Planes, Trains, and Running Shoes

...and then some.

I apologize from my lack of posting. My shabby sister and I are currently house hunting in Maine. Despite the lackluster weather, this weekend was AMAZING.

Me, Ally and Danielle driving up to Bar Harbor

I flew into Portland early Friday afternoon and headed to Danielle's house to immediately start carb-loading with Andy and Meg. Danielle's TV went out so we played a few heated rounds of Scrabble before the rest of our crew joined us for a pasta party.

I had told Danielle that I would run with her at 6:30 the next morning and to come wake me up when she was ready to head out but when she came in and said, "Ready to run? It's 30 degrees outside!" I bailed. Sorry, I need to acclimate to the weather getting colder and I didn't have nearly enough clothes to get me through a run and a race. Excuses, excuses. I'm a big giant baby and hate running in the cold and immediately regretted my decision to sign up for a spring marathon.

Moving on, I slept in...and in...and in before getting up and heading to breakfast with everyone and starting our journey up to Bar Harbor.

MOOSE!

Since we're runners (and girls) and drink gallons and gallons of water, we made a dozen pit stops (ok 3) and took lots of photos.

When we got to Bar Harbor, it was time to hit the expo, get lunch and walk around downtown Bar Harbor. Bar Harbor is absolutely gorgeous! It was my first time there and I would definitely go back...you know, in July...when it's not bitterly cold.

Ally and I on the Harbor

That night, our caravan of runners, old friends and new friends alike made our way to dinner for laughs and drinks all around. Brendan had brought a copy of the race manual for me which somehow, either by fault of gmail sending it to spam or just never receiving it, I had never seen. I became somewhat terrified when I saw in the instructions that this race should be treated as a 'mini ultra-marathon' and that one should not expect to run their personal best.

I immediately felt better though when one of the girls mentioned that having lived and trained in Bar Harbor her whole life, she found the NYC Marathon to be a really easy course. My thoughts going into the race were that this would be tough, but that if I could get through it, New York would be fine.

This post is getting long enough already so stay tuned for the full race recap to come!