There is just over a month left until Boston and a month and a half until London, which seems insane to me. I can’t believe how fast the past few months have gone by. And how lax I have gotten about writing my blog! So let’s get caught up!
February was a busy month for fundraising! I had an awesome Paint Night Fundraiser where we brought in over $1300 for Boston Children’s Hospital. I also won a fundraising contest on Valentine’s Day (also raising about $1300…lucky number?) by getting the largest number of donors on my team. The prize was finish line passes on Marathon Monday, which is just amazing for my family! I’m so fortunate to have such supportive friends, family and coworkers who help me along this journey. The fundraising is far more stressful than the marathon training, to be honest, because if we don’t raise our minimum, we not only are letting the hospital down, but the difference comes out of our own pockets! I am sure people must get sick of my constant pleas for donations, but I promised myself when Natalie’s liver was failing that if she lived, I would do everything in my power to give back to Boston Children’s Hospital for the rest of my life. Raising money for research and programs that help kids and families at BCH is the best way I know how to do this.
Training has intensified over the past few weeks with our mileage getting higher both for the “short” runs during the week and our “long” runs for Saturdays. On February 23rd, we had a 17 mile run with the Miles for Miracles Team which started in Newton on the Boston race course, headed toward Wellesley, then back into Newton, over Heartbreak Hill and into Boston, where we crossed over the Boston finish line. It’s a really great opportunity to see the last miles of the course in order to mentally prepare for race day, and the volunteer support is amazing. The best part is that Miles for Miracles arranges for us to be able to shower afterward at Boston Sports Club and has a nice gathering with all our teammates with food and drinks where we can relax and spend some non-running quality time together. It was a fun day.
For me, this run had particular significance. The night before the 17 mile run last year, my daughter was up vomiting all night and I got about 2 hours of sleep. My mother came to watch her while I ran but I came home directly after the run because I didn’t want to go to the after-run party when my little girl was home sick. But the biggest part of that day in 2018 was that it marked the last of my long runs before Boston because I injured myself and was unable to run again until about a week and a half before race day. I had to train in the pool and on a bike and hope that come race day I would be able to make it.
This year I finished the 17 miler without injury. As we ran into Boston all my memories from race day, good and bad, came back. It was an amazing feeling knowing that my hard work this year (together with daily foam rolling, weekly chiropractor visits, downing Ibuprofen like it’s my job and sleeping with ice packs strapped to my shins and hips) paid off and I had made it this far injury-free and running stronger than ever before.
Of course, this being New England, the weather has made some of our runs more challenging. We were fortunate to avoid snow for most of our long runs, but our 18 mile group run was cancelled because of an impending storm and we had to sort out how to run it on our own. Our coaches said that we could break the run up into segments as long as they were completed within 24 hours. I opted to do 5 miles Friday evening on the indoor track at the YMCA, which has been a lifesaver for me since running on a treadmill is like torture for me, then do the remaining 13 Saturday morning. I managed to get in 8 miles outside in the snow before the roads became unsafe to run, and then I did the last 5 on the indoor track again. It was definitely a challenge breaking it up, and it felt really good to finish!
This weekend we have a 19 mile run, dial it back next week for 12, and finally our big 21 mile run where we begin at the starting line in Hopkinton and run to Boston College. That will be the highest mileage before 26.2 on race day, then it’s the taper (shorter runs so your body can rest and recover before the big day!) and race day April 15th.
I’ll be making the final push for my fundraising for Boston in the next month–I have a Red Sox tickets drawing today and a REALLY special online auction coming up next week that I am SUPER excited about, so stay tuned! As always, if you’d like to support my fundraising for Boston Children’s Hospital, you can donate any time in any amount, here: Donate to Boston Children’s
Thanks for reading!
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