September part II: Tractors, Choos, and 20 miles!

I'll try to condense my post this time...

Labor Day: We flew to Nebraska to visit our dear friend Joey (probably the only one who reads this blog ;) for that he deserves a shout out). He showed us all the ironic midwestern stuff a left-coaster could want to see: tornado warning signs, flat land stretching to the horizon, "Corn husker" ice cream for game day, and a tractor testing track complete with a tractor museum! Yee haw!

Needless to say, we didn't get much running in...

9/10/05: We had another 10-12 mile run, which we did on the Campbell trail by our house -- all in all a good, uneventful run since 12 miles is now becoming standard for us (crazy, right?).

Right: Campbell Park,the start of the
Campbell-Los Gatos Creek Trail


9/17/05: We did a "short" 6-8 mile run on our own. Nothing too exciting, BUT I do have a good story about that evening:

KRON 4, a local San Francisco station began airing Sex and the City that weekend, and to kick off the show, they had a "premiere" in Union Square. At noon they gave away 1,000 pair of Jimmy Choo shoes!! However, the line for the choos (he he) opened at midnight. What's a girl to do? Luckily, Joshin's girlfriend Tiina is a huge shoe fan as well and was up for an adventure. Yep, we (including Joshin who was dragged along) got in line at midnight and camped out all night for a free pair of shoes, albeit $600 shoes! Our shoes were gorgeous and Tiina and I strut happily ever after in our choos, though I shouldn't wear mine 'til after the marathon to save my feet...

9/24/05 -- Our last 20-miler
Early (but not so bright as fall arrives) we completed our second and final 20-mile run for the season. Hurray! Our run took us approximately 3 hrs 30 minutes total, so we are on track for our goal time of 4 hrs and 30 minutes for the marathon. After the run, we did our first "ice bath," which was an experience...when you run 20 miles it really tears down your muscles, so the coaches recommend you take an ice bath to reduce the swelling. It sounds terrible, but it actually is wonderful after that long run.
From now on we will be taking it “easy” running no more than 12 miles so we can recover for the marathon. It’s funny that 12 miles is “short” to us now, isn’t it?
Our 20-miler took place at the Sawyer Camp Trail, where we did our 12-miler back in July, and then we connected to the San Andreas Trail to increase our mileage. As we went along the San Andreas Trail and reservoir, we tried not to think about the fact that we were running on one of the most notorious fault lines in the world! The run was beautiful proceeding along water and mostly shaded by old trees, which made it peaceful for the long distance. We also saw six deer while running, including a fawn, which was cool.

10/1/05: Kimmie came down to watch the Stanford-Oregon football game, and we sort-of routed for Oregon...we told Kim we'd support our state, but if UO messed up, she'd hear about it. Of course we only got to point and laugh at the beginning when Stanford started with a field goal because UO killed them 44-20. Okay, *cough* good job ducks!

We ran 5 miles on the Campbell trail again on Sunday since it was our down weekend.

Okay, so that was actually long, sorry!
Now only two and a half weeks to go...