"What to do with an old box, Idea #546": Make an Alien helmet. (unkl Dan photo)

What does this have to do with anything? The box started life holding the vase that I won for coming first in the Royal Victoria Half Marathon this last weekend. The kid inside is my son Ross. The cool alien helmet was made by his big sister Maia. This photo exemplifies how I balance my athletic professional life with my family.

In case anyone is wondering how I do it, here is the short version. I left the house at 6:30 am on Sunday morning. Ross was already up, and I left him with Janet, our super-sitter, reassuring him with the usual "mummy is going for a run." That always works. It was sort of late for a 7:30 start, but this is my home town and I was pretty sure I knew where to park even on race morning. I love the drive down Blanshard before a race. I get on the highway at Royal Oak, favourite music turned up loud and pretty soon I can tell the other runners' cars: caps, running jackets, people with Ironman Canada stickers on their back windshields. It's like the pre-race rally. I nailed my parking spot, 3 blocks from the Empress.

I was already sure I was going to have a great race. I am not exactly sure why this is so, except that I have never NOT had a great race in the city, and after years of practicing race preparation, my body just seems to go on positive thinking auto pilot on race morning.

Nevertheless I was a little nervous. I was a little nervous because I had set myself up with some extrinsic goals on top of my usual run out of sheer joy and fun attitude. I want to break my course record, and I had publicly stated that I want to break that Canadian Masters record. I want to win (I always want to win, I admit. I have felt this way since I was 5 and it just doesn't go away, even though I am 40, have kids and should know better).

I was nervous, because I had a pretty strange week as far as preparing for a race goes. After three easy and moderate weeks post Ironman Canada, I built into two very strong weeks of training, and felt awesome. At the end of that 2 weeks I performed an excellent training session consisting of a 2 and a half hour run with 80 minutes of strong tempo in the latter half of the run. I had to really commit to that run. It was hard but I was determined to make it happen. I was tired for a week after that training block and had to modify most of my sessions leading into the Half Marathon.

I had a busy week with the kids too, with Lance away at the Hawaii Ironman (catch his commentary on http://www.triathletemag.com/). They don't sleep well when he first goes away, and with soccer, swimming and everything else I was in full on kid mode most of the time.

In fact, I took the last 4 days before Sunday so easy that I knew I would be OK. It's one thing I know about myself, I race well when rested.

Despite the weather warnings, the morning was not cold, the wind was calm and the day was perfect for running. (that changed at about 10:30am, halfway through the race for the poor marathoners).

I can honestly say that after the horn sounded, I just ran. I ran as hard as I could and when it started to get uncomfortable at 11k, I told myself to be tough. With Ironman still fresh in my mind (that's 10 hours of tough and at least 5 hours of really really tough), I knew I could hurt for 40 more minutes, or 30, or 5). At one point I felt my right shoe slipping a little on my heel. "Oh rats, I thought. I didn't tighten my laces enough. Now my Achilles is hurting. What if I have to drop out so I don't injure myself?" I decided to stop thinking about it, as even thinking about it was slowing my pace down. I decided to cross that bridge when I got there--if it really did start hurting. Guess what? I forgot all about it. Though I will make a mental note to check my laces before longer races next time.

Coming back through Fairfield I ran past all the participants still heading out. Wow. The young guy I was running with began a conversation. I wasn't in the mood for talking but I told him my name was Lucy. He remarked, "I figured that out. It seems like everybody is cheering for you!"

With a kilometer to go, I glanced at my watch and saw 1:13 and change. That was good; I turned it up a notch. Coming around the Wax Museum into that finishing straight, I saw 1:15 on the clock and as I approached it turned over to 1:16. Knowing my course record was close, I just sprinted as fast as I could. I got the record by 1 second.


It was a good confidence booster for Worlds and New York City Marathon. Except that my legs were so sore. I could hardly cool down my legs were so sore. It's Tuesday now and they are still sore. That's another thing I know about myself. My legs get sore.

Well, the rest of the morning was just wonderful. The RVM is a world class event with world class atmosphere. I chatted with the PowerBar guys as I drank my post race recovery shake and watched them trying to enforce the 1 per athlete quota. I joined Silken Laumann, Alison Sydor and the rowers-on-fire Malcolm and Kevin for the kids run. I grabbed a beautiful latte from Mirage on Government, I finally spent my birthday gift certificate at Munroes Bookstore. Then I attended the awards ceremony, where I was graciously given the wonderful trophy vase and the BOX in which to carry it home.

Then I went home and spent the rest of the rainy afternoon indoor with my children.

I can't say enough good things about the organization of this race. Next year I REALLY want to run the marathon. Wouldn't that be awesome...the 2 mums out there. (Suzanne Evans, the multiple time winner of the marathon, has 2 children--and by the way, she deserved an equally large photo in the paper, and that's no slight to Steve O).

Lucy