Big Sur

Last weekend was my Big Sur Half Marathon in Monterey, CA. Adam's good childhood friend Charlie lives there and hooked us up with a great room at the Hyatt. Below are some pictures of the golf course that sits on the grounds of the hotel.

The morning after the race, Adam was napping and I got some chai tea and sat right here in front of this sand pit and watched the guys golf on the 17th green (you can see it in the R corner). I learned a lot that day about golf. I realized I actually really liked the idea of guys playing golf together, pretending to be gentleman and playing a game that they are all horrible at. I didn't see one guy on the green put the ball in the first time. So, they pay lots of money to play this game their no good at in slacks and polo's and drive around in little carts and appear as if they are gentleman playing the gentlemans sport. But having sat there for about an hour the idea of not being able to change a man was confirmed. They would drive those golf carts like mad men, swear and curse everytime they had a bad shot, smoke cigars and you know in the back pocket of those fancy pants was a big old nasty chew can, not to mention the cheap beer they had tucked in their golf bags. It's a funny thing

The 7AM start, over 6,000 runners.
The pictures following is the trail that the race took place on.....it was unbeleivable how beautiful it was, we even ran past Pebble Beach Golf course. 90% of the race was ocean side!

I had never seen Aloe plants before they were everywhere

I eventually finished. The good news about the race is in the pictures above, it was beautiful, great weather, sea level, and.....well the only bad news really is that I did not beat my PR(personal record). The even worse news is that I should have, I trained way harder for this half than my last, it was at sea level, and at the end I didn't exhaust myself enough. My pace the hole time was good, but I didn't kick in soon enough at the end. I got done and felt too good. I missed my PR by like 30seconds. Live and learn. But........

I got an award for placing 4th in my division, this made me feel a little better. However the girl that placed 3rd finished 7seconds before me!!!!

But take a minute to look at this picture. This is a great picture because if you didn't know it
appears as if I finished right next to the Kenyan girl, when in reality she placed first and finished in a ridiculous amount of time ahead of me and everyone else there. Good picture to show your kids when your old and forgetful....

Neither one of us had ever been to the California coast

Very different sand than WA or OR coast

Adam cracks me up, all season long while I am training he makes fun of me, my running shorts my putting running before everything else, and then come finish time of a race, I don't beat my PR and lose third place by 7 seconds and he's all advice and motivation. He will deny it, but he said more than once that weekend, that he would like to run a half some day with me!