Let's start from the very beginning...

John and Christina arrived in Portland Friday night. It was great to see them. We had spaghetti and meatballs for dinner and then headed to bed. We woke up Saturday morning, had pancakes, sausage and fruit and then got ready to head down to Eugene. We got in the car around 11:30 and I called Carolyn and Laura to let them know that we were on our way. On the way down, we stopped at the outlet mall and stretched our legs a bit. Then we stopped at Subway to grab a bite to eat. Believe it or not, standing in front of us in line at this random Subway just north of Salem, was Laura. We chatted with her a bit about nerves, how the past few days have gone, and the plans for later in the evening. We decided that we would meet up with her later and eat pasta dinner together.

The next hour on the road seemed to take forever. About half an hour out, John notices our GPS and says, "hey look, we only have a marathon left to drive." I think that is when I got excited. 26.2 miles. The next day, I would need to move myself 26.2 miles. It didn't seem scary anymore - I just wanted to do it.

We got to the Hilton (the event hotel), picked up our packets, got our goodie bags and our t-shirts, and then went and sat in the bar so Christina could have a drink :) Laura met us in the bar and bought us a round in thanks for letting her join us for dinner (see, great running partner, huh?) I had a beer and it was amazing. I felt every nerve in my body let go. We ate our pasta dinner and then headed to our hotel to check in and get some sleep.

I laid out my clothes. I planned for various weather conditions. I made sure everything was in order. I laid down at 9 and was asleep at 9:30... Tomorrow was going to be a very very very big day.