After a week of rest since my last run, the island girl relay race had finally come up. My friend Susan and I had signed up earlier in the year for this. Like the previous year, the run would start with Susan running the first leg, and me running the second.
Unfortunately, as they say, the best laid plans, oft goes awry!
The night before the race, susan called and told me she wasn't feeling well and wouldn't be able to do the race. lol but she said I could totally do her leg too if I wanted to, and I completely balked at the idea. The year before I had "winged" a full marathon, and it was one of the toughest things to go through. lol I wasn't planning on just waking up and doing a half marathon.
I told her to rest up, and that I too was considering of not going too. Ironically about 5 minutes before she had called, I had just fallen while going up on an escalator. The result was bruising on my shins, and some scraping of the skin too. Eck. Not a good way to prepare for a race the next day.
At any rate, I did still want to see if I could do it, since there was no pain (at least noticeable), when I put weight on my right leg. I figured that if anything, I would just go to the island and if my leg did hurt, I would just walk around and skip the race.
I set my alarm, one for 6am and one for 6:30am as backup. If anything, one of them should wake me up since I had planned to catch either the 6:00am or the 7:30am ferry.
Race Day
I missed my 6am alarm. And my 6:30am alarm. It was 6:50am when I got up, and so like a mad woman, I raced to put on my gear and thankfully the night before I had set that all up.
Freshening up and all geared up (plus a jacket!), I was out the door and waiting for the street car by 7:05am. This was really cutting things close. The ferry would definitely leave promptly at 7:30am.. would I even make it?
I got to the ferry docks at 7:34am. Lol totally missed the boat.
Fortunately, it seemed I wasn't the only there for the race. There were in fact race crew people there, with their wagon of stuff as well. There was an 8:00am ferry to Centre Island. Phew.
While waiting, I laced up my timing chip and also discovered that there were no safety pins in my race kit envelop. No worries, I knew that the baggage check-in area always had safety pins available.
The ferry ride was quite uneventful, though I saw a super cut dog on it with his owner. I so wanted to pet him (or her).
Arriving on the island I had about 20 minutes to spare since my race didn't start till 8:40am. I checked in my baggage and got my safety pins to attach my bib to my running shirt. Sadly this year, Island girl package didn't include a free tshirt, but instead sandals. Liked the sandals, super cute, but the shirt would have been more of a practical use for me in the long run.
Once I had checked in the bag I realized then that I hadn't eaten for the morning. Sigh. How could I have forgotten such an obvious thing? Worse was also I had forgotten to bring my bottle of water!
Great.
lol. I would just have to make do, I knew there were a few water stations along the way. Just had to last until I got to them. Hunger.. well, I would deal with that later. It was too late to eat, the race was starting in a few minutes!
I took this time to speak with the race crew on what I should do since I was doing the relay solo. I was told by them that I would just do the first leg and then just head to finish line afterwards.
That sounded just fine by me lol as long as there was no expectation of me running both legs haha. Though honestly the chance of that happening was quite impossible.
Race Start
8:40am finally came and off I went. I seemed to enjoy the morning run a bit more, something about the time of doing the runs make quite the difference. The race route interestingly also went through the boardwalk section, just like the previous week, except I was going the opposite way.
As I was running along the route, I saw the km signs for the half marathoners and I couldn't help but think about what I was up for in October. The 10.5 k was already quite a feat for me, lol I had dropped in cardio after not consistantly running.
Once my allergies subsides more, I would start more outside training. It would be good to get some fresh air as well.
I crossed the relay transfer point, did a virtual tag to my missing partner and then made my way to the finish line.
I left the island not too long after that, got a hair cut :P and then went boating - ironically, right back on the harbourfront again!
Island girl relay, until next year as well!
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