Coral Springs Half Marathon {Race Recap}

I didn't have to wake up as early on race morning because I was already in Coral Springs from the night before, and the start location was only 10 minutes away from where I was staying. That's the good news. The bad news is I was tossing and turning throughout the night so I didn't get much sleep. By the time I finally gave up on getting sleep it was 4:15am.

Although the race didn't start until 6, I was there around 5:00 sitting in my car, charging my phone, and trying to get excited about the event. That didn't quite work out so I met up with Andy (fellow runner and Coral Springs Half Marathon veteran) at 5:30am and he gave me some insight into what the course was like...

(Andy and I at the start)

It was a pretty small event (comparatively)...

(Everyone here was doing the half)

Tuesday's Tangents...

So today was exhausting. It started early (4am) when I dragged myself out of bed to get ready to run. I snoozed my "wake up and go to the gym" alarm so running was my last training option this morning...

I've been discussing the possibility of eliminating intervals (gasp) during my runs with two of my running friends who... independently... on the same day... in separate conversations... made that recommendation. I argued all the reasons why the idea was ridiculous, but agreed to "at least try it and see". 

So this morning I ran a non-stop 5K...

(not bad right?)

Making The List...

I've talked a lot about my Bucket List on the blog. Originally my plan was to run 13 full marathons and 26 half marathons, but since I started running I've added Rangar relays and 20 milers to that list. And it keeps evolving as I add more and more races and come up with different criteria to determine if a race is "Bucket List worthy".

So far I've run 13 half marathons and one full marathon, and of course a bunch of 5Ks and 10Ks which don't make the Bucket List per se... but are noteworthy none-the-less because I got a medal ;)

{How I feel when I think about race medals}

image source

Running Sarasota: 1/2 the Distance ~ 2x the Fun {Sarasota Half Marathon Relay Race Recap}

On race morning I woke up to a MilePost quote (by Joe Henderson) that said "A course never quite looks the same way twice. The combinations of weather, season, light, feelings and thoughts that you find there are ever-changing". Truer words have never been spoken. That's exactly how I felt about being in Sarasota again for the half-marathon. Granted, a lot of things were different this year: I was doing the relay (not the "full" half marathon); I car-pooled up Niqui (relay partner) and we both brought our kids; and some crazy people from years ago (who were obviously not runners) implemented Daylight Savings and I lost an hour of sleep.

The day before race day was a great one. Kai and I met up with Niqui and her son and we all drove up to Sarasota. We left South Florida pretty early, stopped for Starbucks, and then headed out...

Our first stop was the packet-pickup because we wanted to get that out of the way early...

After a lot of pictures and a little shopping we headed out to find food, then our hotel (thank heavens for early check-in!), and then took advantage of some uninterrupted "rest" time before our pre-race dinner plans with Anthony and Dafney (pictured below) later that day.

While I'm Away...

The Sarasota Half Marathon Relay race weekend officially starts tomorrow!!!! I'm heading out early with Niqui (my relay partner) and our wonderful offspring (the teenager and the toddler) for what I hope will be a fun-filled-great-weather-no-car-sickness Saturday and Sunday.

I know I haven't been passing the "Are you a good blogger" test over the past few weeks. I've been running I promise (a lot of "short" and "slow" runs); and doing a lot of strength training (mostly lower body and mainly squats); and trying hard to find time to sleep between a hectic work schedule and study schedule; and (of course) there are all the crazy random surprises that life decided to throw my way.

Anyway, I know this weekend will be busy so I will be M.I.A. (again) from posting. Instead of trying to do several mini-posts, I will be updating my Instagram account with "moment-by-amazing-moment" updates of my race weekend. I'm also going to try and stalk interview more runners so that I can add more posts to my @100runners IG page [I have the giveaway stuff ready to go but still need A LOT more runners before I can do anything with it :( ]

Running Tee Made Just For Me!!!!

I'm beyond excited about the shirt that my brother created for me!

His company is called Binary Fashion and these particular shirts have the binary code for D, N, & A listed under each letter :)

There are also a variety of different colors (for those of you that aren't as obsessed with purple as I am) and different styles...

He also created a discount code for me to share with everyone for 20% off! You can click >> FASTER20 << and that will take you straight to the site to order the shirt with the 20% off discount already included!

I'm planning to give away one of the shirts to one of the runners featured on my @100runners Instagram account! You have to be featured to qualify for the giveaway, so if you're interested in being featured:

1. Follow the account @100runners

2. DM or email (thisismyfaster@yahoo.com) a picture of your running shoes (one pair) and your (one sentence) answer to the "why do you run?" question 

The sooner I get to 100 runners the sooner I can do the giveaway ;)

But if you don't want to wait for that then check out FASTER20 for more info on how to order your "Running is in my DNA" shirt or look at some of the other great shirts on the BINARY FASHION site!

Ten Days To Go & Trying to Stay Motivated...

My Sarasota Half Marathon Relay is coming up in 10 days!!! and this is the medal I can look forward to...

(I know...so pretty right?!)

It hasn't really been a great training week. Actually the past few weeks haven't been great. I've tried to run a few times and I swam a few times, but mostly I've been doing strength training. I'm learning how to squat. It's a struggle and I'm not that great at it (you know how the whole "try not to fall over with the 45lb weight bar" thing can be a challenge). I hope I get better though because I don't want my trainer to think he's wasting his time, and the strength training is supposed to help me stay injury-free. That's the goal at least.

This morning was a swimming day...