21 Weeks to 21K

In 21 short weeks, I'll be in Las Vegas, Nevada running 21km. It's going to be great - maybe - and maybe I won't die. I've been reading The Nonrunner's Marathon Guide for Women: Get Off Your Butt and On with Your Training by Dawn Dias. In fact, I'm following her training guide because she had never run a day in her life (well maybe as a child) before she decided to run a marathon (a full one I might add). It's slow and steady, but not easy by any means. The basic structure is Sunday: short run, Monday: rest, Tuesday: short run, Wednesday: a bit longer run, Thursday: 45mins - 1hour Cross Training (which means something that is low-impact like biking, weights, core - pretty much anything that does not require incessantly pounding the pavement and having my shins scream out in protest), Friday: rest, Saturday: long run (a.k.a. Hell Day). That is repeated every week until week 19 at which point I do short runs Monday and Tuesday and rest every day after that until the marathon on Sunday.  

So that's the running part...

...now for the fundraising part.

A few days ago I needed $150 to hit the $1000 mark. I promised that I would post an embarrassing photo of myself post-workout once I reached that landmark. I launched my second fundraising idea - Pennies for Progress - and asked people to help me collect enough pennies to cover each kilometer of Africa's continental border. That's 30,557 pennies! When you ask for pennies, you're pretty much guaranteed to get other coins as well. A friend of mine pulled this jar of coins from the back of her closet and delivered it to my desk. There was over $200 in that jar which put me over the $1000 mark. With online and personal donations in addition to honey sales and coins collected so far I've raised $1080 dollars! You can see the financial breakdown associated with each aspect of my fundraising efforts here. You can also add to my fundraising efforts there. 

Alright, I am done digressing. Here is the pre- vs post-workout photo. Hopefully you get some idea of the sweat and stink emanating from me in the second photo!