First of all, apologies if you saw a version of this earlier. I meant to save as a draft, but published by accident.

Yesterday, I had an awesome client event. New Balance had their fall press preview, and I worked at it for a few hours.

We showed quite a few lines of shoes, but there was one that I was dying to try–the RC 1600s.

First of all, they’re GORGEOUS. I value my knees and not injuring them, so I don’t pick my shoes based on looks, but these are one good-looking pair of shoes.

And they’re made for marathoners. They’re racing shoes built for people racing distances anywhere up to 26.2. (It just so happens I’ll be doing that again in October!) They’re lightweight (less than 5 ounces) and have a shorter heel-to-toe drop.

I have never worn racing shoes before, and honestly, I’m not sure if I ever would have bought them, but I decided to take them out on a tempo run this morning. One mile warm-up, two miles tempo (8:20, 7:56!), one mile cool-down.

They were awesome. The first mile it felt a bit odd wearing such a light shoe with a thin sole, but after that, it felt great. I could definitely feel how a lighter shoe helped my legs power through.

The tempo run was also amazing, too. So far, so good on my #RWrunstreak. 4 for 4. For the past few months, I’ve had no desire to do any sort of speed work at all, but knowing I’m starting marathon training next month, I’m starting to add it back in to prepare my body for what’s to come. (Dear body: a lot of running. Some of it as fast as you possibly can.)

We also showed the RC 5000s–the lightest shoe ever. The women’s version weighs 2.7 ounces!

They’re made for short-distance racing and speed workouts. (And are also gorgeous.)

Do you (or would you ever) wear racing shoes?

I’ll be 30 at the beginning of next year. Or, I mean, 29 again.

While a wise friend has convinced me that life does actually go on at 30 (and that I can continue to PR in races), I’m trying to make this last year of my 20s particularly awesome.

So far, so good.

But a fun night tonight convinced me that maybe I need to let loose a little more often. After all, nobody ever said, I wish I sat at home more, right?

I moved to NYC in the summer of 2008 and started this whole “healthy thing” in February 2009. For the first year, I was trying (and succeeding at!) losing 50 pounds. Since then, I’ve spent most of my time training for races. I enjoy cocktails, but always in moderation…on work nights.

But tonight? Tonight I had a ridiculously fun Junior League meeting.

We held our last meeting of the year at Tortilla Flats–a tradition three years running.

Tonight just happened to be bingo night.

And I just happened to win! Which means I won this hot t-shirt and a round of tequila shots for our table.

Thank god for fajitas.

This place is so cheesy, but I love it.

We stayed so long that Erin, one of the girls on my committee, also won.

Since I would like to be a responsible adult at work tomorrow, I sneakily handed off my shot to the table behind me.

Once we finally went to leave, it was pouring out and none of us had umbrellas, so we headed back to our table for another pitcher of margaritas.

I walked the 1.2 miles home and now am going to chug a million glasses of water before going to sleep.

Worth it.

6:45am: alarm goes off

7-7:30: pack stuff

7:30-7:40: run just one mile to start off the Runner’s World Run Streak. (One mile > 0 miles, and knowing I had a loooong day of travel ahead, I didn’t want to wake up any earlier than necessary.) Tina asked who was going to tell her she couldn’t stop when it got tough during her half this weekend, and I told her that she was. She was going to tell herself to just STFU and run. I’m going to take some of my own advice here and just STFU and run. Every day between now and July 4. I’m going to start marathon training on July 9, so this will be awesome pre-training, and on days that I would have otherwise rested, I’ll just run one mile.

(Besides, it’s pretty hard not to run when this is what you’re looking at.)

7:40-8: shower, get ready

8-8:30: double-check I haven’t forgotten anything in the house, say goodbyes

8:30: leave with Tina and Sarah; drop off keys at rental place, which is awesome, and which we’ve used four out of the five years we’ve gone down there.

8:45-9:15: drive to the bridge to leave the Outer Banks. We stayed in Corolla this year, which is a nice town and a little quieter than Nags Head/Kitty Hawk, where we’ve stayed in the past, but a bit further from the bridge to leave the island. Staying in Corolla, though, means you basically have to drive south just to drive an equal distance up north to leave the island.

9:15-10:30:: Drive from the bridge leaving OBX to the border of NC and VA. Stop for bathroom break #1 of quite a few.

10:30-3:30: Drive to Arlington, Va., to drop off my friends. Driving straight from OBX to NYC would be more direct (100 miles more direct, according to the Google), but driving alone that whole way on Memorial Day would suck. At some point in there, we stopped at Subway. After an indulgent weekend, I want lots of veggies.

3:30-4: Stop at Sarah’s and rest for a few before turning around and leaving again; text Anne and tell her I’m approximately a mile away from her and would love to meet up…but know that I have a gazillion more hours on the road.

4-5:30: Drive and feel exhausted and wonder how I’ll make it the whole way. Stop at Maryland House and contemplate taking 10-minute nap in car. Set iPhone timer for 10 minutes, close eyes, after 30 seconds decide to screw it and buy some coffee. Get an iced soy latte and veggie wrap at Starbucks (that place cannot ruin anything it puts in a whole wheat wrap, FYI) and hope it does the trick.

5:30-6:30: The coffee helps almost immediately and I start rocking out to Madonna.

6:30: Google Map the route the rest of the way, even though having lived in DC for 7 years, I’ve driven this way approximately one million times; notice there’s traffic and decide to skip the New Jersey Turnpike to take 295-N. Probably best decision of my life, as I didn’t sit and stare at taillights once.

7:30: Spy a “scenic overlook” sign on 295. Delirious on espresso and exhaustion, wonder if I’m seeing things. Scenic overlook in NJ? I know my home state has some pretty parts, but I didn’t expect to see any of them on my drive.

I had to walk on this overpass over the highway to get to it, but I was too curious not to.

Such a pretty sunset over the river.

…and there’s the smokestacks.

7:30-9:15: Keep driving, think of driving like a marathon and tell myself I’m almost there. Try not to think about the fact that I’ve been on the road since 8:30am.

9:15: Walk into my parents’ house to exchange car for dog; my awesome mom gives me a ride back into the city.

10:15: Walk back into apartment, deliriously tired, but happy to sleep in my own bed for the first time since last Tuesday.

11:20: Faceplant in bed.

An incredibly long day of travel to go 550 miles, but so worth it to have a fun weekend at the beach to mostly unplug and wind down and be thankful for time off and to go back to a secure job, instead of worrying about being laid off, like last year.

How was your Memorial Day? Favorite long roadtrip that’s totally worth it?

Greetings from paradise.

I’m in the Outer Banks for the fifth Memorial Day in the row. On maybe the first or second time here, someone said we should come here every Memorial Day, even when everyone’s married and with kids. We haven’t gotten to the bringing kids phase yet (although one couple has dropped out due to child), but there are quite a few engaged or married couples here now, so I think it’s safe to say we’ll be coming here for a long, long time.

Thursday night, I drove down to DC from NY and got in at 11:30PM, cat-napped and left around 3:30AM to get to the beach. It sucked, but we were on the beach by 10am, so I couldn’t really complain.

Yesterday mostly consisted of relaxing, but by 5pm, everyone was drinking, and I knew I wanted to get a run in.

It sucked. I was exhausted and dehydrated from laying on the beach all day, and my legs felt like lead. And it was hot. I had planned to only run three miles, but by 2.25, I was done. I tried to get myself to keep going, but by 2.5, there was no trick or mantra in the world to keep me going, and I ended up walking the last half a mile. I haven’t done that on a short run in forever, but I had absolutely nothing left in me.

This morning, my friend Sarah and I rented bikes from Just for the Beach. Sarah has a road bike and rides centuries, and is pretty hardcore. I’m not that hardcore a biker, but I do usually ride for a workout, not just to ride.

So when we got to the rental shop and realized they only had cruisers, we were a little disappointed.

But, in going with the “whatever, we’re at the beach” attitude, we hopped on and rode away.

We rode down through Corolla and Duck and rode about an hour each way. I didn’t have my Garmin, so I don’t know how far we rode, but we broke a sweat and had fun, and got more exercise than we would have had we not gone, so there’s that. It was certainly less far than the 50 miles we rode last year!

It’s nice to have other friends on vacation who are in to fitness, because I probably wouldn’t have otherwise gone to rent a bike on my own.

Do you exercise on vacation?

Greetings from paradise.

I’m in the Outer Banks for the fifth Memorial Day in the row. On maybe the first or second time here, someone said we should come here every Memorial Day, even when everyone’s married and with kids. We haven’t gotten to the bringing kids phase yet (although one couple has dropped out due to child), but there are quite a few engaged or married couples here now, so I think it’s safe to say we’ll be coming here for a long, long time.

Thursday night, I drove down to DC from NY and got in at 11:30PM, cat-napped and left around 3:30AM to get to the beach. It sucked, but we were on the beach by 10am, so I couldn’t really complain.

Yesterday mostly consisted of relaxing, but by 5pm, everyone was drinking, and I knew I wanted to get a run in.

It sucked. I was exhausted and dehydrated from laying on the beach all day, and my legs felt like lead. And it was hot. I had planned to only run three miles, but by 2.25, I was done. I tried to get myself to keep going, but by 2.5, there was no trick or mantra in the world to keep me going, and I ended up walking the last half a mile. I haven’t done that on a short run in forever, but I had absolutely nothing left in me.

This morning, my friend Sarah and I rented bikes from Just for the Beach. Sarah has a road bike and rides centuries, and is pretty hardcore. I’m not that hardcore a biker, but I do usually ride for a workout, not just to ride.

So when we got to the rental shop and realized they only had cruisers, we were a little disappointed.

But, in going with the “whatever, we’re at the beach” attitude, we hopped on and rode away.

We rode down through Corolla and Duck and rode about an hour each way. I didn’t have my Garmin, so I don’t know how far we rode, but we broke a sweat and had fun, and got more exercise than we would have had we not gone, so there’s that. It was certainly less far than the 50 miles we rode last year!

It’s nice to have other friends on vacation who are in to fitness, because I probably wouldn’t have otherwise gone to rent a bike on my own.

Do you exercise on vacation?

…this isn’t a post about Reach the Beach?

I had so much fun, but it’s nice to get back to regular blogging. Sort of. I leave for a fabulous long weekend at the beach TONIGHT! I’m going to the Outer Banks with friends–for the fifth Memorial Day in a row–and driving down to DC tonight and OBX tomorrow.

I’m really excited to collapse on the beach tomorrow, because I feel like I’m still catching up from sleep from last weekend. I’ve been a complete fail at waking up to work out, but I still managed to get a good workout in Tuesday night and last night.

Tuesday, I did 20 minutes of super-sweaty intervals on the Stairmaster, and last night I had a lovely run while out at my parents’.

The Stairmaster is something I did often while losing weight, and I forgot what a good workout it is. I mean, hoisting your body weight over and over again for 20 minutes is no joke.

Last night, I went out to my parents’ to borrow a car to drive down to the Outer Banks. I hadn’t woken up in time to work out before work yesterday, so I told my mom that as soon as I got home, I was going to run. I didn’t give myself or her a choice. Once I walked in the door, I dropped my bags and immediately changed into my workout clothes, because I knew I wouldn’t otherwise do it.

There’s a huge hill coming out of their street, and I tackled it head-on. After running on hilly terrain all last weekend, I was far less afraid of tackling hills. Tuesday’s tough-but-awesome workout reminded me that I need to push myself more in my workouts than I have been lately, so after that first tough mile, I kept picking it up.

I came back, and my mom had an awesome dinner of scallops, sweet potatoes and spinach for me.

So, a few weeks ago, I said I really wanted to lose a few pounds before going to the beach this weekend. Three weeks later, and the scale’s only down a pound and I tried on a bikini last night and was still really unhappy with what I saw. I’m disappointed in myself, but at least I feel like I’m making progress.

Save for this week, I’m back in a much better workout routine. I’ve introduced strength training back into my life. It’s no longer as much a puzzle to get my workouts in, making me wonder how I thought it was so hard just a few months ago, as my schedule hasn’t gotten any lighter.

And now that the routine is back, I’m craving the intensity. I want the hard workouts, not just because they will make me thinner (which they will, if I don’t eat back everything I burned…), but because I miss pushing myself.

But I’m ready.

(Which is great, because I have a marathon coming up that I’m coming for.)

I’m back in a better place than I’ve been lately, and I’m ready to kick ass.

I’ve had a great week at work, and considering that last year as I left for OBX, I knew I was probably going to get laid off the week after (and I did..), I am just really thankful to be employed at all, much less at a rewarding job.

Tonight I’ll be driving to DC and tomorrow, down to OBX.

I have a feeling I’ll be talked into another long bike ride, so I’m sure I’ll be back at some point with another post.

HAPPY MEMORIAL DAY WEEKEND! Are you doing anything fun?

So this is one of my last Reach the Beach-related posts…probably. There’s a few more things about the race still on my mind that I may blog about, but I’ll at least spare you a few days!

One of the other really cool things we did was go on a tour of the New Balance factory in Lawrence, Mass.–about 40 minutes outside of Boston.

While this tour would have been interesting to me just as a blogger who was interested in running, it also held special meaning to me for a few other reasons.

First of all, they’re my client, so it was completely invaluable to learn more about the background of the company I’m working with. The past six months, I’ve loved working on this account, but seeing the factory in person really brought it all to life and made me feel even more connected with NB.

Secondly, until recently, my dad owned a textile factory in NJ, despite most of his competition going over to China–so New Balance’s commitment to American manufacturing really makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

The facility in Lawrence we went to is one of New Balance’s five U.S. factories. The company is committed to manufacturing 25 percent of its shoes in the U.S–which is 25 percent more than any other American running shoe company.

While this is obviously good for keeping jobs here, it also helps the company because its retail partners can maintain a lower inventory at any time, since the shoes aren’t coming as far. It also means that if you customize 990s or 993s online, you can get them on your doorstep within a week.

Sarah made a very important phone call from the lobby before our tour started.

Safety first–we had to wear these safety goggles and closed-toed shoes.

And…yeah. Our New Balance and RTB friends quickly realized what a pack of bloggers means: lots of “can you take a picture with my camera?”

[photo via Jack at pixelwiremedia.com / rtbrelay.com]

The shoes’ uppers are constructed from synthetics and pigskin sourced from Maine and cut by hand.

They are cut down, and then the Ns are sewn on. (The shoes we saw being made are the 990s, the company’s heritage shoe.)

The upper is then formed before the sole is put on. Once the sole is put on, the shoe is put in heat to form the shape. It’s then put through a metal detector to make sure there are no pieces of metal in the shoe.

Ta-da!

In this factory, the 990, 812 walking shoe and 706 walking shoe are produced. (Walking is a big market for New Balance’s U.S.-made shoes.)

I also thought the corporate culture I saw in the factory was really interesting.

Every year, each associate is responsible for coming up with a problem-solving idea, which is then displayed on this wall.

There was also this poster on the eight deadly wastes, one of which is “unused associate creativity.” The company really values the contributions of everyone.

After the tour, we went down to the Sports Research Lab, which interacts with and tests athletes from high school athletes and runners from local running clubs to elite Team New Balance runners.

It was really freaking cool. We started off trying out a device that measures how your foot distributes weight, aka the loading rate.

You step on this…

And it spits out this graph, which also shows your arches. It can’t show height, but it shoes whether they’re long or not. I think this graph is Sarah’s feet, but they said my arches were long. (Probably because I’m a bigfoot.)

Afterwards, they split us into three groups and rotated us among the stations.

We started off with the Glass Top Kistler Force Plate, which measures the forces people apply to the ground in all directions while a camera below the plate captures the foot landing. It’s one of the only glass top force plates in the United States.

I first walked over it and then ran over it.

The initial bump in this graph shows that I heel-struck a bit, but not too dramatically.

They had tons of competitors’ shoes to test.

Next, we went into the Smash Lab.

We learned that the more firm the foam, basically the more it protects your foot and leg. He showed us with a softer foam, and we saw the machine hit the foam harder and leave an indent. The stiffer foam absorbed more of the impact and didn’t leave an indent.

This MTS Mini Bionix System applies force and torque to simulate an athlete’s use of the shoe. It can replicate 6-8 weeks of wear in two to three days.

This machine measures traction, and how much force it takes to move the foot within the shoe.

[via Monica]

Next, we got to run on a treadmill to measure gait. Even for 30 seconds, running without a sports bra was…interesting.

DO YOU SEE THAT MIDFOOT STRIKE? It is a thing of beauty.

They explained, though, that it’s much easier to not heel-strike barefoot–hence the whole barefoot running trend and their Minimus line.

But still. I’m going to pretend I just have a pretty midfoot strike like that.

Finally, we learned about perception testing.

Do you see his weird goggles? We all have subconscious (and conscious) brand preferences. They found that if they brought in runners who were used to, say, Brooks, and asked them to try on a Brooks and a New Balance, if they could see them, they’d always pick Brooks. They also noticed that some people would always choose the shoe on their right foot, no matter what. So they started using these googles so their testers couldn’t see their feet.

They suggested, that if you’re trying on a few different pairs of shoes, to not just try one on each foot, but to switch the shoe on each foot so you don’t select the shoe you’re naturally biased towards.

And that’s it! Our tour concluded in their factory store, where I ended up buying the skirt I wore on my last leg. #thingsidontneed #notevenalittlebit

If you could go inside any company’s office/factory, what company would be? (Or what cool company have you been inside of?)

Last we left off, we’d gone through one round of our team, and I was trying to get some sleep in the van, semi-unsuccessfully.

We got to the Van Transition Area (the points where our entire team was together for a little while while we transitioned from Runner #6, Sarah, to Runner #7, Tina) around 11:15, but we weren’t expecting the second van to get in until about 1:30am.

I sort of thought I’d be able to sleep while Tina and Monica, the runners before me, were running. I mean, I wasn’t running, so I could sleep, right? But as soon as our van mom’s alarm went off, we were all up and ready to cheer on the rest of our runners.

Tina and Monica went before me. I’d been a little nervous about the whole nighttime running thing, but watching Monica freak out right before my leg freaked me out a little, too. What would it really be like to run in the dark at 3:30?

In order to stay safe while running in the dark, there were a few things we did: wore reflective vests, sweet New Balance hats with lights and blinking lights on the vest.

[photo of Elizabeth, via Tina]

I don’t have any pictures of myself in the dark, but just picture me wearing a long-sleeved awesome pink New Balance shirt with black capris, and it’s pretty much the same thing.

The running hat with lights was one of the things I couldn’t quite wrap my head around before the race. Would the hat really throw off enough light? Would it really be so dark that I need it? Yes, and yes.

This leg was 6.51 miles. Although when I first saw how nervous Monica was, I became nervous myself, by the time it was my turn, I’d seen how wonderful the team was at supporting her on the course and was less scared. The van “hopscotched,” meaning that Monica would run half a mile, and the van would run up to meet her (cheer for her, jump out in a banana costume.)

Before each leg, NB Monica would ask us what we needed for the leg–when did we want her to stop? Would we need water? (There’s no water out on the course, which makes sense, but is an interesting difference from traditional races.)

I didn’t want to play hero, so I asked Monica to stop just as frequently for me as she had for Monica. I started off the first mile with my lower back really tight from sitting/sleeping in the van, and I was nervous it would hurt for the rest of the run, but I stopped for a second to stretch out a little and, very luckily, it ended up being fine. The first 3-4 miles were pretty dark, but I was less scared than I thought I’d be. I thought I’d be terrified. Every once in a while, in the stretches in between meeting up with the van, I’d think I heard footsteps and turn around to look…but they were my own.

By mile 4ish, I was getting into Foxborough. Not only was it starting to get lighter out (it was after 4 at this point), but there was a nice little downtown with streetlights (streeeeetlights, peeeople…ohhhhh ohh….), so I felt much more comfortable with this overnight running thing. Once I got around mile 3.5-4, I picked up the pace because I was just ready to be done and back in the van. About a mile or so before the end, some dude passed me, and I picked up the pace. I knew I’d never pass him back, but thinking about picking up my pace helped. I gave myself a goal for this leg, too–and it was to run 6.51 in no more than an hour. My Garmin literally said 1:00:00 when I stopped it, for a 9:10 pace. I can definitely run faster in “normal” races, but given the lack of sleep and sitting around, I was plenty happy with this pace.

Elizabeth, Anne and Ashley ran after me, and then it was time for another trip to the Van Transition Area.

Some of the girls tried to go back to sleep, but Elizabeth and I were wide awake, and decided to hop on top of the van. Why? I don’t really know. NB Monica mentioned she’d slept on top of her van when she did Ragnar, and we thought it was a good idea to hop up there.

Sometimes, even bananas get tired. I think she was the only one who actually fell asleep. The rest of us laid outside for awhile and chatted before Monica woke up at 9:30 and we went for coffee.

At this point, basically everyone’s stomach was upset except mine. Considering I usually am the one with stomach issues, I was convinced this meant I was next, and I ate as plainly as I could. We went to Dunkin’ Donuts and I got a turkey sausage flatbread without cheese and an iced tea.

All afternoon, I was antsy to just go run so I could get to the beach, but by the time my turn came around, I didn’t actually want to run.

But, um, I didn’t really have a choice, so off I went.

This leg was my longest, at 6.88, and it was HARD. Hot, hilly, sunny. I wish I had taken pictures on this leg, because it was pretty. I ran past some farms (that didn’t smell pretty) and a winery (which I wanted to stop at), and I tried to make myself enjoy this leg. To be honest, the running part of this leg was no fun at all. I was tired and hot and ready to be done.

Finally I finished! I was so happy to have the running behind me, but at this point, I was really antsy and wanted to reach the beach immediately. However, there were still three runners ahead of me–Elizabeth, Anne and Ashley.

Ashley’s last leg was gorgeous!

FINALLY

FINALLY!

31-some hours after we started, we reached the beach.

Our van zipped ahead to get us to the beach (where Van 1 had been hanging since around noon that afternoon) and wait for Ashley to finish.

We did it!

And then we made a beeline for the burrito bowls. After 31 hours of random meals, it was nice to get some veggies.

And a quick beer.

I totally caught Sarah making a quick video in the parking lot. Vloggers will be vloggers?

We taped a quick interview with the RTB videographer who’d been hanging with us for the entire experience, and then it was all over. We boarded our vans and went back to the New Balance offices, where our entire adventure had begun. The upbeat mood we’d all been in for the previous 48 hours was replaced by some quiet small talk, as we all started to crash and realize our adventure was coming to an end.

I said goodbye to all the Boston bloggers, and Monica drove us back to the hotel where New Balance was putting us up for the night. Melissa and Ashley had mentioned earlier potentially going out when we got back to the hotel, but by the time we got back, any talk of that had ended. Ashley and I showered and were in bed by 10:15.

Sunday morning, we had a quick breakfast with Anne and Gretchen, and Ashley and I headed for South Station to come back to NYC.

So, spoiler alert: we did reach the beach.

But I want to recap the trip we took to get there.

On Thursday night, after touring the New Balance factory (more on that later), we headed to Wachusett to stay at the adorable Wachusett Inn, near the start.

The bathroom doors had beer openers inside them, which I found hilarious.

We had breakfast as a team before taking off for the start.

Knowing I had to run later that afternoon, in the heat, I had a hard time trying to figure out what to eat. I didn’t want anything that would bother my stomach, and I knew I needed some protein, since I had no idea what would happen for lunch. I decided to go for some scrambled eggs, a pancake, some fruit, potatoes and bacon. Luckily, it didn’t bother my stomach at all.

We boarded our van at 8:45 to take off for the start. Maybe the most clutch part of the whole experience? New Balance also hooked us up with drivers, so we could just focus on the running. (Or maybe because they thought we’d be too busy tweeting and get lost.) Our driver was the AMAZING Monica, who is a trackster (tech rep) for Southern California for New Balance. You’ll see later just how awesome she was, but all weekend, we had an answer to basically any running or New Balance question we had, and she also put together a spreadsheet with our paces and leg lengths so that we could project when each runner would finish and be at transition area. She even kept this up as we were running so that we could make these predictions as accurately as possible.

How much stuff does it take 6 girls to run a 200-mile relay? A lot. We had much more near our seats.

We arrived at the Wachusett ski lodge, where the race was starting from, around 9.

I KNOW HIM!

Before we could start, we had to go to safety check and show that we had our race handbook, maps of our legs, waivers and all of our safety gear–the reflective vests, headlamps and flashing lights. After that, we sat through a brief orientation just going over some more basics of the course and some more rules and regulations. Up next was registration, and then we got to head outside for our favorite part: team photo time.

Gretchen gave us some jumping-photo instruction (make sure to kick your knees as close to your butt as possible, and I’m proud to report I acheived some serious air here. Although not nearly as much as Gretchen.

Speaking of Gretchen, she was up first, and so we walked her down to the start to send her off.

On the way there, we found Gia, and took a NYC blogger photo.

And they’re off!

Poor Gretchen had to tackle a serious hill right off the bat–and she says they only got worse.

Once Gretchen took off, my van, Van 2, had a few hours on our hands as Van 1 went through the first 6 legs.

So we found a park near the first Van Transition Area and hung out there for awhile.

[photos via Tina]

I was already feeling a little tight from sitting on a bus two nights earlier and then standing for a few hours at the New Balance tour, so I did some yoga in the park to loosen up.

We found a nearby Panera for lunch, and I had a roasted turkey and avocado BLT on sourdough with a salad and an apple. If I have a nighttime run, I won’t usually eat salad, but this ended up being okay for my sensitive jerk of a stomach.

Before we knew it, it was time to go to the transition area for Sarah to hand off to Tina.

Go Tina! She looked so strong. All that damn Crossfit.

Next up was Monica. I was on deck after her, so when she was up, I started getting really nervous. Would my stomach be okay? Would I be too tight from sitting in the van?

By the way, I’m happy to report that there were approximately a million Porta-potties at each transition area. There weren’t any sorts of bathroom stops on the course, but each transition area only ended up being around a 10-15 minute drive.

It was the first time running in my shoes, the New Balance 860v2s, and they were a bit loose. NB Monica taught me a new-to-me way of lacing them. She called it “marathon lacing,” and New Balance’s site describes it as preventing heel slip.

Monica and I did our transition…

And I was off!

(Yes, this is my new Facebook picture.)

My first leg was leg 9, which was 6.36 miles and rated as hard. It went from Shrewsbury, Mass. to the Marion Zeh school in Northborough.

Stupid hills.

It wasn’t an easy run, because of the hills and being a little tired and tight, but it was gorgeous. It included running past a nice pond and a good amount of downhills.

The awesome thing about the relay is that every mile or two, your van will pull up next to you and cheer for you, and this made me so happy.

There’s also no water stations, so if you need it, your teammates have to bring you some. (Thanks Ash! And yes, that is the videographer running next to me. No bigs.)

I played mental games with myself to keep going, but at some point during this leg, I lot all ability to do math, and kept telling myself as I got to 4.90ish that I was almost done. Fail, Theodora. I still had more than a mile to go.

I eventually finished, handed off to Elizabeth and tried to take a minute or two outside the van to stretch before we started going again.

[photo via Monica]

While, as a team, we weren’t racing for time, I set time goals for myself for the first two legs just to keep myself going. I did the 6.36 miles in 58:23. Not anywhere near a PR sort of pace, but still a time I was happy with.

I usually spent the entire next runner’s leg attempting to recover/stop sweating/stop breathing like a monster. The hills definitely gave me a good cardio workout.

Once Anne and Ashley finished their legs, we had another 4-5 hours to kill before it was our van’s turn again, so we stopped for food.

We found a restaurant called Carbone’s near the transition area and made a beeline for it.

I ordered spaghetti and meatballs, which was not so great. By some miracle, it didn’t bother my stomach much, but almost everyone else had stomach issues the next day.

After this, we headed to the Van Transition Area to get a few hours’ sleep. I think I’m a good sleeper, but I had a hard time falling asleep in the van. I started off in the seat I was sharing with Ashley, but eventually ended up taking over the driver’s seat to sleep, since NB Monica was sleeping outside in a sleeping bag. I’ve never slept outside, but I think if I did a relay, I might try it. It seems like it beats sleeping sitting up.

More to come…

For the first 27 years of my life, I was convinced that I was allergic to nuts. I knew I was allergic to peanut butter, and for some reason, I was just convinced I was allergic to other nuts. Which was fine with me, because I had zero desire to eat them for the first 26 years of my life.

After I turned 26 and started living a healthier lifestyle, nuts kept coming up as a great healthy snack. Since the diet I was following included no dairy, that eliminated a lot of snacks. Do you realize how many healthy snacks include yogurt or cheese?! My trainer kept forgetting I was allergic to nuts and kept suggesting I have almonds or walnuts as a part of my snack.

A few years ago, I started having stomach troubles again and went for extensive allergy and gastrointestinal testing. The tests showed that I was, in fact, allergic to peanut butter, but not to other nuts.

Starting to eat something you’d thought was off-limits for your entire life is really weird. The first time I bought nuts felt like the first time I bought alcohol legally–can I really do this? Are you sure?

Since then, I’ve made up for lost time with my nut consumption.

And, no matter how bare my kitchen cabinets get, I always have almonds in them.

They’re a delicious, filling snack, and they’re good for you.

Some health benefits of almonds:

• high in monounsaturated fat (the good kind!)–which has been associated with reduced risk of heart disease
• have been proven to lower cholesterol
• contain potassium and magnesium
• eating them with a high-glycemic index meal has been proven to reduce the glycemic index of the meal

While almonds are good for you, some of the ones with extra salt and other ingredients aren’t quite as good for you. Recently, a number of Blue Diamond Almonds were certified by the American Heart Association to be heart-healthy. I love their almonds, and even more, their almond milk, so I was happy to see that their almonds are recognized as heart-healthy, since learning more about heart disease in women a few months ago.

• Whole Natural
• Roasted Salted
• Low Sodium
• Sea Salt
• No Salt
• Honey Dijon

Unfortunately, those chocolate ones weren’t. But they’re still tasty!

If you want to learn more about Blue Diamond Almonds and their AHA certification, you can join the Twitter chat tomorrow night at 8PM CST/9 PM EST by following #bluediamond.

What’s your favorite nut? Any good recipes incorporating almonds to share?

FitFluential LLC compensated me for this campaign. All opinions are my own.