The flight was roughly 3 hours which brought us into Dublin around 7pm on a Friday evening. Thankfully our luggage arrived and was out relatively quickly so we could get to our hotel, settle in and meet up with our friends who also traveled to Dublin to run. This first evening we went to the Temple Bar area and found a restaurant called O'Sheas where we had a good first taste of Irish food; I ordered Guinness beef stew and Z ordered the Irish stew. Mine was incredibly tasty and made me think that adding Guinness to my stew back home is a must do. The Guinness certainly tastes 100% better in Ireland.
The next morning we were up and off to run our 5km run as part of the Dublin Rock'n'Roll Marathon remix challenge- running two races in two days. I've done a remix challenge once before but it was a 5/10km distance vs this time being a 5/half marathon (21.1km). What was I thinking outside of being crazy and getting two extra medals!! The 5km route was in Phoenix Park and because we arrived later on Friday we had to pick up our race bibs the morning of the race. This was a little stressful for me because I felt we were a little rushed in getting to the race, finding our pick up place, final bathroom stop and getting to the start. In the end everything worked out just fine, we ended up getting a bit of a warm up jog in to get our bibs and get back to the start, but we made it with some time to spare. I think I really need to work on worrying a little less. The race was a good route, mostly flat but with a couple gradual hills. The three of us, Z, Viv, and I ran together and finished in 30 minutes. Not bad for taking it easy as Z and Viv said. I have to mention though that I crossed the finish line before Z but his official time is 1/100 of a seconds faster than mine. Go figure!?!
The 5km run happened to land on my birthday and that morning my wonderful Z gave me my awesome birthday card which had a button attached to it which said "one year sexier"! I ended up wearing this button during the race which made him very happy! After the race we had lunch at a great place called Queen of Tarts. I had an amazing butternut squash and roasted red pepper soup with a chicken sandwich while Z had the avocado and bacon pie and we both ordered fresh lemon iced tea. The food here was fabulous and reminded me of " home cooking". This place is also well known for their desserts and pastries and we couldn't resist ourselves so we ordered a vanilla swirl cupcake and carrot cake for take away. Very yummy when we finally ate them the next day. We needed to get to the race expo to pick up our half marathon packets so we parted ways with our friends for the afternoon. The expo was at Trinity College, a stones throw from our hotel, the Dublin Westin. The expo was quite small but we still managed to buy a couple token souvenir items because this was my first half marathon. We spent a little time walking around along the River Liffey before deciding it was better to rest up for the big day. It was later afternoon at this point and still about an hour and half before our dinner reservation. I was starting to get a little peckish and said I wanted to go back to the hotel to have a couple snacks we had in the room. Little did I know a surprise was waiting for me when we got back. I don't know when or how he did it, and like usual he won't tell me, but when we got back to our room there was a lemon cheesecake slice with a chocolate happy birthday sign sitting on the desk with two forks. He really does treat me amazingly!!! I'm really lucky. It was a really good cheesecake and yes I did share. It was a very nice treat and I felt no guilt eating it right before dinner!!
I had found an Italian restaurant called Toscana before we travelled over. They offer a 3-course menu option for a set price before 6:30pm so we had made a 6pm reservation. The food here was very good. I wish they explained that they charge for water before we ordered 3 bottles because that was a bit of a surprise when we received our check. I ordered the bruschetta which came on very thick bread, the linguine with meatballs and a panna cotta for dessert. Z had the fish balls, also the linguine and the tiramisu for dessert. This meal was just what I needed to carb up before the race the next day. We didn't do much more that evening besides prepare for the next morning which included laying our our running gear, making sure we knew where and which team to catch and making sure we got a good night's sleep. The sleep piece was a problem however. After our first night in Prague, I've been having significant trouble falling asleep. I usually wouldn't fall asleep until 2 or 3am which just wouldn't be OK this night. During this week of insomnia I really couldn't figure out what my problem was....I didn't think the jet lag would last that long....I think my subconscious was getting the better of me and was stressing about the run because once the run was done I slept just fine every night after in Dublin. Long story short it did still take me awhile to fall asleep the night before the race but because we went to bed earlier I still got a sufficient amount of sleep.
Race morning started with a 6:30am wake up. With everything I needed laid out the night before, getting ready was quite simple. I was just about to run a half marathon so no morning shower was really necessary.....just needed to get dressed. Pre-race food consisted of a banana and a couple handfuls of Cheerios with a little water. I was ready for the race, physically and mentally and I felt good. From there it was meet up our friends and walk to the tram station. The tram was jam packed with other runners but we managed to get ourselves on and arrived at the start area in very good time. It was a coolish morning with the wind blowing quite steadily. The clouds overhead were quite daunting and threaten rain for a good amount of time. After gear check, we queued up in a very long line at The Gibsons hotel nearby to use the facilities one last time before the start. I'm sure the hotel staff were thrilled to see hundreds of runners line up through their lobby to use the restrooms. They didn't say anything which was nice. There was a very cool mural of Bono and The Edge in this hotel and of course I had to get a picture because this was closest chance of "seeing" Bono.
Z and our friend Bry are both faster runners than me but we decided that we would all start in the same corral even though I was supposed to start in corral 11. With the wave start I would have started a good 15-20 minutes after them which would have put me at a much later overall finish time. We all "snuck" into corral 5 even with the race announcer saying with only 30ish seconds before the race started that everyone should line up their assigned corrals otherwise their timing chips wouldn't work. This was just mean to announce just before the start and particularly because it isn't true! Race started at 8:30 and we were off, starting at the Docklands and running along the River Liffey on the north side. Just before the 1.6km mark we crossed over one of the city's many bridges to the south side still running along the river, past the Guinness brewery, Christ Church Cathedral, and briefly into the beautiful park grounds of Royal Hospital Kilmainham before continuing through residential areas and past the Longmeadows pitch and putt and continuing along St Laurence's Rd before crossing over the River Liffey again and running along the road bordering Phoenix Park before entering the park and finishing the last 8km in the park. Overall the scenery of the route was beautiful with all the old architecture in the city centre and riverfront and because it was all new to me it helped keep my mind interested and focussed. The wind was at times quite strong and challenging particularly when it was a head or cross wind. It didn't rain except for a few minor sprinkles right at the beginning but it didn't last.
I had a very good run....I didn't have any aches or pains, no cramping, no feeling of needing to walk and didn't hit any mental walls. I was very proud of myself and very thankful for Z's supportive coaching in getting me ready for this day!! I finished my race in 2:18 beating my target of 2:30.
As with all Rock'n'Roll races, there is music blasting at the start line and they have bands or DJ's along the course. The bands along the course were all local bands and quite good!! I made an effort to either clap or give them the thumbs up because that can't be an easy gig especially on this morning where there was a constant blistery wind.
After the half there was a 3km family fun run which our friends, their 17 month old and Z signed up for. I thought this was a great race idea they had to encourage runners' kids to get into running.
After all races were done, we made our way back to the city centre and found an Insomnia Cafe where I had an amazing flat white and the best tasting pistachio macaroon as a snack before our lunch at Hanleys Cornish Pasties in the Temple Bar area. I had the chicken tikka pastie and Z had the mint lamb. This place was a great find and taste for money was right up there. Definitely a place to visit while in Dublin!!
After satisfying our hunger needs from the run, we got ourselves smelling like more civilized people again before hanging out for the balance of the afternoon. The Dublin Westin is in an old bank building converted into the hotel. As such their restaurants have financial names. My plan after finishing my race was to have a Guinness and so we went to The Mint, the pub in the hotel in the basement which we assume is where the vault was kept back in the day, and after first downing a cocktail I had my pint of the best tasting Guinness. I felt accomplished!
For dinner we went back to Temple Bar and found a great pub called Merchants Arch which had a great local atmosphere with a live musician playing guitar and singing. He was quite good and really made me wish we had more establishments like this back home. The food was great....I had the Guinness beef pie which had a huge helping of tender beef over a layer of mashed potatoes. And of course I had a Guinness, half pint this time, to wash it all down. Z enjoyed a pint of Guinness with his fish and chips.
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