I did the Air China promo. Have stayed the req'd 12 nights in 90 days, so expect to continue as gold through 2/12, but have no confirmation of this from Marriott.

I have seen posts indicating that gold & platinum members sometimes request room upgrades by contacting the hotel in advance. Is this standard practice? Who should the e-mail be sent to? What about asking for an upgrade at the time of check in? Is that effective? What do you say? I have not yet received any upgrades during my recent stays as gold (didn't request any either), so am hoping for some advice to increase my upgrade odds.

Also have a really basic ? - so dumb that I couldn't find it when searching the forum. I'll hit at least 50 nights with Marriott in 2011. Will that make me gold for all of 2012? Think that's a yes, but wanted to be sure.

Thank very much!