Marathon Pictures Are In

The Oakland Marathon

Well, today was the day! I ran my first marathon. Let me just say, "If you're thinking of doing a marathon, do not underestimate it!" I'm going to start from the top and give you a play-by-play of today.

For the past four months, I've been training with the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society's Team in Training. I've raised $2,000 for the cause, and have been running every Saturday and a few days during the week to prepare for the Oakland Running Festival. The city of Oakland has not had a marathon in over 25 years, so this was quite a big deal to people who live there. You may know that Oakland has a bit of a bad rap. Well, after seeing a lot more of it these past few days, I have to say that Oakland definitely has it's nicer areas too. A marathon is something that would help attract positive attention to the city, and the residents were pretty happy. In fact, they kept thanking us for running as they cheered us along on the sidelines.

The race started at 7:30am, so I met up with my team at 7am. We did our usual cheers and headed over to the starting line in downtown Oakland. (I used to refer to downtown Oakland as the bad part of town, but it's actually the really nice part right by Lake Merritt. The bad area is more southwest Oakland, I believe). Anyway, as we were waiting at the start, we were greeted by Oakland's very own Mark Curry. (You know, from "Hangin' with Mr. Cooper?) He ran through the start line about 10ft from me, giving everyone hi-fives. I thought it was pretty exciting.

As the race started, I was with two of my teammates, who I became friends with during the season. We ran together for about the first 9 miles or so, which is where I was feeling pretty good. Mile 5 had a pretty serious hill, which I conquered proudly. Then miles 6-10 had rolling hills, which I still did pretty well on. In fact, I passed several people up these hills and was on pace to make my goal of 4:30. Then I ran into my cryptonite: the downhill. Mile 10 had a long, steep downhill out of the Oakland hills. Running has given me knee problems, and it's something I've taken several precautions and remedies to overcome, but one thing that I can't protect myself from is a serious downhill. I tried to land softly, but every step was torcher. If the pain alone didn't make me want to cry, it was the crowd of people I had just passed now passing me. All I could do was watch them go by and pray for this downhill to be over soon. Once it finally was, the rest of the course was pretty flat, but my knees were already torn-up by that time. I tried to push through it, but from about mile 13 on, I had to alternate running and walking. When I stopped to walk, my knees got a break, but my hips and thighs started throbbing. Then I'd try to run again, and my knees were so stiff that I could barely take the first few steps.
My two teammates, who I had got ahead of during all the hills, ended up catching back up to me around miles 16 and 20. The second girl and I ended up running the last 6 miles together. She was in a lot of pain too, so we alternated our walking/jogging together.

The last 3 miles of the race were around Lake Merritt, and we ended by running into the City Center where we started. There was a large crowd and a live band playing. The event itself was pretty exciting. I would've stayed longer if it didn't hurt so much to walk. As soon as I got home, I took an ice bath in my pool. Since the pool isn't heated yet, it's perfect for this. I just took off my shoes and walked into the pool waist high in my running clothes and stayed there for 20 minutes. It's hard to get in at first, but I swear by it! It helps so much!

By the way, my time wa 5:08, which was pretty far from my goal. I was beating myself up about it during the race when I figured out I wasn't going to make it, but towards the end when I was hurting so much, I didn't care anymore. I just wanted to be done! And now, I just feel proud to have accomplished such an extreme event. I can't say that I'll ever be doing one again, but I've wanted to for a long time, and now I can say that I have!

Play Day in the Snow

The best part of working in the field is that I get every Friday off! Yesterday I took a little trip to Royal Gorge over by Tahoe and went x-country skiing for the first time. I drove over with my friend, Sonia, and we met two other PG&E ladies who live in Sacramento. We drove the rest of the way to Tahoe with them and went skiing. I was the only one who had never done it before, but I caught on pretty quickly. I really liked it and can't wait to go again!

On the way back, we stopped in Sacramento again to drop off Carol and Mary and had dinner at Carol's. She's a Land Agent out of the Sacramento office, and quite an interesting person. She's had a lot of adventures. Mary's husband and daughter joined us for dinner also. We had some really great dinner conversation. I always like having dinner with new people because I am always learning something new and hearing a lot of interesting stories. It's just neat to see the different ways that people grew up and how their lives are different.

The hard part about going skiing Friday was that this morning I had a 10 mile run with Team in Training. I was afraid I was going to be very sore for my run, but I actually wasn't too bad. I had a little soreness on my outer thighs, but it didn't really bother me until about mile 8. I struggled the last two miles, and now I can hardly walk. That's ok though. I like feeling the effects of my body working really hard! ...but I think I'll be doing a lot of icing and using my foam roller today.

Oh yeah, and Sonia and I found some cool vintage posters in one of the lodges that showed our heritage.

I ran 14 miles today!

I know, I can't believe it either. This is the longest distance I've gone yet. I only stopped after mile 1 to stretch and after mile 7 at one of the water stops. Other than that, I ran a consistent 10 min/mile pace. That's 2 hours and 20 minutes of continuous running! Can you believe I'm going to run almost twice that amount in a couple months? It's hard for me to imagine running any farther than I did today, but that's why we train up to it.

Wish me luck, and pray that my joints don't give me anymore problems!

In the Field

As of January 4th, I've started working in the field for a six month rotation. We have two survey crews at work for our area, well two party chiefs anyway, and people have been rotating out from the office to get the field experience. And finally it's my turn. So each week, I travel somewhere in California to do survey work with my party chief. It's basically what I did during my summers with the BLM when I was in school. Well, it's actually a whole different kind of surveying, but the traveling part of it and working four 10-hour days is the same.

I just finished my first week. We started out traveling to Ureka, then to Livermore and then Antioch. So basically, I never know where I'm going to be until about a day in advance. But it's really exciting and I'm loving it! The company pays for travel expenses, hotel rooms, and meals. So far, I've stayed at the Hampton Inn and gone out to nice dinner including a nice steak house all in beautiful wine country! I love my job!

I'll mainly be traveling in our area, which is along the north coast: from just north of San Jose all the way north to the CA/OR border and west of I-5. However, if other offices need our help, we can travel to other areas as well. So basically, I could be going anywhere in California. Here are a couple pictures my party chief got of me setting up the base station before doing some GPS topography.

Training Runs

Here are some pictures from my training so far...

I'm one of the few without reflecting running clothes.

We were having a moment of silence for one of our honorees who just passed away the night before.

Doing some pre-run stretching at the harbor in Richmond.

Left: One of our after-run potlucks. We usually do something after our Saturday morning runs.

Right: My new friend, Stacey, and me battling the hills at Redwoods Regional Park in Oakland.

Last night we had our Christmas Lights run where we ran to this house totally decked out for the holidays.

As you can see, I showed my spirit of the season. I borrowed the antlers from work.

Team In Training (TNT)

Every once in a while, I get these flyers in the mail advertising Team in Training, showing pictures of people in purple shirts smiling and running. I would always take a quick look and them toss it. But when I received the latest one back in October, I gave it a second look. Running a marathon is something I've been wanting to work towards for a while now. I've done a few 10k's and a couple 12k's since moving to the bay area, but my speed and athleticism have declined a bit since I graduated college. When I was doing track and cross country, I had people to push me and to work together with, and I really miss that. So I decided to go to the informational meeting they were having. It took only 10 minutes in the meeting to convince me. Not only would I be able to train with a team again and feel that sense of accomplishment of finishing my marathon, but I would be helping save lives along the way.

See, Team in Training is an organization that raises money for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society (LLS). It provides support for research and treatments, helping people with blood cancers such as Leukemia, Myeloma and Hodgkins disease. We call these people our honorees, and we even have a few who have recovered and are now training with us as a way of showing their appreciation.

Here's how it works: You first sign up for a team. There is a running team, run/walk team, ski team, triathlon team, and a cycling team. (I signed up with the run team). There is an initial cost to join, but then you raise the rest of the money through fundraising and there is a minimum amount you need to raise to do your event. My event is the Oakland Marathon on March 27th and my minimum to raise is $2,000. They encourage you to shoot higher than the minimum, so I put $3,000 as my goal. That seems like a lot of money, though, so I'll be happy with $2,000.

I sent a letter out to probably all of you who are reading this, and if you have any fundraising ideas for me, please let me know. Also, I would love it if you would spread the word around to anyone you know. I've been trainging very hard, so far, and I'm having a blast and already making new friends. If you are unable to donate, please don't feel obligated. I appreciate your warm words and thoughts. But please tell your friends!

For donations, go to my fundraising page http://pages.teamintraining.org/sf/Oakland10/rmarshajsr

Also, you can help by purchasing Mary Kay products. All of my profits from now until March 27th will go towards TNT. To order online, go to my personal MK page
http://marykay.com/bjmarshall

Both of these links are on my blog page as well.