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Posts Tagged ‘boston marathon’

Spectating Boston Like A Champ

Tuesday, April 20th, 2010

Today’s training plan was simple.

Get out of bed whenever I felt like it, have breakfast, jump on my bike, point my wheels south towards the Boston Marathon course and go have fun.

I had finally recovered from a pretty wicked stomach bug that kicked my ass this weekend and I was eager to see how my legs really felt without fully committing to jumping back into my training plan.

I arrived at the Newton hills (around mile 20) just as the wheelchair athletes cam rolling through. I kept weaving in and out of the crowds and chasing the runners up the hills. Total Blast.

As more and more runners came in, I made my way closer and closer to the finish line. I even managed to spot two of my Trakkers teammates, Chris and Thor out of the entire mass of 25,000 runners. Because of my fantastic efforts, I have been given the best spectator of the race award by the Boston Athletic Association. That is how awesome my cheering skills were today. Granted if it wasn’t for the  bright green Trakkers gear, it would have been a lot harder, but let’s not dilute the awesomeness of my skills here.

He isn’t a local and I hadn’t actually ever met Chris before, so just yelled out “TRAKKERS!” as he ran by at around mile 23. He flashed a huge smile and kept on flying. I tried to weave around the crowd on my bike to catch him later in the course, but he was too speedy for me. Stupid one way roads. Either way, you’ve gotta love mid-race team meetups.

Congrats to Chris, Thor and everyone else that raced today. Awesome event. Inspiring athletes. Great day out on the bike taking it easy.

Here are some video clips of some of the top Americans powering it up the hill at mile 20 (Ryan Hall and Meb Keflezighi). Totally impressive.

Tags: , , | Posted in Running, Videos | 2 Comments »

Spectating Boston

Tuesday, April 21st, 2009

I really don’t know why they just don’t hand out registration forms for next years race at the Boston Marathon. I had only toyed with the idea of running Boston before, but went to the expo on Friday and Sunday, and then volunteered at the clothing return after the finish line on Monday and it was a completely different story. If they were handing out 2010 registration forms, I would have snatched one up without a second thought.

There was so much energy everywhere throughout the city this weekend that it was amazing.

I snapped a few quick video clips between my volunteering duties. Here are some of the fast runners coming through, and two guys that ran in giant Solo cups. And no, I didn’t bother peeking down to see if they were actually wearing anything under there. :-)

YouTube Preview Image

Click through for HD version.

One of the greatest things was just all the energy bouncing back and forth between the racers and the volunteers. So many exhausted runners would walk past me on their way back to the hotel, staring blankly at the ground. As they passed, I would pat them on the shoulder, congratulate them, and make sure the wind didn’t blow their mylar blanket off of them and they had some water and food in their hands. Every single one of them would look up, eyes wide open, and crack this huge smile. It was great to be able to bring them back out of their dazed stuper and remind them of the amazing accomplishment that they just finished.

Even later that night, hours after the finish line had closed and the finisher’s corral was dismantled, the energy kept on coming. I was sporting my neon yellow volunteer jacket, and gave a little congratulatory nod to everyone I saw in a blue racer’s jacket or anyone sporting a medal. That same huge smile still came out instantly. One guy, a whole block down from me, just started yelling, “No! THANK YOU! Without you we couldn’t do this!”

I love random love spread between strangers. :) It made my day.

Err… well. That came out wrong, but you know what I mean.

It is definitely too early to make any promises about next year, but lets just say I have a new race moving its way up my priority list.

Tags: | Posted in Triathlon | 2 Comments »

MMMmmm, Rest Week

Friday, April 18th, 2008

So this week is my first whole “rest week” in my training schedule, where I am still working out 6 days a week, at least once a day, but a whole lot slower and a whole lot shorter. It feels weird, but great.

I’ve built up all of these little knots, sore spots and tight muscles over the last month or so, and now I’m just working on taking it easy, stretching them all out and doing plenty of “self massage.” :-)

Weird thing is that I feel like I’m MORE sore in different spots after a few easy days than I was during the past two weeks, when I was pushing it a lot harder and my body is reacting all funny. You know those knots of tension that you get in your neck/shoulders when you are stressed or sleep in a bad position? I got one of those in my chest the other day. Is it me, or is that really weird? It was this big ‘ol lump o’ muscle on the top of my left pec that was really tight and made swimming really awkward, forcing me to cut the workout short after only 1,200 meters. Then it disappears the next day.

Then yesterday I had this weird calf tightness in my right leg that just wouldn’t let up. I beat the hell out of it with my foam roller, and went out for a nice easy 40 minute run at just over 9:00 pace and it was all better. I love when workouts actually FIX soreness instead of cause it. It is a beautiful thing.

As I was running around town yesterday, which happened to be the nicest day of the year so far, there were TONS of runners out, all chatting it up about the Boston Marathon this coming Monday. I feel like the whole city gets this big burst of energy this time of year and it is awesome. I really love just roaming around the streets and soaking up the athletic-vibes that are floating around.

I will be tracking the race online and on TV in my work’s break room since I can’t take the day off, but SO wish I could cheer on all the racers on Monday. I’m so psyched that the weather looks like it will actually be nice and not the barely above freezing hurricane wind of a mess that it was last year.

So send some good vibes to Triboomer and the rest of the tri-blogger crowd that will be running on Monday!

Happy Friday Tri-Peeps.

Tags: , , | Posted in Running, Triathlon | No Comments »