Hello!

I’m Sarah Mac. I’m a writer, mom, runner. This is my original running blog, Running Starfish, started in 2009 to chronicle my first (and supposed to be last) marathon, all the way through qualifying for the 2016 Olympic Trials Marathon.

race time: san diego half marathon


Time to book the spray tan, I'm headed to San Diego! On March 10th I'm racing the San Diego half marathon. I'm excited to get under the sun for a few hours. I fly in mid morning on March 9th, race on the morning of the 10th and I'm flying back to this wet blanket  Seattle the same night. Hopefully cheers-ing myself with a $7 mini merlot for a race well run. 

This is my first time flying to a race, first time getting set up with digs, a VIP start (bling, bling) and my first time heading to a race solo. I'm pretty friggin excited about the first three. When I heard about the race a couple other Oiselle girls were going to head down to race, which honestly was a lot of the pull. I thought it'd fun to have a sunny race meet-up. However, soon after booking my ticket they'd all pulled out for various reasons. Hence the solo migration. 

I'm looking forward to meeting other runners and seeing some of my Cali Oiselle teammates. Based on what I know about elite rooms at other races I assume I'll be sharing my hotel room with another runner. Never had that experience. Seems a bit pressure filled as my pre-race night is usually pretty sleepless. I picture us tossing and turning in our separate queen beds. Trying to get sleep so we can... race each other. #gulp

My training has been going well. I had one crazy week, capping my mileage at 79 (so close!!). Which is literally the highest mileage week of my entire life. High school, college, adult... what have you. One for the record books. But I didn't recover from key workouts. And I had a big week at work, which was invigorating so I didn't notice the negative affects of my overworked body. 

The next week I crashed. I felt like my entire body was fighting to stay awake. I could have fallen asleep standing up. I went to bed everynight at 8pm. I went through 4 days feeling completely drugged. I bounced back, but yeah 79 was followed by a week of 50 with two rest days. Lessons learned. 

In other news I found a 'mechanic'. A physical therapist, who actually thinks my flippy leg can be a thing of the past. If you've ever seen me run, you'll notice right away I have an awkward oar for a right leg. I get the most debilitating leg and side cramps on the right side. Everything is working way too hard over there. Until I met Julie, my mechanic, I was losing hope that I could get faster with the way my body worked. But a couple weeks later, I'm feeling very hopeful. I'm looking forward to seeing how I can perform in the half marathon with some of the mechical issues behind me. 

goodbye weirdo leg

best laid plans. *%$#

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