Big Sur Marathon – Here we come!

We have trained.  We have planned.  We made ipod mixes.  We have packed our bags.  On Sunday, we will run! 

When we announced our move to California, Susan Matheny of Welcome Touch Massage told us that the Big Sur Marathon was the most amazing and breath-taking marathon she has run.  Eric promptly signed us up! 

The course looks beautiful.  We will start at 7am in Big Sur, then run along Highway 1 north to Carmel.  We start in the Redwoods, then spend most of the course along the coast with the mountains to our right and rocky cliffs to the powerful Pacific to our left.  They most challenging part of this race (other than running 26.2 miles…) is the 2 mile, 5% grade climb, to Hurricane Point between miles 10 and 12.  After this point, the view is said to be incredible as we cross the famous Bixby Bridge to the sounds of a grand piano. 

As we approach the race, I’m excited and anxious at the same time.  I feel confident in my training and well prepared, so I look forward to seeing what kind of time both Eric and I can run.  Although they say to add 20min to your marathon time for this race to account for the hills and wind, I hope to complete my race around 4hrs, 15min.  Eric will finish at least 30min before me.  Then after re-fueling at the finish line, catch the shuttle back to Monterey and take a long afternoon nap.  We’ll relax and enjoy Monterey on Sunday evening, then drive back to Sac-town on Monday. 

Please be thinking of us Sunday morning!  I’ll try to post Sunday afternoon with our times!