Support Crews and Road Trips, Oh My!

Ok, so the road trip hasn't happened yet.  It will officially commence this Thursday at 5 a.m. when we load up my dad's Land Cruiser and set out for Cedar Point Amusement Park for E's first iron-distance triathlon!  I'm so proud of him for all of the training he has done, and I know he is going to kick some Cedar Point butt on Sunday.  I can't believe it's here.  The past five months of training have been an incredible learning process for both of us.  He has been training for this race to support the Ulman Cancer Fund, and Team Fight - you can donate here, if you're so inclined.  It's an excellent cause and one close to our hearts.

We spent most of the long weekend packing - we are taking all our own food with us, so I am making huge batches of our favorite pasta-and-protein meals, and we are also bringing along our microwave and toaster and all other manner of goodies.  In addition to his taper, my marathon training started today!  So I'm packing my nutrition for a long run on Saturday and some runs while on the road on our drive up.  It's going to be a full truck!

In other exciting news, as I mentioned, my first official marathon training run was this morning.  I was out there before dawn this morning, and it was beautiful.  We had rain coming in, so it was windy and a little wild out.  I got inside right before the worst of it started.  The run went really well - it was a nice way to kick off training.

This weekend was also like running Christmas.  A few weeks ago, The Clymb ran a 2XU sale, and I scooped up a pair of compression tights, which got here on Friday.  And, though I felt like a hypocrite, I tried on Nike Free's again when I was at our local run store Saturday and loved them just as much as when I tried them out several months ago.  Despite my vows to not support Nike, I gave in and bought them.  I have been wanting a pair of minimalist shoes in rotation with my Newton's, and these just felt so good.  I took them out on Sunday for an easy 3 miles with my dad, and absolutely loved them.  Being able to feel my movements more even improved my stride a bit.  I definitely have been nursing some sore calves, but I'm loving these shoes.

That's it for now. I'll blog from the road, I'm sure.  We have two days in the car to get to Cedar Point.  Happy trails!