Our First Relay/TAPER TIME!

Today, Rebecca, Audrey, Alice and I ran our first ever relay race at the Maine Marathon. The Maine Half Marathon was my first half in 2009, and I was seriously having a hard time knowing that I could not run it 5 days before running the Hartford Marathon this year, so we improvised, and made a relay team!

I really did not know what to expect from this other than there might be a lot of waiting around, marathoners would be annoyed with us, and I feel seriously dirty for getting a wicked sweet medal for only running 6.1 miles. Well - I was right on 2 accounts - it is SO dirty to get a medal for so little work and I had a few encounters with some angry marathoners and was reminded immediately of this eCard...

However, I would like to mention that the lady who was the most annoyed by us relayers today was at about mile 11.5...not really sure what her excuse was. hehe. As for the waiting around part - not so much! Our AMAZING driver (thanks Shaun!) got us to our checkpoints and between warming up and cheering on Rock Star Deb, there was little waiting around. 

Our team rocked it. Audrey, the jedi knight of weaving, started and ran a speedy 5.7 miles with Deb to start off with. Rebecca CRUSHED 8.7 miles at an 8:25 pace on some pretty serious hills. I ran after Rebecca and jumped in with her in the middle of my warmup for a mile...and my nice comfy 8:35 warm up pace was suddenly about 7:40 for a mile! Cruising! I ran the 3rd leg on goal marathon heartrate (162) for a pace of 7:44 (which I will NOT be running next week). And Alice smoked the ending 5.7 to bring our team in for a 3:28:53 ending with a 3rd place female relay team win! Woohoo!

Meanwhile, Sole Sista' Deb rocked the full marathon at 3:27:54 WITH a bathroom stop and stretch break! And Julia kicked her 3rd marathon in the booty, even though the marathon course tried to stop her at MILE ONE! Julia ran the next 25.2 miles with double skinned knees...not stopping at medical until she was done! Now that is dedication! 

This was a lot of fun and I can't wait for our second relay (um, yea, about that...that is 2 weeks away...oops!). 

But for now...FIVE days till marathon day!! It's serious taper time! And...go figure...my hip is out of place again..first time since 3 days before GCI (hmm, I'm sensing this has something to do with tapering and tighter muscles when not running...grrr). Let's pray it works itself out before then! 

Deb rocking it at 5.7!

Team Sole Sisters!