San Diego Rock n Roll Marathon Recap Part 1

To spare you one looooong post, I've decided to break up my San Diego Rock n' Roll Marathon weekend into 2 posts.

The Mutiny

The weekend of my EVENT finally arrived and after much overpacking, the BF and I headed out in The Mutiny (our RV) destined for San Diego, home of the Rock n' Roll Marathon.  

Working Facebooking in traffic...cool.

Although my participation with Team in Training included airfare (for me only) to and from San Diego, we could not pass up the opportunity for a ROAD TRIP!  Both my BF and I LOVE to travel and try to take advantage as often as possible.  For the trip down, we decided to try hanging out by the coast and randomly selected Morro Bay as our midway stop over on Thursday night.

We were not disappointed with this selection!  We have come to terms with the fact that many RV parks are basically huge parking lots and not at all like "real" camping which was the case with Morro Dunes RV Park.  However, the views and location were spectacular.  Morro Rock was in view and within walking distance of the RV park.  The beach was right across the street and the ocean waves were close enough to lull us to sleep.  After a quick stroll down the beach to get some close ups of the "Gibraltar of the Pacific", we found a walking/bike path that conveniently took us down to the Embarcadero (which was where we were headed for dinner any way...no need for a cab!!).

Morro Rock

Cute garden knick-knacks.

Who doesn't love a smiling frog?

 After browsing around some of the cute shops we happened upon a restaurant and bar aptly called the Embarcadero Grill.  The service was awesome, as were the Bloody Marys (hello vitamin C) and the food was pretty good.  It had been quite a while since we had eaten last so we stuffed ourselves like it was the last meal.  Luckily, the BF actually didn't mind walking back to the RV park rather then taking a cab back (great for the digestion).  What a cool guy!

Great Bloody Marys!

Day 2 of the trip wasn't quite as spectacular since it involved L.A. traffic.  Ughhh...I don't know how people deal with that every day!  I'll take my small town living over traffic delays and road rage any day!

Traffic sucks!

After a long, long, long second day of travel we arrived in Mission Bay to our weekend home away from home.  Our site backed up to the bay and offered not only a beautiful sunset, but fireworks from Seaworld every night! 

One of the reasons I picked San Diego as my marathon event is because my BF's daughter and her girlfriend live there...so it was a 2 for 1 weekend!  They drove us all over the city and kept the BF company when I went for my run Sunday morning.  We had an awesome breakfast at this place:

And then we checked out the race Expo.  It was an amazing expo with so much going on the it was almost overwhelming.  It was hard to not try every sample that was laid out from energy bars to Gu's to wine and beer.  I was determined to try to stick to my plan of not trying or doing anything new the day before the race.  I did, however, buy a new pair of sunglasses for the race....shhhhhhh.

Oh yea!

Packet pickup...16 hours til the start of the race!

Always keep this in mind!

The Brooks Running Circus.

That evening I actually stayed in the same hotel as the rest of my Team in Training team.  Our meeting time was 4:15 a.m. and I didn't want to take any chances on being late or arranging transportation.  Saturday night we had our Inspiration Dinner for TNT participants, honorees and families.  And although I normally wouldn't have eaten large quantities of pasta (too much gluten) it was a fun evening.

John "The Penguin" Bingham

The Penguin was our MC and let me tell you, this guy is hilarious!  Check out his blog when you get a chance (like now...but remember to come back here to comment).  But the most inspiring story came from Barry Costa, a TNT participant for the past 12 years, who lost his daughter, Kimberly Joy Costa, to blood cancer when she was 19 years old. Her story was very touching and there was not a dry eye in the room of 1000+ people.  

Barry Costa

Kimberly Joy Costa

After getting back to the hotel after 10pm, I set out my running gear, pinned on my race bib, set out my breakfast, set my alarm for 330am, and tried to drift off for a few hours of sleep.  

To be continued...