Mama K's Mighty Marathon : Boilermaker, the beach, and some IT relief!

When last I left you I was in a flurry of packing in anticipation of the Boilermaker and our trip to the seaside of Delaware. It has been quite a little while since I have updated the blog. Sorry!

Our trip to Utica went off without a hitch. The boys had an amazing time with their two cousins while we were at the race and were completely exhausted from all the fun when we loaded up the car once again and headed South for the beach.

But let me back up and tell you all about the Boilermaker!

We VERY nearly didn't even attend the race at all. Our youngest had very recently developed an incredible terrible two fit that I couldn't quite place -I thought it might be molar teething pain, and he was up most of the night before the race (but who sleeps the night before a race anyway right?). I tried in vain to get him settled by 5AM, when we would need to get our stuff together and head to the race. He would NOT be pacified. Then thankfully at the LAST moment that I thought we could leave and still make it to the race start comfortably he fell asleep...

We ended up with plenty of time to find the start area, the potties, and make sure we were fully ready for the race. I found Jacki and we lined up together at the start.

It may be early, but I'm ready for this race!

Just so you know, Jacki knew this would be in my blog, HA!

Look at all those people lined up at the start!

What a crazy crush! 14,000 racers! WOW. That is a LOT of people. The streets were lined with people for almost the entire 9.3 miles! My favorite parts were the frozen ice pops and the 21 drum band! My least favorite parts were the hills (two quite long ones near the beginning and the last mile was a steady incline, but not really a hill).

By the end of the race I was absolutely drenched from sweat, dumping water over my head, dumping ice into my sport bra, and from running through sprinklers. I was pretty uncomfortable. I was really exhausted and my IT band had been pretty painful from about the second mile on... Once I stopped running my leg sort of froze up and it was very painful to flex my leg. I must have looked about as pathetic as I felt limping around trying to find a beer truck and a free area in which to drink it. The after party was an absolute crush of people.

Phew, I'm exhausted and soaked

Thankfully Tom and I had agreed to just get a bus back to our car and to meet there. I'm pretty sure I never would have found him at the after party area.

Not too much later we were clean and fed (thanks Jenn and Kevin) and leaving with the car packed back up and the boys tucked into their car seats for the next part of our trip, the BEACH!

Tom and I love the beach! This was our first vacation in quite a few years. The weather was really nice, not being too hot or too cool (most of the time). The days slipped by quickly and we were back again in the car headed for home (thank you for the hospitality -we loved our break from reality)!

We were very glad during the trip that after some deliberation had decided to bring the twin jogging stroller. I took Darren out a couple mornings early (to let people sleep a bit longer) and Tom did the same a couple of other mornings. I even had a couple of good runs in the morning and have been trying to do some exercises to heal my IT band pain. So far I am having some success!