on for the first half of the race. Around Mile 2 I was 6 minutes ahead of pace. Mile 4 I was 7 minutes ahead. Mile 5 I was 10 minutes ahead.
The bane of my existence – pace bikes!
By mile 5, though, the heat was getting to me. I was having trouble keeping up my run segments, and found myself walking more and more. Mile 5 was for my nephew, though, and I kept trying to run as much as I could. Mile 6 was for Karena, and I kept running, but not as much. Mile 7 was for Melissa, one of my best friends, who I’ve inspired to start running. When I heard Time Warp come on the iPod, I tried to get in a few more run segments, but I’d be lying if I said I succeeded in getting more than a couple in.
The whole race was a bit of a mind game. I kept listening to how far ahead of pace I was, and wondering at what point I could just walk the rest of the race. I kept calculating how much time I lose over minimum pace when I walk, and how many miles I would have before my lead over minimum would be erased. My goal was mile 10 – holding out hope that the 10-mile rumor was true.
Disney had arranged for there to be “stuff” happening in each mile. Once we exited the parks, there were marching bands, cheerleaders, and ethnic dance groups along the race route. Around mile 7.5, we started running through classic cars (!). I started to see Model A cars and other very early cars. Over the course of the next mile, the cars got more and more recent, until we went through 70s-era cars. How cool is that? (Before you answer, I own a Model A, so I’m not being sarcastic – I love the classics!) This is also the mile where we ran past the Honda Center (coincidence?).
And, by this point, I was walking full-time. The sun was high, the temperature was up, and my body just wanted to quit. I knew I could keep it walking, but if I pushed it to run, I couldn’t guarantee that I would cross the finish. I was far enough ahead of the sweep, that if the 10-mile rumor was true, I should be okay. I kept going, thinking about Jessica for mile 8 and Jaime for mile 9.
Next up on the trail was Angel’s Stadium, which came during Andrew’s mile. We actually got to run through the stadium, which was a lot of fun. There were scout troops and other people in the stands cheering us on as we went. So cool.
I finally crossed the 10-mile sign. Was I safe? I had passed a bunch of shuttle buses in the stadium’s parking lot, so I felt like I had made it. Others around me were talking, and they seemed to confirm the rumor, and also added the tidbit that we basically had an hour after the 10-mile mark to finish. I could do that. Mile 11 was Sweetie’s. Mile 12 was Kirsten’s, and I knew she was waiting at the finish for me. I was going to get there.
I tweeted this, so Kirsten would know I was close.
At this point we were also back on Disney property. It was the home stretch. I ventured a smile when I knew the finish was close.
I used the last of my energy to run the last bit to the finish.
You don’t see the tears here, but they weren’t far off.
I traded in my wristbands for my Coast-to-Coast and Dumbo medals.
After picking up my water, nutrition box, and my checked bag, I found Kirsten in the reunion area.
I cried. I’ll admit it. I didn’t care what my time was – I had completed the Dumbo Double Dare. And, I was very proud of myself. (Still am.)
Oh, and somehow, I PRed! Shaving about 6 minutes off my Walt Disney World time. I think it was trying to keep ahead of the sweepers!
I arrived in California on Thursday before the race – I don’t always have the best luck traveling, so I didn’t want to fret about getting to the Expo and picking up my packet on the same day I was traveling.
After checking in to my hotel, I decided to walk the half-mile to a nearby grocery store to pick up some supplies for the weekend. Have I mentioned that I’ve been struggling with blisters throughout my long runs? And that I thought I had finally conquered them during my last long run. Yeah, well, I was done-in by that 1-mile round-trip to the grocery store…new blisters! Ugh.
Oh well…nothing to do, but bandage them up and move on. But I felt pretty dumb.
Next morning was the Expo. Good thing I hadn’t planned on doing anything else on Friday, because there were LINES!
Once the Expo opened, it didn’t actually take too long to get my bib (and Kirsten’s bib, since she wouldn’t be able to pick hers up before the race on Sunday).
After that, I walked the floor of the expo, and found a couple places to spend some money (of course!). Last thing up was to pick up some of the official merchandise….oof. I picked out a couple of shirts and few Dumbo things, and went to find the end of the line. And then I waited. And waited. And waited. And waited. I got to hear some of Jeff Galloway’s talk, and some chick from Biggest Loser (hate that show with a burning passion), and then Sean Astin. I also chatted with a woman in front of me, which was, frankly, more interesting than the talks. After about 2 hours in line, I finally got to the front of the line. We probably should have gotten finisher medals for the merchandise line…no lie.
I laid low for the rest of the evening – watching movies in my hotel room and grabbing an early dinner before heading off to bed early. The alarm was set for 3AM, so no reason to stay up late!
As usual, I slept like crap worrying about whether or not I would get up on time, about finishing the race, and about finding the start. I must have dozed off at some point, because I dreamt about getting to the race. In the dream, I was there on time, but had forgotten my shoes in the car (even though I wasn’t driving in real life). I went to get my shoes and then got distracted at the theme park while getting back to the start. Perhaps it’s just as well that I didn’t sleep much more.
The alarm went off at 3AM like it was supposed to. I looked at the weather first thing, and it was still 77* – at 3AM (!). Nothing to do but go out, so Jo and I got ready for the race.
I left the hotel around 4AM, and walked toward the start. I wasn’t completely sure where we should be going, so I found some other racers and followed them.
The 5k race was happening before the 10k, and I got there early enough to hear them call away the 5k runners. While waiting, a lady approached me to see if I knew where we needed to be. She and I got to chatting, and waited to be called to our corrals together. We were also in the same corral, so Rosemary and I stuck together as we walked over to the corrals. I will say that the corrals for the 10k were not as well organized as they were for the Walt Disney World half marathon. Rosemary ended up pulling me into a corral. When I started asking if it was ours, she said, “Just stand here and act like nothing’s going on.” Honestly, I was just as happy to be in an earlier corral, so I shut my mouth and waited for the start.
Finally our corral moved toward the start. It was still 77* out. But at least today was the short race, right?
And we were off. Since I was in an earlier corral, I felt free to stop a little on the way to grab a couple of pictures. We spent a bit more than a mile on the streets of Anaheim, and then moved into the Disney parks. We ran through Radiator Springs first, and I stopped for a picture with Red, the fire truck from Cars.
Along the way, I was running my miles for different people. Through the parks, most of the miles were for the kids in my life. My nieces got the mile that include Radiator Springs, which is appropriate since my middle niece was in love with Lightning McQueen for a long time. My youngest nephew, my best friend’s son, had the mile that took me into Disneyland. And Sweetie had the mile that took me through the Castle.
I did my run-walk for about the first half of the race, but it was hot and humid and I was feeling like I was giving everything I had to keep that up. Knowing that I had a second race to get through and that I had gotten into an earlier corral (so I didn’t have to worry too much about being swept), I walked most of the rest of the race. I didn’t want to use up everything.
I’ll say that I initially didn’t want to write this race report at all. But I feel like I should have *something* here about my very first half marathon.
The morning of the half marathon, Kirsten and I walked as far as we could together toward our corrals. We say this on the way:
Shortly after that, we had to part, since Kirsten was in a different corral. I found mine, and waited for the race to start.
And waited, and waited, and waited! Finally, we heard the countdown begin, and saw this:
Of course, being in Corral G, we had a long way to wait until we were able to go. After what seemed an eternity, our corral was next, and we could see the start line.
Disney has fun things along the course, and I tried taking a few pictures along the way, but I didn’t really want to stop for those pictures, so the ones before dawn didn’t really turn out. But shortly after Mile 3, we came to this:
Yup, we were entering the Magic Kingdom! Before long, I was running through Cinderella’s Castle. (See me up front at about 15 seconds in.)
I’m impressed that I was running for the whole video! After passing through the castle, I looked back and snapped this, my favorite picture of the day:
It was when we were exiting the Magic Kingdom that things started going downhill for me. The road getting us out the park were fairly narrow, and with the crowds, I just couldn’t keep running my intervals. So I ended up walking for a couple miles. Somewhere in there was the halfway point…and the just-over halfway point:
I also saw a couple of familiar faces on the side of the road — Maggie and Meredith from work. They were cheering on some other friends, too, and Meredith would be running the full marathon the next day.
Sometime around mile 8, the road widened out so I could run. However, my legs had cramped up, so it was really, really hard. In retrospect, I maybe should have worked through it a little, and they probably would have loosened up in time. But I just wasn’t feeling it. The sun was up, the temperature was up.
Around Mile 9.5, I stepped off the road and got this:
I didn’t stop at the medical tent to get it patched up, though, because I knew that I was in danger of getting swept up. I did continue to try and run occasionally, and walked as fast as I could. Around Mile 12, we were told we were safe, and so I walked the rest, without even trying to run.
I was finally arriving at Epcot.
I mustered enough energy when I got close to the finish to jog through and high-fived Mickey on my way over the finish line.
I *love* this video of me crossing the finish. Even more so because I was actually jogging for the entire video! If they had started a few seconds earlier, I’m fairly sure I was still walking, but who cares?
I picked up my finisher medal and food box on my way out, and stopped to get my official finisher picture. (Next time, remind me to put down the Gatorade!)
Kirsten met me at package pick-up, and we found Andrew in the family waiting area.
I’d be lying if I said I was happy at the end of the race. I was pissed. I didn’t get swept up, but I should have…at least in my mind. The only reason I didn’t was because I wasn’t in the last corral.
Last Saturday I got to cash in my prize. Sweetie even came out from MN for the tour! I also brought Andrew, JD, Laurie and their kids, Lorna, Stef and Doug. We had to get to the zoo early, but Marie, the elephant manager and our host, met us and brought us up to the Mezzanine.
When we arrived, Kandula was getting his bath.
The ladies, Shanthi and Ambika, were eating in another stall. They also were throwing hay onto their backs – apparently back-hay is very tasty:
Marie answered many of our questions. The kids wanted to ask about the elephant poo – how much do they poo in a day? Turns out, each time they poo, it weighs as much as a 7-year-old boy!
Next up for a bath was Ambika – Marie had to leave us, as she was in charge of bathing Ambika. So, Becky came up to answer our questions and supervise us.
After her bath, Ambika went to the “sandbox” stall, and started flinging sand on her still-wet back. Turns out this is good for their skin, because as the sand dries and falls off, it helps to exfoliate their skin.
We stayed in the barn for an hour and a half! It sure didn’t seem like it. After the tour, we walked around much of the rest of the zoo. We even checked out the elephants again – we just hadn’t gotten enough! Oh, and the keepers were out in the yard, and recognized our group…I’m sure that was a good thing, and not because we were terribly annoying 🙂
While I’m not the biggest astronaut and “human spaceflight” nut, I have always wanted to see a shuttle launch…or a rocket launch…okay, I wanted to see something big with fire behind it rise up into the sky. Given that the shuttle program was coming to an end, I began to realize that I needed to get on the ball and hustle down to Florida for a launch. A small number of NASA employees are elligible to get tickets to see the launch from the NASA causeway – you know the place with the giant countdown clock that you see on TV? Since these last several launches were so well-attended, a lottery was instituted for these car passes to the causeway. I started putting my name in last fall, but never got picked. So, I did what members of the non-NASA public had to do, I gathered up my family and dragged them down to Florida, and staked out a claim on public land for the launch.
Because this has been such a crappy and hectic year, I wasn’t able to drag everyone (or even just my husband) down for launches earlier in the year. So, we were stuck going to the last launch…when a million people were expected to descend on the Space Coast. No problem. We could deal with it, if only for a day.
To make this a real event, I also invited my Mom and my aunt, Maggie. Mom flew out to DC ahead of time to enjoy July 4th in DC, then the three of us (Mom, Andrew, and me) piled into the car early Thursday morning and drove the 15 hours to Cocoa Beach. We met up with my aunt in Cocoa Beach – she had flown in earlier on Thursday and checked into our hotel. None of us was optomistic that we would see the launch – Friday’s forecast for launch was just 30%, as was Saturday; Sunday’s was a bit higher at 60%. We had to leave on Monday, so if the shuttle didn’t launch over the weekend, we wouldn’t see it. No matter – we would make an adventure out of it either way.
Friday morning we set the alarms for 3:00 AM with a goal of leaving for Titusville and Space View Park by 4:00 AM. As we drove, I checked the weather and launch forecast again – it still didn’t look good for the 11:26 AM launch time; 30% for “go” was predicted. We forged ahead anyway. Along the way, we passed cars and trailers parked along the road, and if we squinted we could see the bright spotlights lighting up the launch pad. We wondered if we should also stop…but our plan was Space View park, and we were sticking to it.
Traffic wasn’t actually bad until we were very close to Space View park – we circled around a bit, and finally found a pay parking lot charging just $15 (which, frankly, we didn’t care about – we just wanted to park the car and find a place to park ourselves). We had packed to be there all day – we brought our airline friendly storage, blankets, chairs, a cooler with drinks and picnic fixings, picnic basket, bag of snacks – so we grabbed everything except the chairs, and trudged out to the park. It took a couple tries to figure out where exactly we should way, but eventually we staked our claim, laid out the blankets, and got ready to wait.
And wait. And check the status updates. And wait.
Each check of the shuttle status seemed to end with a version of the phrase, “the chance of launch remains at 30%”. So we were making plans for Saturday – deciding what we would do differently, where we might try to wait, and how early we might want to try to show up.
And as we waited, more and more people showed up. People were everywhere. Everywhere – including one dumbass and his (near-adult) boys on top of the Gemini program monument. Thankfully a few cops finally came through and made them get off of the monument.
Clouds threatened rain. We were “misted” on. Blue sky peeked in and out. We had no clue what the weather was going to do; if it would permit the launch today.
And waited. (Chocolate and potato chips might have been consumed before 10 AM.) And the crew continued to ready the shuttle, and the countdown and planned countdown-holds, continued. Each update, still with the caveat that launch was only a 30% probability.
Then word came down – they were exiting the final planned hold, with 9 minutes on the clock. Launch would happen! The weather cooperated, if barely, to permit the launch. We all waited, watching our clocks, listening to the flight control team on several radios. More people pushed into the park. I took Trevor and my camera and nudged my way up closer to the water – around the bush that threatened our view. We thought we were in the final 30-second countdown…the crowd counted (without a nearby radio). No launch. What happened? Then word came that there was a 30-second hold. The countdown started again (once a nearby onlooker pulled up the radio channel with the control room chatter). We counted along.
10….9….8….7….6….5….4….3…2
…
1
…
blastoff!
I held my camera over the heads of the crowd, aimed as best I could, and held down the shutter (in “sports, continuous” mode). It took a little bit for me to see the orange glow rising. The crowd was clapping, and we watched the glow rise with a cloudy-tail behind it. Unfortunately the clouds were low in the sky, so we soon lost view of the shuttle.
A few people started leaving, but the guys behind me kept saying, “wait for it, people, you don’t want to leave yet.” So I waited. And it seemed to take a while….and then I knew what they were talking about.
The sound. Or the feel. It’s hard to say. Certainly the sound of the rocket hit us, but it was more of a feeling. A rumbling deep in the gut that spread out to every part from my toes to my head. And it kept going for what seemed minutes, though probably less. And that is probably the memory I will carry from this experience – the rumble of a rocket thrusting a fragile vessile of human life into space.
I signed up for the Sisterhood Virtual 5k back in October when I had high hopes of doing the c25k program after getting my heel healed up. Well, I’ve been spotty at best about caring for my heel (please don’t yell at me – I have a plan and will come up with a stretching and icing schedule to make it better). Â But I knew that I could walk it no matter what.
When I went to take the dog out this morning, though, this is what I saw:
(Image the snow a bit more pristine and the air white with flurries.)
I don’t have access to a treadmill, so outside was my only options. So I started making excuses – I can’t go out in the snow! What if I slip? It’s only 28° out there – that’s cold! I should just cancel. No one would blame me for not doing it today.
But I ignored those excuses. I bundled up, grabbed my iPod and camera, laced up my walking shoes, and headed off on the course I’d mapped yesterday. Here I am heading out for my virtual 5k:
For the first mile or so, I was thinking about all the girls at Disney – about the training they did and how awesome it will be tomorrow when their training all pays off. For the second mile, I was mostly concerned about not slipping – the terrain was downhill then uphill, and I had to be careful about where I was stepping.
For the third mile I started to marvel at how far I’ve come in a year. Last year the idea of walking outside in the snow and cold would have been laughable. In fact, the idea of doing a virtual 5k at all would have been weird. Not because I couldn’t have walked that far – I’m pretty sure my husband and I do it all the time when we go downtown to visit the museums – but because it wouldn’t have occurred to me to do it. I’m also starting to figure out that exercise is not something that takes up time that I could be doing something else, but is the something else that I should be making time for. I haven’t been 100% with exercise and training this past year, but each time I fell away from it, I went back. And I went back faster each time.
I snapped a couple of pics along the way, but then realized that the pics make it look like I was walking out in the country…I wasn’t, I’m in one of DC’s suburbs, so these were just carefully chosen shots to show the snow.
And my footprints on the snowy sidewalk:
And here I am back home, after my 3.5 miles (yes, longer than a 5k, but it was the closest route I could find that I actually wanted to take):
The National Zoo was blessed this year with two litters of lion cubs, totaling 7 cubs. They started to let them out for public viewing Dec 18 for short periods of time. I dragged Andrew to the Zoo on Christmas Eve so we could see them.
Luckily the cubs are not cute at all…they’d have a hard time being taken seriously if they were cute. You can see for yourself in the pictures I took below:
I’m usually on the look-out for fun and different things that we can do in DC, so when I saw the Glenn Gary Parlor Magic show on Groupon, I thought it would be fun to give it a go.
I wasn’t sure what to expect, but we had a great time! The show is in the Fireplace Parlor in the Westin Hotel in DC. The venue is small, and so only about 30 people can be in the audience at a time. This made the show feel very intimate, and ensured that nearly everyone was included in some part of the show. While tricks are important, a magic show is really only as good as the magician’s banter. Glenn’s banter started out a little slow, but picked up (and because a bit blue at points!) – by the end I was giggling quite a bit.
As far as tricks, Glenn did several standards, like handkerchiefs and rings. Also card tricks and sleight-of-hand. The most impressive was his closer…I don’t know how much I should give away, but Andrew and I walked out of there wondering how he did it!
If you’re in the DC area, this show is definitely worth a visit. (And yes, even at full price!)
We decided to cap our biking year last weekend with the Back Roads Century ride, doing the 29-mile route. The ride looked like it would have pretty scenery and the course was described as “moderately hilly,” so we didn’t think it would be too bad…especially since we did 50 just a couple weeks ago.
The ride starts in Berryville, VA, about 60 miles from our house, so we got an early start. The day started out on the bad note when we were just 15 minutes from home and the “check engine” light went on in Andrew’s car. We debated for a minute, then decided that it would be bad if we were off in Berryville and the engine conked out. So, we turned around and moved all of our stuff to my car.
We got to the start point in pretty good time, though, and took off after re-filling our water bottles. The scenery was very pretty…once I learned to ignore all the road kill. In fact, the ride could almost be called the “Road Kill Century.” Oh well, look up, not down, because this is far better to look at:
This is also horse country, so there were loads of horses at all of the farms along the way. For a while it seemed that they were all shy of the road, though, until we came upon this pair:
Note the home burial plot in front of the horses. I really wanted to take a closer look at the gravestones, but refrained – I wasn’t sure how the homeowners would take it if they were to see me stomping around.
Around mile 12 there was a beautiful rest stop at the Burwell-Morgan Mill. We actually kept a fairly good pace on the first 12 miles – there were hills on the way, but most of the uphills were immediately preceded by downhills that allowed a little momentum into the uphills. At the rest stop There were snacks and a Charlie Casabona’s Trio, a trio that included a hammered dulcimer. We stayed a little while to refuel and rest.
After the rest stop, though, things got ugly. There was a scary downhill, which I rode the breaks on (because I couldn’t see the bottom and it was very steep). Of course, this was later followed by an equally scary uphill. I made it about halfway up the hill and then walked the rest of the way.
Yeah, and there were more hills, and bigger hills than were on the first leg of the trip. And then more hills, and then more, and then more. I made it up a few of them, but not up all of them. The second, and last, really big one was killer. Several bikers were walking up it, so I wasn’t alone.
After Andrew and I stopped for some water and caught our breath, we went on again…and I had a flat. Yup. Flat, flat, flat. Turned out that there was a small piece of glass in my tire. When we pulled out my spare inner tube, it appeared to be the wrong size. So, with the last few electrons in my phone, I called the roadside assistance, and we waited.
It took a while, but the roadside car came, and the guy fixed up my tire very quickly. Then we were an our way again. There weren’t any more really big hills, but by this time my legs were pretty much spent. I made it up a few hills (very slowly), but I also walked up a couple…I just couldn’t do them all.
When we made it back to our starting point, there was a big picnic. We picked up our t-shirts and water bottles, and then grabbed a well-deserved lunch.
I wore my helmet camera for the ride (and only missed a small part of the trip due to not turning it on), and made a time-lapse of our ride:
Yup, we took a bike ride to celebrate our sixth anniversary! Wonder why?
This is where we were on our honeymoon:
Aren’t we cute? We’ve come a long way since then…both on the bikes and off. Best six years of my life so far…any moments that weren’t best (such as finishing my thesis) were made better by having Andrew in my life. I love you, honey.
I'm an astronomer, cyclist, scrapbooker, reader, movie-goer, cat-and-dog-lover, wife, gamer, and all-around-wonderful-woman...not necessarily in that order.
