One Race...OneLlove. "3 for the 26.2!"

   So... a 30 something, fearless white girl who moves from Okc to Nyc, because she could.  A 20 something spunky Columbian latina, code name Dirty Diana who loves Ludacris and dancing at wedding receptions and a 40 something black guy from oklahoma who loves HipHop decide to run the NY Marathon...

  "Whats the punchline?" you may ask...because I know it sounds like the beginning of some off color joke...But alas there is no punchline. Its the result of 3 friends from very different walks of life unexpectantly coming to the same point at the same time in their lives, Week 4 of 16 week marathon training!! And on Nov, 4 in 12 short weeks they will be standing at the starting line (and then hard part...) 5 hrs...5 boroughs later at the finish line of New York Marathon!! Go Hard or Go Home right?

So let me start of by thanking my best friend Kyndra for letting me guest blog for her and adding some testosterone to her page. If you havent guessed it yet...I'm the black guy. Lol!..Heres a brief synopsis of me and my journey to SMASH 26.2 mi.thru the streets of NYC!!!

My name is Lloyd and my story is one of Llife. Some of the lowest lows and some of the highest highs....Sort of like when running long distances. Running has got me thru some really tough times since I started a yr and a half ago. I wont bore you with the lows I'll just dazzel you with the highs.. because theres been far more of those! :-)

Febuary 6th 2011!! my first race!! Yes thats SNOW!!! Crazy right? It was a 4 mi race through Central park. Yeah it was pretty cold, but by the end I was warm for sure. I ran an 11min pace exactly, 44.mins. I was 4940 out of 5813..that means I beat 873 New Yorkers!!  2725 out of 3006 males, so I left 281 men in my dust!! (Stats provided by the good folks at New York Road Runners)

   That's who I qualified through. I had to run 9 races and volunteer. Races ranged between 4mi and 9.3 (15k), to my longest the Staten Island Half Marathon.

    13.1 mi ran in 2hrs and 24min and 46sec! MAJOR!!!!  It was an Amazing feeling needless to say I was hooked! I was 4493 out of 5304, 811  runners smoked!!! Okay im done bragging..cause I got dusted too by 4492! doesnt quite have the same ring to it does it? Lol..

   I've been lucky to not have had any major injuries, thank God. Altho I do have my occasional ache and pain, I try to just take it easy and run at a low impact pace. My last race in New York was the Scotland 6 mi run. Finished in 57mi.41sec.

   It was a really fun race, people had their face painted like Mel Gibson in Braveheart! I mean face fully painted one side white, the other blue!  Crazy!

   I left New York and returned home to Oklahoma and have been training daily. getting up at 5am to beat the heat.

Which is very hard to do, but I have a goal to accomplish so theres no choice. Plus I really love running...and Im a lover of music so Its nice to find different songs to run to. To me music has a different effect on me when Im running, Its like its my own little soundtrack to my journey. I ran to a Kanye and Jay "Watch the Throne" mix today for my 10 mi run...and it was so perfectly fitting.

   I started w/ "lift off"!! Man, its like pure energy!!! The horns and Beyonce goin off! It really set the the tone for a good pace.

   "No church in the wild" kept me amped and at mile 3 when "N----s in Paris" came on I was warmed up and ready to pick up the pace. Then it would switch from a slower tempo track to a faster uptempo track. Around mile 5 "Murder to excellence" comes on...So appropriate, I'm starting to labor a little but the beat is Crazy and the drums get me pumped! Jay and Yay are goin off on the rhymes the beat breaks down to bongos and the the drums come back in at just the right time and Im in my Zone! Energy!! I feel the endorphins kick in and I feel like a machine...until the song fades...I'm reminded that I am not and slow my pace as a slower track comes on. Around mile 7 I go straight to H.A.M (hard as a mutha) to get that last push of sonic energy from my headphones. I ended mi 9 to 10 with track 15 "the joy" a nice slow Curtis Mayfield / Pete Rock sample. A slow soulful track, cause my pace at this time was slow and soulful..lol  I finished at a 11min pace, not too bad.

   Well, I could go on but I'll stop there. 3 mi tomorrow will make a total of 24mi this week. Next sat 16mi!! The saga continues...

Thanks for taking the time to be a part of my journey. See you at the finish line.

.Llove-Llife.