Hail to the road warriors

Today was the Silicon Valley Marathon. I was at the mile-5/22 aid station. I spent most of the time standing by the side of the course and handing out cups of Amino Vital, cheering on the runners and making them chuckle with chants of "Amino! Breakfast of champions! Running's finest Japanese import! Almost there – just one trillionth of a lightyear to go!" Standing on the sidelines, I got to see a wide variety of runners – a half dozen Halloween costumes, a huge Team Asha contingent, a colleague from work, a blind woman with guide, a barefoot runner and one unfortunate man with runner's nipples.

I was itching to run today, especially watching all my teammates cross the finish line. Deanna, Nathan, Paul and Jenni completed the San José Hat Trick and picked up their hockey-puck trophies signed by the likes of Patrick Marleau, Jonathan Cheechoo and Joe Thornton.

Soon it will be my turn. The healing progress on my knee is promising. At this point I can bear weight on it – standing and walking – with hardly any swelling. I went swimming today for 30 minutes in an attempt to stay in condition and to burn off the weight I'd gained after Friday's pasta dinner. The extra pounds were to be expected since carb-loading causes a person to retain water to support stored carbohydrates. During my swim the lower extremity of the lateral hamstring cramped up a little bit, so I'm still not out of the woods yet. This is still better than last week, where the swelling was over the entire knee. I'll need to do a lot of gentle stretching this week to get back into form. My hope is to start running again next weekend at least 8 stable miles, but I'll be happy right now with a good 10K.

The Red Rovers are coming out to support me by running the CIM relay alongside me. What a great team!