The Day Before the Malibu Marathon

In the good old days, the day before a marathon I'd stay in a hotel room, lounge around and drink Gatorade and read and watch TV all day, then go out for an early dinner and continue relaxing.

That was then. Today's routine was more like...get kids fed and dressed, go to soccer game to coach the last game of the season, break up fights, go to Jersey Mike's with the kids, break up more fights, go to Roadrunner Sports to buy something last minute only to have to leave because the kid were...fighting, stop by the house, drop off one kid, take the other kid out for multiple errands (went to Future Track Running Store instead), came home, jumped on the trampoline w/the kids, bathe the kids, brush their teeth...the list goes on. Now it is 9:30 pm and I've got an hour til bedtime to myself. Alarm is set for 5:30 am.

I'm relaxed, I'm not taking this marathon too seriously. If I can come close to a 3 hour performance I'll be happy.

On Friday I drove the course from Camarillo Airport to Zuma to pick up my bib number. Boy does 26.2 miles seem FAR when you drive it.

Roughly 2/3rds of the course is along PCH, which means this is probably one of the most scenic marathons in the world and I can't imagine many races with more oceanfront.

The last 6 miles though look pretty challenging, with some pretty significant hills in the Leo Carrillo area. I will make a note to save plenty of energy for that final 10K...meaning don't worry about the first half marathon. Just take it easy and enjoy the ride.

The liquids served on the course include water and Zico Coconut Water. I tried Zico for the first time at the race expo, but since I've not used it at all during training run, it probably isn't a good idea to try it during the race. But it did seem to go down pretty nicely.

My purchase today was a very small waist pack that fits 4 GU gels. I decided to try something other than pinning the gels to my shorts. This pack is so small that it should not cause me any problems tomorrow. Those GUs may come in quite handy.

It has been windy now for a number of days, but they say the wind will die down tomorrow. Wind is my biggest enemy in the marathon as it dries me out.

So on that note, I'm off to relax a bit more so I'm off and running tomorrow morning...