It wasn’t that long ago that I was basking in the glow of the Disneyland Half Marathon Weekend. Now, here I am….leaving for the Windy City to run my 3rd full marathon and 1st World Major Marathon. The training is finished. No matter how imperfect it was, I can’t go back and change anything. All that remains is flying to Chicago (which I do today), attending the Expo, and running the race. Hopefully, at the end of the race, I’ll be all smiles like in the above picture. Time will tell.

This is what I’ll be wearing on race day.

Here’s the front of the shirt that Adoption-Link & Holt International have designed for us to wear.

And the back. I love the back…Every child deserves a loving and permanent home. In other words, every child deserves a forever home of their own. This is what I’ve raised all that money for.

Here’s my plan for surviving the 2015 Bank of America Chicago Marathon:

• I will run 30 seconds, walk 90 seconds – hopefully, this proves to be a winning strategy and one that I will keep up for the ENTIRE race. I hope there won’t be too many missed run intervals.
• I will take on Gatorade at each water/fuel station until I get sick of it. Then, take on water. When it gets warmer, I plan to take a cup of water to pour on myself to cool off and a cup of Gatorade to drink.
• I will take a Cliff Shot Blok every 30 minutes. I’ll be carrying one bottle of water on me and one bottle of Gatorade. So, even if I’m not near a water station, I’ll be fine.
• As I said, I’ll have a bottle of water and one of Gatorade on me for those moments I feel like I need extra hydration along the way but am not near a water station.
• I have my running playlist all set for the race.
• Depending on how the race goes, I’ll post some pics along the way to Instagram and Twitter. So, if you’re not following along and want to join my journey, please do.
• There are four pictures I want to capture during the race….
  • The Trump Tower
  • The Chicago Theatre
  • The United Center
  • The Finish Line
• After the race, I plan to make my way to the Bean for a picture with my race medal.
• Post Race Meal at Giordano’s for some real Chicago Pizza

As for time goals…

• If I’m running out of my mind amazing – Sub 6 hours
• A New PR – Anything under 6 hours, 21 minutes, 45 seconds
• A New 2nd Best – Anything between 6 ours, 21 minutes, 46 seconds to 6 hours, 30 minutes, 00 seconds.

Anything over 6 hours, 30 minutes means I’m not an official finisher of the 2015 Bank of America Chicago Marathon. As I’ve thought over this, I realize that a 6 hour, 30 minute finish is totally doable for me (even with all the craziness of my training for this race). The temps will be higher than I like. But, the course is also relatively flat. If I can stay focused long enough and fight through those moments where I question my own sanity of trying a race so long, I should be able to finish in the time required. After all, the 2015 Los Angeles Marathon features a course much more difficult and temps that were around 10 degrees higher and I finished around 6 hours, 55 minutes. So, I could totally see how 10 degrees cooler and a flatter course would see me finish around a minute per mile faster.

It’s time to dream of the marathon again. I’ll be in Chicago through Tuesday. I’ll try to put up a picture with the Bean and my medal on Monday to announce I’ve finished. By the way, if you follow along on Twitter or Instagram, feel free to leave comments with the pictures I post. With 90 second walk breaks, I may just get to read some of them while I’m running the marathon. My wave starts at 8am in the Central Time Zone. I’m not sure how long it will take me to get going. However, if you’re looking anytime after that, you might see some of my pics from the course.