Celebrating My Birthday and Marathon Training While Travelling

I couldn’t be more excited to be writing this blog update from my condo in Boston! A week ago, I was en route to NYC for a shoot with Fairfield Inn & Suites and CBS Interactive.

Working on my Bday in NYC

I’ve been on the road a lot lately and last Monday was actually my birthday. I tweeted on the train down that all I wanted for my bday was dinner from Sweetgreen and macarons. The social team from Fairfield saw this and brought these to my hotel room during my lunch break at the shoot on Tuesday! I was so touched I almost cried… I also had a wake up call of 5:30am and took a red eye in from LA on Saturday so I was a little sleep deprived/time zone confused.

The macarons were from Macaron Cafe in NYC and were totally delicious. My favorite was the Nutella. I also discovered there is a gift shop in Boston at the Pru near my optometrist, Eye’s Over Copley, that sells macarons from Macaron Cafe! 

The production crew also got me a cake to celebrate at the end of the shoot. It was from Zaro’s and ridiculously delicious with vanilla custard and chocolate fudge in the middle.

The videos will be available on the CBS Interactive site in the near future. The shoot began at 6am and we finished around 6:30pm. I decided to take the day off from my marathon training. I was scheduled for a strength training day but I was exhausted. I did meet up with my friend Theodora for a glass of wine and then the production crew for a beer at a near by dive bar before calling it a night.

I decided to take the noon train home on Wednesday and fit in my mile repeat workout in Central Park before checking out of the Fairfield Inn & Suites by Penn Station for a change of scenery.

My workout from my Race Pace Wellness Marathon program was a 2 mile warm up followed by 4 mile repeats at 80% max effort followed by 800 meter recoveries and a mile cool down. I surprisingly felt great. Must have been all the sugar from the day before! Wednesday night was spent chilling on my couch and doing nothing.

On Thursday, it was raining in Boston hard most of the day. Instead of an easy run, I took a 45 minute spin class at Recycle Studio. If you haven’t been to their new Boston Common location, you need to check it out. There are amazing new locker rooms with showers, stadium seating and extra bikes! Kelly taught the 5pm who I adore and covers my ass at Barry’s while I travel most of the time. Afterwards, my girlfriends Cate and Rebecca treated me to wine, Sweetgreen, macarons (from Thinking Cup) and new comfy pants!

Cate owns Recycle Studio and always has the cutest branded apparel. I’m obsessed with these tapered comfy sweat pants because they are actually flattering and adorable.

My perfect birthday celebratory evening was achieved thanks to these two. Since I have been so busy, they knew a relaxing night was just what I needed. It was like an adult sleepover that ended at 10pm on a school night. I think I need to do a blog post on where to buy macarons in Boston since I now feel like an expert.

On Friday, I took a $5 community yoga class at Back Bay Yoga with the always inspiring Kimberly Rajotte to stretch out before my 20 miler on Saturday.

On Saturday, I woke up early for my long run. Roomie drove me out to mile 6 in Framingham along the Boston marathon course so that I could finish at the actual finish line.

It snowed/rained the entire 20 miles. There were hundreds of runners out on the course, as well as police officers helping with traffic, charities and families cheering on the runners and supplying water and food. It felt like I was running an actual race. The energy helped push my pace and kept me from feeling bored and wanting to stop to walk.

I made it to the finish line with an average pace around 9:30/mile and more importantly uninjured. I was wet and freezing but felt strong and ecstatic to be that much closer to Marathon Monday.

This was the last long run for most marathon runners, but my schedule has a 22 miler next week as well before I start to taper.

I literally picked the worst in New England to train for the Boston Marathon. We have had record snow fall and cold temperatures. It’s almost April and we STILL have snow on the ground. I feel prepared to run in whatever kind of weather marathon Monday might bring but I can’t wait to say good bye to this weather even with all my west coast travels.

I know some people do not want to run Boston without qualifying because it’s a badge of honor. I feel apologetic that I’ve been given this opportunity to run without qualifying but after training in this winter, I do feel like I’ve earned some street credit. If you are unfamiliar with how you get to run Boston, you either qualify by running another marathon really fast, run on behalf of a charity or run on behalf of one of the sponsors. Companies can buy bibs as well. The BAA is a business after all. I am running with the #TeamAdidas. I worked with them for most of 2014 and have never been so in love with a running shoe as I am with the Boost. They are the title sponsor for the Boston Marathon so they get a number of bibs to give to their athletes and employees.

Have you run the Boston Marathon or are you running this year? Let me know down below. Would love to meet as many of you as possible during race weekend festivities!