Weekend of the Halves

So, we have had some pretty hardcore race situations: double headers, triple whammies, back to back race weekends. Crazy stuff like that. Well this past weekend is just another to add to the list. It was the.....

What makes this the weekend of the halves is that this time last year, we ran the Myrtle Beach Mini Marathon with friends and had such a great time that we signed up soon after for this year's race. We were so excited for 2015 Myrtle Beach Mini Marathon on October 18! While we were signed up for this race, my crazy husband who not only runs, but swims and bikes as well had his goal for doing his first Half Iron distance triathlon in 2015. He heard so many people in our area saying great things about this race called PPD Beach 2 Battleship (PPDB2B), which has a half and a full iron distance available. So he signed up for it! Yay he's going to a Half Ironman yay!!!!!!!!! When asked about the date... he told me that it was going to be on October 17. Wait a second.... Myrtle Beach on the 18th, PPDB2B on the 17th. That's back to back days, in case you didn't realize. But hey, he decided to tackle it head on and I decided to go along for the ride.So that's just what we did! And we had a spectacular weekend. Here's the recap of the weekend:


We headed to Wilmington and Wrightsville Beach, NC to prepare for the PPDB2B festivities on Thursday. Friday was full of logistics planning-- we went to the expo, got his bike checked in, got his transition bags checked in at the two different transition areas, stuff like that. Then on Saturday, we woke up super early so I could drop off Mr. Marathon (Mr. Half Ironman?!) at the swim to bike transition area in Wrightsville Beach. The swim was a 1.2 mile swim in the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway, so it was salty, in open water, salty, with a current, and did I already say salty (???)-- all things he wasn't used to swimming in. Regardless, he had a fantastic swim at a time of 34:25. Upon completing the swim, he had to run across some docks and have his wet suit removed by wet suit strippers (I guess I had no choice but to be ok with this?!?!?!) and ran to the transition area where he biked out for his 56 mile bike. The bike was a little challenging due to limited training as he was focused more on the swimming and running. He hadn't biked this far since he had his Gran Fondo adventure last year, but he ended up finishing in 2:54:52, a little faster than he expected! After he biked in to the Wilmington Convention Center, where the bike to run transition area was located, he had a speedy quick transition and headed out for his 13.1 mile run, which he ended up finishing in 1:44:27! Even after swimming and biking for the past few hours. Crazy guy. While he was off gallivanting around, I was busy taking care of business. And by business I mean being his race buddy, which means I got to pick up his stuff as he finished with it, like his bike and his transition bags. And I had to pick them up and walk them to the car where I parked like a mile away in a parking garage (I ended up walking 7.5 miles that day according to my Fitbit-- almost a Half Ironman, right? HINT: WRONG. A Half Ironman is 70.3 miles). Anyway, he ended up finishing in 5:21:02, which was an hour shorter than he expected! He was very pleased with his time, especially taking into consideration the fact that he did not quite get in all the training he wanted to. And I'm super proud of him for setting his goal and smashing it!

Now for some pictures from the PPDB2B portion of the weekend:

At the expo!

Planning his transition bags very carefully

setting up bike to run transition

Setting up swim to bike transition area

Posing in front of where the swim course was

Oh yeah, and we're super cute! Hanging out on the beach!

Doing his wet suit waddle, haha!

Before doing a triathlon, one must take a selfie, duh

Getting on the trolley to go to swim start

There were too many people smiling as they went past this sign...

Making his strong arm as he ran through after his swim

Taking off on the bike

Coming in, he barely looks tired!

Running out like a flash!

Running down the finishing chute!
Ignore the lady who was still watching for her Ironman,
she's chill, don't worry.

Post race pizza, soda, chips, and cookies.
Also, from this angle you can see
his awesome temporary tattoo body marking!

His unofficial time/distance

After our busy day on Saturday (ok, some of us were busier than others), we headed an additional hour south to Myrtle Beach, SC to prepare for the Mini Marathon. We went to the expo, ate some pasta, and settled in for the evening to prepare for our early morning on Sunday. We woke up at 5 (ok 5ish....) and headed to the start line by 6:15. Of course after extensive porta-potty line-waiting, it was time to start. Now, remember that SOME people completed a Half Ironman the day before. Mister was sore and tired, obvs. But he still decided to give it all he had for his second half of the weekend. And despite my 7.5 miles the day before (totally hardcore, I know!), I decided to give it all I had as well. He finished in 1:34:58, which is by no means a PR, but still very impressive considering he had just completed 70.3 miles the day before. I have not been putting in the training that I needed for a PR, so I did not expect to do very well. I ended up finishing in 2:37:23, which is approximately 18 minutes longer than my standing PR from last year's race. So my time was not awesome, but at the same time, it's not too shabby at all (considering my practice run from 2 weeks ago took me over 3 hours....!). We were both happy with the race and we had a fun weekend, or should a say a fun.....

Now here are some pictures from Sunday:

OH LOOK! We ran in to our running buddies at the expo...
JK we wish. They had other things going on and couldn't make it.
(They're photoshopped in there, I know you can't tell.)

Pre-race Flat Stanleys

Very nice pic of me around mile 11 or 12
on the Myrtle Beach Boardwalk
courtesy of my personal photographer

Weekend of the Halves in one picture.... 

Running buddies
(yes my eyes are closed
THEY WERE CLOSED IN EVERY SINGLE ONE
OK IT WAS BRIGHT.)

:)

Walking on the beach post-race

It was a tough weekend, ok??
And somebody had to drive the car!
(HINT: It wasn't me.)

As for upcoming events, we don't have anything coming up immediately. Mr. Marathon has his Spartan Beast event in November, but other than that, nothing else major, besides actually training. Yeah, we need to do some of that I guess... for anything else that may come up in the future.... As for now, we will be recovering from the !

From Bassett....

Saturday September 1, 2012:

This is the date that mister and I started this blog. We have been blogging for a little over 3 years. Hard to believe, right?? It's already been 3 years! In our first blog post, we explained the name of our blog: From Bassett to Boston & From Southern Belle to Disney's Belle (now, 13.1 to 26.2). We told you, our lovely dedicated readers, our deepest darkest running secrets-- his: to qualify for the Boston Marathon and hers: to run a half (full) marathon. As you know if you follow the blog or know me at all, you know I have achieved my goal of running both half and full marathons, which in comparison to Mr. Marathon's dream, mine was relatively easy to achieve. Qualifying for the Boston Marathon is the highest standard, the ultimate goal for many marathoners. He made the announcement to the world (uhhh ok, to the blog) that he had the goal to qualify for Boston over 3 years ago, although it has been in the back of his mind since he ran his first marathon in April 2010. Over the course of 5 years a lot has happened, many miles have been logged, injuries have occurred, races have been run, motivation has come and gone and come back again, culminating in one single moment in time. One single race application (yes, for those of you who don't know you have to apply for this race). And one single email response:

ACCEPTED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

From Bassett to Boston:  

Now, I'll leave you with this song called Boston by Augustana. Although it has literally nothing to do with the Boston Marathon or running at all, I like the part where they go "AND I THINK I'LL GO TO BOOOOOSTOOOOOON" and that's exactly what Mr. Marathon will be (or he better be!) singing between now and April 18, 2016 when he has the privilege to run the most prestigious marathon in the world! And I’ll get to go watch. :)

Boston-- here comes Alfredo Garcia!!!!!!!

His head shot from Cross County at Averett University.
He so cute!!

Patriots Triathlon

A couple of weeks ago, we traveled to Williamsburg, VA for the Patriot Triathlon. This race was very well organized  with lots of refereeing going on (which can be a good or bad thing....). There were two distances on Saturday (International and Half Ironman) with a sprint on Sunday. Mr. Marathon decided to up his triathlon mileage and go for the International distance in preparation for the Half Ironman he is doing NEXT MONTH!!!!! Anyway, the International was a good in between distance for him so he can keep on improving. This distance included a 1500 meter (open water!) swim, a 40 km (approx. 24 miles) bike ride, and a 10k run (6.2 miles). Enjoy these photos chronicling the day's events, start to finish!

Preparing to swim in the 80-degree James River

It was stormy, cloudy, and rainy.....
Perfect day for a triathlon...?

Coming out of the water!

Running to the transition area

Biking out

Running in to the finish

Finishing strong!

He really enjoyed this triathlon, and he finished with a time of 2:42:38. He was hoping to finish around 3 hours, so he totally blew his goal outta the water!

As for upcoming events, we have the Myrtle Beach Mini Marathon coming up in October, but also, as I mentioned at the beginning of this post, Mr. Marathon is going to tackle the half iron distance in October as well in Wilmington, NC called PPD Beach 2 Battleship. That's pretty much all we have lined up for now, besides the never ending training!

Slumps and Spartans

Hello, everybody. We (I) haven't been blogging lately for a multitude of reasons. First of all, we haven't been racing a lot due to our summer slump because it's been hot and muggy and storming and ew, which makes it hard to stay motivated and keep going consistently. Second of all, we haven't done had many races to do because it's summer and therefore NOT race season, thus contributing to the summer slump. Finally, for the past two weeks, I have been in the midst of a personal struggle. If you follow me on Facebook or Instagram or know me at all in person, you know that I lost a close friend two and a half weeks ago, which has been very difficult to cope with. I have been in an even bigger slump, not just in running, but in all aspects of my life. I have been slowly stumbling back to my feeble attempt at being normal. So, in that regard, I'm going to do some catch-up here on the blog. Here we go! But first, enjoy these then and now pictures of me and my bff since second grade who I will always remember fondly, while doing a random smile....

Ok so, the main thing that I haven't talked about on the blog that I feel like I need to is that Mr. Marathon is going for the Spartan Trifecta, which means he has to complete a sprint, super, and beast, which are varying distances of Spartan races, within a calendar year.

Back in April, he completed the Charlotte Spartan Sprint, which we never blogged about (shame, shame, I know). He ran it with a friend, and had tons of fun. Here are some pictures!

MUD

Looking TOUGH!

Jumping over hot coals

Victorious (and muddy) Spartans!

Showing off their bling

Last month, on August 22, we traveled to beautiful Wintergreen, VA for the Virginia Spartan Super race. It was a fun day, good weather, and a challenging course. I say it was a fun day for me because I didn't do it and I got to ride the ski lift up and down the mountain. Yes, I said mountain. For those of you who don't know, Wintergreen is a ski resort. Which means the entire course was on an actual mountain. Turns out, this is the reason that the Virginia Super is like, the hardest one. Leave it to hubbs to find the hardest one to do. Anyway, he and  his friend who did the Charlotte Sprint with him came to do the Super and brought his brother along. Here are some pictures!

The gang before getting muddied up

Climbing the cargo net

Artistic photograph of the cargo net climb

Climbing up a wall! Like a boss!

That obstacle that hubbs is too skinny to do:
There was a pulley with a sandbag that may or may not be heavier than his whole entire body.

  

Ridin' dirty on the ski lift

Panoramic view of the party zone

One of the most challenging obstacles

Rope climb over a mud pit

Jumping over the *huge* firepit OoOoOo So HaRdCoRe

His medals from the Sprint and the Super...
all that's missing is the BEAST!

Yesterday, he participated in the Patriot Triathlon which I will blog about soon. As for upcoming events, Mr. Marathon is currently running cross country for his college, Averett University, so they have meets until about November, and we will both be participating in the Myrtle Beach Mini Marathon in October.We have some exciting stuff coming up, so hopefully I'll actually blog about it and not fail miserably...!