We finished the marathon with personal best times

The victory photo.

The Good News...

We finished this weekend's marathon in Victoria with personal best times. I barely made my personal best time but Jean-Louis blew his away. Holy moly is what I said! Notice how I actually beat him in our first marathon?? Hard to believe now.

April 6, 2003 Le Marathon International de Paris:

Jean-louis	04h 16' 15"	9010th/25806 Males
Susan	03h 59' 54"	652th/4339 Females

October 7, 2012 Victoria Marathon results:

Jean-louis	3:22:07	158th/1076 Males	10km mark: 45:29	21.1km mark: 1:34:48	30km mark: 2:16:28
Susan	3:57:47	182nd/837 Females	10km mark: 49:29	21.1km mark: 1:48:06	30km mark: 2:39:35

The Bad News...

I never quit and I didn't quit but in my mind I did kind of "cheat." I had to walk and jog the last 8 kms :( For the record, I have NEVER walked before during a run in my life. Not even during training have I walked. It doesn't count if you walk. So obviously I feel sad that I had to. When I say I "had" to, I really mean it too.

As you can see from my times, I started out well and as each kilometer went by, I got slower and slower. Most amateur newbies do this actually. Lol. I ran non-stop until around 34 km. It was then that my left calf went into spasm, along with my upper right thigh and front lower part of my right leg. It was so painful I thought my muscles were going to burst out of my flesh! I came to a complete halt and started pounding on them with my fists. I walked a bit to try to shake it off. Each time I tried to run, the spasm would occur again in the same places. Of course! I thought I was toast. I thought the race was over for me. This has never happened to me before. I never get leg spasms! Never. So then I had to walk, jog, walk, jog until the end of the race. I was not happy walking. I was embarrassed to walk. I used to judge people who walked but now I understand that some people may be walking because they simply can't run due to severe cramps, not because they were too exhausted and wanted to rest. Although that was the case for me too. I was exhausted of course but I would never walk just because of that. I would just run super slow.

So cute! I love this picture :)

I was discussing cramps and spasms with Jean-Louis. I told him that cramps you can run through, spasms you cannot. At least that is the case for me. I had chest cramps early on and ran with them for awhile. They would come and go and would occur in different places. But I kept running because in my experience they would always eventually go away. When I got the leg spasms, my legs just buckled and I felt like I couldn't move really. I had to stop and deal with them before moving on. It was awful! Even with just 2 km left in the end, I could not jog all the way. I still had to walk and jog through it. For the final few hundred meters, I tried my hardest to give it my all and when the spasms came again I kind of freaked out because I knew all the spectators would see me limp through the finish line in agony. So awful. So glad it's all over.

The cramping and spasms could be from a number of things. I believed I did train enough, especially since recovery right now seems to be going so well. I had half a banana the morning of the race for the extra Potassium. From what I have read online, other possible causes could have been extreme exhaustion, heat exhaustion and heat cramps, sodium depletion, or lack of Magnesium. I was drinking water at every station and pretty much energy electrolyte drinks at every station as well. It was really hot out that day! To be honest I'm not sure what I could do differently to avoid this next time. I would try again to run the first half slower and maybe look at eating more Potassium and Magnesium foods. All this could simply just be due to the unusual hot weather in October. It appeared that many people were suffering from cramps. Or maybe I just noticed them more. Jean-Louis and his boss, who also did this race, also complained about cramps during much of the race.

42.195 km for the marathon is a long race. Running it is hard. Even walking the entire route is hard. I walked two marathons in the past and it hurt. Running it is worst but at least it will end sooner. After a few hours your mind plays tricks on you and you question whether or not you are going to make it to the finish line. Your feet hurt so much that if you accidentally step on a twig, you weep in pain. The only thing keeping your body moving forward is your brain. Someone on Twitter asked me why I even bother doing marathons if they are so brutal. I told her that I choose to run marathons because they are hard. I like the challenge and when it's all over, I feel a bit more victorious. I did get my medal so yeah, I kind of do :)

Despite my unfortunate encounter with leg spasms, I was still able to finish the race faster than almost 10 years ago. I think that is amazing. Considering I took a big break from running and racing and I weigh at least 15 pounds more now. Lol. My target goal was under 4 hours and I got it. If I was spasm-free, I may have been able to do it in 3:45 even (which was my secret wishful target goal - doh). Guess we will never know now. That was so hard that I don't think I will be doing any more marathons again. My bucket list is already complete in the marathon department!

Bucket List:

Run a marathon
Run a marathon after going through childbirth

Apple picking at Ma and Gong's house

Lots of apples = apple pie ...of course:)

Victoria half marathon was a success!

We did it! We were blessed with great weather and had a terrific run. In fact, Jean-Louis finished with a personal best time! We both achieved our target goal of under 2 hours. Not too shabby for our first race in over 3 years :)

Here are our results:

	Time	Final Place	Place in Sex	Place in Age Division
Jean-Louis	1:39:10	533/5147	401/1916	65/245
Susan	1:47:29	1009/5147	326/3231	59/439

Jean-Louis and I ran together for the first kilometer or so and then we lost each other in the crowd. In the end he just smoked me, as my brother-in-law puts it! I had a feeling he would do well since he was in much better shape than I was and trained twice as much as I did. We used to be great pace buddies. A long time ago, that is. It's hard to think that I used to beat him in some of the longer races in the past. Not that I'm bummed by my own results. I more than reached my goal so I'm proud :)

After the race, we ate oranges, bananas, chocolate energy drinks, bagels, and cookies. There were also puddings, energy bars, and muffins. My favorite were the oranges. I couldn't get enough of those sweet oranges! Thank-you Thrifty Foods for breakfast :)

The Victoria marathon event, which also includes the half marathon, 8km road race, wheelchair competitions, and  kids run has been voted the best marathon in Western Canada. It is always well organized and we pretty much get everything we want out of a race. We have competed in maybe twenty races since 2002 and this race is one of our most highly rated ones! I get the feeling that the competitors in this race are overall faster compared to other races. Or maybe I'm just getting old :) Hey, next year I will be in a new age division! Wow.

I ran too slow, then too fast, then super slow, then held steady to the end. I actually sprinted the last 500 meters. It was bad strategy on my part so if I were to race again soon, I know I could do better. It has been so long that I must have forgotten what it was like to race again. Overall, Jean-Louis and I both feel good about the half-marathon. It really wasn't so bad. After the race, Jean-Louis mentioned that the race was actually quite short. Brag, brag, brag. Not for me! The guy even tweeted while he ran! Obviously it was too easy for Jean-Louis :) Now that the half marathon is behind us, the full marathon seems a lot more reachable. The main problem is finding the time to train with Tristan and also finding someone to watch Tristan.

My parents babysat Tristan for the first time ever this weekend so we could both race. We were a bit stressed about it, especially since we left him early in the morning while he was still sleeping. In the end, he was perfectly fine. It was a couple of hours without us and it was just fine for everyone. I think it helped that I had told him about it for awhile now. He knew that we were running and that he would have to stay with his gong and ma. We planned for them to watch us along the route but unfortunately we totally missed each other :( Thankfully none of us got lost this year and we were able to meet up after wards. We even made Tristan a sign to hold while cheering us on! My parents said he was saying hi to everyone that ran by and they said hi back to him :) Oh well. Maybe we can use the sign again next year :)

Training for the Victoria Half Marathon

Jean-Louis and I are both racing in the Victoria Half Marathon this coming weekend. That's in 5 days!!! This will be our first race in over 3 years. Basically since I was pregnant with Tristan. I'm both nervous and excited.

The Victoria Half Marathon always occurs during Thanksgiving long weekend, which is one more reason for us to ferry over to Victoria and spend time with the family. At the same time, it's my mom's birthday too! Good thing it's a long weekend :)

We've ran the Victoria Half Marathon twice already back in 2005 and 2006. It's a beautiful scenic route and I would recommend this race based on just that fact. It turns out that the race also hands out excellent long sleeve New Balance technical shirts to participants, rather than your typical running white t-shirts. Another plus. Being staged in October means that we get the nice summer weather to train for it. Another plus! We've ran the Vancouver Half Marathon once and it just pales in comparison. I mean the route is also very lovely and the biggest bonus is that it's in town so we don't have to travel to get to it. But it's in May and training needs to start in the winter and that means running in the cold and rain :( But it's also the little things. The Victoria race has better snacks and food for after the race since they are sponsored by Thrifty Foods. Overall it seems you get more and it's $5 cheaper than the Vancouver half marathon. Man, I suddenly feel like a promoter for the Victoria Half Marathon :) But honestly, if you are a half marathon runner, you should run the race in Victoria. It's totally awesome and it's my hometown! :)

Are we ready for our race? We are as ready as we can ever be, being parents of a 2.5 year old toddler. Poor Tristan has to sit in the jogging stroller for one hour at a time when we go running together now. He's been doing pretty well. We try to time it during is naps but he barely naps anymore. We run with him in the stroller only twice a week. Jean-Louis and I run together while Tristan is in daycare twice a week. We basically run once Jean-Louis gets home from work and then we run straight to daycare to pick Tristan up. The daycare staff is used to seeing us both all sweaty and gross :) If we're not prepared now, it's hopeless. This week we're taking it a bit easy. We have two more runs left to do before race day. One 10KM and one 5KM and that's it! Running these short distances is probably not the best way to train for the race but we just don't have time to be running a half-marathon in the day. I already feel bad that Tristan is stuck in the stroller for one hour.

5 days left! Sunday around 9:30AM, I'm going to be one happy sore runner :)

Strawberry picking with Ma

What we did for Father's Day

What was supposed to have been a home barbecue turned into a weekend trip over to Victoria at the last minute. We invited my parents over earlier in last week but they didn't want to come over so we decided to head over ourselves. It was also an occasion to celebrate my dad's upcoming birthday this week.

We went out to eat at Heron Rock Bistro Saturday night with the family. It was us, my parents, my two brothers, and my niece. The food was surprisingly good. I'm not a big burger person but their chicken burger was quite tasty. Their steak apparently was very good too. We went home after wards to have cake. Tristan had a small sliver of chocolate cake so we had to take him out to exercise. My parents tagged along to Dallas Beach where we let Tristan bike a bit. It was really windy down there so we took out the kite as well. By the time we got home, it was past 9PM. By the time we all bathed and showered it was more past 11PM. Tristan slept past 11PM for the first time ever. He only napped maybe 15 minutes that day too. The next day he still woke up at 7AM!

On Sunday morning, we went to the flea market with my parents. After wards, Jean-Louis and I pushed Tristan for a run down to the beach. It was a nice 8.8km run to Dallas and through Beacon Hill Park. Then we met my friend and her two boys for some play time at a nearby park. We had late brunch plans with the family at 2PM. It was the only time we could get in unfortunately. We went to Aura Restaurant at the Laurel Point Inn for their Father's Day BBQ brunch buffet. It was good but not as great as what I remembered at the hotel. It was also held on the restaurant side rather than in the big banquet room in the previous years. The food was good but the selection was small. They had a big selection on breads and crackers though.

Overall, it was a productive and enjoyable trip to Victoria. Good food and Tristan got to spend more time with his grandparents (Gong and Ma) and see other family members he normally doesn't see.

Finally, Jean-Louis got a Father's Day gift from daycare as well! It's nice but we both think my Mother's Day gift was cooler :)

Happy Easter!

We're not doing anything special this year for Easter. Maybe next year when Tristan is 3, we'll do an Easter hunt and he can have more chocolate. Right now he is not familiar with chocolate. He has eaten it before but it's usually part of something else like chocolate chips in a cookie. He has probably tasted chocolate only three times in his life! In fact when I gave him a banana oatmeal chocolate chip cookie last week, he was asking me what the chips were. He was calling them blueberries and I told him they were chocolate chips.

We're heading over to Victoria for my Grandpa's 49th day passing on Tuesday so we decided to make a weekend out of it and go during Easter as well. I don't feel like it's an appropriate time for celebrating but I did bake Easter cookies to mark Easter. Like always, I will be giving most of them away. I usually bake around 55 cookies or two batches. We can't possibly eat that many cookies anyway. I'll probably freeze some as well :)

This week one of the kids at daycare gave Tristan and all the other kids in the toddler room some Easter treats. He was the only one and I was sort of wondering if kids were doing this. It's definitely not popular but it was so nice to receive something :)
Happy Easter and enjoy your day off work!

The passing of a loved one, my Grandpa

Last week was a sad week. We received news that my Grandpa had passed away. It was nothing sudden since he has been in ill health for awhile now. We all returned to Victoria for his funeral and farewell last Thursday and Friday. Grandpa will be missed dearly but I think he is in a better place now.

Although Tristan will not remember him, Tristan had the privilege to meet his great Grandpa. Our last visit with Grandpa was during Thanksgiving. Tristan was talking at the time and called out to Grandpa. I felt as though for the first time in a very long time, Grandpa was interested and happy to see Tristan and us there. Grandpa smiled and reached his hand out. I was surprised. I'm glad that was my last memory of him. He was happy and alert.

Our trip to Victoria was rough for me. I cried a lot when Grandma passed away over a decade ago but I am much closer to Grandpa. They are the only grandparents I know. I didn't cry as much this time but I find myself in tears whenever I think about Grandpa still. I was worried about how Tristan would react to all the funeral proceedings and that might have controlled my emotions a bit. For the most part, he was well behaved. It's definitely not easy for a 27 month old to keep quiet for such a long time.

It's sad to think that one of the very few times the entire family is together is at a funeral. Our family has grown apart a lot since my Grandma passed away. All my little cousins are now grown up and in high school or university. They all look so different. My aunts and uncles look much older. Many of my family members were meeting Tristan for the first time. We saw each other again but we didn't speak. I remember a long time ago, we were all a much bigger part of each others lives. Sad. At least we were all together now. Grandpa would be happy to see everyone together.

Recap of our Thanksgiving weekend

We all headed to Victoria this Thanksgiving. We had a nice visit with family and friends and then we enjoyed a Chinese Thanksgiving dinner. It's probably my first non-traditional turkey dinner with the family. Normally, I do all the cooking but since we went over to Victoria and we were busy running around and taking care of Tristan, it would have been too much to cook all day as well. My parents roasted the turkey Chinese-style and it was served with chow mein. We also had olive bread and champagne. Hey, there is a first for everything, right :)

My contribution to the turkey dinner was the dessert. I prepared some crust from home, bought some pie pumpkins on our way into town from the ferries, and made a couple of delicious pumpkin pies. In the past I have always made pumpkin pie from canned pumpkin but now that I have done it with fresh pumpkin, I'm never going back. I also tried a new recipe which turned out a winner :) It was a big treat for Tristan and he of course, kept asking for more. I do have two small pumpkins left so I'll roast them later this week for more pumpkin pie. Yum!

We also visited my grandpa in the nursing home. He was so happy to see Tristan. I'm glad we brought him. Tristan called "grandpa" in Chinese and waved to him and grandpa's eyes lit up and his mouth opened. That is as responsive as I have ever seen him. It was great.

We also took a trip to Goldstream since we heard that there would be salmon there. Sadly, there was not a single fish :( I'm guessing we were too early this year. We did take a few pictures of all the nice autumn foliage though.

We stayed a day longer than we normally do in Victoria and we still weren't able to do everything we wanted to. We missed out on the shopping altogether. We wanted to check out their Walmart Super Center and the Uptown mall and walk downtown but never got the chance. Oh well. We could have stayed a few hours earlier but we were anxious to get home. When we are away from home, Tristan sleeps later and wakes up early and we all suffer a bit from it. Needless to say, we had to drink more coffee over this past weekend. It's so nice to be home!!

Gung Hay Fat Choy - Year of the Tiger!

The Chinese New Year is the biggest holiday for Chinese in the year. If there is any time you need to be with family, it is during this time. My family mainly lives in Victoria so that is where we went over the weekend. Chinese New Year so happen to fall on Valentine's Day. I thought about Valentines but didn't do anything. This past weekend was all about Chinese New Year.

In our family, we celebrate with a big feast on the Eve, which was Saturday this year. We all feasted on hot pot with all the good stuff like seafood, pork and fish balls, tofu, spinach, mushrooms - everything you would want in a hot pot. We ate until we were silly. That night, I tasted a bit of alcohol for the first time in almost 2 years. It was kind of gross. Then there was lobster, chocolate chip cookies that we bought, and lots of oranges! There was also traditional fried goodies of all sorts. All the married people had to give out red envelopes (lai see) to all the unmarried people who are younger, as well as the parents. Since we have been married for awhile, we had to give out a lot and of course, we never got any in return - until Tristan arrived! We will be depositing all his lai see money in his account :) Lucky baby!

On New Year's day, we were always told to be in our best behavior because what happens on that day will affect your whole year. Also, if at all possible, there is to be no cleaning at all and no hair washing. You can't take medicine either, unless you are terribly ill. You must wear new clothes as well. This was what we all grew up to so even to this day, I try to do many of those things. Because we live away from home and don't see family much, I feel as though tradition is slowing dying in the family. There are some things which my parents cook every year that is tradition in the family but I have no idea how to make it. I probably should learn how though. It's nice to have tradition but it just a shame we're not a very close family.

Tristan was cranky on New Years. He went to sleep late and didn't sleep well because the environment was different and it was noisy in the house. His running nose seemed to be worst as well. All is fine and dandy now that we have been home a day. Jean-Louis was also in a sour mood that day. He woke up early with Tristan and if Tristan is crabby, then he will be too. Jean-Louis broke the toilet and then there was a flood. So much for not cleaning on New Years. He swore throughout the day, he yelled, he was grumpy all day like he was mad at someone - he was on a role to condemn his whole year! What a pity considering he is a Tiger and this was suppose to be his year:( My day was a bit better, although I felt another cold coming and I was super tired.

This past weekend made me realize that going away and breaking our routine is not something I enjoy at all. I love being routine and boring because it makes our lives easier. That in turn means we are not crabby and life is more pleasant this way. Luckily, we don't go off routine too often. I seriously think routine has been our secret weapon for survival in the first year with Tristan.