Boston: Part 2

These are all of the photos taken on my phone.

I think I posted this picture on my last post, but again, this was the welcoming sign I saw upon getting off of the plane in Boston.  I thought there would be many more signage promoting the race, but surprisingly, this was it.

We landed Saturday morning at 5:30am Boston time, 2:30am CA time.  Luckily, we thought ahead and booked our room starting Friday night so that we could check in right away instead of waiting around till the 3pm check in time.  Brad went to sleep right away and I hit the hotel gym for a 4 miler taper run.  This was the view from our room - overlooking the Charles River.

Later that day we headed out to the expo.  We passed Boston University along the way:

The expo was very organized and easy to pick up your bib.

It was HUGE too!  There were so many vendors that it was hard to know if you actually made it up and down every aisle.

This is a shot of the outside of the expo building:

Of course I bought a few things :)

The next day we went back to the expo and got Brad a ticket for the pre race dinner.  It was nothing exciting, but at least we can say we tried it out and know the experience.  Carb loading!

It's race day!!  Here we go Boston!

Amy (whom I befriended at our hotel) & I while in line for the buses. The race started at 10:20am, but we had to meet at 6am in order to make it in time.  Crazy, huh?!  It is a point-to-point course, so they had to bus 27,000 people 45 minutes away to the start and get everyone organized in our corrals.  We literally only had about 20 minutes with nothing to do.

Not a good shot, but this is the area where everyone gets in the looong lines to load the buses.

This is too!

Once we get off the bus, we walk over to Runners' Village.  Here they have porta potties, food, water, coffee, announcements, etc.  We even had a moment of silence for the Sandy Hook victims.... ironic... who would have known that the finish line would be bombed and add another tragic moment in history.

It was a tough race, for sure.  I am VERY happy with my PR (personal record) of 3:15:47!  That is a 7:24 pace!