Aurora's Blog

What a beautiful day for a race!

I can hardly imagine a better start to a race day. I stayed with my incredible friend Sheeva. She’s supremely talented, incredibly brilliant, and a complete sweetheart. I adore her. (She’s Fareed’s sister, in case you’re keeping track of all the characters mentioned here on the blog.)

Sheeva was busy the night I stayed with her, which worked out perfectly because I went to bed around 3:30pm! I was so rested and refreshed the morning of the race. She actually got up at 5:50 in the morning to drive me to the race! I offered to walk since she was only about 2 miles away, but she is the ultimate host and insisted on driving. Well, if you say so, I’m not gonna turn down a ride!

I’m sure you’re all on the edge of your seats as to what I chose to wear after the great Portland Pants Debacle of May 2012. My new pants that I’d ordered hadn’t arrived yet, and I wanted to wear something comfortable ’cause I was planning on kicking butt and taking names in this half marathon. So, I wore the old cutoff pants that I’d ruined in Portland.

They may expose the bottom of my legs, but everything above the lower part of my calves is so unbelievably comfortable. I don’t even know what type of fabric is used. The label just says “Calvin Klein Performance.” Whatever type of fabric it is, it’s magical. I  won’t be able to part with these pants for good until they’re just scraps of fabric that can no longer be worn. (Of course that will probably never happen because these are such quality pants.)

In case you’re worried that I say all of this, in the product placement world that we live in, because I get free pants; let me assure you, I do not get free pants. These sentiments come from my heart and my tear-filled eyes.

If you’re curious about the current pants situation, here’s where things are. Jeanette, one of my friends and lovely blog followers commented on the Portland entry with a link to pants that looked incredible similar to my pants. I ordered them. They weren’t in time for the race, but I did get them on Monday. Unfortunately, they were not the pants. The fabric was much thinner.

I emailed Calvin Klein (the company, not the man), being very specific about the pants I was looking for. I told them I’d been searching through tons of websites and wasn’t having any luck. I begged for any information about where said pants might exist somewhere in the world. Alas, they wrote back and said they didn’t have any information on pants from four years ago.

I’ll never have good pants again.

So, I come up to my corral dancing in my fashion faux pas. They’re only that was now because I mangled them. Before I ruined these gorgeous pants, they were not a fashion mistake.

I met up with Joy, the 3 hour pacer. I figured, it’s a beautiful day, on a great course with lots of flat and downhill sections. I’m gonna see how long I can keep up with her. We had a good little new group of friends. Sherri and her friend, Kathleen, were doing their first half marathon. Brandon was also a first timer who had decided only a couple of weeks prior to sign up for the endeavor.

Our group was rounded out by Marie, who caught the running bug last year; and Taiwo, one of Joy’s friends who joined us once we were closer to the start.

We all talked as our corral got inched toward the start line. I learned that Joy is from Turkey. She’s a nurse who’s about to start studying to become a doctor!

After more than an hour had gone by, our corral started. (Yay!) Meb Keflezighi, the Olympian who won the race, was crossing the finish line about a minute and a half after we crossed the start line.

How did my race go? I’ll tell you now, I did not finish in under 3 hours. But how long was I able to keep up with Joy and the gang? I’ll continue the story tomorrow.