Nike Women's Marathon - San Francisco

And after my trip to Chicago, came San Francisco for the Nike Women's Marathon weekend with Team in Training! Check out how cool our hotel room was at the Monaco. I loved the variety of colors, patterns, and fabrics used. Definitely nothing I would have ever thought to pair together, but it seems to work!

Loved the huge round mirror!

We stayed about 2 blocks from Union Square, which was where all the marathon action took place. The race expo was set up here as well as well as the start of the race! And there was shopping galore on every corner!

The Nike Women's Marathon is where I ran my very first marathon two years ago in 2008 and it was truly an amazing and life changing experience! I trained and raised money with Team in Training for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society and have been involved with this great organization ever since! I was so excited to head back to San Fran this year and support the 33 women who I've been coaching all season long! This race caters to women and nothing is more empowering than to run for a great cause with 20,000 other women right beside you!

Right across the street from the expo was a 7 floor Niketown, this place was sheer chaos all weekend long! Check out all the people outside the building lineup up to find their names on the wall!

The names of all the race participants for the weekend were printed on the side of the building! It took a few minutes, but I was able to locate my name "Lauren Kapeluck"! How cool is that to see your name amongst thousands of others on the Nike building!

Saturday was a day spent touring the city. A group of us took a 5 hour shuttle and ferry guided tour to hit up some of the famous landmarks. Our journey started at the Ferry Building, which is the most fabulous Farmer's Market I have ever seen featuring fresh and local produce, flowers, gourmet chocolates, breads, cheeses, meats and so much more! It's also where I bought cupcakes from Miette Patisserie that I featured here.

Our first stop on the tour was Lombard Street...aka crooked or zig zag street! We actually walked down this steep road and the girl in front of me was wearing about 4 inch heels, I don't know how she made it down without twisting an ankle!

Then we saw the famous Painted Ladies. Love all 7 of these Victorian Homes. These homes have been featured in the opening credits of Full House...anyone remember that show, I grew up watching the Tanner family! The house on the left was also featured in the movie Mrs. Doubtfire, one of my faves and also just recently went on the market for 4 million dollars!

Finally the moment I had been waiting for the entire tour was the Golden Gate Bridge. On my previous trip to San Fran 2 years ago I could hardly see the bridge it was so foggy, so I was super excited this time to not only be able to see the bridge up close but to get to ride across it. WOW, it was gorgeous!
What an amazing photo opportunity!
Here's a pick of the ladies that went on the tour: Stacy, Heather, Deanna, Kimberly, Me, Micah

Did you know the Golden Gate bridge is the 2nd most photographed landmark in the world next to the Eiffel Tower.


On the other side of the Golden Gate bridge was Sausalito, a quaint town with lots of unique shops and restaurants. I wish I had more time to spend there. I was in awe at all the mansions built up on the hillside, these homes were unbelievable.

We grabbed lunch at Venice Gourmet Delicatessen.

What better to get than the Sausalito Turkey Sandwich...turkey breast marinated in sun dried tomatoes, salsa and cracked pepper with mayonnaise, lettuce and tomato on sourdough. This is probably one of the best sandwiches I have ever eaten! I would be one happy girl if I could eat this every day for lunch!

After lunch in Sausilito we took the ferry back over to San Fran. It was time to get ready for our pasta party and carb load before the big race the next day!

Sunday was race morning! All the ladies are decked out in their purple Team in Training jerseys!
In this picture: Jennifer, Kimee, Mary Kendall, Meredith & Kim!

Here's our HUGE team of ladies from Mobile right before we headed to the starting line! The weather was perfect, cool and in the low 50s, but later on in the race came some rain! Luckily everyone was prepared as we did one of our 20 milers in the pouring rain! All our ladies were troopers and endured the nasty weather to finish their 13.1 and 26.2 mile races!

One of the coolest parts of the race, is as you cross the finish line there are firemen in tuxedos holding silver platters with blue Tiffany & Co. boxes...and here's what was on the inside! I love my new necklace! The theme of the entire weekend was "I Run to Be"...strong, powerful, healthy, etc!

After the marathon it was time to head to the victory party and celebrate everyone's achievements! In this picture: Jennifer, Kelly, Michelle, Me, Kim & Kimee.

In this picture: Micah, Megan, Me, Katie, Robin, Kimberly, Heather, Melissa, Beth!

Great job ladies, you all did amazing on your races and I'm so glad I got to be part of your Team in Training experience over the last 5 months as your coach! So sad the race is over, but so glad to gotten to know each and every one of you! Keep on running!

Chicago Marathon

As promised I've finally gotten a chance to upload some pictures of my recent trip to Chicago to share with you. Here's a quick glimpse at some of my favorite photos from the Marathon Weekend. I had an awesome view of the city right outside my plane window as we were preparing to land. Look at all those sky scrapers, what an amazing city!

Right after arriving in Chicago we headed over to the marathon expo to pick up our race packets. This is a picture of me and Thomas, one of our Mobile participants who was going to be running the race. I was the Alabama Team in Training coach for the marathon weekend so I had the privilege of running along with and encouraging all the TNT participants along the marathon course! I can honestly say this was the largest race I have ever seen, with 40,000 people taking to the streets of Chicago, it was unreal!

The day of the marathon was 10-10-10...how cool is that?

Posing for a picture with the jumbo 10-10-10 structure before leaving the race expo.

We headed to Gino's East Pizzeria for dinner. Chicago pizza is a must on every visit to the city!

We got the traditional deep dish pepperoni...YUM!

I loved the restaurant atmosphere with all the graffiti on the walls. This is a picture of my friend Jennifer, me and Thomas.

This was the view right across from our hotel, the Wrigley Building! I love how the top was lit pink for breast cancer awareness month!

Saturday morning we took a 4 mile jog and went over to the big bean. Love seeing the building reflections in this silver structure, this is such a cool piece of art.

Sunday was the day of the marathon. I don't really have any pictures from the race because I left my camera in the hotel room. So just imagine 40,000 runners and 1.5 million spectators lining the streets of Chicago for about 6 hours! It was crazy!

Dinner on Sunday night after the marathon we went to Mindy's Hot Chocolate. Just the name alone, got me excited. The atmosphere was quaint and dark, lit by candles and the menu was amazing with fresh local ingredients! I was so hungry I wanted one of everything but finally settled on...

The flank steak with applewood bacon smoked cheesy potatoes and broccoli. Delish!

And of course for dessert we had some hot chocolate. Check out all the variations.

I got the light hot chocolate....white chocolate with a touch of milk chocolate, vanilla bean and malted milk. There was even a homemade marshmallow!

Monday morning before heading to the airport there was time to squeeze in a quick architectural boat tour on the Chicago River to check out the history of all the buildings. This is the Wrigley Building again and the Trump Tower. Just beautiful!

Jennifer and I on the boat tour. She is one of my best friends in Mobile and decided to tag along for the weekend in Chicago because she actually owns a condo there. She was a great tour guide for the weekend and her condo is 1 block off Michigan Ave, so it's right in the heart of the city!

Check out the street we rode under on the boat tour...Randolph Street! I just couldn't resist getting a picture taken in front of it given my husband's name is Randolph! I swear we kept running into this street all weekend long, it was right around the corner from our hotel! And every time I saw it I took a picture!

The magnificent Sears Tour!

As our boat tour was coming to an end, we had a slight delay since the Centennial Fountain was going off. It goes off on the hour for 10 minutes so we got a great view of the arch of water.

And the last stop before heading to the airport was this fabulous little gourmet deli in Bucktown right by Jennifer's condo, The Goddess and Grocer.

I had the California Dreaming sandwich, honey maple turkey breast with avocado, swiss, sprouts, lettuce, tomato and lemon mayonnaise on multigrain. This sandwich was unbelievable and was the perfect way to gear up for my next weekend trip to San Francisco!

And in case you are wondering, there were of course tons of cupcakes on this trip when I visited the famous Sprinkles Cupcakes shop. These cupcakes deserved a post all of there own, which you can check out here if you haven't seen it already.

So as you can see Chicago was fabulous, I absolutely LOVE the windy city, there is just never enough time to see and do everything the city has to offer. I'm already trying to figure out how I can go back soon!

Next up a recap of my weekend in San Francisco!