Pacer Jerbear

Whilst perusing the Medtronic Twin Cities Marathon expo, a random guy inquired on the pace bands that Alyssa and I had snatched up at a previous booth.  We explained that neither of us were doing the TC marathon, but were grabbing them for our next marathon in Vegas BABY Vegas!  Ahem....  He explained that he was pacing the 4:00 group for tomorrow, and I got super excited and starting badgering him with questions, mainly:  how do you become a pacer?  To which he responded, you talk to me.  (!!!!!!!!!!!!)  We chatted with him and briefly explained our running backgrounds.  One of my new years resolutions/yearly goals was to figure out how to become a pacer (in the half marathon distance, mind you), so I was beyond excited to meet up with him (and so was Alyssa) and beyond excited is an understatement, let me tell you.


After talking more, he let us know that he had a couple of openings for pacing opportunities for the Mankato Half Marathon.  It didn't take much convincing for Alyssa and I to jump on the chance.  You are hereby reading the blog of the official 2:10 pacer for the Mankato Half Marathon.  Woohoo!  I'm so excited!  And it should actually fit in with my marathon training well, as I'll have to tack on another 7 miles post-race.  I hope the pacing goes well, because this is something I would truly love to do on a more frequent basis.  Rest assured, I'm already having nightmares about performing badly.  Crazy brain. :p

Thursday morning I hopped out of bed bright and early to get in a quick and easy 4 miles before I had to head to work.  I expected my legs to feel like trash after running a tough tempo run not more than 12 hours before, but they felt fresh as daisies.  Whatevs, I'll take it.  With a mile and a half to go on the run, I noticed what looked like smoke from a fire off in the distance.  As I got closer I realized that there was a truck spraying white smoke along the bike path.  I jumped to the road to try to avoid it, but of course there was a southern wind blowing it right to where I was.  Remind me of October 7th if I end up with lung cancer/bronchitis/etc.  Parks and Rec FAIL.

Despite getting gassed, I did 4 miles in 39:03 for a pace of 9:46.

And lastly (but obviously most importantly) I've recently been given an award.... TWICE.  Yes, alert the presses....somebody's a big deal.  psssst..... it's me.
The rules are as follows:

*Thank and link back to the person(s) who gave you this award.
*Share 7 things about yourself
*Pass the award along to others who you think are fabulous

Sarah is seriously super mom who is a new mommy and is already back to running, racing, and getting back in to shape!  Tres impressive.  ;)

Danielle is my 5k arch nemesis/virtual rabbit/running buddy.  We both have a 5k goal of hitting 22:xx.  We may have come up short (or technically I should say long) this summer, but next year it is ours.  Muhahahhaahahahha.  Ok, the Dr. Evil laugh was a bit much.

And for my list of 7 things:
1.  My eye color is some what of a mood ring.  It varies from blue to green.  Blue = happy as a lark.  Green = pissssssssssed.  It's really too bad because they're the prettiest when they're green.
2.  I almost always go to bed with socks on, because my feet are always freezing.  Once my feet warm up, I chuck them.  There have been times when I've woke up with my socks in my hands nuzzled up on my face.
3.  I have one older brother, and he's the crazy good athlete of the family.  We're talking state champion in basketball and football his senior year, and a college football scholarship.  But he didn't go to state in track, and I did, so neener neener, yes? :)
4.  I have this weird thing with dating left handed guys.  I think there's been one guy I've dated seriously that's been a righty.  So bizarre.
5.  My favorite sport growing up was basketball.  I played hundreds of hours of basketball every summer.  My best friend Nikki and I would live at the gym in the summer.  Sadly, the sport I was the best at was volleyball, which was my least favorite (behind bball and track).  Makes me wonder what I could've done if I put some effort in to it.  Oh well.  :)

6.  I was a cheerleader in college.  Gooooooooooooo Vikes!  I cheered for football my sophomore and junior year.  I hated doing it my junior year because all of my friends were getting playing time and I couldn't see the game from where we had to stand.  So I didn't try out my senior year.  Tailgating was more fun. :)
7.  I have a birthmark on my shoulder that is 5 indentations, and if you were to connect them it would be in the shape of a star.  My parents had plans to name me Montana Star (if you know my last name, you will understand how truly atrocious this would have been).  Yes they were hippies, and yes, I'd probably be blogging about my stripping career instead of my dabblings in running if this had gone through.  Luckily my parents didn't take it as a sign, and instead named me after my daddy.... Jerry Lee and Jeri Lee.

And now I nominate:
Slomohusky
Jenn
Alyssa
Cynthia
Susan
Glenn