Final running event of year completed!

Last week, I completed my last running event for the year, the Scotiabank Waterfront full marathon (Sunday Sept. 26, 2010). I was nervous I will admit - having to do it alone with no coaches or a team to run with and also having cut my training almost by half. I think I have learned that training alone has its pros and cons - pro being a great way to just have time to do reflection, con because sometimes its also nice to talk to someone as you do those long 15km + runs. I guess I got accustomed to the training through TNT to talking to my teammates :) I miss that.

Although I was running the marathon alone, my friend susan had decided to join me this year to do her first half-marathon. We hadn't the chance to train together (only in hiking), I had given her pretty much the marathon training 101 that I had learned through experience. Including the 10 in 1 interval part, in hopes that if she did decide that was the type of pacing she wanted to do, we could run together for the first half of our course on race day.

The weekend kicked off with a great start - celebration of my friend Cecilia's birthday. High tea followed by a massage at Elmwood Spas! Way too relaxing for what I was about to put my poor body through!













We finished off the evening with a carbs feast at Epicure Cafe. DELICIOUS food. If I wasn't pressed for eating only carbs, I would definitely have ordered a whole lot of other stuff! :D

Susan and I checked back into our hotel (Super 8) at around 10:00pm, and set up our gear, bibs, and laced up our race chip. Air con troubles (it failed to turn on because we had set it below 70 degree F) caused us to extend our bed time... but thankfully we were able to sleep by 12am.

We were up at 5:45am, and having breakfast by 6:30am. My breakfast was so pathetic: half a muffin and some apple juice. My friend at least managed to have some cereal + a drink and an apple (not sure if she ate the apple though...)

We had made our way to catch the 506 street car, but just missed it by a minute. we ended up flagging down a cab and arrived at the Sheraton hotel (across from Nathan Phillips Square) to do our baggage check; it was about 7:05am. Baggaged checked, both of us headed down to the start line which was at University St. and we tried to make our way through to get to our correct corals.

Failed attempt.

It was too packed and there was no way we could make it to our corals before the race started. As we waited I remember wishing we could sit lol. My coach last year gave a really great tip about sitting before doing a race - but sadly, there wasn't even time to sit and relax before the race. We should have booked a closer hotel I guess. lol. Ah the sacrifices to save $$.

7:30am, the anthem started, and there was a cheer as the race began.

Calm and steady we ran together; and I remember at the 5km mark, Susan turned to me and said in a rather sad and disappointed voice, it's only 5km?? I smiled and nodded. Yep. 5km in!

8km in, I was starting to get really hot. The morning had been really cool - as a precautionary measure I had worn a sweatshirt that I was going going to donate/throw away anyway. I told my friend that I was going to stop and toss my sweater away... and that was the last I saw of her. lol So happens very often in races; I didn't see her again until after my race.

15-17km in, I saw two of my clients standing in the sidelines. Sid Ikeda and Yoko Matsuno - they were going to be doing their 5km run at 10am. Seeing them really helped me, and added more power in my strides.

21km, I was still feeling strong in my run. I had improved my time vs my Midsummer night run, at 2.33 (minus time to get to start line).

29km, my poor hip started to bother me. It started as a little twinge of pain, but eventually uncomfortable to the point where I had to walk it off. Ironic that my ipod started playing "OMG" by Usher.

29-38km, I did shorter intervals of running, a slight cramp on my right thigh area - at this point I busted out my emergency trailmix and started popping peanuts, cashews, and almonds into my mouth. Quite delicious considering I had been chewing primarily on electrolyte packed jube jubes and downing gatorade :)
Also did some self-reflection (life, goals, etc) and also to whom this race was dedicated towards.

38-40km, I had a slight mental wall, weariness tugged at me, my legs hurt, my thighs hurt, my feet hurt, AND my hip hurt!

40km-finish, sucked it up (realized I was running short on time), and made my fastest ever recovery run as I blazed towards finishing the marathon.

Happiest feeling ever crossing that finish line. It meant SITTING, MASSAGE, and FOOD. lol and yes, in that order. They slipped the medal on me, and gave me an emergency blanket (so that as our body cools down from all the running, we wouldn't be cold) and I made my way to the closest seat.

As I sat down, I remember having the urge to pull off my shoes to ensure that all my toe nails were still there! Yes, both sad and gross I know! But no. I didn't pull them off there...I did that only after I got my baggaged checked out to slip into my sandals. It took me nearly 10 minutes to get across the street to the hotel, up the stairs and claim my backpack. I bloody wished I hadn't packed so much though. Truly an overkill on my part. Picture my poor exhausted feet and hefting a backpack that weighs like there's a 17" laptop in it + a textbook or two!

I contacted susan and madeline, and set to meet with them; first with mad since I found her literally as I was going to meet with Susan. I left Madeline at Eaton's Indigo bookstore and utilized the Goodlife facilities (finally, my membership there for good use!!). All clean and exhausted, susan and I booked for a foot massage back at the super 8 hotel. Mad held the remote control and we watched a movie on the women's network to which we had no idea what the movie title was... (After some googling, was actually "In her Shoes").

After foot Massage, we ended the evening with sushi buffet dinner. Carbs galore. Never felt less guilty eating so much rice :)

So that ends my recollection of my most anticipated event of the year (right next to the Oxfam hike!). Thank you again to everyone who has sponsored me for all the different events I have participated in this year! Thank you for helping make a difference :)

Uncover the Cure!

Yet again, lol, a post long past due... This post takes place a week after my Midsummer nights run (so that Makes it.. Aug 28th), and I have a 10k run with a team I joined (The Butt-erflies - Rafeeza, Aleisha, Yuki, Yuka, Kristen and I) in raising funds for cancers below the waist. Aside from the anxiety of not making my minimum (but thankfully I have some really awesome friends + team members who pulled through for me in the end!), I was a little sore and thought maybe it would be good to take it easy and do the 5km walk instead.

I arrived at the woodbine park early and picked up my race kit, switched over to do the walk and observed at the multitude of different costumes all the participants around me had on. The theme of the race was to wear things that bring cancers below the waist to mind; some of the costumes ranged from bras + patterned thongs to neon green unitards!





When my teammates arrived they brought the remaining bits of costume, a set butterfly wings! This was all handcrafted by one of my team members, Kristen. Oh, and there was also the garter with butterflies hanging off the tail of it. Fancy workmanship!

After we had secured our race chip to our shoe and saftey pinned our bib numbers to our shirts, we watched as the presenters on stage called out the top fundraisers onstage. There was also a best costume contest... one of the ones I thought was great was the sumo one. lol She even did the sumo pose for us!

The race started for the runners at 6:30pm, and the one runner from our group - Aleisha, spirited off to complete the 10k. For us walkers, we started - give our take around 7pm, and due to the large number of participants, rather than the power walk I expected, we ended up doing an easy stroll. Not that I was complaining! hehe. It was a pleasant and leisure walk, chatting with my team mates and finishing together!






Once we crossed the finish line, not more than a few minutes passed before we saw Aleisha cross over as well. The team was together again! We went to pick up our handbags, souvineer tshirt, and had some drinks offered by some of the tents at the Expo. An event with an awesome and refreshing finish:

Cheers! :)

Some prep work... Midsummer Nights 30km Run

This year, I was fortunate enough that my camping weekend did not land on the Midsummer Nights Run event (August 21, 2010) . I've been wanting to participate in this event for the last 2 years simply because I've never had the chance to do a night time run :) Just the idea of running in the dark with headlights on made me curious enough to register for it.

I got more than I asked for!

The race started, and chilled as I was from the constant sprinkle of rain, I had a sweat shirt on as I ran. The first time having been a part of a race without team members, I kept reminding myself in my head to keep my own pace, nice and steady, like my previous coaches have always said: don't be affected by others pacing. Nice and steady... or not.

Somehow, I pushed myself to match up to a much quicker pace than my usual. I stayed on that pacing for nearly 3km in... a terrible idea. I started to run out of breath, and needed more time for recovery. Soon enough others that were behind me caught up and went ahead. I wasn't deterred from that, but I was pretty frustrated that I let myself fall into the pacing trap.

Accepting that I'd already messed things up a little bit, I controlled my pacing more carefully. There was a point where I was running alongside this other woman, who like me, was doing a shorter interval than the usual 10 minutes. One moment I was ahead of her and as I stopped to take my interval break, she would run ahead of me. After she stopped, my rest period ended and I ran head of her. We continued on this pattern for a few kilometres until finally I felt the perfect pacing, and I kept on this for the remainding 18km, doing between 9/10 minute intervals. I lost sight of her after that.

It was around 9pm when the rain really started to pour. In fact, it was like the sky just opened up and decided to flood the streets of Toronto with water. This made my last half-hour of running a pure running hell. I had slipped on my sweatshirt again after the sun had gone down, and I could feel the chill in the air again. But even with my sweatshirt I could do little to deal with the crazy downpour. As I ran on the street, there was no way to avoid the puddles. I just stepped right into them, feeling the water soak into my running shoes. I had a cap on, my music on low, my cramp in my left leg throbbing slightly, sweaty, drenched, tired...

At long last, I made it to the finish line, Like a beacon it glowed in the night. I ran towards it, they gave me a waterbottle and hung something around my neck. At first I didn't even register any of it. I was just glad to be done and have someone put an umbrella over my head.

I checked out my time on the finish line; not too bad (considering that my training had gone downhill after coming back from my hiking event), could have been better: 4.26 minutes :)

I guess next on my list would be get back into training more consistantly. Wish me luck on that :P

Oxfam Trailwalker 2010 - Hike 100km in 48 Hours

To start, this was a much overdue post meant to be up a month ago. But as things go, I got swamped with life's never-ending stream of "things to do" and the post never stood a chance on my list of priorities. Until now of course. My first completely and utterly free Sunday afternoon. No where I want to go, no where I need to go either. Good time to just veg.

In thinking back, the 100k hike in 48 hours for Oxfam was an immensely challenging ordeal for my team and I; the sheer distance and time limit, the extra burden of a hydration pack, and the endurance required for such an event. I've chatted with a client (Sandy - the amazing individual who introduced me to this event) she mentioned how she was doing these long hikes, both daylight ones and night ones, up to 50k + at times. I was seriously impressed. Although our team did do our training bit, we as a team nor as an individual even, hiked as far as 33km! I swear, it must have some bloody miracle we survived the event as we did :P

I could say it was all miracles and such, but it also had a lot with real people -- my donors/supporters -- that made the difference. The sponsors for my event: Anna, Hoanh, Hue, Jeffrey, Joyce, Kimberly, Kai, Laura A, Laura O, Liana, Lynette, Manh, Mark, Michael, Muoi, Phuc, Phung, Richard, Seyed/Diana, Thu, Vinh-The, Yoko. My supporters, Bill Petruck who surprised me with cake and pizza! on the day before the hike at work, my co-workers who supported me, and of course, the support crew (more on them later! ;) ) - Mr. and Mrs. Tsang, Maggie, Gabe, Janet. Together as a team, we managed to raise $2,714! 108% of our original goal. None of this could have been done without the people listed above. I just wanted to say... thank you to all of you again! :)

The tale of our journey begins on Thursday, July 22nd while I sitting at work coding a new feature for an web application. I was to get off earlier, get picked up and dropped off at my friends house (I had the gatorade to distribute to my team + luggage and everything as all packed up but too heavy to bring with me).

As I'm work away, my mind drifts off to thinking about the hike,... will we survive this? Did we train enough?

Lunch time rolls around, and I'm surprised with: 1. Cake and pizza from my boss to wish us luck on completing the event! :P 2. A visit by J and his wife Meg and their little bundle of joy :) We enjoy a bit of chit chat, watch my boss as he made some funny face for the kid to giggle at :P and touched on the hike topic. Apparently Meg had a pair of colleagues who participated in the event and mentioned that it was very intense. lol Great, more to add to the anxiety!

I receive a phone call from my mom shortly after lunch. She tells me that they're getting ready to leave the house and asks me if there's anything else that I needed besides my luggage and the gatorade. I say, nope, that's it. Just the luggage and the gatorade. Nothing else.

There was a pause on the phone. I can hear her shuffling and ready to hang-up as she's heading towards the doorway (the rumbling of the shoes being shifted :)). And then she says, "I see a pair of shoes here ... didn't you always go walking with them?"

I was about to answer to her, "no I've got everythi-- ". Oh crap. lol I look down at my feet. I see sandals. lol. "no wait wait!" I remember clearly saying, "bring them, bring them. Are they.. gray and pink? yes, yes, please bring them". I didn't know at that time whether to laugh or feel miserable stupid... maybe both. I, of all the things I could have forgotten... forgot my hiking shoes. Such an embarrassing and definitely devastating moment. I was for sure not to even notice that I didn't have them till... probably when I was in Barrie already!

I felt a huge sigh of relief. In all the excitement in the morning, I was intending to wear the hiking shoes to work.. but thought it last minute that I'd rather be more comfortable wearing sandals. Unfortunately, I did not think to pack the shoes away. Silly me. Just have to say, thank goodness for Moms! lol

My parents arrive, I catch the ride, and I knock on my friends house. She invites me in, and we wait for my other two friends to arrive. When the do, we pack our luggage into her car.. as we do, I relate to my friends the tale of the forgotten hiking shoes. We all laugh at it... except one friend. Her eyes are wide. And she looks at the rest of us. "Umm.. oh no. I think I forgot it." We look at her, thinking she was kidding. She wasn't.





We drove to her house and picked up the missing hiking boots. On our way up we discovered that it was a good thing we didn't go straight away on our venture, the 401 highway was clogged up. Alls well that starts poorly lol is that they say. Or I say.

To Barrie we go.

We check in first at the Oxfam Trailwalker meeting point to pick up our bibs and our sourvineer t-shirt. Next we check in at the Days Inn, and at a whole lot of pasta at East Side Marios. This probably would be the last time we will have hot tastey food ... in the next two days.

After some reorganization and unpacking, we go to sleep.

Day #1 - 6:41 AM











To end off, although it was only 48 hours...(40 for us actually), it felt like 2 weeks had gone by. During the hike we went through many things, injuries, dehydration, moments of sheer exhaustion and frustration. We each learned things about ourselves, each other, and as a team. And that its a good thing Man invented cars! lol. The weather was also on our side; forecast was wrong for two days in a row. Apparently back in Toronto, it was just pure rains and thunderstorms. Lucky lucky. I don't think we would have made it otherwise!

Finally, Runner friendly weather!

For the past week, we've experienced a heat wave alert. Temperatures rising up as far as 33 degrees, but in face feels like it's 42 degrees. Just too hot to run.

Today, however, after a good shower on the friday, it was running appropriate weather. I know, rain or shine, but, the heat ... just doesn't work too well with me. Last week, we actually did a 19km hike in Rouge Hill Valley. At the time, I will like to say in our defense, we didn't realize there was a heat alert going on. Our starting point was a short walk (so we thought) from my friend's place, up on to Sheppard and Kingston Rd. It took us an astounding 45 minutes to walk ... 2 km? The rest of the hike did not bold too well for us either. Each of us had 2L of iced water in our hydration packs, some snacks, and of course our caps and cell phones. Energy already on the low (by the disappointment of the time it took us to get to the start path), the remaining of the hike was much slower than our previous practice hikes - approx. 4 hours.

My friend Madeline needed to return home by 1pm, and we had just finished the hike at that time - just at the starting point of the trail. Which meant that we still had to 2 km to hike through - sun, heat, glaring down at us, we opted in the end to use our cell phones and.. call a cab :-) We were back at her house in give or take 5 minutes. Ah if only we could sprout wheels beneath our shoes..

Today, I was back in business with running - cool air had once again returned! I had my usual breakfast, although with a slight twist -- smoked ham! I went through my usual routine, water to water belt, key check, cell, etc. I added some more running music to my ipod, something 'epic marathon music' remix. I also strapped on another support band for my right knee. Yep, Now I've got one on each leg :( I also got a free sample of this "rock tape", its suppose to also work similarly as a support band - except obviously it's tape. I think I will keep it with me just in case as backup stuff for our team hike - which by the way is about 2 weeks away! Yay!! I'm both excited and filled with anxiety! 100km, hiking from Barrie to Orillia..

So, anyway, lol, got side tracked there. I got to the beach and did my run, this time only for 16km - I thought it best to keep it easier for myself considering I had done no running all week. And also, it would be my first time running on pavement vs. the boardwalk. Hurray though, I managed it in 2 hours 10 minutes. Ok time, not the best. I could push for better. One step at a time. Sort of a warm up. And of course, I need to be sure I'm A-Ok for the hike, I wouldn't want to let my teammates down!

Next: Yoga on Monday! My friends Susan and Angela invited me to try out Moshka Yoga. I have only tried Bikram Hot Yoga, so I'm pretty excited to see what its like.

Second long run of the season plus two hikes - all in one weekend

For two weeks I have been quite adamant on staying with my training schedule, some easy runs in throughout the week, some cross-training on my bike (sadly, just my stationary one), and the Saturday that just passed, it was no different - despite that I had an 11km scheduled hike in the evening. Do note at the time, I had it in my schedule to be a 6km hike. Silly things that don't get recorded right...

The Saturday morning started off quite well. I was actually well awake for 6am (much better than the previous week), I dawdled a little in the kitchen, frying up yet again my two sunny side up eggs and toasted whole wheat bread. As I chewed on my food offhandedly I filled up my water bottles with fruit punch flavoured Gatorade. I decided I didn't much like the orange one - tasted too much like vitamin c (like the chewable Flintstones one I used to have as a kid).

Geared up with the usual, IT band - check, ipod - check, hat - check, keys and phone - check, emergency $5 - check, ...

And out the door, I went and discovered...
it was raining.

hmm. unexpected.

For a moment, I thought about heading back inside - only a second though - and banished the thought. Here I was in full running gear and I was going to quit because of a little drizzle? :P I've been through much worse - thinking back to last year when I ran with Team In Training while literally pouring rain, lightning and thunder, with all that jazz.

I started running, headed straight to the boardwalk. Surprisingly - though I know I shouldn't have been, there was a good turnout of runners that I saw; not only runners, but some pretty hardcore volley ball players! With light rain peeter patting on and off, I did my 16km run. Saw some cute dogs along the way, bumped into an avid walker 3 times (Still been putting off figuring out a more interesting route). I finished the run in 2 hours, which wasn't too bad. I had to keep in mind though, it was the boardwalk I had been training on -- I have yet to try running on concrete. Have been thinking maybe to warm up a bit before trying it.

After my run, I headed home, freshened up, finished packing, and off I went to meet my friends so I could go with them up to Barrie for the hike.

Oh, I have to say, while I was waiting at the mall to meet with them, I saw this most disturbing commercial about magic goo. Yes. Magic goo that apparently starts off as liquid, but you can add some substance and it turns into goo. And get this, cool as it is if you're just stirring it around in a container, but if you show a commercial with kids bathing in this stuff, it's just plain weird. My opinion of course.

Met up with my friends, did a little shopping, went to Vaughan Mills -- ah, wonderful mall, endless supply of shops... went to Bass Pro shops to get some items we still needed for the hike; got sucked into Lululemon...,and ended off all the shopping with a pasta dinner in the food court.

We checked in to our hotel, geared up and took our first official team picture! lol this is in fact, the first time all four of us were able to get together to do a hike. The event is only what, 4 weeks way?! :P

We headed up to horseshoe Resort to meet with our Oxfam group. Signing our lives away (the waiver), we were transported via a bus to CP4.





11.3km later, we congratulated each other on managing to finish the trail well within our expected finish time. During the hike, I introduced my friends to the cliffbloks that I used/am using when I do my runs; they kept saying it tasted so good! lol surprisingly, I thought they tasted quite good too. I guess having not eaten them for nearly half a year has brought back my love for them. Let's hope it keeps up haha. We also all used our hydration packs. Ok, not all of us - I hadn't filled mine with water... so water breaks for me entailed sliding my bag down, swinging it forward, unzipping the bottom compartment, pulling out my water bottle, unscrewing the lid, and then finally drinking it. My friends just uncorked the water tube and drank. Hydration pack envy. And irony was I HAD a hydration pack - just... unused. This would change the following day.



After doing a couple of stretches, we drove back to the hotel, freshened up and had instant noodles. We talked about our plan for the next day - our own little familiarization hike. We wanted to do a hike from checkpoint 1 to checkpoint 2, that alone in one direction was about 17km. That meant to get back to our car, it would be 34km. The idea was vetoed, and instead, we opted to go from checkpoint 1 to the rest area, approx. 11km one direction, making it only to be 22km hike cumulatively.

Sounded like a good plan.

Sunday morning, we all woke up - some more refreshed than others - ready to hike! We had instant noodles for breakfast and decided to drop in for the complimentary breakfast. Had a second breakfast (we felt like hobbits!!) and stocked up for lunch :) Made peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Hadn't had that for a long time.

We began the hike at Forrest Hill Public school, following a printed map provided by Cecilia (good thing she printed it out, otherwise, hiking would have been interesting while lost..)

Hiking at a steady pace, I had them try out the edisks -- which as Cecilia pointed out, tasted like concentrated Gatorade. I don't contest that. It does. Lol

For the first 5-6km, we were mostly still enjoying the scenery. The weather was also keeping good with us, drizzling on and off, keep us cool. I noticed though there was a dull ache in my left ankle. Of course, I ignored it, hoping that it would stretch out eventually as we hiked.

The path along the way wasn't always clear. There was a good point where we lost the white marker we were trying to follow and had to do backtracking. And hills. Lots of hills. Have I mentioned that I loathe hills with a passion? We decided as a group that we would run up those hills - better to get them over with. Worked out pretty good at the beginning ... but after 15km of hiking uneven ground, running up a hill becomes ever more difficult.

When we finally reached the midpoint of our hike (the 11km), we rested and had a 10min quick lunch. I don't think a peanut butter and jelly sandwich ever tasted so good. My friends who made their own variations for sandwiches - one just had a bagel with butter - even loved it. Funny how we all gain a new appreciation for the simple food sometimes.

After finishing up our lunch and having some snacks(trail mix, sandwiches,chocolates, etc) we headed off again, back to the same direction we came from -- to where our park would be parked at the end of the hike. Our speed at this point had dropped a bit, although we attempted our best to keep the pace up. My ankle by the 14km mark had began to complain a lot, but we needed to keep moving, none of us wanted to be out there in the dark.

By the 16/17km mark, we began realizing that we were running low on water. Lol. Our estimations were a little bit off - but we still had some extra Gatorade set aside in a water bottle. I was actually the first to discover that my hydration pack was clear of water. The Tremblant hiking incident flashed through my mind ... I will tell that story another time :)

At any rate, let us just say, it was not a good feeling. For the remaining km, we all began conserving our water, drinking as needed and of course we all agreed, anyone who needs any water, who ever can provide, shares :P Fantastic team eh? I guess deep down inside none of us wants to have to carry a fallen team member. hahaha Joking of course! :D

When we finally arrived at our destination, I wanted to hug the car. I never realized that walking could be so strenuous - coming from a person who ran a marathon. But then again, when you're running a marathon, you don't carry about 2L worth of water on your back, plus extra other gears in the backpack.

Before we could sit down or do anything else, we took our after the hike photo. I think we hid our exhaustion quite well :)

In total, we did 33km hiking that weekend.

Tomorrow our team will be getting together to do another practice hike, about 9km :)
Piece of cake! But wish us luck any way ;)

First long run of the season

Seems like forever since I had run more than an easy 6/7km, but today, I finally felt ready to punch it up a notch and get back into my old long slow distance training weekends. Not easy I have to admit because I love sleeping in!
Admittantly, I did sleep in a little more than I wanted - got up for 7:00am instead of 6:00am.

Todays breakfast: Buttered bread with sunny side up eggs. I would have added the bacon if there was any...

I was out the door by 8:30am and off to the boardwalk.

My great plan for the running route was really lazy work :) I had been contemplating it greatly throughout the week: do I want to do the beltline? Sunny brook? Map out my own route? There's the nifty app called mapmyrun.com that would make that pretty easy... But on the friday I proclaimed to my coworker that, yes, my great plan was to basically run the boardwalk 3 times (which would make it 18km). Easy to measure. Refilling the gatorade will be simply with the purchase of a new bottle, and in my mind, point of purchase would have been from the little stand that usually sets up beside the volleyball area of the beach.

Plan worked out pretty well for the most part. Only part that did not work out was the refilling portion - the stand I had been hoping to be set up was not there, even the pizza pizza wasn't open yet. I forgot it was Sunday -- likely they opened up a little later into the day. I managed though to conserve whatever gatorade I had; next time though I would get some of those e-discs and have some plain water instead. and... those cliffshots. Jubes jubes that I dreaded to eat for the longest time since the marathon (over saturated! :P)

After finishing my 15km (though my intention was 16km -- missed my mark by 1km!), I did a quick check - knee? felt good. face? not burnned. hungry? Very!

Next week, I rejoin my team 'Fantastic Four' for a night hike up in Barrie! This one will be I'm uber excited (I get to use those super headlights again!). We've got about 5 weeks to go till the Oxfam Trail event!

I also want to thank kindly to some new sponsors: Kimberley Bailey, Anna Do, and my amazing cousins! Thanks so much for your encouragement and contribution! :)

The Price is Right ...

So for the past few weeks I had been been shopping (more like online browsing!) for a bike to replace my old one. Nothing, however, would suit the budget I was going after (my friend Jeff had something to say about making a long term investment...).

Finally after been driven to two different locations of Canadian Tires, some visits to other stores and to Costco (yes, not a bike store, but they're known for their good prices!), I ended up at Cyclepath after some urging from my friend that it IS the place to get a bike if you're serious about biking. Which I am. Honest :)

The personel at Cyclepath were very helpful, they helped me out in picking the right frame, offered several alternatives to fit my budget... well, an attempt was made :) Most of the bikes there were over my budget to start, but they made up in quality (much lighter frames!). I ended up picking a Trek 7000 series -- very pretty :) Pricy, but pretty.

After making the bike purchase, both Jeff and I were pretty tired and hungry (and we hadn't even started biking yet!) so we headed off to Pho House (formally known as Pho 88), a Vietnamese restaurant on Broadview. Best way to power up! :P

We decided after eating, that we would wait until early evening when it wasn't so hot (and until I installed a bell on my bike), so I got dropped off at home. You would think I did something constructive during the time, but I ended up taking a nap. It wasn't until perhaps 10 minutes before I had to meet with Jeff I hooked up my bell, filled up my water bottle and jetted out of the house.

We met on Coxwell and Queen, and headed on the bike path and we made our way to this oversized parking lot. I practiced a lot of my turning and testing of the gears here (Jeff's biking bootcamp ;)) and once I got my groove with my new bike, we did a few runs (well, 2 really) of the actual path. Still, all in all, quite productive! I loved the feel of the new bike, the ease in changing gears, awesome brakes (that work!). The price for bike was high, but it feels ... right :)

Aside from getting a new bike, I had been doing a lot of hiking/walking long distances - mostly 6km - 7km. Nothing too streneous, but still keeping the training up for the long hike. Tomorrow, however, will be picking up the pace and doing a easy 6km run.

Lastly, but certainly not least, I want to thank my current sponsors to my event: Hoanh T. Ngo, Jeffrey Lam, Joyce Quan, Kai Liang, Lynette, Manh Nguyen, Phuc Nghiem Phu, Phung Nguyen, Vinh-The Lam, and Richard. Thank you so much for your support! :)

Dusk to Darkness

Saturday our team the Fantastic Four (minus one, because the lucky girl is in Japan!), did our first hike together - up at Horseshoe Valley in Barrie. The hike was organized by Oxfam as part of a familiarization of 100km trail, in this case, a 6% taste of what's to come in the last weekend of July.

Gearless as I was (notice the past tense reference :P), the three of us dropped in on Vaughn Mills Mall on the way up to the meeting spot. For those who have not been there, the mall's interior resembles a figure 8.. or an infinity sign :) You can wander in there forever!

Our first stop in the Mall was to hit the Bass Pro shop. The multitudes of things you can buy in there when you're planning an outdoor activity! Hydration packs, hats, flashlights, first aid kits, iodine, ponchos, sleeping bags, boots, shoes, tents, ... so many options.

First stop though was to get headlights. The title of the posting was selected purposely (and also named activity by Oxfam). I got myself a Petzl® Tikka2 LED Headlamp, followed by an sleeping bag (Can't even find a picture of it, but it resembles much like a emergency blanket), a 5-in-1 survival aid kit (liquid filled compass with a luminous dial, a waterproof match box, a whistle, a fire starting flint, and a nylon lanyard). My teammates got themselves a hydration pack (I was fortunate enough to have gotten one as a gift :P Now I get to put it to use!), headlamps and flashlights.

We grabbed a quick bite and headed off to our destination, excited with our purchases. Sadly to note, at this point, I have not bought my hiking boots -- I was going to make do with my old runners. May as well make use of them before they are officially retired.

We arrived at Carriage Ridge Resort (a place we booked for overnight stay) a bit earlier, and had time to unpack our stuff, and gear up for the night hike. Before we left, we took a quick team picture (see first pic), and drove to the meeting spot to sign in.

There was, as it was, a big turnout for the hike, approx 94 people. A school bus full of hikers. They drove us to the start point of the event, and we started the hike approx. 8:19pm.

I was eager to try out the headlights -- it said it could give visibility up to 29m! It didn't get dark until 9pm, (between all that time, cracks of daylight could be seen through the tall trees, lighting the trail for us), but it was hard not to want to turn it on earlier - :) I do love to try out new gadgets!

When darkness did finally fall, turned out my headlamp was as awesome as I had imagined it to be. On its own, it could light up the trail enough for all three of us AND the people ahead of us. Sweet. Got my money's worth! *grin*

The hike continued with light chatter, some talk about "what kind of bird would I be?" We have the answers: Goose, Phoenix, Penguin. Lol, Guess which one I am? ;)

A few times during the hike, I tried to convince my friends (inspired by the headlamp) that we should go Spelunking again. They.. have yet to be persuaded. I have learned, thought, that no doesn't always mean no...

We finished the hike in a little over an hour, signed out, and drove back to our resort. Having settled in and microwaved up some Uncle Ben's rice (surprisingly good after a hike), and indulging on some munchies, we settled down on the couch and watched the ending of "Goonies" (ah, such a classic!) on the tele. Following up with it, we all somehow (ok, it may have just been me :P) hooked on watching "Holes". We slept away at around 1am, and checked out promptly around 11 in the morning... and headed to the Cookstown outlet mall.

Originally, we had had planned to put in another hike in the morning, but it had rained during the night, making the ground exceptionally muddy, so as an alternative, we opted to use the time to get some uniforms for our team and any remaining necessities for the hike.

In Cookstown we found ourselves with some good bargain deals on a dryfit shirt for our team, but nothing else jumped out for us, so we headed back down to Vaughnmills Mall to check out other options. This time around, we found our team hat, another set of team tshirts, and most importantly, hiking shoes. I also found myself a pair of new runners that matched the current series I had been wearing. Made my selection much easier! One of my teammates also bought a pair of hikers.

Noted, all these purchases took us nearly 5 hours. And we had only ventured into the stores that were relevant to our "mission". Compared to the hike itself, I was more tired after shopping :P We ended the day at the mall with a Gelato icecream/milkshake. *grin* I can't complain, my weekend was well spent! :)

After a long winter of hibernation - that is what tends to happen when it gets cold outside :) - I have finally returned to running outdoors. Although my knee is not as tenuous as last year, I am still very careful with it - one has to be if you expect it to last!

My first run of the spring season was in fact on the Easter long weekend. Having been under the weather for a while, the idea of feeling well enough to do a short sprint on the boardwalk sounded like an excellent idea. The start of the run was amazing as always, feeling the cool breeze hit my face, the sun warming my body, and the thought of having an ice cream afterwards... :)

My speed wasn't as fast, but the good thing that came about was that I was running with out the knee support. AND that it felt normal! Can't imagine the victorious smile on my face afterwards.

Next few days, however, my left foot was feeling rather painful. It was only then I realized that I should have retired the pair of runners (yes, the same pair I used to run my marathon in addition to the training that led up to it. So give or take its been used for over 363 km). I am pretty sure the cushion... er, wait, there isn't any! has been worn to nothing but a thin pad.

So. Task at hand: Get new pair of runners before engaging in any new running activities. The next few weeks I did stretching exercises and random Yoga classes thrown into the mix.

Just the past week, since I have yet to get my new runners, I participated in a few spin classes at my local gym. If you recall in all my previous bloggings, I hate hills of any sort with a passion (My friends who have hiked with me in Greece know that by personal experience). So there is some irony that the spin classes that I joined in on were all- terrain ones. What better way to conquer your fears? Or in this case, fears and arch nemesis :)

Turned out Spin Classes are quite fun. My enjoyment was surprising and it worked well in my goal of training for my Triathlon (coming up in 2012 hopefully! Provided the Mayans were incorrect on their predictions ;)) and for helping me strengthen the calve and quad muscles; should help me in preparing for my long hike event.