365 Days with the Carlsons: March 9th, 2014

my day began with my alarm going off at 1:20am (since it was still 40min before the scheduled time change). by the time i was about ready to leave to drive to santa monica, it was 2am (or rather 3am, after the times change). parking was relatively easy since i purchased pre-paid parking. the shuttle were adjacent to where i parked, and therefore easy to get to. i had an unfortunate shuttle time of 4am (due to the fact that i registered kind of late...in january) although in hindsight, i probably could've easily gotten onto a later shuttle because noone checked my shuttle time on my bib. they did glance at my clear plastic gear bag, though.
the shuttle ride was ok...i even closed my eyes and fell asleep for few minutes on the ride over to dodger stadium. when we arrived, i looked at my watch. 4:18am. the race wasn't going to start for another 3 hours. help!
an email i received said that the kitten rescue people would be in the suite at 5am (but i think it was actually open before then. unfortunately i didn't know that). so i sat behind home plate for about 30min before heading up to the suites. met a few other runners and relaxed for a while. there were restrooms up there, and ended up using it twice, which was good because when i left to go downstairs, the bathrooms for 'regular folk' was super duper long!
made my way down to search for wherever the marathon maniacs were going to meet for a group picture. i was only able to find eddie hahn, eddie vega, and another eddie from el paso. another guy, richard joined in our group pic at the last minute. there were so many people there, it was kind of chaotic.
entered corral D easily, and waited for the race to start. wasn't able to find my student (he was in corral E and arrived 5 minutes to 7am due to all the traffic).
the race started off really well for me. i felt good, and was going at a very good pace for the first half of the race. it started to warm up by mile 15 and by mile 18, i was pretty warm. saw some kids at mile 15 =D and kitten rescue was at mile 18. got to see matthew...gave him a big hug and everything. slowly made it to mile 20, where i knew (former student) kelly was waiting. saw her and walked with her for a couple minutes before saying goodbye. upon entering the VA, i walked off an on. it was pretty much the same all the way to the end of the marathon.
the image below shows my 10k splits. except for the first two splits, take note that it took me longer and longer as the race progressed...
i just looked now, and the weather report says the high for santa monica was 88 (at 2pm). although i finished the race at 12:11, it had to be getting awfully close to 88 around the time i finished. good grief!

i poured a lot of water on my head, down my back, on my arms, on my hands...i also drank a lot, too. but didn't feel the need to use the restroom or anything...so that tells me i really needed the hydration.
all in all, i'm glad the race is over. it was way too hot for my liking. this year the race was one week earlier than usual because of some event happening next week. if it's cooler next sunday than it was today, i think i'll scream, because that'd be so unfair.
don't know if i'd ever run this again. the weather is so unpredictable. cool weather last year (heard it was nice)...impending rain two years ago when i ran it (and pouring buckets the day before the race), and pouring rain during the race three years ago. 25,000 runners is also a whole lot of people. having only 2000 or so is a lot less crowded.
who knows?! i know i can't say i won't for sure. maybe i'll run for kitten rescue again. we'll just have to see.
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