Confessions of an overpacker

Sunday I ran my first solo race – the Hyannis Half Marathon. 13.1 miles all to myself. And the race was actually fantastic.

The photog and I went up to the cape Saturday night to stay at his parent’s beach house. It was perfect, just 30 min away from the starting line, but of course I had to “crazy” up the whole situation with my obsessive packing. Now I left out this fun fact when recapping the Newport Marathon, but my nerves tend to manifest themselves as over packing and over preparing. On our trip to Newport I not only packed extra clothes an towels for me, Sarsh and the photog, but I packed bagels, bread, water, G2 and a Toaster. Yup, I threw my toaster in a bag and took it to the Travelodge.

Anyway, when preparing for our trip to Eastham I packed every single ingredient for dinner and breakfast including gluten free bread, butter, apples, g2, broccoli, asparagus, green peppers, pasta sauce, gluten free pasta, regular pasta, garlic, spices, chicken, and olive oil. When we started loading up the car I actually thought the photog was gonna dump me, because as I soon learned the house was completely stocked with all of the essentials (although I don’t think they had the gluten free carbs and fresh veggies). And that doesnt even touch upon the many an option for race day apparel and my snuggie, of which I have detailed in photos.

Mom don’t kill me but here are my “you are a goddess” undies, they are special dry fit undies that I wear on every long run, plus they come with a fun little ego boost every time you put them on.









Two other undie/sports bra options:


Running tights – cold and heat gear


My second layer pants – hardtails and yoga/dryfit pants


Multiple dryfit shirt options


Windbreaker, gloves, earmuffs hat


Anyway that’s just a little taste of all the crap I brought with me, yup one day, one run and way too many options. But it all worked out great, I ended up wearing my cold gear tights, dry-fit yoga pants, my nike short sleeve dry-fit, my Pittsburgh half marathon dry-fit long sleeve that sarah gave me as a gift (in the words of the photog this was the perfect option because it was like I was brining Sarsh with me every step of the way), and then all of my outerwear gloves, hat ear muffs ect. I may have been the only person out of the close to 6,000 there that was wearing 2 pairs of pants, but I’m totally ok with that.

Anyway the day was great, not a drop of rain (despite the scary forecast) and I finished in 2:22:31 not horrible considering I didn’t train much and usually avoid cold like the plague. Plus, the photog was there right at the finish to see me cross, hand me one of the many g2s I brought and the extra towel I packed.

The race itself was also amazingly well done, but I’ll do a “real” recap tomorrow. For now bedtime!

Here’s one last photo of me in all my layers plus the photog’s sweatshirt (now mine) before the race.