Let's go to Vegas! And so this race experience was born!
I turned 30 this weekend! All year long, I had wanted to spend my 30th in Vegas. We went for Kris' 30th over 3 years ago...and I wanted to do the same. I also knew that this year, the Las Vegas Rock N' Roll Marathon was on my birthday weekend. After several things came up over the year, it became increasingly difficult to plan my birthday trip. So it had definitely been put on the back burner. By the time the November 11th weekend had come to a close, all the things that had been in the way of my birthday trip had come and gone...and well....I jumped and decided that Vegas would be in my sights. We looked at plane tickets and hotel options the whole ride home from SA. And by the weeks end, we had planned our trip! I thought about not telling anyone that I was going to race this weekend. But well...yeah...I got super excited, so for the past couple of weeks, my friends and family have heard me go on and on about what was to be our first "DESTINATION" race in Sin City.
Also, my client Delia, who was my very FIRST client at Bod Squad has been set to do her first half in Vegas for months now. So I jumped at the chance to also be there for her race weekend as well! Friday, Delia, Kris and I boarded a plane headed for Vegas and an experience we will all never forget. As we speak...Delia is still in Vegas enjoying the life of luxury and getting pampered at the Canyon Ranch Spa @ Venetian! She deserves it...she ran 13.1 miles for the first time last night! I am so amazingly proud of that woman for setting a goal 11 months ago and attacking it! She has worked so hard. She started running back in March doing intervals with our run team. 2 minutes run, 1 minute walk. And she worked her way up to the half! So much dedication! So inspiring. Congratulations DELIA!!!!
All week long, I had felt good in prep for our trip. No swollen knees. No sleepless nights. I was rested and ready to board that plane! Delia and I spent the entire 3 hour flight from SA to Vegas talking excitedly about the weekend to come. Good thing Kris had a book to read...I think he tuned us out!
Delia and I on the plane to VEGAS!
When we touched down, got in our shuttles and headed for our hotels, I literally couldn't have been happier. I could feel it. This weekend was going to be one for the books. As we drove to the Strip, seeing the lights at night, I could hardly contain my excitement to run underneath them 48 hours later. Most people go to Vegas to gamble. I am too pinche to be a good gambler. Mostly, other than the race, I was excited to...EAT? Carb-loading in Vegas. Yes please! Forget the slot machines (ok...I put some money in the slots almost immediately...), take me to the buffet!
As it happened, this weekend, my longest and dearest friend Jennifer and her husband Graham were also in Sin City! PERFECTO! It all worked out perfectly. Kris and I met up with them later in the evening to do some pre-birthday celebrating at the brand spankin' new Cosmopolitan Hotel where we partook in some interesting fancy schmancy drinks and the boys peed in a urinal next to Lou Ferigno (THE HULK...). True story. And he was wearing a tight green shirt. Go figure. Celebrity siting numero uno! We walked around the city on Friday night shopping, drinking, gambling a little and looking at the Christmas decor. Jenn and I got especially excited when we walked by the Bellagio Fountains, and the iconic water show was being done to a beautiful rendition of 'Oh Holy Night'. It was magical and it got me all Christmas-ey happy!
Jenn and I in front of the Fountains @ Bellagio
We stayed out until 3:30am Texas time. Here's a little synopsis (and its short...) of my gambling adventures this weekend. Put $20 in a slot. Lost $10. Cashed out. Played $10 an hour later...got up to $34.60. Cashed out. Added $15 to my stash. Put $50 on a roulette table. Played for an hour. Got up to $85. Lost all but $25. Cashed out. Put $20 in a slot machine at 1:20am. Got up to $65. Cashed out. Went to bed. Next day. Played $50 on a Craps table having never ever ever played Craps ever before. Got a short lesson from the nice people at the Monte Carlo (BET THE PASS LINE!!). Got up to $80. Lost back to $54. Cashed out. The end. That's all I gambled. So I put in roughly $35. Came out with $54-ish. FINISHED. So I won?! Maybe $19. There may have been another $20 thrown in there somewhere...but the gist is that I didn't really waste my $$ on those evil machines or table games I don't really understand. Yay. Go ME! Thanks for all the "WIN BIG" encouragement from all my friends and family. I won BIG to the tune of less than $20 bucks. Or I lost $1. I don't know.
Anyways, Day 2! MY BIRTHDAY! We got to head down to the Packet Pickup. San Antonio Rock N' Roll boasts 23,000 runners. Vegas had over 35,000. The Venetian was a zoo. Kris and I got in, got our stuff. I bought some Newtons and new headphones and we got out. It was much the same type of vendors that we had just seen a couple of weeks ago...so we weren't missing out on much. All day long, I got so many sweet calls and texts and messages from all my friends and family. My phone almost died like 18 times. I loved every message! So thank you all for thinking of me! When we finally got back to our hotel to get ready for dinner, I had the most beautiful bouquet of flowers sent to me by some amazing girls! They made our room smell so pretty! We got ready to head to dinner with Jenn and Graham and my conundrum began. I have to run a marathon tomorrow. I cannot walk around in heels. I cannot get unnecessary blisters. Boots do not look good with my sparkly dress. And because I care so much about how cool I look, I figured, what way to look cooler than to wear a super sparkly glitzy dress...with my new running shoes! The lady in the elevator looked at me and said "your dress is beautiful" "why are you wearing those shoes". When I told her...she didn't really understand. Oh well...I like it!
Newtons and Sequins. Perfect Combo.
I went to a very fancy Sushi Restaurant in that getup. Before dinner, we headed into the Minus5 Ice Bar to drink some ridiculously sweet drinks out of ice cups and freeze our butts off. Jenn and I got matching fur hats to take home as souvenirs. Not sure when I'll wear my eskimo hat in the Valley. But it is definitely cute and festive! Since we partied so late on Friday. By 11:30...I was nodding off. So my birthday night ended even before midnight. I know. I'm such a raging party animal. But Sunday was race day!
RACE DAY! I rather like the late afternoon race start. We leisurely ate breakfast and got dressed for the day. We also moved hotels to the Mirage where we would literally finish the race and be able to walk into our hotel (well...not really...but more on that later...). We got settled in to our new room and I taped my knees up and started getting the ancy-sssss. As we walked down to the Strip. It was nuts seeing NO TRAFFIC. They shut down the entire Las Vegas Blvd for the race. The finish line was within view of our hotel window. As we walked across the street to the monorail, I saw them loading the medals onto the stands.
Kris and I about to board the monorail
When we got to the Start line area, it was huge and almost desolate. The full marathoners started an hour and a half earlier than the half marathoners. There were only 3200 registered marathoners (a lot were scared off because of last year's marathon debacle...look it up...it was interesting...). So there were over 32,000 half marathoners that hadn't started arriving. Still, they started playing music trying to get the 1,000 or so people that were there riled up. And it wasn't just any music. Journey was playing. Yes. The Journey. Sans Steve Perry. Kris and I fist pumped to 'Worlds Apart'. It was epic. Since there were so few people there early...there was also so few port-a-potty lines. AMAZING! I didn't have a single bad port-a-potty experience in Vegas. What I did experience however...was the wind. Right before the race, Kris looked up the weather. There was a little "!" in the Vegas forecast. What did that mean....well....this....
They weren't kidding. The wind was CRAZY. And lucky us...we got to run the first 1.5 miles into it. So we get all lined up. Corral 2. Windy and ready to go. There was a hard cut off of 4.5 hours for the marathon finish. So basically...you finish in 4.5 hours or well...you don't finish. So unlike a lot of races that we've run where there's a lot of walkers. We started, and there was very little weaving or slow down. Everyone started and was moving. But even before the gun went off, it became immediately apparent to me that something was missing. And I'll say this...
Every race I've been to in Texas. Even the little ones. We always have a benediction of some sort and sing the National Anthem. At this race. There was no prayer...and no National Anthem. I kept waiting for it. But it never came. Which was strange to me. It was definitely missed.
So we started running. Having just done a 10 miler a week and a half before mostly below 8:30...Kris and I really planned to stay as close to the 3:40 finish group as possible. We figured we would hang with them as long as possible. I know Kris can hang with them. And he said he was going to stay with me the whole time. So that was the plan. Until it wasn't the plan. And the plans changed by about mile 5.
Sooooo....usually, when I start a marathon, I feel like a horse coming out of a gate. I have to really try to slow myself down. In San Antonio, I clocked my first half mile at below a 7 min mile. I felt like I wasn't moving. But I was flying. Yesterday, I got the same feeling. Like a horse out of a gate. But going into the wind, I looked at my watch, I was breathing heavy. And I was at an 8:30. WHAT THE HELLLLLLLLLLLL. I hung with it. Figured "It's just the wind...when we turn around I'll be fine." Yeah no. When we turned around at mile 1.5, tailwind behind us, heading down the Strip into the sights and all the people, at 8:30...I was panting. I held on. Figured "I'm just riled up, calm down, you do this pace all the time and are fine with it". About mile 4, I started drifting back, 3:40 pacers were getting a bit ahead. Kris was in front of me...and when he said about mile 5 that he needed to stop to pee, I thought to myself "THANK THE JESUS...WHAT THE HECK IS GOING ON HERE." I texted Renea. Told her that this was going to be interesting. Something was going on with my cardiovascularly, and I was having trouble catching my breath. A million things (or maybe like five) ran through my head. When Kris came out of the port-a-potty...I told him that we were going to have to slow down, that I was having trouble keeping my breathing under control. It's super humid in South Texas. It's super DRY in Vegas. The whole high winds thing was drying me out and I felt constantly thirsty even though I had hydrated all day, didn't drink much the night before. I knew I was hydrated. But I was just...well...DRY. By mile 7, I was having fun posing for pictures at every camera guy I saw, but I was a tad bit frustrated. Not totally melt down ready. But still a little frustrated. Not even my music helped pick up my pace. By mile 8. Kris turned and looked at me at the water station and said one word. And I felt like an idiot. Altitude??.....
Now, I know this. Las Vegas is only about 2100 feet above sea level. Harlingen is at sea level. I ran in Wyoming this summer at over 6000 feet above sea level and felt much the same as I did in Vegas. Out of breath and not really able to go very quick (for me anyways...) So I don't know if it was the altitude. Or the wind (which almost lifted me off my feet at one point). Or the dryness. Or maybe my 20 miler below a 8:45 minute mile back in late October was a fluke??? Whatever...so by mile 8 I knew that I wasn't going to hit a huge PR. But I was having a good time...so I just went with it. I didn't look at my Garmin much. I stopped at the water stations...And when we ran through this...
Fremont Street!
I literally lit up like a Christmas Tree. It was soooooo fun! They had it all blocked off, we ran right through it with thousands of drunk people cheering for us. It was AMAZING!!!!
By the time we got to mile 21, my legs were locking up a bit, and we were running dead into the wind. This was my conundrum. I couldn't run my regular pace because I was out of breath and the wind was bad. But I was running much slower than I was used to so my legs started to fatigue more. I stopped and stretched a lot that last 5 miles. And I was so glad that Kristofor was there. He literally kept me going. I didn't want to stop...I just was wanting to go so much slower that I was used to. We passed the 4 hour mark...I didn't even care...I just wanted to be done. As we rounded the corner to head into the Strip and to the Mirage, there were people everywhere cheering. They were so close to us...it almost got claustrophobic at points. I stopped my Garmin at 26.2...and we ended up running close to 26.5 by the time we crossed. I think our time was about 4:12 ish...about 12 minutes off my Austin pace...and about 3 minutes quicker than last year's San Antonio run. So right in the middle. Officially our time was about 4:16...with the extra mileage and literally almost being trapped behind people in a narrow lane for the little extra mileage at the end...we didn't have much of a choice.
AND...I don't really care. Honestly, I'm cool with it. This was the first race I've ever done (where I was trying...) that I haven't PRed. Had to happen sometime. It's good for me right?
My pictures are also waaaayyyy better this time. Because I was actually having fun!
After the Finish!
ANDDD!! As soon as we crossed, I heard someone SCREAMING my name. I turned around, and my fellow Bod Squadder, Sarah, had just crossed the finish line for the half! Out of 35,000 runners...we found each other! I had chills! She said I was her "carrot" at the end. She saw my zebra pants and knew she had to keep going even though she was out of gas! I LOVE that we found each other! We embraced for a really sweaty...we just ran 13.1/26.2 mile HUG!
Bod Squad Running Team in Vegas!
Sadly...they herded us out of the finisher area like cattle, so there was no possible way I could wait to see Delia finish. I had gotten her updates though...so I knew she had crossed the 10 mile mark and was pacing well!
Side note: That was my least favorite part of the race. Being herded like a cow, and being unable to exit the finisher area for close to a mile...then having to track all the way back down to our hotel...after running 26.5 miles. If I give this race one complaint...it was that. So many people. Windy. Narrow area...no where to exit. People shoving chocolate milk and gatorade at you. And jamba juice. No where to exit. I had a mini attack. Kris kept telling me to be quiet. I just wanted OUUUUUTTTT. Anyways...
I also had gotten not 1, not 10, but FORTY SEVENNNNN text messages from my friends and family. Seems my timing chip didn't go off at mile 13.1. Kris' did but not mine. So for a good while, a lot of the girls thought that I had stopped...until I checked in at mile 20. So between 13-17, I had a bunch of "where the hell are you"..."whats going on"...."are you ok we are worried" "call us now please" texts. And then when the 20 miler checked me in I got a bunch of "thank God you're still going" "oh my gosh you're back" texts! Glad to know I'm loved!! It was awesome seeing all the love when I finally looked at my phone. And I could feel my phone going off in my SPI belt. I didn't let myself look at it after mile 5. But I knew you guys were there!
We headed up to our room, and started to wind down. And being the party animals that we are. Everyone said "GO CELEBRATE!!!" Yeah. We ate California Pizza Kitchen and were in bed by 1030. Rockstars. So wild. I was tired. We headed to the airport at 6am this morning for our long day of traveling. Weekend Destination Marathon. DONE.
I texted several people on Sunday telling them that I was running a mile for them, and the reason why. I will tell you, that definitely helped me. I thought I would have to look at my paper to see who was who on what mile...but I actually remembered. Also, I pledged to run this ENTIRE race in Honor of my good friend Courtney who was diagnosed with cancer a couple of months ago. She has been a big sister figure to me, and I love her dearly. She had surgery (successfully!!) this morning, and is recovering. So I thought about her a lot. I ran the last 6.2 exclusively for her. Those are the hardest, so I had to fight the toughest. So thank you to everyone for the inspiration. It really did make a difference. And if you want to know how your mile went...I actually can tell you...because I remember EVERY single one :)!
What's next? Houston! January 13th. I'm going to focus on some speedwork between now and then. And I've about decided that this may not be my Boston year. I've had a bit of a rough go, and to be brutally honest, I'm not that focused on it at the moment. I lost my Boston drive some where between my San Antonio Massacre and Mile 8 of Vegas. Not that I don't think I can do it. I think I could if that was the only thing I was working on. Exclusively. But I've had a lot of irons in the fire this year. When I wrote on the wall at Bod Squad in January. I said I wanted to Boston Qualify, and I wrote "3:40, 26.2" Now Boston...for my age group is 3:35. If I can sniff a 3:45 at Houston, I think I'll be proud of myself. There's always next year. I know what I have to work on. And...
To be honest. I've come to the point now, after having a couple of tough races, where I can really look back at my sub 4 in Austin last February and be so proud of that accomplishment. I think this year has taught me that THAT really was a great great great race for me. I think I took it for granted a bit. I did it and IMMEDIATELY wanted to beat it. I think as I've gotten further from it, I can take it for what it was...a really strong strong race to be proud of, on a very hilly course. I can always say I've done a sub 4 marathon. And I hope to do another one. But if I don't, whatever the reason may be, I always have that.
Soooo....That's my story...hope someone made it to the end of this...! Merry Christmas everyone! I'll check back in in 2013!
Thanks for cheering me on,
Lacy
