Thank you again to everyone for all of your support throughout the training process. I’m happy to announce that I have reached my goal and have exceeded $1000 of donations (in both paypal and personal checks) for Mith Samlanh “Friends”! If you haven’t donated already, it’s not too late! I’ll be making my actual donation to friends early next week after I return from Minnesota.

My t-shirt has already arrived and I can’t wait to wear my Cambodian-designed logo this coming Sunday. I completed my last long training run on Saturday – 7 miles in humid, rainy gross-ness – which is making me ever-more-grateful for the cool air of the northern United States!

Other than that, I’m trying to rest myself for the upcoming race, including ignoring the scratchy throat/impending cold I’ve been feeling since Saturday. EmergenC usually does wonders for me, so I’m hoping it will continue its magic this time around!

My friend (psuedo coach) Peter reminded me to actually get excited about the race, and I’m glad he did. All of this work over the past 6 months is finally coming to a head and I’ll have the chance to really see what 26.2 feels like – for better or for worse. I’m impressed with myself for actually following through and making it this far, despite the shin splints, my crazy summer traveling schedule, AND the most recent IT band woes I’ve encountered. I’m excited to know what it feels like to cross that finish line and hear thousands of strangers screaming my name. And I’m also going to try to remember to smile when I see a photographer along the course so that I don’t have any more embarassing running pictures floating around the internets.

I’ll be posting more race-day information here in the coming days, including ways for you to receive race updates from your cell phone.

I continue to be amazed at all the incredible people in my life who have offered their support, encouragement, and talents to help me accomplish my goal of raising $1000 for Mith Samlanh Friends AND running in my first marathon. I’ve nearly reached $950 with checks and online donations, and despite a little glitch injury that happened over the weekend during my 20-mile run, I’m in great spirits and looking forward to hitting the trail again today.

I also woke up this morning to find some AWESOME shirt designs for race day. John Weeks – a fellow blogger and friend from my time in Cambodia – and his team of graphic artists were kind enough to offer their time to design me a shirt. Not a small offer with their huge workload and the Cambodia BarCamp coming up this weekend. The designs are included below and it’s important that I make a decision TODAY about which one I prefer so I can finalize the design and can get this thing to print tomorrow. I would love to hear your thoughts! I am definitely leaning towards the Khmer writing and the runner in orange.

Please place your vote in the comments, including any additional suggestions you might have. I’ll be wearing a white t-shirt with the image on the front. If you’d like to learn more about the race and why I’m doing (and help me meet my fundraising goal), click here.

I’ll announce the winner here tomorrow. Thank you John and Team!!!
Image 1

Image 2

Image 3

Image 4

Image 5

Image 6

Thank you SO much to all of you who’ve donated so far! I sincerely appreciate your support and I know that the money raised will most definitely help the street children of Cambodia. I am truly touched by your generosity.

I’ve got my last long practice run on Sunday this weekend – a half-marathon race in Rockville, and then I’m planning to run from Bethesda, back to Arlington to get the last of the full 20 miles in! I know I’ll be hurting afterwards, but it will be great preparation for October 5th.

At the end of this weekend I will have run over 50 miles in just the past two weeks! I can’t believe race day is so soon ).

Many of you already know that I’ve been training for the Twin Cities Marathon over the past several months, and I’ve about reached the end of my preparatory, longer runs. This past weekend I was scheduled to run my last 18-miler (20 miles is this coming weekend!), but hurricane Hanna had other plans.

I had arranged to meet up with 4 other women from my running group at 6 am saturday morning, to knock those 18 miles out of the way before breakfast. I usually run at 7 am, but my running partner was out of town that weekend, and the only group of folks I knew that were also running 18 were even earlier risers than I usually am. That said, I thought this might be a good thing as the heaviest rains from the storm weren’t scheduled to hit until 10 am.

Though the idea of running 18 miles makes me physically ill, these longer runs are some of the most important training you can do in preparation for a marathon, and because of this amazing Cambodian organization that I’m raising money for (please help!), I am determined to finish Oct 5ths 26.2 strong.

Even so, I woke up at 5 am Saturday and looked outside, praying for a proverbial “rain-out”. Alas, it was just a light drizzle and incredible dense heat that met me. I took my dog for a brief walk, gathered up layers of dry clothes to put on afterwards, loaded up my gu and gatorade, and headed up to Bethesda.

Everyone in our group showed up despite the forboding sky. We headed out onto the dark, Capital Crescent trail around 6:20 am, with just a little drizzle and incredible thick air. As we neared Georgetown, most of us kept yelling aloud, “Where is this rain? It’s SO hot!” Soon enough, the sky opened up and a light rain began to cover the path and our wicking shirts. The dampness felt great on our boiling skin, and as we headed back up the long, 6+ mile incline back to Bethesda, our clothes and shoes soaked up the water and we lost track of what was sweat and what was rain.

Continue reading ‘Running in the rain: why 18 miles in hurricane Hanna was worth it’