The Epic Run

He is one wicked fast runnah!

WAY TO GO.....

seriously, I mean it you went way FAR....I am so proud!

O.k., it has taken me awhile to get this post up because I had to pay for my few nights of undisturbed, absolutely peaceful nights of sleep - I came home to my baby pushing through 2 more teeth and now she is sick (no, not swine flu!) and is up, and up, and up during the night, and NIGHT is the time I usually work on the computer....so when I get sleep it trumps blogging!


So why does he run? Because he loves every horrible, wonderful minute of it!

That's part of it, the other part is that it was an outlet after his mom's passing.

Now that is a part of his mental running plan...imagining his mom at the finish line, because that is where she would be.

I am starting at the finish instead of finishing at the start.....After the marathon, Randy was cold. A biting northeastern wind was blowing and the guy doesn't have a lot of body fat...running does that to him....poor thing.

Unlike his 1st marathon, (he's run 6 now) he no longer walks stiff legged like he is in pain following his marathons, one reason is better training and two, he pops "runner's candy" (ibuprofen) early in his run.

I saw quite a few people that it hurt to watch walk, it was like they were trying to stretch out the onset of rigamortis, not an easy task.

So, he was tired after the race, but not too bad - in fact, after his last marathon we took my parents sight seeing for a couple hours, and had dinner, and my dad bought me a new washer and dryer before going home. Suffice it to say, Randy does pretty well following his runs.

After seeing Randy run at the beginning of the marathon, we hopped into the car, hoping to get closer into the finish and see him a 2nd time. Since I knew his splits, I knew we could most likely do it, IF we could find a way around the road closures, and IF we could find parking and IF we could nudge into the thick crowds at the finish.

We got there about 10 min. after the elite men crossed the finish, it was awesome because they were still showing the winner on the jumbo-tron.

We were only about a block from the finish, I didn't think we would make it in that close. When we were close to the time I thought Randy would be coming in at, I got my camera poised, only to see him on the opposite side of the street and missed getting pics of him in the final leg -

now I am totally going to get sucked into buying overpriced photos from marathon photo

It is funny how couples think a like, I took this picture because I thought it was so neat the runners would take a moment to high five his little boy.......little did I know that Randy was doing the same thing to the kids that stuck out their hands....he said that he kept thinking that if our kids were there, he'd want the runners to high five them too.

I was looking for a white short sleeved shirt, but it was cold, so he made a wardrobe change at the start line and changed into his long sleeved gray shirt -

See him now-

Long sleeved gray shirt, black shorts, dark hair, fantastic body, awesome smile...

SEE HIM?

"Hey, totally awesome support team, love the homemade poster board sign - o.k. see you at the finish, I am feeling great!"

He is number #5829 out of about 25,000 runners

bib numbers correspond to qualifying times, the lower the number, the faster the runner

to run Boston, you have to run another marathon and meet a certain time for your age bracket to qualify to run here (except for the few that buy their way in, the money goes to charity, but still.....)

Yeah, he sees us! He is in the far corner, he came up so quick. This is around mile 5, looking pretty spunky.

He ran his half (13.1) in 1 hr. 30 and was hoping to complete the course at around 3 hrs.,

Finished in 3 hrs. 18 min., he was happy but slightly bothered that he cramped up in his knees around mile 18 and slowed down a bit to try and stretch it out. As such, he ran just over a 7 min. mile - but I have a feeling this won't be his last marathon, and hopefully not his first and last Boston either.

He was a smart man to slow down to stretch his cramps and not to slow down around the half way mark to kiss the girls from Wellsley College holding up signs, "Free Kisses" for the runners,

seriously, most of these men are starting to sweat at this point, yuck! The Wellsely girls have been there supporting the runners for 113 years - what a cheering section.

Randy said you could hear them screaming and cheering a mile before you even got to them!

This is the pack of elite runners,

they run under a 5 minute mile...FAST

my pic doesn't lie, there all black, from Kenya, Ethopia - the guy on the airplane said you could run fast too if you had lions chasing you all day - that's one theory

the one white guy is Ryan Hall, he was trying to become the 1st American to win Boston since 1983, he came in 3rd place.

It was so awesome to see these guys come - we just missed the elite ladies, they start a little earlier. This was the first year the elite runners had their names on their bibs instead of their ranks.

the sign says it all, this is the starting point-

not to mock anyone BUT, since Randy and I really had a few people ask these questions and since I OCCASSIONALLY laugh when people do dumb things, I am going to share-

somene asked me, "So is the Boston Marathon in Boston?", o.k. she is blonde really, we laughed, you can too!

"What does 26.2 mean, I keep seeing it everywhere?" I admit I don't know everything about most sports so some leniency is given here, but the answer is, for those reading this that may still not know, it is the length of a marathon.

About THREE WEEKS before the race, Randy was asked by him (a non-runner) "So I was talking to a runner friend of mine and he says about 3 hrs. to run the marathon is pretty good, so have you started training?"

Several people have asked me, "So do you run WITH your husband and are you going to run a marathon?" Randy runs PAST me but not WITH me. As for the 2nd part of the question, I am literally his better half, that is why for now I am sticking with half marathons.

it was like the first day of school, my boy getting on the bus-

Dinner of champions - pasta feed, carb loading, night before race

So if you want to stop here, the rest of this post is about our visit in Boston - which I now consider one of my top favorite towns - definitely put on places to visit

Randy and his siblings have been a couple times before this visit

his sister used to live here

but this was my 1st visit and I LOVED IT! I am sure part was due to the fact that it was us, his brother and sister and no kids (love them, but rejuvenating to have a break), and part was the vibe of the marathon, everywhere we went, the canary yellow shirt called out, "hey, I am a marathon runner" and so everyone else, from people on the plane (he got applause both going there and coming back from the passengers and crew), to people in the restaurants, to passersbys on the freedom trail, all wishing him good luck -

it was an awesome, positive experience,

I guess the department of travel and tourism should get some thanks too - THANKS, we'll be back!

The Border is a great, buzzing place on Harvard campus - good food, local ambiance, long wait (we passed some of the time by going to Urban Outfitters), but it was yummah!

Later we stopped by the Boston LDS temple - pretty!

Below - the cheerleaders,

Randy's brother, Kelly (the navigator, he brought his gps unit - she was brought to life when Kaylin named her Janice, totally helped with the tunnels and one way roads), and part time photographer

Kaylin, Randy's sister (once a Bostonian, limited on directions but real helpful on insights into sites and sisterly love and support),

Me, the photographer when not in the picture

Randy, the inspiration and the runner

Snapped a picture of this sign for you dad as we were driving along, it is by Fenway Park and reads,

"We sell Guns!, No i.d. required, no background checks, criminals and terrorists welcome"

I know this is a political push, but it also falls under our democrat vs. republican banter and is our kind of acidic humor.

Big baseball fan?

Me, not really,

I am starting small, t-ball and moving up to the big league

though my grandpa, semi-pro, and Randy's parents were big time baseball players

total tourists - pic in the subway, catching the green line - luckily everyone seemed a tourist since the Red Sox had a couple games, the Celtics were playing, the marathon ramp up was going on...

Boston is history-

Kaylin kept asking me some history questions, which I stumbled on,

having earned the history departments scholarship for college, I should have known more,

humbled me to come home and brush up on some U.S. history,

This is inside the Old North Church, the steeple that Sexton Robert Newman hung two lanterns on April 18, 1775 to signal the beginning of Paul Revere's momentous ride - it is also in the movie National Treasure for those looking for a short cut, Hollywood style history lesson

behind the Old North Church-

you can't see it in this picture, but there is an elementary school just to the side, think how it must be to have your teacher say, "...Paul Revere rode to the Old North Church to warn the colonists, o.k. now go look out the window to see it."

the original cobblestone roads in front of the Paul Revere home built in 1680, that public works crew did one heck of a job -

Revere was the father of 16 children and a part-time dentist, I know facts, you couldn't live without-

Benjamin Franklin went to school here - the first public school - the school is still open (at a different location) and 4 years of latin are still required- I wonder if the CIA still has a need for Latin linguists?

this is King's Chapel-

President George Washington came here during a visit in 1789-

to the side of the chapel is Boston's oldest burying ground; March Childton the first woman beleived to step off the Mayflower is buried here.

This is the house that Henry David Thoreau built and lived in for two years while he wrote. He built it at a cost of $29.

- inside the home; pretty simple living, minimal housework, no kids, quiet, no wonder the man could think and write

Randy looking out at Walden Pond, probably thinking this wouldn't be too bad of a place to live.

Walden Pond, a good thinking spot-

later we dipped our feet into the lake, cold water!

Harvard University -

I wasn't impressed with the aesthetics of the center campus, looked like it had been designed by academics, red brick buildings, a green court that was more dirt than grass, but a spot of levity hung high as tire swings were hoisted high up on the trees -

this was the best picture I took-

I applied to Yale, so have a natural bias toward Harvard (still if I had 80,000 a year to blow, I'd consider maybe going here for my graduate work).

This is Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's home -

Only a couple hundred yards down the street lived tories, those loyal to the British crown, while in this house George Washington planned attacks on the British soldiers, I can only imagine the tension and secrecy that must have hung in the air-

little Italy district in Boston, I love the flavor of the neighborhoods -

looks like the graveyard from one of our favorite Halloween books, "Rattlebone Rock"-

We spent quite a bit of time here taking in what these people's lives must have been like-

Buried here are are Samuel Adams, eight governors, all five Boston Massacre victims, Paul Revere, Ben Frankin's parents Peter Faneuil and Mother Goose (I didn't know she was a real person!)

Part of John Hancock is here too, but there not sure how much. Grave robbers wanting a piece of American history dug him up and cut off his hand that signed the Declaration of Independence, then a few years later during construction of a building nearby, his grave was accidentally dug up and before they got it back in the ground, grave robbers came and got his bones, so as far as REST IN PEACE goes....well, maybe not so peaceful.

the stone tablets, many of them too old to read, call out a time and place in history that so profoundly shaped our country-

Spending some time in Boston Common, America's oldest public park-

While Randy was registering, we drove around Boston to get a feel for the town, I even drove in Boston for a little bit, I was hoping not to get the northeast salute, (the finger), I got honked at once or twice, but drove like I was handing fries to a kid in a car seat that couldn't reach them, in other words, kind of wreckless and a bit aggressive, not too bad for a first timer.

Architecture marks areas, these are "Brownstones" in Boston proper which pretty much means pricey, pricey real estate -

There are so many old buildings and churches throughout Boston, lots of red brick, gothic windows, hand milled stonework, it all made me want to go back and look over my art history books again.

I loved being in this history rich, walking town, like Randy says, "Good Memories, Good Memories." I agree, it has been, "Good Memories!"

Thanks Mom so much for watching the kids!!! And for re-decorating the girls rooms, and cleaning, and playing with them and pretty much telling us to quit calling and enjoy our break. Kids, thanks for being so good and helping out with Kenzy while we were gone, you have been running right a long with Dad, your our special athletes and we love you tons o, la!