LiveStrong Challenge

What a totally fun day! I am dying to run out to the bike store to buy a road bike so I can be in this even on a bike next year. It was still cool on foot, but the runners really were just sidekicks to the main participants on bikes. I look really nerdy in that picture, I know!

The day had a 5K run and walk plus 10, 40, 70 and 100 mile bike rides. There were thousands of particpants, mostly on bikes. Lance was there and I managed to get his photo when he was on stage but when he was 2 feet away on his bike, I only managed to catch his left arm. That's him riding right out of the frame. He's the one with the watch. I don't know who his unidentifiable sidekick is. (You can click on the picutes to make them bigger!)

The weather was hot and humid but it was overcast in the morning, which was a blessing since the run was still hard even with the cloud cover.

I took a lot of pictures before during and after the event and you can see them all by clicking this link to the slideshow.

I don't know how I did because I was struggling a little with the humidity and I stopped a few times to take photos. I did, however, run as fast as a I possibly could at the end from the point where I took this photo to the finish line which you can see if you look close -- it has to be no more than a quarter mile from the photo point. Maybe less. The point is that I ran hard enough at that point that the kid barely had time to unhook the timing thingie from my ankle before I totally hurled over the corral fence into the grass. I have done 20+ races and I've never even had a hint of throwing up from exertion before but here I was doing it for Lance. Crazy!

My friend from work was here today too doing her very first 5k ever and she did great and had a great time. She was as excited as I'd hoped she be when she finished.

Since is is all about fighting cancer, if you'd like to Donate some money to the Lance Armstrong Foundation you can do that by clicking on this link.

The t-shirt we all got was neat too. It has the LiveStrong logo in the center and it's surrounded by these yellow words:

LiveStrong means....knowing not all heros wear capes
LiveStrong means....honoring my child with every mile
LiveStrong means....challenging myself
LiveStrong means....having the courage to take a walk
LiveStrong means....defining my own finish line
LiveStrong means....pushing through the pain
LiveStrong means....having the courage to take a ride
LiveStrong means....turning tears into sweat
LiveStrong means....having the courage to go for a run
LiveStrong means....channelling attitude into action
LiveStrong means....pedaling my heart out
LiveStrong means....pounding the pavement to make a difference
LiveStrong means....knowing that courage is taking the first step
LiveStrong means....digging deep when I want to quit
LiveStrong means....knowing not all winners finish first
LiveStrong means....being scared and showing up anyway
LiveStrong means....believing in myself
LiveStrong means....knowing it's about the journey and not the finish line
LiveStrong means....knowing I'm stronger than I thought
LiveStrong means....never, never, never giving up


Unity is strength. Knowledge is power.