The eve of the race is here!

After a good nights sleep and a relaxing morning, Amy and I headed out for a somewhat cursory tour of Cleveland! Funny how this weekend getaway to explore a new city turned into a race with some sight seeing fit in!

After grabbing lunch at the Chocolate Bar (yes they had real food too) we took a "shuttle" (30 minutes!) to the Cleveland Health and Fitness Expo where we picked up our race packets, got our goody bags and did some shopping.

It was at an Expo center and was huge with over 200 vendors selling everything from apparel to 100 kinds of energy gels and chews to....well every running accessory you could think of. We bought a few things including a spi-belt, some apparel and even new phone holders that fit in the palm of your hand! 

Afterwards we hit the rock and roll hall of fame, which we had not nearly enough time to see, saw the better part of the Indians / A's game at Progressive Field and had a delicious carb filled pasta dinner to cap the evening!

As we sit in our hotel room, just feet from the starting line, just 9 hours and change away from 7am, we feel ready as we will ever be.

It's been a long 30 days but we are both ready to realize a crazy idea we had just a month ago and wake up at 5am tomorrow morning and run all over Cleveland with 15,000 of our new running buddies!

Stay tuned tomorrow morning for a pic or two from the starting corral!

A few pre-race notes

Since this is only our second organized race we are not quite sure what to expect in Cleveland, especially since this isn't just some 5k race. We chose to stay at the Hyatt Regency at the Arcade in downtown Cleveland. Why? Because it's the host hotel of the race and they had decent rates. :)

As we check we see the whole place is ready for runners (and race officials and other Rite Aid employees) to descend on the town and hotel. The check in girl asks if we're running in the race and we say yes. She seems excited for us (more on that later) and hands us a paper. Attached to it were 2 coupons for a boxed breakfast to be picked up Saturday afternoon! We were very concerned previously on how we were going to eat so early Sunday morning but apparently not anymore! Personally I thought this was a great gesture by the race/hotel to make the race the best it can be. It's the little things, right?

Also the hotel has a free shuttle to the running expo where packet pickup is and they even moved check out time on Sunday back to noon to give runners more time! 

So far I couldn't be more pleased with how the sign-up, communication and "perks" part of the race has gone. Can't wait to see the expo today!

For now here's a pic of our beautiful hotel!

Welcome to Cleveland!

After driving for 6 1/2 hours we have finally arrived in Cleveland!!! 

Day #30: Final Run!

  It's Day 30, which means our 30 days to the 10k are up!  We have hit the gym, ridden the BWI bike trail and ran ran ran!  I asked us to grade our training efforts this evening and we agreed a B was a low end grade and considering all the other stuff we had going on, A- it is.


  I would like to congratulate Amy for being such a hard worker and helping us stick to the program.

  All in all, Amy ran 31 miles and I ran 36 miles overall in the last month!!!!!!  I know that if a month ago you would have told me to run over 30 miles in a month I would have laughed at you!  But we did it and now we are more than excited to see the city of Cleveland while running through the streets with 20,000 fellow running friends!

  I know we have been back posting for a while here but  starting Friday the 16th we will be live posting, documenting our trip!

  Stay tuned for some pictures and stories from the state of Ohio!!


  Oh and here's my run from Thursday :)

Day #27 through #29

Due to final exams and the Boston Bruins unfortunate demise in the NHL Stanley Cup Playoffs, we were forced to suspend our beginning of the week activities.

 It's not easy working full time jobs, going to college, caring for a child AND trying to train for a 10k race.  We had to sacrifice a bit of strength and cross-fit training to get our work done.  Let's hope it doesn't bite us in the butt!

 Either way, we are looking forward to testing our abilities Sunday in Cleveland!

 Day #30 and the final pre-race run is next!!!!

Day #26: 5 Miles on Mother's Day!

 Even though we skipped the 12 mile bike ride, we arent cutting our runs out, so we had 5 long miles to run this morning.

 We didn't get started as early as we wanted and it wasn't until after 10am that we began our run. It was already 70 degrees out and the sun was shining bright.  Amy had a particularly  hard time with the sun, partially due to her not having a hat! (Note to Amy: "just wear the hat!")

  She was a tough cookie, though, and fought through it (she got my hat into the 4 mile!) and we finished those damn 5 miles.  6.2 seems awfully daunting as of now, but it's definitely doable and I am confident that we will at least finish the race. 

  With finals coming we have basically one more run (Thursday) before we go to Cleveland.

Day #24: One Week Until We Head West!

Friday May 9th and it's one week until we head west for the race.  We are feeling somewhere ready but final exams and Boston Bruins hockey are really tightening up our schedule!

Tonight was a short run and we had to do it seperately due to Mother's Day planning as well!

 Tomorrow we will take off because we are just too darn busy, but Sunday we'll tackle 5 miles!!!

Day #23: Harder Than It Looks

Day 23 is Thursday May 8th and unfortunately, due to the fact that we have so much homework to do and Amy is still feeling under the weather AND the Boston Bruins are playing playoff hockey tonight, we are going to skip our night at the gym and do homework.

It's not what we wanted to do, but priorities lie with school first! (hockey, second!)

Friday, we will get back to running for sure!

Day #21 and #22: Rest and a week 4 begins!

 We can't believe we are less than 2 weeks away from running this race! Although, I suppose we were never more than 5 weeks, since that was when we thought of the idea!

  We think our training is going pretty well, at least the running part.  It's been difficult to keep up on everything though.  I seriously commend those who can stick to a daily training plan like this for an extended time!


  So Tuesday was our rest (and class) day and it was a good thing.  Amy started feeling very ill Tuesday afternoon and ended up missing class and laying in bed all evening with a fever of 102!Rest day or no, she wasn't doing any working out today!  Feel better soon, love!

   Wednesday was time to run again and as usual, we were too busy to run together so we ran seperately.  Amy ran right after work, while I had to wait until 7:30pm to run because I had another class.

  Amy said she ran very well! It was a concern after not running so well the time before.  And considering she was sick the day before.   My run was good too, I'm again, the king of negative splits, and not really sure why, but i did 3.5 miles in just a minute more than my 3.1 mile time from under 2 months ago.  I can definitely see some improvement and working toward that 10 minute mile :)

 

 

Day #20: 5 Miles on Cinco de Mayo!!!!

     Well, that was the plan anyway.  

      Monday the 5th was going to be our moved Sunday long run and this week was going to be 5 big fat long miles!  It was going to be the longest we'd ever run! The weather was nice, we felt good and set out on our run..........

      But about 1/'2 mile in Amy's leg was saying "no way Jose!!" We stopped to stretch, we walked for a bit and we tried to keep going, but she just couldn't maintain a real jog.  She did fight though, continuing to try to run as much as she could through 2 miles but for health reasons we simply had to shut it down. 

    It was disappointing to her that it happened but it's better to happen in a training run than in the real race!  Let's hope it was nothing serious. That would truly be no bueno!!!!


  

Day # 19: Just Another Bike Ride Around the Airport

  The weather may not be cooperating on our run days but its certainly been spectacular on our bike ride days, whether it be Saturday or Sunday.  We had a lot to do on Sunday so we had to wake up rather early and get in our ride.  Back to the BWI trail we went in search of a 10-mile ride.

    The trail is 12.5 miles long and while we felt good enough to try the whole thing, we were celebrating Cinco de Mayo a day early in Federal Hill so we kepy it to around 10 miles.

Day #17 & #18: Rest and Running, of course!

So Friday is not supposed to be our rest day but since we pushed back Wednesday's run, we are forced to push back a few days.  This will eliminate our workout day for Monday but won't skip a run day. (Since running is the most importaant part!)

Day #18 we were back on the running path though! It was another short run, basically Friday's run moved back a day.  We ran it together and went 3.5 miles like we anticipated.

For some reason our MapMyRun aps do not sync up together. It always says she ran further than me, despite us going the same route.  So we'll use hers cause it said we went quicker. 

No GU this time, but it was rather warm and Amy made a note to try to run earlier in the AM from now on.  As summer comes this will be even more poignant.

Day #16: May 1st! The Second Half Begins!

The second half of our training that is. Our normally scheduled Wednesday run took place on a Thursday due to the rain.  Since we were on parental duty we ran seperately. It was tough since we hadn't run in 4 days and hadn't really done much exercising in 2. You really realize how much of a groove you have to stay in with fitness!


We both did 3 miles though and felt good doing it.  It's really hitting home now that a 5K is going to be no big huge deal anymore.  Sure we don't run it fast yet, but we're running it!

Day #15: Woah! We're Halfway There!!!

  But today we weren't "livin on a prayer."  We were busy contemplating building an ark! It has been pretty consitently downpouring from Monday night thru Tuesday and into Wednesday evening.  With the weather and our schedules, we are forced to alter our schedules.

 For the rest of the week we will do our short runs on Thursday and Saturday with a rest day on Friday (I work Friday evening) and a bike ride on Sunday.

  In the meantime, check out this video from a sinkhole in Baltimore City!

Baltimore Landslide: Baltimore Landslide



  

Day #13: Gym time!

  With the impending weather coming (April showers) we hit the gym and worked on toning some muscles. As we are busy with school and work we have been unable to develop a good gym routine to get what may be the most of our workouts, but going is better than sitting at home!


  Day #14 is an off day and Day #15 is a short run of 3 miles.