Accepted!!!

The news came in this morning! They accepted me to the Boston Marathon. I am super excited. My training begins officially.

I celebrated by conquering a new preserve. "Conquering" means I have run the entire length of the course. As opposed to "exploring" which means I have run only part of the course. So today I have "conquered" Fremont Older. Yesterday I "explored" Corte de Madera and the Sand Caves. The Sand Caves were very cool. I don't know why but to me they looked like giant skull rocks. A friend of mine tried to show me some time ago where the Sand Caves were. She thought they were in Purisima which is the OSP next to Corte de Madera.

Last week I made not one but three runs up to Skyline three days in a row. Huddart, Wunderlich and Windy Hill. I took some great pictures. I love my new phone - The HTC Touch Pro. It takes great pictures.

My goal for the break is to run/conquer/explore the remaining OSP's that I have not yet visited. Since last Saturday I have visited three. Teague Hill, Corte de Madera and Fremont Older. I have about Nine more to go including what I call the "Watchtower." The Watchtower is really Mt. Umunhum. It is a special run to me and perhaps the biggest and the highest of all the OSP's. I am saving that for New Years Day.

I want to thank Christina for going with me to pick up some wine for holiday gifts. We had a great time. On that note Happy Holidays to everyone! I hope that you have a great one. Also congrats on your new SUV.

Not to be outdone

Since I am usually so busy on this weekends and this past weekend was no exception I usually go out for a long run Monday morning. I was going to skip but Amanda called me yeaterday at the Raider game to tell me about her 14 mile run. Needless to say she inspired me to go out inbetween rain storms here and brave huddart park.

So JUST FOR YOU AMANDA

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/1550867

Ok - now to the hot tub to recover!

Holiday Weekend FUN FUN FUN

Wow! What a weekend! What a week! I accomplished most of my ends and had a great time doing it.

I spent last week recovering mostly. I did some cross training. On Thursday I took the Fit2Rub Class up to Long Ridge. That was exciting.
http://connect.garmin.com/activity/1531021



On Saturday Christina and I did a Holiday Run with my sister and her family. Nico had surgery on his arm on Friday so he had to sit out the run. My sister and I took fifth place in our divisions respectively. I had a great time!
http://connect.garmin.com/activity/1537258





Saturday I partied with Christina and BDO. We had a great time. Christina sang "Dancing Queen" karaoke style. I took a video. Her friends asked me if I was going to blackmail her and I replied "Blackmail? my dear friend, some people cannot be bought or reasoned with, some people just want to see the world burn" (or enjoy torturing their son's mom - Just Kidding)




On Sunday we went to the Raiders vs Patriots. We had a tailgate and everything. We had a great time! I love hanging out with my sister.




My sister had put a bid on a house in Oakland so I am keeping my fingers crossed for her.

Also I heard Amanda ran 14 miles yesterday for her training for her upcoming Marathon in March. Congrats to her and good luck with your training, also thanks for the mention on your blog.

Very Important - Updated Links!

I have changed the name of this blog to fit2run:
http://fit2run.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default

Through MapmyRun.com I have created a group where you can look at previous maps for the Fit2Run class (anyone can look or join) - GREAT RESOURCE!
http://www.mapmyrun.com/community/groups/703585503

You can follow me on twitter now:
http://twitter.com/bernardo_tapia

Alright now - back to fitness (me as well)

QUALIFIED!!!

Div Place:86 Overall:466 Pace:7m15s Time:3h10m12s Half Marathon:1h29m55s
http://connect.garmin.com/activity/1503990

Let me first thank my son and his mom Christina whom without today would have been much more difficult.

That being said I DID IT and having done it I have decided to do what comes next. I am going t Boston. I earned it so I am going. I will work out the details lie how to pay for it later.

The race this morning went well. We had driven the course yesterday so I was familiar with the course and the turns. I crossed the staring line about 6 seconds after the start of the race. Knowing my body and my previous experience with runs over 16 miles I decided to take the advice of my former boss Jason Jones (a fellow runner) and try to get to the 20 mile mark in a decent time that would allow me to coast in the remaining 6. That strategy was risky since my running style is to start off slower and build speed during the course of the race (works great for middle distance events). However knowing my body and knowing that I tend to slow down after 16 or so miles. I decided it best to push myself early and coast in. Well it worked. I finished in 3 hours 10 minutes. I needed 3 hours 15 minutes to qualify and so I did it with 5 minutes to spare.
It was super cold on the morning so I was bundled up and that start of the race. I had Nico and Christina meet me at mile 2 so I could hand off my jacket and gloves. By then I was good and warm. At the half marathon mark I was at 1:29 (another PR) and I was feeling pretty good. I stayed with the 3 hour pace group till mile 16 or so at which my right hip started to bother me a little. By mile 20 both my quads were on fire but I kept seeing "Boston or Bust" signs so I decided to tough it out. At the 25th mile mark the 3:10 pace group caught me and so I had enough energy left to pace him the rest of the way in. At the finish line Nico and Christina were there to cheer me on which meant a lot to me. My fellow blogger/runner Amanda was there as well.

It was still freezing when I got to the finish line so we did not stick around long. We found 'cafe bernardo' and decided it was a sign so we had breakfast there. They even had my favorite breakfast.



Time to recover. The rest of the day I hung out at my aunt Teresa's house (special thanks to her as well for letting us crash at her house). We also stopped by my grandpa's house to wish him an early 'happy birthday.' We also watched the 49ers beat the Jets at the ranch as well.

When we finally got home we celebrated by opening up my very best bottle of wine that I had picked up at Loma Prieta Winery a month ago. This wine was a gold medal wine that was voted the best red wine in California. It was great.

Well I am tired for obvious reason. I will recover this week. The rest of the month I will do some light running and a lot of cross training (I am hoping Santa Clause will bring me a mountain bike) and I will start training for the Boston in January.

Tapering Down

Monday after Thanksgiving can be a scary time if you weigh yourself in on Monday Mornings. Especially if you have not one but two Thanksgivings. So you can imagine how relived I was when a week before my big marathon I came in at at 162. I was extremely happy. I got a lot of exercise in over the Thanksgiving weekend so I was able to keep my weight gain to a minimum.

As I mentioned above with less than a week to go - it is time to taper down. I've put my miles in and now it is time to rest and recover. I have been doing some cross training. Mountain biking to be more specific. I LOVE IT!!! I have been using Dominic's bike but I think I will get my own.

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/1470286

I had a great Thanksgiving. I made another killer turkey and some desserts. I brought a bottle of port but we didn't make it that far. Might have had something to do with the six or so previous glasses of wine. Next Year! Special thanks to Candida, Tony, Christina, Theresa and my Mom for preparing food. But especially my uncle Dennis who helped me out a lot both this year and last with the prepapration of the Turkey. My friend Amanda was also there. It is always nice to have guests.

Oh Yeah and I brought my Jeep home. Nino and Jose gave me endless grief. I had not brought the Jeep to the ranch in a long long time and I had put a lot of work in her this year. She looks terrific.

Well thats all for now.

B