Sat 16 Sept 2006

The mandatory Fitness Expo at Disneyland Hotel was pretty cool. They gave out a lot of free edible nutriments, and the free t-shirt that races give participants turned out to be a Champion brand long-sleeve double-dry commemorative tech shirt. That's almost worth the $80 this race costs! Okay, not really. I'd also been looking for trendy sunglasses, and bought 2 pairs at the expo. They're really different from what I usually wear, mostly because I normally resist trends. Oh well, I gave in to them because I like the way these glasses look on me. One is a rhinestoned light blue lens, and the other is squared larger black frames.

I just finished compiling a bunch of running songs into my MP3 player. At least 3 hours' worth. And if it takes me longer to finish the half-marathon, well, then, I would be disqualified and shipped back on the bus. I've also set up the runners' tracker so that me, Mr. W, and Navy Girl Vanessa get an instant text message on our cells whenever Vicky or I cross certain checkpoints, i.e. 10K, halfway, and finish line.

On my way to Dwaine's house party, then to Disneyland! I can't believe I'm gonna be in bed by 8. I bet neither Vicky nor I would be.

Sun 17 Sept 2006

I was out of bed at 3:30 a.m., down in front of the hotel waiting for the shuttle at 4:15 a.m., at Disneyland at 4:35 a.m., in my corral waiting for the start of the race at 5:05 a.m., sniffling in the cold darkness. Yes, there were indeed people in trash bags, just like Greg said. There were also people in Tinkerbell and Peter Pan outfits, and those were just the men. A lot of women wore Minnie Mouse outfits, one in Pocahontas, another in Snow White, and lots and lots of them wore Mickey ear hats. When we were going down the Downtown Disney street being funneled from the corral to the start street, I looked up and saw that they had stopped the Disneyland Monorail directly above our path and a ton of Disney cast member characters in costume were hanging out of the Monorail cheering and waving at us. That and the pyrotechnics as we launched were pretty cool.

My goal: be done by 8:30 a.m., especially because it looked like it was going to be a clear and sunny day. At 4:30 a.m., the sky was dark but with visible moon and stars. Darn it!

What I did not expect: it took me 10 minutes to even get to the start line. Oh well, I guess I should change my aim to 2 hours and 30 minutes from the time I started, which would make it 8:40 a.m., which I acknowledge is optimistic considering I haven't trained more than 3 or so miles before the race.

the liveresult emailed to me:

disney@alerts.activeresult.com to email-services More options 8:34 am (6 hours ago) CINDY [my last name], 02:22:47 @ Finish: Disneyland Half Marathon presented by Kaiser Permanente, Disney Destinations LLC

Woohoo!

Other stuff I did not expect:

* running through Disneyland and California Adventure took forever because people kept stopping in front of me to take pictures with the Disney characters that had come out to cheer us on (I hit 5K or a little over 3 miles in 45 minutes; 3 miles normally takes me less than 30)

* I felt so incredibly good through mile 8 that I thought I could run an entire marathon; I only stopped to a walk twice at that point, both times for 30 seconds to drink some water that was offered

* the first physical pain hit me at mile 10; the PowerAid I'd drunk the mile before was giving me pain on the right side of my waist, like it does when I eat too much and then play too hard, so I walked for about 30 more seconds

* after rounding the bases inside Angel Stadium, I ran out of the stadium to see Mr. W on the side of the track taking photos (photos to come as he shrinks them down enough to be uploaded)

* I ran near a banana almost the entire time (an Asian guy in black tights wearing a banana suit shaking maracas - I didn't get it)

* the last 3 miles were so incredibly hard because the physical pain kicked in; my right 4th toe felt tingly and sloshy, like a huge blister enveloped the entire top half of the toe; the left foot's 4th toe hurt, too, but not as badly; to compensate for the weight I'm trying to keep off the toe, the inside of my ankles started hurting. I was having trouble lifting my shoes entirely off the ground in the steps

* Since I started 10 mins late, and I started having some problems toward the end, I figured there was no way I would finish before 8:30; instead, I finished at 8:32a; the chip time (which takes into account the fact that I crossed the start line late) is 2:22

* Vicky, doing her run-2-minutes-walk-a-minute routine finished only 32 minutes behind me, and she was feeling good with no injuries (except a slightly swollen ankle)

The music I had on the MP3 player helped immensely. I know this because for a brief moment, the gap between 2 songs was unusually long and I was running in silence. Hearing my footsteps pound on the ground, I was immediately drained. But as soon as the music started back up, I was all good and could run uphill over the 5 Freeway without slowing down much. During the run, as I surprised myself with how well I was handling everything cardiovascularly, I thought about Greg (the commenter who suggested I wear a trash bag) and the time I ran with him in San Francisco from the clock tower through Embarcadero to some old battalion thing under the Bay Bridge during the Blue Angels Air Show. It wasn't until after the 12-mile run that I found out the farthest he'd ever run up to that point was 3-4 miles. "Then why'd you run this with me? Why didn't you tell me?" I'd asked him. "Because I told you I'd run with you, and I didn't want you to be all, 'Oh, we didn't do 12 miles because Greg wimped out.' "

I was afraid to look into my shoe after the run because I didn't want to remove the sock and see a toenail fall out, which I hear is a relatively common occurrence. But what it appears to be, is a blood blister around the toe and under that nail. Despite the fact that the toe is the color of a black grape, I was instructed not to drain the blood for fear of infection. Maybe when the blood clots, the nail will fall out anyway, I dunno. I ran into an old friend, who's also a running trainer, at the end of the race. She lectured me, "Next time, Cindy, when you decide to do something like this…TRAIN!" Well, hindsight, 20/20, etc.

Shortly before 7:00 a.m. on Sunday, Mr. W was awakened when his cell phone received the livetracking automatically generated text message that indicated I had just passed the 5K point in the Disneyland Half-Marathon. He got up, jumped in the shower, checked the course map to see where the 5K marker was, then decided to drive out to Angel Stadium (which is Mile 10) to take photos of us. He didn't expect to see me because he had no idea where I was by the time he got to the stadium, but figured he could take photos of the runners by the stadium and photoshop me in later. Turned out, he didn't have to because I ran right up to him. He didn't even know it was me until I waved in his face.

At the completion of the 13.1 mile race, finishers were given this gawdy huge gold commemorative Inaugural Disneyland Half-Marathon medal, which on our tired bodies felt like 3 pounds. But it was really only 2 pounds. Haha.

Thanks to Mr. W for the photos, and for making me feel like walking the half-marathon is not an option. And for driving me around the next day and waiting on me hand and foot because I was in too much pain (whilst calling me an emperor penguin for my hobbling). "It's my job," he'd said when I thanked him on Sunday. "It's not your job to chauffeur me around," I'd said. "It's my job to take care of you," he told me with a kiss.

See Cindy's Photo's