Good news my avid readers! I completed the Scotiabank Toronto Waterfront Full Marathon (42.2km)! Yipeeee!

My legs right now, though, feels like rubber! I had thought my long runs on all those Saturday training sessions were exhausting on my muscles, but boy, this is a whole new feeling. Despite the soreness, I have to say, I am very proud and happy to have made it through my first marathon! I'm now in the 1% of the world who can complete a marathon. A proud achievement for me :-)

Details on pre-run date: On Saturday I checked into my room at the Hilton Hotel, met up with my two room mates, had a pre-race jitter talk with them, had a most delicious pasta dinner with all my team mates, listened to 3 speeches that teared me up, and proceeded to sleep at 11pm in night ... only to have to wake up at 4:45am the next morning.

Had breakfast at 5:50am (Had to run around downtown toronto to look for the 24 hour Tim Hortons); successful, but I didn't end up getting the hashbrowns that I wanted :-( They were not serving it yet until 9am. Had a butter croissant and small double double. Tastey.

My two roomates and I rushed back to our hotel, to our rooms, got our water belts, jackets, (and luggage for me -- planned to use the baggage check-in at city hall), and proceeded downstairs to the lobby to meet the rest of the TNT group.

It was still dark when we began heading over to Nathan Phillips Square to our tent. The race did not start until 7:30am, so there was still lots time to be nervous, worried and having thoughts of of a number of possible, but rather unlikely events that could happen before and during the race. 42 km was a pretty long way. Stepping on a pothole, my knee injury coming back, headache, cramps, hip pain, rain, too much sun, wind... all of it was an unknown. Rain was probably the worse thought on my mind. A member of my team said that it was suppose to shower a little bit; and there was chance of a little sun between 8-9am. How comforting.

It was about 7:10am when we began to move towards our corals (our starting area). While we waited until the race started, I took the time to take in the excitement, the energy around me. I could hear the sound of music, laughter, friends and family cheering.. it was amazing.

The national anthem then started and we were all silent as we listened to it.

The gunshot sounded; the race was on!

To make it easiest to describe the run, I will list the few pivotal moments:

15km -- Felt so happy that it was not raining nor was it too sunny.
21km -- I felt this rush of pride, I passed the 21km mark @ 2:32 hours
27km -- I hit my mental wall, anxiety on not having enough time to finish hit me (my coach was thank god there, and talked me out of my fear - I had about 3 hours still and I was more than half way)
30km -- My right quad cramped up on me, and I devoured all the peanuts I had in my pouch (Thank you Lise for the idea and Lynette for the trail mix!)
33km -- My left and right quads cramped on me, coach offered me a salt tablet
34km -- Started to dislike drinking Gatorade and those little cubes meant to help me restore the balance of my electrolytes. There is only so much love for those supplements ...
36km -- The top of my left knee began to spasm on me, forced me to slow down a lot
40km -- My IT band began to hurt a little bit
41km -- Used an unknown stored energy to sprint to that finish line.
41.5km -- I thought about the cause I was running for and wished for the good health of my family, my relatives, my uncle, my friends, my supporters.
42.2 km -- A victorious feeling :-)

As I crossed the finish line, it felt amazing. First - I finished a marathon! I had run 26 miles! Second - Yes, I could now sit and eat. I was famished.

I hugged my parents and brother who were there to support me, and my three wonderful cousins who trekked all the way downtown to see me, from morning until I finished my race! My two friends Kai and Jeffrey who special delivered me food that I requested :-) (namely chinese buns and gatorade).

After having a brief lunch with my two friends, I headed home. At this point, my legs were tired, it was not until I got home and sat on the sofa, when I felt the soreness creep in. By the time my friend Madeline dropped by to congratulate me on my run, I could feel the stiffness in my legs. I was walking very oddly. lol. I definitely needed to do some light stretching.

This morning, when I woke up, my poor legs only got more sore. lol. Will be booking with a massage therapist this week! :-)

Well, so this ends my marathon journey for this year :-) Thank you all for following me and supporting me on my training for the marathon.

Next weekend I will be doing a short run/walk (let's see how my legs feel hehe), for the CIBC run for the cure - Breast Cancer. Wish me luck!

P.S. Thanks M for the kind donation!

First thing I have to say is, YAY! Thank you thank you wonderful supporters! Without you guys, I wouldn't have been able to reach my fundraising goal! =) You guys are the best!

Special thanks to my new sponsors: Bill Petruck, Marty Kobayashi, Lise Hansen, Richard Tanha, Diana Trac, and the anonymous people who kindly contributed to my little tincan :-)

Now to the running bit:
This weekend, :-( bad news came about with my knee again. Tricky little fella I have to say. It had not complained for the last two weeks of the long run training - 23km and 32km respectively, but on Saturday, having just run just a little past 10km, it faltered on me again. I was fortunate to be close to home (ironic since our new route passes my house), so I was able to head home straight away to to ice the knee. No sense in injuring it further since race day is literally at this point 14 days away.

The knee, as I iced it, was all red and inflammed. I applied some a535, did some stretching afterwards and it was not after I took a long nap that afternoon did it start feeling better. I was able to walk around and not exactly run, but trot about without any pain. This was a huge relief. Previously when I first had this happen to me, walking even hurt me. I took this as a good sign. This morning, did more stretching, and my knee feels good again - which means good news I can resume my training again! I am going to taper down with lower milages than the training schedule. My knee will be more happier, I'm sure. And a friendly visit to my doctor again for an assessment (just in case) of my knee too :-)

Tomorrow, I will do yoga ... 14 days ... in counting!

Today's theme: Peaches. That's what the food show Ricardo told me. And boy did I feel for peaches afterwards! I learned how to make peach soup, BBQ'd peach, peach drink, and of course, we can't forget peach crumble! And all this was while in front of a treadmill. Kinda liking this dual tasking *grin* =)

Honestly, my 10km never zoomed by so fast. I actually skipped my usual 10 and 1's. Went straight through my run. I think I should try to get to the gym around this same time, lol, got to watch two of my favourite cooking shows.

Mind you, lol, I like learning to cook, but I have yet to put those skills to practical use. That may change soon enough! A friend (thanks Laura!) suggested a new fundraising idea that I might just take up on...

Also, I have many special thanks to my most recent sponsors: Kimberley Bailey, Gina Cramarossa, Cindy Poon, Kim Nguyen, Ping Young, Rafeeza Khan, Patricia Denessidis, Ryan MacLachlan, and Jason Cheng! You guys are great!! Thanks so much for supporting my cause! Getting much much closer!

The Saturday that just passed, I did my longest run to date: 32km! Dear God, I really did not know if I could do it. Took me about 5 hours 25 min ... I will definitely need to pick up the pace just a tad ... though I do blame them hills for holding me back ;) The scotia run is relatively flat, so that will be something going towards my favour. Now if it were only all down hill ... ah such wishful thinking :-)

I woke up at 4am, ate 2 pieces of toast and 2 eggs (mmmm soo goooood), drank some leftover gatorade, 2 1/2 glasses of water (still shakened by the dyhdration scare from the previous week).

Speaking of hydration, I decided to try out gatorade instead of the regular elode discs to replenish lost electrolytes while running. Turns out, it was a good decision. I noticed I was able to keep a more consistant pace and was not as thirsty so often. Best of all, no adverse stomach cramps or nausea afterwards. I have heard that some people do not take in gatorade too well. Next week, I will be filling all my water bottles with gatorade. Let us see what 100% gatorade does... :) It will be my last week when I can truly experiment with the different sports drinks.


During my run, as I mentioned before, it was a 5 1/2 hour run, I did eventually run out of water/gatorade. There was a point where I had to refill with tap water from a sink. Not a big deal in many respects, but for those who know me well ... lol, kinda biggie for me =) But when it comes right down to it, if you need water, you need water.


On the first half of the five and a half hours, I chatted with fellow runners. Eventually, we all drifted apart, running our own pace. As I'm running along the beltline to finish my last 11km, I hummed a few tunes, I problem solved work stuff, thought about vacation and travel, poetry, books to read, mountains to climb ... and then I cross path with a rat.

Such a random event. I never knew there were rats in the woody forest. But then again, there were some residential areas... perhaps, I imagined then at the time, some kind hearted old lady saved the rat by releasing him into the wild instead of panning him down. No, I was not delarious ;-) just humble musings ... while some have the good fortune of having beautiful hymns come to them (Sid), I occassionally come up with backstories of things that I come across during my run.

Oh, good thing: I did not hit "the wall" during the run [for those curious for the detailed definition of what I mean by that: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marathon]. Yay!

Next week, 23km. We're starting to taper down our long runs. Phew. lol.

-edit-

I had some really delicious vietnamese food after the run as a reward for my hardwork :P

P.S. Thank you Joyce Q. For the kind sponsorship! Getting closer!

:-) Yay! I managed to squeeze in 6km today in prep work for Saturday's long run. Following this, I had energy to go shopping :)

And then...

I had Kimchi tofu soon in Korean town and some delicious walnut cakes! So tastey! Ah, I have to admit, there are benefits to training this hard ;)

Tomorrow, I plan to do some easy hill training (ai...I loathe them hills...). Depending on the weather and how my allergies are, I may actually run outdoors :P

Also, Special thanks to Cecilia T. and Jeffrey L. for their recent sponsorship! :) Yay! Getting closer to my goal!

Thanks Hui also for the encouragement! I will need those prayers... :)

Saturday's run went well. I did not do my expected run - 29km - however, I did the recovery run, 23km (suggested by my coach since I was just returning from a knee strain injury). I think overall it was good effort in getting back into the training routine (0km to 23km!).

Sadly to say, there was nothing extraordinary that occured during the run... except I have to say, as we passed what was previously used as the emergency waste drop off area, the stench from whatever "toxins" cummulated from the garbage bags sitting there could still be smelled. ick.

After the run, however, something did happen. Not a good thing, but I guess considering that everything is fine now, I would consider it an interesting story. Or at least something I will remember NOT to repeat ever again.

I had completed my run, finished doing my stretches, and had hopped into the showers. A few minutes later, a sudden wave of dizziness and nausea washed over me. My vision changed slightly (I can't quite describe the change, it seemed sharper but dimmer?), it was suddenly for just a second, an outer body experience. I think my hands shook slightly...I felt a stomach cramp creep up on me ... I made it out of the showers and headed towards the locker area (at the time, I felt it better to well, if I did collapse, at least be somewhere where ppl were).

On my way there, I saw what I would never imagine to be something I'd ever crave for -- a protein bar; mind you, lol, it wasn't even my bar. A fellow runner had it on her -- Clare -- and all I could say to her the moment she looked up to greet me was, "Could I, if you don't mind, have just a little piece?". I honestly attempted to take a little piece off of it, but she would have none of it. Maybe it was ghastly pale complexion that worried her.... next thing I know I'm chewing away at the whole bar and having some water offered to me. Two other runners, Kate and Janine came to the rescue with an additional protein shake as well. Life savers. .. and because of them, crisis was averted.

The crisis had been... dehydration. Although I had a waterbelt on me and had been drinking water regularly every 10min, it did not help the fact that I was.. already slightly dehydrated. Having been out of the intense training schedule, I had - out of bad habit - drank less water.

After the incident, you betcha I drank a good 2L of H20 :-)

Sipping some right now...

P.S. Thank you Madeline A. and Laura A. for your support! =)

Also, Coach Helena sent us an interesting trailer for a movie about marathons. It's kind of inspiring =) See for yourself; the movie is called "The Spirit of the Marathon":

After taking nearly 3 weeks off running to recover from knee strain injury, I returned back into training yesterday. I decided to go easier on myself and instead of outdoor running, I did an easy run indoors on a treadmill at my local gym.

I have to admit, as I first stepped on that treadmill, I was worried. Although I had felt no pain at all for a while, I was worried that doing any running would set my knee back ... but, I was pleasantly surprised to find that I was able to do an easy 4km (in 22min!) smoothly and rather comfortably. My cardio level appeared unaffected by the break -- thank goodness -- but most importantly, my left knee didn't complain at all. *happy dance happy dance!!*

With that said, I can officially say, I will be returning to the TNT regular training sessions this week! 29km here I come!! :P Yay!

Before I log off tonight, I would like to say a special thanks to all my sponsors to date!

Barb Sauder, Christine Takasaki, David Matsumoto, Don Martyn, Gary Suessman, James Heron, James Ko, John Hui, John Ko, Kai Liang, Kathy Tazumi, Laura Oda, Lynette Le, Michael Kim, Milton Reynolds, Muoi Thai and my amazing cousins, Richard Tran, Rossan, Sally Kumagawa, Sandy Chan, Toshiko Yamashita, Yukiko Hipsh!

To my most recent sponsors: Susan Jong, Anna Do, Hui Wing Yang, Gordon Chan, Liana Li, Yoko Matsuno, and Angela Fung. Thank you all!

And of course I have to thank my avid blog readers as well as potential donors =) For those who are wondering when the deadline for me to reach my fundraising goal, it's September 12th :)

Donations aside, as of tomorrow, it will be 1 month before the big run!

Recovery time

Last everyone heard (on this blog) was me looking forward to doing my 29km the following saturday ... and then no word since. No worries, I survived it :) Just that I didn't quite make the milage that I was aiming for.

To start at the beginning: For the past few weeks during my training runs, I had been feeling a slight twinge of pain on my left knee. At first it was only after the run, when I sat down, rested a bit and felt the odd twist in my knee. I admit, I pretty much brushed it aside ... it didn't hurt when I ran ...

Then it started to hurt a bit when I ran. For my 29km run, it was very painful all of a sudden. I think I was around my 14/15km when I felt the sharp jolt of pain. I attempted to do a bit of a trot, but even that didn't help. I ended up walking 8km, until I returned back to the gym. Good thing I had such great team mates (JH, KS, CW ,TT); those 8km would have been heck of a long walk otherwise :)

After the run, I decided I would take minimum two weeks rest from running -- I do have time to spare between now and Sept. 27. Do some yoga and some low level cross training, ease up on the heavy training and strain on my knees. Less running on concrete to relieve the stress on my knees. I have considered perhaps training on my own with a friend on running the beltline for the next few weeks - lower impace on the knee. Or I could always do 10 times back and forth along the beaches boardwalk to get in my 30km. It is 3km each way ... Something I may consider.

So far, in this second week of rest, my knee feels a lot better. I'm missing running a lot though ...but patience, one more week, and I can go back into training again! Lookin' forward to it.

By the way, I think I'm considered an official runner! I've got my first knee injury! woohoo! lol Now lets hope it's my last .... (hopefully) and that its temporary!

Special thanks to JS and LA for wondering about the updates! =)

19km ... next up 29km

I completed my 19 km this saturday that just passed -- happily, made it through shy of 2.5 hours (2hr 28min according to my coach) =) I consider that fair considering I slept about 5 hours; having watched a late movie the night before and having only 1/2 a banana for breakfast. Note to self: Thumbs down on that move.

The night before I watched "The Ugly Truth" (was aiming for the Orphan, but wasn't playing at the theatre I was at -- was being spontaneous!). Turned out to be a great movie though; got home about 12am, began to pack my running gear and hit the bed by 1:30am.

Then.

The sun rises.

I didn't hear my alarm.

It's 6:20am. I'm suppose be at the meeting place by 7:00am. mmm. I had to freshen up and eat breakfast first. Eating was key. But what to eat that I could digest in 30min? And run without stomach pains?

Half a banana appearently.

Tick tock, gotta move it! I got on the bus by 6:45am. When I finally arrived, I was fortunate enough to find my team still there. Phew! :P

For the run itself, this week was not quite as exciting as the weekend run where it started to storm (lightning, thunder and all that jazz). I had it from good sources it wasn't suppose to rain until late afternoon. Not a cloud in sight. Just a bit of wind...

Oh. yes. About the wind. For most runners it is a blessing (and it still is by all means) when there is a soft breeze hitting your face as you run steadily along your running route. It is however not so great when it carries with it the 'delightful' stench of a month old garbage.

Our running route passes through Mount Hope Cementary and then eventually leads into Sunny brook park. The park itself is beautiful to run in - before the garbage strike. About a month ago an 'emergency waste drop-off area' was set up in one of the parking lots inside the park. The first week we ran past the dumpyard, it was only filled up at one small corner of the lot. This week...it was 2/3rds full, stacked at least 30 feet. Mountains of garbage. ek. I could smell the garbage a kilometer away. Had to hold my breath to get through it.

I dread to have to pass through that next week. Garbage will be 5 weeks old. Wonder what kind of toxins it will be releasing then??

After the 19km run, I dashed off to my friend's bridal shower! I was very fortunate she chose a spa day for the shower! I had myself a facial and did some lounging in the pool area.

Following the spa, I attended a dinner with the same group of friends and a Jack and Jill party afterwards. We ended fairly late, well into the next morning actually. But it was an amazing evening! I couldn't have wished to be anywhere else then seeing how happy my friend was with her soon to be husband =) Congrats again AF and EL!

Back to running...:P
Next week I'm off to do a 29km run!
For training this week, I'm hoping to some water running ;)

Back in training ... easy 7km run

Today, I'm back in training again! To explain what I mean by that, I'll have to backtrack to some events that happened last Saturday, where I was suppose to do my 26km run. During the week I had not been able to do my regular runs due to work and well, my social life got in the way a little :) I admit, I sacrificed a night of running to watch Harry Potter ;) I did manage however to get in one yoga session during the week, so I could be redeemed a little.

Despite my weak training that week, I was still confident to do my 26km run -- I actually prepared myself on the friday - eating more carbs than usual (lol, two dinners! 2 pizzas and fries). The next morning, however, when I woke up and was readying up to head out, I noticed my foot was hurting a bit. In fact, it was cramped up. Unusual. Especially since I hadn't done anything exertive the past few days. It was only 5:30am at this point, so I was able to spare sometime to do some googling. Mind you, it's amazing with the things you can find with just typing keywords of "pain" and "foot". So, after doing some reading, I decided - heh, maybe I shouldn't run today. The fact of just shifting my weight hurt it spoke volumes about not running. Sad moment. But. One thing I learned from the coaches: always listen to your body. Back to bed for me it was :)

That afternoon I went with my friends for an overnight trip at a resort up in Barrie. It wasn't until I got my rest (3 hours of restful sleep), amazingly, my foot 'healed' itself. It was painfree after that. So it wasn't the same case as some of the things I read from my google search :P I was extremely relieved mind you. Still am. That means: I can continue training! :)

After a restful week of no running, I resumed training on the Monday, doing a calm easy cross-training exercise (yoga). Today, I did my easy 7km run at my local Goodlife fitness gym followed by some 20 odd situps (I recall one of the coaches mentioning building abs to being a good help in conserving calorie burn rate). Hurray!!! I got one of my runs in this week. Tomorrow I'm off for an eye doctor's appointment so no gym for me. Hopefully my perscription doesn't change.... :P

Current cravings of food right now:

(French Onion Soup!)


(Eggs benedict!) - might have this on saturday!

Rain or shine -- the training must go on!

Greetings fellow readers of the 'run wendy run' blog =) After some kind encouragement from a friend (thanks LA!) I am finally making my first post since I registered for this blog space.

To begin, let me start with a brief W5 for this blog.

The Who: This blog is not really about me, it's more about my journey in training for a full marathon (42.2km) and fundraising for my charity; The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society of Canada. My goal is to raise the minimum amount of $1750.

The What: The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society (www.lls.org) is the world's largest voluntary health organization dedicated to funding blood cancer research, education and patient services. The Society's mission is to cure leukemia, lymphoma, Hodgkin's disease and myeloma, and to improve the quality of life of patients and their families.

The When: My marathon date is September 27th, 2009

The Where: The Scotiabank Toronto Waterfront Marathon @ 7am. Information about the route click here.


The Why: I run because I have always wanted to be a part of team that is contributing to the betterment of society. And I think I am; just one km at a time, I hope that the money that I raise will one day result in victorious finding of a cure for blood cancer. Lend me your support to help me cross the finish line =) Online donation link: http://tinyurl.com/runwendyrun/. My thanks to all supporters in advance.

Now that I have given you the quick summary of the blog's purpose; the update on my training:

To date, I have run a total of 172 km in my training for the event. The Saturday that just passed, 7/11/2009, I did a 23km run =)

On the night before the long practice run, the weather forecast listed extreme thunderstorm warnings. I had hope though: what if I could finish my run in 3 hours, before the thunderstorming happened? Hope in place, I went to bed. 5am, I'm up the next day, eating my little breakfast and gearing myself up (watch, waterbelt, my crocs --heavenly footwear, etc.). I took a peek out through my bedroom blinds, and was pleasantly surprised to see not a dark cloud rolling in the horizon. My Wendy happy moment. Yes, the run could still be done. Out the door I went.

I arrived and met with my team -- which was now a much smaller group than it usually was; appearantly most people were not crazy like me who thought they could out-run the storm (but there were some, so I was not nuts alone! :P)

The run began, nice and easy. I was running with my coach at one point, and we were chatting about the weather, could we make it before the rainfall? There were no dark clouds, weather was still fairly nice ... was this like the calm before the storm? My coach then told me a story about her run last spring, where the weather was similar to this day, warning of some storm coming, but with no visible signs ... and out of the blue wind and hail (yes, you read correctly, hail - chunks of ice) started pittering and pattering downwards. She hoped this wouldn't be the case.

Not quite, but minus the hail, everything was as she said it was. deja vu!

I was 17km into my run when swoosh, the rain came down. We were fortunate to be near a washroom shelter (locked by the way due to the strike) nearby, and didn't completely get drenched. We chatted with some other runners/cyclists who took shelter there and waited until the lightning subsided. If there had not been lightning, we would have proceeded running through -- but since there was a whole lot of that going on, I did not want to be that exception to the case on the headlines - "runner struck by lightning in park". Besides, it didn't help that I read recently on the news a woman being struck by lightning in her home ( read story here: Boy Saves Mom After Lightning Strike).

Once the coast was clear (though still raining quite a bit), we continued to finish the last 6km =)

The sweet finish reward was a nice pina colada protein drink (tasty) to replenish lost nutrients in my system.

That was my training run story of the week. Next week... running 26km! As much as I enjoyed the 'adventure' this week with the running, I do hope next Saturday's run date is nice and sunny. Though really in the end, it doesn't matter, rain or shine -- the training must go on! :P Support me by making an onine donation at: http://tinyurl.com/runwendyrun/. Thanks everyone for taking the time to read my post!

~Wendy