Mie Half Marathon

I ran a half marathon (21 km or 13 miles) in Mie prefecture in Komono town. Fumika's family was running it so they asked me to join them. I did it in 1 hour 42 minutes and 35 seconds, smashing my goal of 2 hours! It was pretty awesome, its the country side of Japan and it was sunny and the weather was perfect. It was surreal running by this unfamiliar Japanese landscape with 3,000 Japanese people in the sun out in who knows where in Japan. Definitely a great experience. all along the trail there were locals posted up cheering people on. As for runners there were tons of small women, tons of small dudes, tons of old people, and tons of small and old dudes and women. and tons of them where kicking my arse. somehow they can move their legs enough times a minute more than me. Running in this situation definitly made me run faster as i would say "what the F, that little 65 yr old grandma is beating me, I gotta pass her" that little box times you in and out when you cross the finish line. Another cool thing was that i only saw 3 foreigners (visibly saw, i mean im a foreigner too but i just blend in). so when i told them my name at registration they were surprised. 3,000 people at 7 am getting ready fumikas mom made onigiri and her awesome sandwhiches. some of it came in this awesome box that reads "My name is meatball and it means a strong, tough and sharp man. I try very hard to keep any cuteness out but some very odd people say I'm cute. It's a shame" there's always a bunch of meaningless setup stage crap at events in Japan. maybe i don't really go to events in NY so i have a skewed perspective. I made it. I'm pretty happy with my time, i basically gave it a good effort, I could have squeezed a little more out but I gave it 95% i would say. Picalo from Dragon Ball-Z finishes limping across. I also saw a guy dressed as a nurse, I guy running with a tuba, and a few other weirdnesses but since its somewhere far out in japan there wasn't too much craziness. I sweat so much that you could harvest the salt. fu-balls ran the 5K in 36 min. i ran a half, her dad ran a half marathon in 2hrs and 2 minutes. and her mom ran a 10k in like 1 hr and 12 min. Her dad has been running marathons since 1998, about 5 a year. her mom since 2002 maybe, she said she has run about 40 marathons so that means her dad has run like 60+ marathons! Fu-nutz parents are amazing. final time certificates. I was number 260 out of 857 males aged 40 and below. A rice cleaner at a vegetable market. farmers come in and clean their raw rice here before it goes into bags. it's like a coinstar for rice! not really amazing dinner. sukiyaki. they give you this special chunk of fat with the mean that is used on the pan and for flavor. her brother that is rarely seen caught this fish some old fotos from fumika's camera from when bob was here. Gotemba beach in Aichi prefecture. maybe the bobbest picture of Bob you will ever see. oh man So do i have it in me for another half marathon or a full marathon? yes. but i have bad knees and they hurt after running even 5 km so i think i will just do 1 full marathon and then i have to give up long distance running or i will be in serious trouble later on.