Almost ShowTime!

We are in the final countdown.....the last 2 weeks before the marathon. Asia has peaked at 60 miles per week for several weeks and is now in her taper. February 25 Aaron came to the Running Fit 501 practice to run Asia's 20 miler with her. Typical of most of her Saturday long runs, it had snowed the night before and again Saturday morning. But she wore her screw shoes and she was fine. Last Wednesday was her last mid-week long run with Aaron and Michael, and she's already trying to figure out a way to keep it going....even to talking about running another marathon, if that's what it takes. This past Saturday and Sunday were her last back-to-back 10 mile runs......Saturday with her team and Sunday with Katie, Gwen, and Elizabeth.


All of this extra training would have been nearly impossible without the help of the dedicated runners who ran with her. We will make an LA Marathon collage picture when we get back, and include the pictures of her with her running buddies. We want to do something as a *thank you* but haven't decided what yet.

The other huge thank-you goes out to the family and friends who donated to Asia's fundraising campaign on Crowdrise. She was invited to run the marathon by Train 4 Autism, an organization founded and populated by people whose lives are impacted by autism.....in a family member, friend, co-worker, neighbor. Their purpose is to train endurance athletes to compete and raise money for the autism-related charity of their choice. Their newest project is to pair young runners who are on the autism spectrum with high school and college runners......thereby creating the next generation of *Asias*. Asia (and we) chose both T4A and the University of Michigan chapter of Best Buddies as the recepients of any monies raised. Our initial goal was $1,000 when I sent out the first and only email at the end of January. I am pleased to report that we had to raise the goal to $2,000, and have surpassed even that! The total, as of today, March 6, is $3,036, from 40 donors! I work for Kaiser Optical Systems, whose parent company is Rockwell Collins. Rockwell donated $1,000! We have been overwhelmed by the generosity of our family and family of friends.

I have printed off the course map, as large as it would allow.....12 sheets taped together! (Even with a GPS, there's just something about a paper map!) Jim, a friend at work who used to live in LA went over the map with me after the street closure list was posted. We worked out the best way from the host hotel to the Start, and then in reverse, from the Start to the Finish. We found routes that will allow us to intersect the course and see the runners at Mile 6 and again Mile 17, before driving to the Finish Line. With luck we will see Asia and Sam (her running partner) at least once.

We are making mental packing lists......it's only 12 days now til the race.....

Long Overdue

It's been over a year since I've written on this Blog. Shortly before the last post there was a division in Asia's running team. It caused such a profound rift, and left many of us feeling like, as someone else said, the children of a bad divorce, that I couldn't write without writing about it. So..........I didn't write at all. But a year has passed, the Team is now an equally wonderful new Team, and we haven't lost touch with the old members who were so important in Asia's life. And so, life, and running goes on.

The long and the short of it is, Asia is still running every day. In 2011 she ran in 12 races, including 3 half-marathons, the Martian Half, the Dexter-Ann Arbor Half, and the Brooksie Way Half. She continued to say that she didn't want to run another full marathon, and was pretty adamant about it. She didn't enjoy her last marathon at all, and we supported her decision. Then on September 6 I received an email from Ben Fesasaiga, President of Train 4 Autism in California. He asked about Asia's running schedule for the coming year and casually mentioned that if Asia was interested, he would like to invite her to run on the T4A team in the Los Angeles Marathon on March 18, 2012. (Yeah, right, I thought. She'll never do it.) But I promised to mention it to her.

I was pleasantly surprised when the first words out of her mouth were NOT an emphatic NO! She asked excellent questions. Will Coach make me a schedule? Who will run the long runs with me? Who will run the race with me? (Marathons are the only races in which Asia has a dedicated running partner.) She said she’d think about it. The fact that she didn’t reply with an outright, emphatic NO is testament to how much she likes the Train 4 Autism people she’s met so far.

Several days later, more questions. Would she get to see Ben and Molly and meet Sam’s son? Where would we stay? Would we fly out there? She said she was still thinking about it.

Two weeks later we were at the hotel the night before the Brooksie Way Half-Marathon. We were about to settle down for the night, when Asia asked, “ Mom, are there any Chinese restaurants in LA?” That’s when I knew she was hooked. “Yes, honey,” I replied. “There are many Chinese restaurants, and about any other kind you can think of, in LA.” “Any all-you-can-eat buffet restaurants, mom?” Me: “Oh, I’ll bet we could find a few.” “OK,” she said. “I’ll go.”

Asia’s coach, Kathleen Gina, developed a training schedule for her which started in October, to gradually increase her miles to 60 per week. In non-training periods Asia runs 5 miles a day, every day. She uses her internal clock to tell her when she’s run 5 miles. Her training schedule called for many days of more than 5 miles. Since she typically runs before we get home from work, we decided to set a timer based on the # of miles x her usual speed. She clips on the timer before going out to run and comes in when it goes off.

As soon as we had the training schedule in place I sent out an email to Asia's teams, both the new one and those from the old team that I thought would want to help. Starting in January there were 8 weeks of 10 mile runs in the middle of the week. And there were 5 weekends of *back-to-back* 10 mile runs on Saturday and Sunday. We immediately got responses from Ashley, Claudio, Aaron, Eric, Katie, Gwen and Erin. Aaron offered for Asia to run on Wednesdays with him and Michael and the others offered to pick up some of the Sunday 10 milers. We had a plan in place. I printed a calendar for Asia with her miles for each day and who she was running with.


Angie, Asia, and Ashley

Eric and Asia

We are now in the 60-mile per week period, which will last until the week before the marathon. If regular practice miles didn't match what Asia needed for the day Doug, Vanessa, Erin, Maureen and other members have come in an hour early on Saturdays. Rich has stayed late on Tuesdays to make sure Asia gets her miles in for those days. Most Wednesdays since the first of January Asia has run with Aaron and Michael. Kumi met us in Ann Arbor last Thursday for an evening 10 mile run with Asia. Ashley, Eric, and Katie have filled in all the Sunday slots. And one Sunday, Meg's sister-in-law Angie was in town and ran with Asia and Ashley. If it takes a village to raise a child, then it's taking the commitment of a dedicated Coach, a supportive team, and wonderful friends to get Asia to the Marathon.


Stay tuned.....now that I'm back into writing, there will be more news to follow as we all go thru this Marathon journey.