LA Marathon 2010

I'm going to be running the LA Marathon in March! More details coming soon. But I already updated my fundraising page so check it out if your interested.

San Diego Marathon

I was kind of nervous all week about the marathon. I wasn't sure we were ready. But on Saturday morning Becca, Alice and I drove down from Los Angeles to San Diego to pick up our race numbers for the San Diego Marathon. We arrived with time to browse the booths, sample various energy drinks and supplements and get even more excited for the marathon on Sunday.

I was pretty happy because we were able to raise about $400 for the Tammy Gilbert Fund. Well it would have been nice to raise more money, I am so thankful for the generosity of so many people. I was so busy with school, there wasn't much time to do more fundraising. But the donations we have will make a difference in Tammy's Life and that makes me very happy.

Sunday morning I woke up at 3:54am. I hadn't slept well because I didn't want to oversleep so I would wake up every hour or so and check the time. Finally, I just decided to wake up, look for my glasses- which had fallen under the bed, and get ready. By 4:40 we were ready to go, but we didn't leave the hotel till almost 5am. Finally we were on our way and feeling even more excited. We got on the shuttle with 30 or so other people on their way to the marathon.

By 6:20am we were standing at the start line. I was so impressed that arranged us into corrals because it was so much more organized. Around 6:35am we started running. The moment I had been waiting for finally arrived. We ran at a steady pace for the first few miles. Some of us had to stop and use the restroom, which slowed us down a little bit, but it was unavoidable because I drank so much water to get ready.

Around mile 9 I felt ready to pick up the pace, so I started running a little quicker and within two or three minutes I couldn't find the other ladies. But I felt pretty good, and I didn't want to turn around so I just kept going. I ran at that pace for the next 10 miles. Then around mile 20 I tried to run a little bit quicker. I didn't want to go too fast, because last year I had to walk the last two miles because I was in so much pain. Fortunately, I was able to finish at a quicker pace and I didn't hit the wall!! And that is my story of another successful marathon. Successful running and successfully raising funds.

San Diego Marathon Sunday

The Marathon is this Sunday!! I'm really excited and I hope I am ready. It's been fun to train with Alice. Hopefully I'll be able to post more pictures as the day gets closer and as I am running.

We were successful at raising some funds for Tammy Gilbert so I'm happy about that. Please feel free to send in your donation if you have not done so yet!!

Tammy Gilbert

This May I will be running the San Diego Marathon on behalf of Tammy Gilbert, MSMC Class of 2000. Tammy was diagnosed with scleroderma a few years ago and the disease has progressed to the systemic variety. She has now reached the dangerous stage of pulmonary hypertension. Due to the rapid progression of the disorder, she has recently had to retire from PT (at age of 33) and is facing 6-12 months of chemotherapy in an attempt to halt the disease progression. Tammy is currently on COBRA, but will not qualify for long-term disability for 6 months. In addition, Tammy and her family live just outside of New Orleans. Her parents lost their home and business in Hurricane Katrina. They have not been able to rebuild their home or business, and thus are unable to help Tammy financially.

There are two ways you can give

1) Use the Paypal Button above.
2) The APTA as well as the Louisiana Chapter of the APTA have set up a fund to help with her medical costs. Click on this Link to give directly to the LPTA Tammy Gilbert Fund

NSLA Marathon Club

A bunch of people want to run the marathon next year. I'm hoping we'll be able to train and run together. Let me know if you are in the LA Area and are interested in training together.

Finished with My first Marathon!

25,000 participants, 25, 000 volunteers, and 1 million spectators. Crazy fun!! I was surprised by how much I enjoyed running the marathon. The craziest part of the marathon was the starting line. First there was the block long line of portable toilets lining both streets. Then there was a mass of people packed liked sardines filling an entire street. I was astonished about how much space 20,000 people take up. Interesting sight to behold. A little scary example of herd mentality. About 30 minutes before the race starts everybody starts trying to get a good spot. Well as you can imagine, with so many people there is no way everyone can be at the front. But that doesn’t stop them from trying. Which means lots of squishing. And then 2 minutes before the start you see thousands of sweatshirts and shirts flying to the side of the street. I was so sad that I didn’t have time to collect all the sweatshirts. I wasn’t sure I could finish but I made it to the end. I felt pretty good until mile 20. I started slowing down. But the absolute hardest part of the race for me was mile 24- 26. I kept expecting the cheering spectators, but they weren’t there during mile 24 & 25. However, despite the rough ending, I’m pretty sure I want to do it again. (Anyone want to train for it with me?)

This is the one time where I felt I could actually see the people who live in Los Angeles. Also as a group we got to experience so many different parts of LA Of course it was great to experience everyone who came to cheer me on! Last thing to do is follow up with people who might be interested in supporting Here's Life. I'll be sending that email out soon.

Here's Life

This is my first time doing this so bear with me. Instead of raising money for all these different people, I decided to focus on just one ministry. It's called Here's Life Inner City. They focus on community development and bringing the reality of the gospel to urban environments. I thought I could raise money by just having a blog. Everyone would go read it and just donate. But I had no response so maybe not the best idea. I'll be emailing folks the letter later on today.