Drum roll Puhlease! The winner of the Dick’s Giveaway for the $50 gift card is Alex from Running Just as Fast as I can!

Congrats! Please email me at [email protected]. Some of the comments were hilarious but most were super inspiring as well! I loved reading them and you guys are SO nice to your friends. There were some great comments about encouraging others who had lost weight, were having a baby, or wanted to keep their friends safe. Thanks for sharing your ideas and being open, per usual!

Anyways, an other fun thing I wanted to share was my friend Newlyweds Next Door and I got dinner last week and we FINALLY took a picture together after being friends for over a year and we keep forgetting to take one. I am her cat, Judah’s, Blogmother for goodness sakes! We had a great dinner at Georges and enjoyed catching up and chatting about Long Beach, where we both reside. We always joke about how we are the only LB bloggers! I am wearing the flannel that I seem to wear when I go out anywhere. I do own more than just the flannel though. :)

Look who loves me! Judah! Ha ha, I remember when he was just a wee little kitty. It seems that cats grow into huge beasts, but he is super fun when I see him and I am glad I am his blog mother :) Since this picture I have cut two inches off my hair too. But it looks basically the same, so smish, smash, smoosh, moving on to other super exciting things.

So another drum roll… I am super excited for this giveaway, because I love what I’m giving away. I recently got a great gift from Nana Gift Designs that is a small heart necklace that says 26.2 on it and it’s simply adorable. I am in love with  it and I love the fact that it says 26.2 on it. Crazy as it seems, sometimes I forget that I’ve ran a marathon. This weekend I’m sure I’ll remember how much I… love it? :)

Here is the lovely necklace that I got that I have been wearing since I received it. Hello giant weird neck!

And here is the lovely necklace and me at my desk at work :) I love how small it is, but every time I remember I’m wearing it I remember how far I’ve come.

In honor of the LA Marathon I wanted to do a giveaway of my favorite new thing for you, my lovely and encouraging readers! Since I love this necklace so much, another necklace from Nana Smith Designs will be given away to one lucky reader. The necklace will look like this one pictured below.

This is the necklace! It is a small circle that says run. I really like the simplicity of the necklace and how special and unique they are. You can see all her jewelry here, and her specialized marathon jewelry here. You can also follow her on twitter here. I love her stuff and I’m super excited to give one away to someone who loves to run, or who would give it to someone who does.

So in order to enter this giveaway, just leave a comment telling me why you love to run. If you would like TWO entries for the necklace, you can tweet about the giveaway. You can enter the contest even if you live in Canada! In order to be entered, you can tweet something along this idea…

I entered the I love to run giveaway that @chicrunner is hosting!

So enter away! Why do you love to run? I will randomly pick a winner with the random number generator on Monday, the 22nd when I return with one more marathon under my belt and I will remember how much it sucks to grab the hand rail in the handicapped bathroom since I’ll be so sore I can’t move.

I finally ran today and felt comfortable again. I haven’t had a good run in who knows how long so I felt good that I was okay out there. I am going to swim after work again as well, hoping to swim at least 1000 meters. Tomorrow I’m going to share some LA goals if I can even call them that, but more importantly, WHAT I’LL BE WEARING for the LA Marathon, which I bedazzled so get excited! :) Next week, I’ll have a race recap, another review, what I’ve been hydrating with and how my new job has been going.

Oh and I signed up for this race next weekend. Yup, the week after LA! What am I thinking?!

xoxo

So back in November I ran the inaugural Malibu Marathon. It took me a while, but I really wanted to give a recap of the race from a ‘race’ perspective, instead of from a participants perspective. I think being an inaugural race is tough, you don’t know how many people will sign up, you don’t know how everything is going to flow and no one has ever ‘raced’ the course before. For Malibu, there was an option of a half marathon and a full marathon. I opted for the full to work on completing my marathon maniacs status. We started off traveling to the Expo which was a little hard to find if you were not familiar with the area and the directions were not helpful. That being said, the expo being in a beach parking lot with no rain was pretty spectacular! It was right on the beach and you could see the finish line right by the expo which was cool. They had a course map and some booths up. It was actually an expo that I wandered around at a little bit and talked to a few people. Since the race was smaller, there weren’t hoards of people stampeding each other for samples of GU, which was nice. Made my time at the expo much more enjoyable for the twenty minutes that I was there.

Then we had race morning, this was a bit of a sticky situation. There was no clear direction to where to load the buses and the volunteers just told us where we couldn’t park but not necessarily how to get into the parking lot to load the buses. Once we drove back down the street we had come from about 3 miles, we entered the Zuma Beach parking lot and then drove all the way back down to the bus area. We grabbed our race stuff and loaded up on the bus. Another adventure. The buses really had no where to turn around so up a steep hill we went and that is where the bus driver hit a curb on the side of a mountain. We were all a little jumpy at this point and there may have been some shrieks when the bus hit. This being my first point to point and bus riding experience I was just wondering what the heck was going on.

Finally we arrived at the starting line where there were regular bathrooms and port-a-potties. The port-a-pottie to runner ratio was about 1 for ever 5 to 7 runners. The lines were not long and everyone was mingling about and very friendly. The regular bathroom line for the women was much longer, and I ventured over there to change out of my capris into my shorts. The starting line area was alright, but it seemed that the race started directly next to a stable? So the dirt and horse smell wasn’t exactly appealing, but then again, my high school was located directly next to horse stables so my nose seemed to adjust quickly to the surroundings.

The first mile was a little windy throughout a really random area, but the race has to start somewhere right? It wound around and then we were into the ‘farmland’ area that the course described. There were VERY few spectators along this course, as in about maybe 10 that I saw repeatedly throughout the course. The course was very safe and there were more than ample people riding around for safety purposes which I liked as well. Since the race was much smaller, it was different running with so few people around. Right around mile 8 to 13, the course is fairly boring, but you know that you are approaching the beach area and what lies ahead of you is exciting and beautiful. It seemed in the beginning of the race, until the half marathon mark, there were not as many aid stations as there were at the end, but after the 13.1 mark, there were ample volunteer stations and they were appropriately staffed as well. There were many VERY nice volunteers out that day, and even though the course support wasn’t existant, there were many very nice volunteers and helpers trying to make the race special.

Another aspect I noticed, and since I visit them often, was the lack of port-a-potties along the route. I noticed that if there was one at the aid stations, there was just that, one. I also noticed as the race went on they became scarcer, which is a little odd, because if you get sick, you are going to get sick as the race goes on. I know it was a smaller race, but it seemed that there could have been a few more thrones out there for the runners.

I cannot give enough praise for the volunteers though. They were so cheerful and the aid stations were WELL stocked with water, the course drink, gus, gels, oranges, everything. It was great and they were so encouraging, and I think that really allowed the race to go faster towards the end when I was sputtering out of energy. The course support got a little larger after the half marathon starting point and it was cool to meet up with the half marathoners half way through the race because there were some lonely areas of the course in the beginning.

Another thing I noticed about this race is that it was very photographer friendly. They had tons of photographers out on the course and I really liked that aspect of the course, because no other marathon am I going to have FIFTY pictures of myself running, none the less running in a tutu.

The finish line is right along the ocean in the beach parking lot where the expo was held. It was pretty and well blocked off. Running along the street with a lot of cars for an extended period of time is kind of weird, but I never felt unsafe at all.

Once crossing the finish line, there was the same small expo that was set up the day earlier as well and they immediately handed you your medal, which is BEAUTIFUL and my favorite medal based on beauty. Well favorite besides my Long Beach one becuase of the sentimental reasons. Then they took your picture in front of surfboards and a little backdrop. It was cool because as you crossed the finish line, since it was a smaller race, everyone was cheering for you and the announcer said everyone’s name who crossed the finish line. After you got your medal and picture taken they handed you a lunch bag and some water. The lunch bag is super cute and I use it for my lunch most of the time and it was filled with some of the best post race food I’ve seen. There was pirate’s booty and some other snacks and an orange. Everyone was super helpful and then you got the beach towel immediately that was given out instead of race shirts.

Now, don’t get me wrong, this course was a pretty intense course, by far the hardest course I’ve ever dared to run. The wind started at mile 12 and I literally felt like I was running and not moving at certain points of the race. The hills were pretty brutal during the end of the race and the ‘gentle’ rollers were not very gentle. They were pretty consistent and I think without the wind the hills would have possibly been a little bit easier, but with the wind draining a lot of energy previously in the race, they were pretty tough to climb. The hills also seemed, in my mind, as much more uphill and not as much downhill sections. I remember they were also very deep hills, if that makes sense. They would go from very high to very low points. I know the course does travel alongside the ocean from about mile 12 to mile 26.2, and not many courses can you say that you felt the ocean spray cooling you off as you were running, right?

If there was one thing that stuck out to me about the race it was the personalized experience that the Malibu Marathon delivered on. I know not all races can execute this since they are much larger in number of participants but I do feel that everyone there on race day was actually happy to be out there and helping. I also think that the course was pretty and the race was executed very well from my stand point as a participant. There were a lot of nice touches that made the race stand out in my head as great becuase of the personality of the race. Even before the race started, the Malibu Marathon tweeted often about the course and was very interactive with followers. The lunch bag aspect was a nice touch and the medals are beautiful. I also really like the idea of the towel instead of a t-shirt. The race shirts you could actually buy are super cute as well and not so ‘runnery’. They look like something you could actually wear out on a Saturday and wouldn’t be totally ashamed of it. So bought one. Meh!

And here’s the lunch box.

What makes a race stand out in your mind? What do you love and dislike at races? Besides being an expo hater, I love it when races do things to make themselves memorable. When they really try to push to cater to runners, and not just making it another event.

xoxo

Many people ask me about the shorts I wear when I race. They are normally a blend of spandex and another stretchy material, which I have found over the past year works best for racing. If you get complete spandex shorts, expect them to ride up. As in you will pull them down the entire time you are running. My go-to’s, up until recently, were spandex Nike team shorts. They were about an inch inseam and I wore a medium. I like how they were slightly banded on the edges, that really seemed to keep them down. Recently, I have realized that my Nike shorts have seen better days and the spandex of the shorts was losing it’s snap. So therefore the Nikes will be retired. Sheesh Nikes are just getting retired all over the place aren’t they! No more Nike shoes, no more Nike shorts. I did recently find a new pair that I really like though. There are a few things to keep in mind when you are looking for booty shorts.

I love these Under Armour shorts even though they are a tad longer. I love the waist and how they fit. They aren’t SUPER spandexy. It’s that good blend. :) I wore these in an LA Marathon preview if you want to see them in action.

First thing is TRY THEM ON before buying them. There are many pairs that I’ve looked at and then tried on and went, “NOPE!” Things on the hanger can look a lot different on your body and some times things that look great on the hanger do NOT look great on and vice versa. Also, it’s hard to try to run in shorts while in the dressing room but what I’ve found that works to see if they move and expose is to do some simple stretches. Try to do things that would possibly make the shorts ride up. Sounds strange, but you don’t want to be 8 miles into a long run and your butt is hanging out for the world to see. Believe me, I’ve been there and it’s awkward.

These are my nikes that I wear often for races. These are also the ones that seem to have lost their elasticity after too many wears. Sad day. But I do like how the waist is lower and the inseam is pretty small. I wore these in many race reports.

Secondly, make sure that you check out the fabric. You don’t want to get something cotton or see through. I have seen a lot of girls wearing leggings that you can get anywhere, mostly target or forever 21, to the gym. Guess what lovelies, these are SEE THROUGH. I only wear those underneath dresses and long tanks for a reason, so the world doesn’t get exposed to my butt! So check and make sure fabric isn’t see through by putting your hand under the fabric and stretching it over. If you see any color of skin, just imagine that when your doing your work out at the gym and that fabric is stretched over your butt. Don’t give people a free show. Secondly, Cotton isn’t dry-wicking so when you sweat on your butt, aka swamp butt, it’s going to show up. Spandex blend is a little more forgiving when it comes to showing sweat. Keep that in mind when picking out colors too. I found a pair of light green booty shorts that I really liked, then when I realized sweat would show in them I opted against them. Perhaps not buying them though still haunts me to this day. :/

These are made by Champion and these are SMALL. The waist goes rather high though, which I don’t like. I have a few pairs with a high waist and I’m not the biggest fan. I wore these for my LA Marathon route preview if you want to see them in action.

Thirdly, notice where they hit on your inner thigh area. This is the area where chafing might occur, so make sure that they don’t ride up in that area. Also make sure that there is enough fabric there that if your thighs touch, mine do, then they won’t be rubbing skin on skin. If they are a little shorter, body glide like a champ or Vaseline that area and you’ll be just as golden. Remember, booty shorts WILL ride up just a tad so you have to take that into consideration when purchasing a pair. If you like a longer pair, get a longer pair, if you want them ridiculously short, like the ones I wore in Long Beach, go for it. It’s all about what you are comfortable in and what you want. Make sure that the shorts are not too tight and remember that they will roll up a little bit at the bottom of the shorts when you run as well. I like to wear mine just a little bit higher than normal too, but I wear normal shorts VERY low, so I don’t know where the ‘normal’ place to wear them is. I also make sure that they don’t move when I jump or stretch my legs as if I’m running a hill. They can creep up during those times.

The biggest thing to think about when rocking the booty shorts is to not worry about what other people think. I RARELY wear mine to the gym because I feel that wearing them to the gym might just be taking it to a weird level of booty short dedication, but about 95% of my runs are done in booty shorts. I feel much more comfortable in them and for me, they are fun to run in. They aren’t for everyone, but if you want to try them out, go for it! Don’t be scared of the spandex! When you think about wearing them, don’t think BUT, they won’t look good on me, or BUT they won’t fit right. Think instead, my BUTT will look great! Confidence, Confidence, Confidence, if you have that, you’ll turn heads!

Here are some links that can help you find the perfect pair of spandex for you.

Road Runner Sports 3.5 inch inseam Shorts

Road Runner Sports 6 inch inseam Shorts

Road Runner Sports Knee Shorts

Puma Hot Shorts

Saucony 3 inch inseam Shorts

Under Armour 2 inch inseam Shorts

Asics 2.5 inch inseam Low Cut Shorts

Asics 4 inch inseam Shorts

Asics Abby Long Knee Shorts

Pearl Izumi Low Rise Shorts

Pearl Izumi Longer Shorts

Puma Knee Shorts

New Balance 3 inch inseam Shorts

Puma Essential Fitted Shorts

Asics Stride Shorts

Hope that helps answer all the bootylicious questions out there!

xoxo

So I was thinking on my last long run before the LA Marathon this past weekend, how do I break down these training runs? I thought it might be interesting to some (maybe none?) to let you inside how I get through the long run and what I’m thinking about during the miles. I think that it’s simply imperative for me to break up the run into smaller increments and get through each part of the run like that, and not focus on the run as a whole. When I start out I think about the first three miles and how I run that all the time. It’s a 5k. Once you get those down, I subtract 3 from 20 and then think about the number 17 instead of 20. I think it’s much less daunting and much more manageable.

Then from 4-10, I think of that as a 10k. It’s six miles, and you can break that down to be two sets of 3 miles, or just 6 miles. I try my hardest to tell myself to relax and to let my arms drop every now and then or else my back will get too tight by the end of my run. I focus on breathing and just relaxing. I tell myself a lot to just let it go and keep moving forward. This is the hardest part of the run for me because most of my long runs are out and backs and this is the part where you just keep running further and further out. Once I hit 5-8, I am usually in the zone and moving right along without much thought. I make sure to release my shoulders every now and then and also focus on relaxing. If I don’t relax, things get ugly.

Then I hit mile 10. This is where things usually start to look up a little bit because I’m finally turning around and can re-trace my steps back home. Once I know I’ve made it “out” and I just have to make it back, things become a little bit easier. It’s almost a game to see the same things I saw on the way out. I think a lot about the fact that I’ve already made it ten miles and I just have to make it back home and then I’m done. Usually around miles 12-14 my feet start to hurt a little bit since I’ve been on my feet for around two hours at this point. I keep breaking it down and keep moving forward. Once mile 15 comes around I know I have 5 left and that is a relief, because I KNOW I can run that far and I also am getting closer and closer to my house.

Mile 16-18 are usually where I start getting a little tired and weird. My mind starts to wander to weird things, for example what I’m going to eat later, if I’ll take a nap and how I’ll feel the next day. I start to switch up my running form just a little bit at this point to keep my feet a little fresher and try to make me feel better. This is where I struggle, because once I hit about 18.5 or 19, I know I’m basically done. I have one mile to go and then I’m home. I know how far a lot of different landmarks are from my house and when I hit those it’s like I have new energy, in a weird, hobbly, awkward energy kind of way.

During a long run I really focus on breaking it down and running it for myself not for time. If I stop to walk at all, I will make sure I only walk for a minute and then run again. I do have a lot of stop lights that I run through so that sometimes gives me a little unexpected break too. I know that breaking down the long run makes it much more attainable for me and I really am glad I found a way that works for me.

Breaking down a marathon for me goes like this. Get to the 3 mile mark, you have 10 miles to go before the half marathon point. 6 miles is going to get you to the 10k mark, which means you are almost half way to the half marathon mark. 10 miles means you have a 5k to the half marathon mark. Half Marathon mark, you only have to run what you’ve just run to complete the race. 3 more miles after the half marathon mark and you’ve only got 10 miles left in the race. 4 miles and your at the 20 mile marker. 20 mile marker, you have 6.2 miles to go, which is a 10k or 2 5ks. Get three miles done and you have 3 more to go till the end. Then it’s just counting down those miles to the finish. I just think each step is a step closer to the finish, the faster I go the faster it’s over with at that point.

Does that even make sense?

xoxo

This past Sunday I got the opportunity to volunteer at a race in Malibu. It’s actually the same trail race I ran last year and they have a 50k option, a 25k option (which is what I did and my race report is here) and then a 10k option. I think that trail running is a little out of my league right now but I do like going on shorter, mild elevation changing trail runs on occasion, but it’s hard where I am located at to make the time and effort to go on these trails. Malibu Creek is gorgeous and I do love the area up there and it was fun to volunteer.

Before I left to drive up there, I tweeted that I was volunteering and someone tweeted me back that they were happy that I was volunteering and they wished more runners and cyclists volunteered. Little did they know that this really made me think about runners and volunteering on my hour drive to Malibu. Luckily there was no traffic and I got there right on time, but I thought about that statement and it made me realize that runners are a very selfish breed. Now, I’m speaking generally, or maybe just speaking about myself. Personally, I never want to volunteer because A. the races are early, B. I’m training for my own race C. I have to drive somewhere and D. it’s volunteering. I just don’t have time to do it since I’m running all the time and what if the race falls on a long run day of yours or you have a race that day. Also, I’ve noticed that many runners are “Type A” personality. I think I have a hint of that in me and I’m an obsessive planner. It’s just hard to take the time out and give back but I did realize how much it was appreciated while I was volunteering.

I’m learning that A LOT goes into making a race happen daily at work. Pretty much blow your mind a lot. It’s insane how much we talk about trash cans and port-a-potties. It also has made me realize how much volunteers are appreciated and needed to make an event work. The PCTR races are generally a little bit smaller than huge races and the running community there is great. Everyone seems to know everyone and is friendly and is out there to have a good time and have fun, which I think gets lost in competition sometime. Believe me, when I got up at 5:30 for the second day in a row on the weekend, I regretted volunteering. I didn’t want to drive to Malibu, I didn’t want to stand around in the cold, and I didn’t want to go. I thought about not going and that also made me realize how selfish I was being.

The line for check in for the 50k and 25 k. Notice the mud that everyone was standing in. I thought about wearing my Uggs but I’m glad I opted for my rainboots in that mud!

It wasn’t going to be for that long, I would see some of my friends and I was ‘giving back to the running community’ as my friend Billy puts it. He always talks about that and I’m realizing more and more how important that is. So on the drive up to Malibu Creek I thought about being less selfish and giving back more in more aspects of my life, including making sacrifices, which is hard for me. Once I got there, I immediately was welcomed and everyone was excited and it was fun to check people in. Runners may be selfish on occasion, but they are also some of the nicest people around. That is my favorite part of running sometimes. The encouragement and bond everyone shares.

Checking people in for the 10k. Everyone was so nice and excited to be out on the trails.

I also ran into Lisa! She is so nice and it was great to meet her in real life and I totally stole this picture from her blog :)

Look who ran the 25k. Billy! You can find his race report here

My friend and fellow Maniac, Emil, was out there volunteering too. He is a great guy and crazy marathoner! I love running into him at so many different races and he volunteers often too! He wrote a volunteer report too.

The starting line area in the background and where everyone checked in for the run. Though it was muddy, they said the trails held up very well and it was going to be a great day out there.

It was a gorgeous day out and I was glad I volunteered and saw the race off. I didn’t stay until the finish but talking to a few people and the drive home was great. I’m glad for both small and big running events. I’m glad for volunteers and I’m glad for the ability to run.

xoxo