Experimental Running

Taking a Mental Health Week

2012-02-01T11:41:00.000-08:00

I know that you're super concerned, but have no fear I haven't gone crazy. Yet. No really, things aren't going too badly here. Poor Kaylee did wake up with hives all over her face and head on Monday. I almost had a panic attack. I wasn't sure if they were actually hives or what they could be from if they were in fact hives. Did you know that sometimes viruses can cause hives? I didn't. Anyway the doctor's hypothesis is that a virus has caused the hives, for she also has a runny nose and cough now. Poor kid, she can't catch a break this year. Anyway hives, sniffles, and cough aren't nearly as stressful as vomit...so I'm doing okay.

As you might have guessed, I missed running on Monday. I can't completely blame my little lady, however. Having to go to the doctor's office really messed up the day's schedule, but had I been really motivated I could have run after the kids went to bed at 7:45ish. I wasn't really motivated though. I was tired. And Monday was suppose to be my longer day, which I could potentially do on Thursday, but I don't think I want to run long on Thursday because I'm running a 5K on Sunday and I want to have fresh legs. Phew, that was a mouthful! As a result, I'm taking a mental health week. I'm not going to worry about my mileage this week. I'd like to do my best to get to 40 miles, but I won't worry about the fact that I had planned to run 50. Running is, after all, my fun activity and there are 14 weeks until Providence.

Last week went fairly well as far running was concerned. I did a reasonable 15 mile progression run, a mile time trial in 5:36, and had a total of 52 miles. Overall though, I was tired. I had trouble with some of my easy runs, which isn't normal for me. Motivation was also an issue last week, which almost never happens. So the numbers were okay, but it was a blah week.

Today I had an awesome workout. One of my co-workers wanted to do 3x1 mile repeats on the track. We wound up not making it to the track due to meetings going long and other meetings later in the day, but we have a 1.25 mile loop around our complex that is mostly flat. The three of us went and banged out a stellar workout. My repeat times were: 5:38, 5:52, 5:56. Yes, the last two were significantly slower than the first, but to be completely honest I ran the first one too hard on purpose (and my shoe was untied for almost the entire 3rd mile). My goal was to keep all the repeats under 6:00. I was pleasantly surprised. The workout was hard, but we did a 2.5 mile cool down at 8:30 pace without any issues, which means we weren't completely spent.

Given my repeat times, I think I can break 19 on Sunday, and hence my mental health week. The opportunity to break 19 minutes in the 5K will bring more peace of mind than getting to 50 miles for the week. So there you have it, my training decisions are largely based on my peace of mind. Not a training philosophy for everyone, but it keeps me happy.

How about you? Do you have a strict training philosophy? Would it drive you nuts if you missed your numbers for the week?

In the spirit of good mental health, here are a couple random pics of my little ladies.

Poor Kaylee recovering from...something.

Emily is just too cute. She loves Kaylee's sunglasses. She's such a spunky punky.

Annoying Headlines

2012-01-25T17:03:00.000-08:00

One of my Facebook friends posted this article "One of the Worst Forms of Exercise There Is." And I thought to myself, hmmm, what could this be about? To my utter shock, the article is about long distance running. Seriously, did you know that long distance running was one of the worst forms of exercise there is (eyes rolling)? Besides shocked, I'm irritated. The title of the article and knowing that it's about long distance running makes me not even want to read it. Of course, I might not be the most objective person given that I enjoy long distance running, but really, the author couldn't think of a less antagonistic title? The article provides link after link to studies stating that running can cause heart damage, and then goes on to suggest much better forms of exercise that only need to be done twice a week for 20 minutes. I can't think of anything that I could do for only 20 minutes twice a week that could keep me as fit as I am now. I could envision exercising for the same duration of time as I do now, but doing something other than running (maybe).

What seems to have spurned this article was a recent study entitled "Exercise-induced right ventricular dysfunction and structural remodelling in endurance athletes." For the record, this article title seems very reasonable to me, but a whole slew of news articles have been written based on the study. Some of the titles include: "Running Marathons Could Cause Heart Damage", "Running marathons could permanently damage the heart", and "Running Marathons May Cause Permeant Heart Damage." What's interesting to note, however, is that the study includes only 40 athletes (so it's a small study to begin with) and not all of those athletes were runners. Cyclers and triathletes were also included. Also, the athletes were "elite". Several of the articles above state that the duration of the events included in the study ranged from 3 hours to 11 hours, but it's odd because elite marathoners run faster than 3 hours...

Maybe I'm just being difficult because I run marathons, but I feel as though those news articles aren't necessarily representative of the study they are reporting on. What do you think? Do you think running is damaging your heart? Are these news articles a fair representation of the study? Is long distance running the worst exercise there is?

In other news, wrenches are still flying around here. Have you watched Dodge Ball? "If you can dodge a wrench, you can dodge a ball." Sound advice. I need to learn that skill. Little miss Kaylee was sick yet again last week, but she's getting better. Yay! I did run a great 14 miler, and hit 45 miles for the week. I'm also thinking about running a 5K on super bowl Sunday...

When life throws a wrench at your training...

2012-01-17T04:56:00.000-08:00

You, of course, throw that wrench right back. And waving fists in the air yell, "take that wrench thrower!" Or not. Sometimes that stupid wrench trips me and I fall flat on my face. In fact, that happens more than I would like to admit.

What the heck am I going on about? Well, Kaylee had a stomach bug last week, which made me think about training obstacles. She only wound up being sick for about 24 hours. We were lucky this time. In November, however, she had an evil stomach bug that landed her in the hospital. No running happened that week, and honestly running was the last thing on my mind because as soon as Kaylee came home from the hospital I was dealing with a wicked case of croup with Emily.

It happens though, we manage to schedule running into our already hectic lives, then BAM, you get whacked with a wrench. I'm not sure there's much we can do to mitigate the wrench risk. The week Kaylee and Emily were super sick, there's nothing I could have done differently that would have changed the outcome. How did it impact my training? Minimally, I think. I picked up where I left off, and chose not to linger on any negative thoughts. One poor running week probably doesn't mean much. I like to look at several months when trying to characterize how I'm doing on the running front. One missed week out of several months of good consistent running is fine. Now if I were to start stumbling every other week, then I'd need to reassess how I'm doing and perhaps make changes.

I know some runners that never miss a workout, and that's awesome. I'm not one of them though. I do miss workouts from time to time. I don't think I'm lazy or uncommitted, but you know, there's life and stuff going on...

From a numbers perspective, training was awesome last week. I missed the day Kaylee was sick, but turned around and ran a nice interval workout that turned into a 12 miler. I had also done a tempo run at the beginning of the week that turned into a 12 miler. My mileage total for the week was 55. Overall a good week, but my right knee is twinging ever so slightly. I am certain that it's a case of "runner's knee" and given that I've never had "runner's knee" in my almost two decades of running, I'm fairly certain it's from too much interval running. I may need to limit my workouts to one hard run per week.

How about you? Do you ever feel like someone is throwing a wrench at you while you run? How do you deal training obstacles?

Just Added a Marathon to the Spring Schedule!

2012-01-09T16:28:00.000-08:00

I was selected to be a Rhode Races Blogging Ambassador! Basically I'll be blogging about my training and the nice folks at Rhode Races have offered me a free marathon number! Sweet deal! I'm excited to have the opportunity to connect with other runners who are training for the same race, and excited to be training for another marathon. I only run one or two marathons a year (preferably one actually), so committing to the Cox Providence Marathon is a big deal to me.

My first action as a blogging ambassador will be to suggest this phenomenal post regarding fueling, running, and recovery over at Small Town Runner. Up until last year, I completely ignored fueling. I would drink water on long runs, but that was the extent of my fueling strategy. I still don't generally fuel for runs under 10 miles, but I take longer runs or harder runs much more seriously. I'll take a gel every four miles and sip some electrolyte every mile, and I am finding recovery so much easier! Anyway Raina's post is well written and informative. Definitely worth reading.

Now I have to think about marathon training...Yikes! There are 17 weeks until race day. Plenty of time, right? Truth be told, my training probably won't change too much. I've been running 40-50 miles a week, which seems to be a reasonable amount of running for me. In case anyone is interested, I've been good about inputting my workouts on Daily Mile. You can see my running specifics on the right from the Daily Mile widget. My next challenge will be to plan my long runs, but I'll save that for next week.

On a completely unrelated topic, I wanted to ask about compression tights. I'm on the market for a new pair (yay Christmas money) and can't decide if I want to buy another pair of CW-X tights or try another brand like Zoot. Any thoughts? The CW-X tights truly are amazing. They have done wonders for my recovery and help me out on runs where my legs are simply tired. I hate the way they look, however. I feel like a linebacker in them. To be fair, this could potentially be an issue with any brand. I'm not a small runner. I guess I'm hoping that there's an awesome compression tight out there that is also flattering. What do you like for compression tights?

Reflections & Resolutions & Photos

2012-01-05T04:13:00.001-08:00

Reflections:

2011 was a good running year. When the year began my littlest baby was only 4 months old and an awful sleeper, but somehow I managed to run over 2,000 miles for the year, one half marathon, two full marathons, and three 5ks. Although I was happy with all my race times (which can be found on the right), there's only one race that I actually felt good while I was running. The turkey trot, which wasn't my fastest 5k for the year, but was definitely the best I felt for any race. I blame my tiny tykes for my lack luster feelings on race days. When do kids let their parents sleep anyway?

My best performance was, surprisingly, in the 5k (18:52). I've never believed that the 5k was my best distance, but maybe it is. I don't know. I guess we'll see what happens in the other distances in 2012. Speaking of 2012, I don't really have any new year's resolutions. I don't even have specific goals. I'm finding that training with a loose set of goals is working better for me.

I do whatever training I feel like (within reason), then a week before my race I look at my training logs, the race predictor calculators, and determine what pace I should be able to run. Training by feel is less pressure for me. Selecting a time goal in advance is so much more stressful. There's pressure to run certain paces in training regardless of how one feels, which for me is a recipe for disaster. And less enjoyable overall.

Resolutions:

Okay, so my running resolution for 2012 will be to go with what works (and to have fun). Oh, maybe I should also resolve to blog more, like at least once a week. Yes, I will blog at least once a week in 2012. (Believe it or not, I actually go back through my blog posts sometimes when my training notes and memory are a bit spotty.)

The racing schedule for 2012 is in flux. I have two half marathons planned, but everything else is undecided. Besides those two races, I'm sure I'll run a marathon and a few 5ks. I just haven't decided which to run.

Do you train by feel or with specific times goals? Is your race calendar decided?

Photos:

My fastest race of the year! If you really want to you can purchase photos from Capstone Photography

So much trouble, but so much cuteness in one package!

Me & my little ladies

Speaking of little ladies...

Providence Downtown Jingle 5K RR

2011-12-05T16:28:00.000-08:00

Race Week:
The week of the race wasn't ideal. Nick had to travel, the kids were sick, there wasn't much sleep to be had...blah blah blah. I even had trouble with a few of my easy runs. I run with a few people at work, and generally we run around 8:30 pace. Yes, I struggled running 8:30 pace for seven miles, which seemed like a bad omen, but I chose not to think about it...too much.

Race Morning:
Because Nick was traveling, my parents invited me and the little ladies to stay with them Saturday night, which is really the only reason I was able to run the 5K (thank you mom and dad). I did my typical race morning routine. Coffee and toast with peanut butter and banana, but the race start was at 11:15. I prefer earlier races. The earlier the race, the less time I have to become overly nervous. And I was nervous. Partly because I didn't feel that great, and partly because I had told myself this was the last 5K for a while.

Around 10:00, my dad drove me down to Providence. We parked a mile away from the start and ran in. Even with running to the start, we were still 45 minutes early. If I hadn't been nervous, it would have been a lot of fun watching people. Tons of people were dressed up in all kinds of Christmas decor. Christmas music was playing. The atmosphere was cool. I did feel out of place though. I was in my typical race attire, while everyone else was in long sleeve shirts and running tights. I stuck out and received a few weird looks.

Race Start:
This race was awesome! They had a countdown clock, music, and a great announcer. I loved how everything was organized. Anyway, I lined up right at the front, which always makes me feel self conscious. The worst part of racing for me is waiting at the start. I feel so much better once the gun goes off.

Mile 1:
According to the clock at the mile marker, I ran a 6:02. My Garmin didn't agree with the mile markers. I wonder if the Garmin was inaccurate due to being in the middle of the city? Either that or the mile markers weren't in the correct place. In any case, I had to believe the race mile marker. I was a little disappointed. I wanted to run 5:55 - 6:00 for that first mile. There were three women ahead of me, but not too far ahead.

Mile 2:
I didn't feel any worse for mile 2, but the clock read 12:12, making that second mile 6:10. Now I was really irritated. I knew that I was going to need to run the third mile faster than the second mile to break 19 minutes, but I have never been able to do that.

Mile 3:
I'm guessing you probably read Mary: Iron Matron, who recently wrote a post entitled "How bad do you want it." I'm not nearly as contemplative about such things, but I must have wanted it pretty bad because the clock at the three mile marker read 18:15, which means I ran a 6:03 third mile. I passed the third place female, and really fought with the second place female. She passed me in the final 100 meters. Not because I was slowing mind you. I was hauling, she was just faster.

Results:
I was the third place female, and my official time was 18:52. The other two women were only a few seconds ahead of me, which really made the race more exciting. I felt like I was running in college again. When we crossed the finish the race director grabbed us and gave us our loot right away! I was so excited. He said he didn't want us to have to wait around for an hour, which was great because I never wait around. We each received a $50 gift certificate to a local running store.

Reflections:
My goal going into the race was 18:40. Actually, let me rephrase that...going into the race I believed that if I had a good day I could run 18:30-18:40. I'm sure that sounds ridiculous, given that it has only been the last few weeks that I've run in the mid 19 range. I feel weird even writing it. But I've been getting faster. And how exactly am I getting faster? Eh, I don't know. I suspect it might partially be a mental thing. Last year I read another great post over at Mary: Iron Matron entitled "Kicking Some Ass." Again, I rarely contemplate why I run. I find it satisfying, so I keep doing it. But why? I don't know. And how am I suddenly dropping minutes off my time? Beats me, but maybe Mary is onto something...

Anyway, I'll post my training notes next time, but I'm such an odd runner I'm not sure how useful they'll be to anyone else.

18:52 :)

2011-12-04T14:13:00.001-08:00

So, I ran the Providence downtown jingle 5k today.

Official results: miles 3.1
pace 6:05
total time 18:52

Garmin stats: miles 3.2
pace 5:53
total time: 18:52

I'm sure I'll post a real race report later, but "I'm super happy" pretty much sums it up...

Turkey Trot 5k

2011-11-24T16:16:00.001-08:00

I'm typing on my phone, which makes for a short post...

My official time was 19:26. I was the second female and seventh overall. I'm pleased with the result, felt strong, ran smart, and feel fairly confident that I can run faster.

My Garmin clocked mile 1 at 6:02, mile 2 at 6:04, and mile 3 at 6:18. My final distance was measured at 3.19 with an average pace of 6:06. According to the Garmin, I passed the 3.11 mile point at exactly 18:59. Okay, so Garmin results don't really count, and maybe it was off a little, but I'm thinking I can break 19 on an accurate course...

We had a great day. There were pictures below, but the phone app did a terrible job displaying them. I just left one that seemed fine. Maybe I'll have to post more pics later.

I hope everyone else had a great day too!

Shoe surgery and other stuff

2011-11-22T16:28:00.000-08:00

Before I get into performing surgery on my lovely sneaks, let me just say happy Thanksgiving everyone! I'm feeling thankful the family is healthy (and that I'm injury free)!

I'm excited to run my turkey trot, mostly because my parents will be running, and it's just a great way to start the day. Does anyone else think that turkey trots are becoming a Thanksgiving tradition (almost like watching football)? Given that there are almost 1,000 people signed up for this race that was approximately 400 people a few years ago...I'm thinking turkey trots are becoming a tradition...

Moving on to shoe surgery. I bought these Saucony Kinvaras about a month before my marathon in October. I'm not going to do a shoe review, but if you like to read well written shoe reviews I would suggest runblogger. He loves shoes and consequently writes excellent reviews.

Anyway, I bought the Kinvaras, and absolutely loved them. Like the best running shoe ever. They just feel right. Unfortunately, after a measly 150 miles (three weeks), the left shoe started giving me a blister on my heel. When I got in there and checked things out, I noticed a piece of plastic was poking into my heel. I was furious! 150 miles, seriously that's ridiculous. I had to go back to my Nike frees for the marathon. A few weeks later, I dusted off the Kinvaras and figured I might as well try to fix them. I couldn't run in them as they were anyway. So I went at that left shoe with a pair of sharp scissors and didn't stop until I had cut out approximately one half inch of plastic. Then Macgyver style, I duct taped that bad boy. I've been running in them for three weeks now and they seem fine.

Now for a couple random notes. Here's a picture of some of my runner buddies at work. Every year we do a really easy run together before Thanksgiving. Then we eat pie. Personally, I enjoy the run more than the pie. The slice pecan I ate just gave me an upset stomach. Anyway, they're a fun bunch. There's a guy in there who's a three time Ironman. Three others who have run in the 3:20 range for the marathon. I'm the only one in long pants. It was only 45 ish degrees and we ran slow, so I'm sticking with my pants decision.

And for my last random note...on Saturday I did a two mile time trial in 12:00. I hope everyone has an awesome Thanksgiving!

Lisa's Lung Cancer Awareness 5K Race Report

2011-11-17T17:15:00.001-08:00

I don't really have a race report for last weekend's 5K. I raced it unexpectedly, and the result was unexpected too. Everything is a bit blurry now, and I don't remember much.

I do remember that the first mile felt much harder than I anticipated. The plan was to run a 6:15 first mile and then hang on for dear life. Before the horn sounded, I assumed that I'd have to hold back to make sure I didn't run too fast, but when the race started and I settled down, I looked down at my Garmin to find that I needed to speed up. Mile 1 wound up being 6:16, but I had to work for it.

From there, I just kept telling myself to run harder. I crossed mile 2 at 12:40. Then my lungs started to feel as though they might burst from my chest, but I knew if I hung on I would break 20. This is where racing gets hard for me. In high school and college, I ran for a team, and the team was what motivated me to hang in there when things got uncomfortable. Now there's just me, and I don't care as much. Well, I care afterward, but during...not so much. Anyway, I did hang in there and it was a good day. I did wheeze for several days though. My asthma has been a little annoying lately. Below you can a scary race picture of me finishing.

There's not much else to report for the week. Today I ran 10 x 400 meters at 1:23, which is a good workout for me. I'm planning on running another 5K on Thanksgiving. I also have two halfs planned. One in February and one in March.

Is anyone else running a turkey trot? What's your favorite turkey trot distance? Right now, mine is the 5K, but lately I've been contemplating a 10K.

19:36 :)

2011-11-13T15:57:00.001-08:00

This will have to be short, but I did decide to go ahead and run that 5k today (and my official time was 19:36). I'm glad that I ran. I know the turkey trot course is .1 long, which will make it harder to break 20.

To be honest, I didn't want to run. It was right in the middle of the day, we had lots of chores to do, and everyone is still recovering. But Thursday I did another mile time trial. This time I clocked 5:43, which made me think that I should put in the effort to race.

Again, I'm happy that I did. Overall, I ran a smart race. My first mile was 6:16, and from there I just did my best to hang on. I was the first female finisher, which was cool (although it really just points out that the race wasn't very competitive).

The only downside is that my asthma has been acting up since the race, but that's okay. I haven't run that fast in almost a decade...

I hope everyone else had a good running weekend too!

One good workout to go with one horrific week

2011-11-08T05:00:00.000-08:00

Saturday morning before the snow started (last week), I ran 10 x 400 meters all in 1:26 with one minute jogs between intervals. It was a good workout for me, and I was glad to get in before we lost power that night.

We lost power for three days, which was actually less time than many others in our area. We stayed in the house for two nights, but I opted to take the kids to my parents the third night. (Thank you mom and dad!) It was just getting cold (48 degrees). Losing power in general isn't that big a deal, but we lost all the food in the fridge and came home to find ice cream had melted through the freezer onto the floor and under the fridge. Also, power was out everywhere. That means no gas was available and no stores were open. That was probably the scariest part. Seeing all the stores and gas stations dark.

Power came back and the next morning Kaylee started vomiting. She couldn't keep any fluids down. I called the doctor's office and brought her in. They thought she looked fine and sent us home. I called back a few hours later and they agreed we should take her to the ER. This was stressful for me. Nick stayed with Emily, and I took Kaylee into Boston. We waited over four hours to see a doctor. I was soaked in vomit. Kaylee was exhausted. They gave her an anti nausea drug and IV fluids. Her blood work indicated that she was bad enough to admit to the hospital.

They let us go home the next afternoon, just in time for Emily to have a bad case of croup for the night. The next morning I took her to the doctor's office and she was given a steroid shot.

Everyone in the house is sick and grouchy, but we're doing fine. Hopefully the kids will start feeling better soon. I could write more, but don't have time (and it would probably just sound like whining anyway). It was a crazy week. I'm feeling drained and looking forward to getting back into a routine. I had been planning on running a 5K this past Sunday, but for obvious reasons I was unable to do so. There's another 5K that I might try to run this weekend. We'll see.

How was your week? I hope it was better than mine. ;)

Running Predictors: Do you believe them?

2011-10-26T10:46:00.001-07:00

The marathon is over. I trained, tapered, and recovered. Now I'm planning a few weeks of shorter faster training, in hopes of breaking the ever elusive 20 minutes for the 5K. Why the rush? Well, I always run the same turkey trot every year. It's fun, convenient, and I've conned my parents into going for the last three years. In short, I like it.

Unfortunately though, I had an unwelcome wake up call today. I did a 1 mile time trial (after an appropriate warm up of course). The result was a 5:58 mile, which at the time I thought was reasonably fast. Then I plugged that time into the Mcmillan running calculator to see my predicted 5K time. Ugh, that calculator spit back 20:40. Not what I was hoping. Especially, when I think about how I ran 20:25 5K 12 weeks after Emily's birth on a long course. Could I really be slower than so soon after having a baby? Apparently, I can.

To be honest though, I'm not sure that I trust that calculator. It also spit out a 3:21 predicted marathon time (for the 5:58 mile time), and I wasn't able to run that a couple weeks ago. Yet, I have this gut feeling that if I were to run a 5K right now I'd be able to do low 20 minutes. Basically, in my mind, it's short changing my 5K time and being overly optimistic about my marathon time.

Does anyone else use running predictor calculators? What are your thoughts?

Blogging in random picture style

2011-10-19T04:35:00.000-07:00

Here are my splits from Baystate. In the past, I've complained that the Garmin software doesn't allow one to copy and paste splits. The standalone PC software still doesn't, but Garmin's online tool does have a copy and paste function!

BayState Splits 2011
Mile	Time
1	08:01.4
2	07:41.8
3	07:35.6
4	07:37.0
5	07:45.1
6	07:44.0
7	07:41.8
8	07:46.9
9	07:43.4
10	07:43.3
11	07:42.1
12	07:34.5
13	07:39.4
14	07:32.5
15	07:47.0
16	07:54.7
17	07:52.8
18	07:52.6
19	07:59.7
20	07:49.7
21	07:57.4
22	07:53.5
23	08:01.3
24	08:11.6
25	07:58.6
26	08:09.0

Here's the view from my kitchen window. I love this time of year. My only complaint is losing the extra daylight.

Here I am waving to the camera. When I see a camera, I just can't help myself. I'm automatically smiling or waving no matter how bad I might feel.

Courtesy of Capstone Photography

Here I am at mile 25. I've definitely looked worse...

Courtesy of Capstone Photography

Here's little miss Kaylee trying on her costume. She has been begging me to find her a dragon costume for Halloween. I kept telling her that I didn't think there were any. Then we found one...at Old Navy. How's that for random?

Anyone else use the Blogger app for the iphone? I used it for most of this post. I'm not sure what I think. It seemed ridiculously slow. Any thoughts?

BayState Marathon Race Report

2011-10-17T16:50:00.000-07:00

3:26:58!

Yeah, I'm a little excited. I don't believe that I had the best day that I could have had, but I ran well regardless. Also for me, this is a huge PR.

I didn't post my goals prior to the race because I wasn't sure until that morning what my goals were. Two weeks prior, I went through my training logs several times trying to determine a good set of race goals. I was hesitant to commit to any goal until I knew how I felt on the morning of the race. This might seem odd, but I have yet to run a marathon when I'm not sick. A couple years ago I was sick and slightly injured. I didn't take that into account on the morning of my race. It was a disaster. I went out faster than I should have given the circumstances, and did I mention that it was a disaster?

Anyway, I'm trying to be smarter about this whole racing marathons thing. In high school and college the team races 5Ks, and the strategy is so different (and more aggressive). I'm just beginning to understand that racing a marathon requires patience and careful planning. After going through my training logs several times, I decided that 3:22:30 - 3:25:00 would be my goal (assuming I felt reasonably well on race day).

My plan was to run an 8:00 minute first mile, be around 7:45ish by mile 4, to hold 7:45ish until mile 20-22, and then either kick it up a bit or hang on for dear life (depending on how I felt). My first mile was 8:01 and I was at 7:44 pace by mile 5. Unfortunately though, something was amiss. I just didn't feel right. I was having trouble holding onto my pace. Initially I thought it was mental, so I started trying to find someone to run with, but I didn't have much luck.

I drank and took gels exactly the way I had during my long runs, and my long runs were done on the course at about the same pace. Yet, I was having so much trouble. I maintained 7:44 until mile 11, where I finally met a couple of nice people to run with. They said they were aiming to run 3:30, but they were pushing the pace a bit. I managed to hang with them for a couple miles, but my average pace dropped to 7:42 and I was having trouble. At that point, I figured my issue wasn't mental. There was simply something not quite right, so I let them run on. I passed the half at 1:42:00. Passing the half is great because then you can tell yourself you have more miles behind you than ahead, which is what I kept telling myself.

Somewhere around 14 miles I started getting a headache, which was weird. Around mile 18 my legs started burning, burning like the last mile in a 5K. At that point, I gave myself permission to let up on the pace. I was hoping that I was being smart and not a wimp. By mile 20, I was still hanging onto an average pace of 7:45 (according to my Garmin), but I was really hurting (my legs were still burning). When I hurt, I take things a mile at a time. I don't think about anything beyond the next mile. My slowest mile was 8:11, there was an 8:09 too, and a couple 8:01's. Then finally. The finish! I was so happy that I forgot to stop my watch!

I loved this race! Well, I didn't really like running the race, but I'm pleased with the outcome. I had a goal, things weren't going quite as expected, I adjusted, and still wound up running well. I've also decided that giving myself permission to back off the pace was the right choice. I felt extremely sick the rest of the day. My intestines felt like they were going to explode and my head was killing me. Also, everything is ridiculously sore today, my neck, back, stomach, chest, legs, feet...everything.

And I love that because? Well, the fact that I felt that bad afterward and I'm that sore today means I ran hard. Really hard. Also, my first half was 1:42:00 and my second half was 1:44:58. I would have liked to run even splits, but I don't feel my first half was so much faster than my second half that I went out too fast. Basically, I feel like I ran the best race I could have given the circumstances, and that's what it's all about.

Lots of love to my hubby for taking charge of the kiddos while I was out training and racing! A big thanks to my parents who were my support team for the day. And a huge congrats to AM who ran 3:14! Holy cannoli, she is smoking fast!

What would you do with 2 extra hours?

2011-10-04T05:48:00.001-07:00

What does tapering mean? For me, it means that I had two extra hours last week. And what did I do with all that extra time? No, I didn't take a nap. Although napping would have been awesome, having a sick 13 month old and a crazy 4 year old doesn't make nap time an option. So I carved a pumpkin. Let me just say that pumpkin carving is not nearly as satisfying as a two hour run, but Kaylee loves it.

I did the carving, but she scooped guts and picked the carving design. I'm pretty sure scooping the guts is why Kaylee loves pumpkin carving. Emily was also a big fan of the guts. (She got her little baby paws on the guts bowl. And wow, it took her like 2 seconds to throw those pumpkin guts around.) Here's our jack-o-lantern.

As far as running goes, there's not much to report. I did do a 3 x 1 mile repeat workout that went 6:09, 6:19, 6:30. Clearly, I did the first repeat too fast. Also, it was 75 degrees out, which is a little warm for this time of year. I did some running with Emily in the jogging stroller too. When Kaylee started school a few weeks ago, it allowed me to start running with Emily in the BOB. Pushing that running stroller is hard work!

Other than that, I'm thinking about a music play list for the big day. I also ordered some Ascics arm warmers, that I'm excited to try out. Oh, and if anyone can control the weather, could you please arrange for a sunny 50-55 degree day on October 16th? At the very least, I'd like it to be cooler rather than warmer. Thanks!

Taper

2011-09-26T04:38:00.000-07:00

With three weeks to go, it's taper time. At least for me. This is my first marathon training cycle that I've actually made it to the taper without being sick and injured. (Yes, sick and injured.) Granted I have three weeks to go, but with my last 20 miler behind me I feel good about my odds.

It's funny how training cycles go. This marathon was planned during my pregnancy with Emily, but after Providence this past May...I was seriously considering switching to the half. I just felt wiped. Emily isn't the best sleeper, and I had been surviving on 4 hours of sleep a night. The lack of sleep was getting to me. Thinking about training for another marathon so soon made me exhausted. Then AM asked if I was interested in doing a long run. I was hesitant, but decided that if I survived a 20 miler with her, I'd suck it up and run the marathon. Well, that first run went well. Two others have gone well too. Now I'm excited to race in three weeks. I'm excited to start tapering while healthy. And just generally feeling good.

My last 20 miler was this past weekend. AM and I wound up running 7:40 ish pace. It was gross out. Humid and unseasonable warm, but we got through it. I definitely didn't feel as good after this run as I have for the others, but I'm blaming the weather.

I'm looking forward to tapering. I'll be doing a 20% reduction in miles this week and another 20% next week. My peak mileage week was 53, which isn't a ton of miles, but I did have several weeks in the 50 mile range.

Now I just need to survive the bugs that a certain preschooler is bringing home with her. Seriously, we're drowning in snot right now. Everyone in the house is sick (except me). I fully expect to get sick, but given that I've made it to taper time I'm okay with that. I should be able to get the extra rest that I need to help me fight whatever is causing the river of snot.

Completely unrelated to running (but still fascinating), doesn't it seem like children were designed to spread yucky bugs? Kaylee is getting better at sneezing into her elbow, but I still get it in the face from time to time. And Emily? Well, if she sees me coming with a tissue she immediately starts wiping her nose on anything in sight (and then proceeds to play with the snot). It's glorious.

Since I'm just throwing randomness about, I received a "regret" email from the BAA today (meaning that my qualifying time was not fast enough to get me a number for Boston). I was a tiny bit disappointed, but given that I barely qualified in the first place the outcome wasn't surprising. I am impressed with how the BAA has handled registration this year. I actually received an email and the email stated what the cut off time wound up being for my age group (3:38 if you're interested). It's nice to know what to shoot for (and in this case 3:38 is actually slower than what the qualifying time will be for next year). I receive the news at an interesting time. Three weeks to another marathon that could potentially qualify me for Boston 2013...

Socks are cool

2011-09-13T12:02:00.000-07:00

Things have been crazy! And the crazy has absolutely nothing to do with running. I didn't run anything particularly special last week. I ran 50 miles, most of them slow. There was one 10 mile MP run. That's really all I have to say about running...well yesterday I ran an 8 miler at 7:11 pace, which was cool.

Last week I mentioned preventative maintenance, or something to that affect. Getting stronger and preventing injury is at the top of my objective list this year. One of the more interesting activities I've picked up in my quest to remain free of injury is wearing compression socks.

I've had some nagging Achilles's heel tightness for the last two years. It doesn't seem to get worse, but it doesn't get better either. I've been trying to figure out what I can do to help those heels out. Advice I've found seems to range from don't wear shoes ever to wear shoes all the time. Every piece of advice I find, there's the opposite advice out there too. What seems reasonably correct is that once the the Achilles's tendon is strained or injured it's slow to recover due to poor circulation in the area. Hence the compression socks. Those super expensive socks claim to increase circulation. Also, through trial and error, I have figured out that there is something going on with my calves that isn't helping. Now I wear compression socks and stretch my calves, and the heels seem happy enough.

I have two pairs of socks. The Recovery Sock, which was confusing at first (at least to me). The socks are sold as a pair, not a single sock, but the literal engineer in me was a little nervous that I was only ordering a single sock (given the name). My review...I like them. I run in them, sleep in them, recover in them.

I also have a pair of CEP socks. These socks get an A+ for looking cool. I have the hot pink pair and personally think they're snazzy looking. (Nick thinks they look a little silly.) They're great for running and walking around in, but I find if I sleep in them my heels are tight in the morning. Not sure why that happens.

To be honest, I don't feel a difference between the Recovery Sock and CEP. Both pairs are helpful, but I wouldn't be able to recommend one over the other. The CEP socks look a bit cooler, but the Recovery Sock is almost half the price. Although I wouldn't want to recommend one over the other, I can definitely say that they do help me recover. Enough so, that I'm entertaining the idea of buying a third pair.

A refrigerator full of peaches

2011-09-05T14:35:00.000-07:00

My refrigerator is packed full of peaches. Seriously. Peaches. Well, there's a huge bag of apples too. Nick told me the peaches make his mouth tingle. Since I rarely bake (and never peel things), it look likes I'll be eating four peaches a day for several weeks. We went peach picking on Friday and bought the "big" box for picking. The box looked smaller in the wide open space that was the peach orchard. I'm fairly certain it doubled in size by the time we got it home. It's a magic peach box that doesn't fit into the fridge... None of this has anything to do with running, but peach picking was cool.

Running is going well too. I think. This whole training cycle is about making me feel strong again, and bringing the fun back. That translates into running whatever I feel like, and not concentrating on a time goal. I'm not completely crazy though, I do have loose goals regarding long runs, marathon pace runs, and trying to keep my weekly mileage at a reasonable level. This past week I ran 53 miles. I'll probably peak at 55-60 miles (depending on how I feel). The one more stringent goal I've made for myself recently is to consistently do push ups, ab exercises, strength stuff for my knees, foam rolling, using "the stick", and icing whatever feels tight. I am making a real effort to avoid becoming injured. We'll see how that goes...

I had a great long run this weekend with AM. We did 22 miles at 7:48 pace. Because AM is faster than me, I prepared for the run almost like it was race. I cut my caffeine consumption by 1/2 all week. I went to bed early on Wednesday and Thursday. I ran most of my miles earlier in the week, and took rest days on both Thursday and Friday. I felt reasonably good the whole run, and felt great at the end. Running with AM makes long runs so much easier! And I don't know if it was the caffeinated Roctane or what, but I felt great the rest of the day too. We went to Boston, walked around for a couple hours, and saw a random break dancing street performance. Cool beans.

I ran a recovery run on Sunday, which went fine. By Sunday night though, I was feeling tired. And today, my legs feel trashed. That's fine. I'll take it easy until my legs no longer feel trashed. Problem solved.

In other news, my two little ladies recently had birthdays. Kaylee turned 4 and Emily 1! They're doing well and keep me busy. Yes, I am blaming them for my lack of blogging. I still read everyone's blogs on my phone, I'm just struggling to find time to post...okay, I'm off to eat some peaches. Happy trails!

Me and my little ladies

Nothing like a great long run to build confidence

2011-08-15T04:59:00.000-07:00

Running has been hit or miss for me the last several months. It's probably a mixture of mental and physical fatigue, but whatever it is, it's annoying. I registered for the BayState marathon on a whim, but have been open to switching to the half. I figured I'd just be flexible and see how I felt as marathon day approached.

Around the time I registered, I quickly realized that something had to change with my "training" methods. I had been focused on getting in more miles, hoping to be running 50-60 miles per week, but I just didn't feel good. Many runs were of poor quality. My legs were constantly tight. And my breathing was not smooth. That's when I figured I should be prepared to switch races, and rather than focus on running more miles I should focus on feeling strong.

I stared doing core exercises, push ups, leg exercises, stretching, foam rolling, using "the stick", and icing my legs. Now I've been running for a long time, so I know all this stuff is important. But here's the deal, I'm time limited and figure I should do what I want when I have the time, which is run. Obviously though, running was becoming less fun, so something had to change.

Anyway, all that leads me to this awesome long run I ran with AM this past weekend. She mentioned us doing a long run together, which sounded great in theory, but she's a lot faster than me (and I'm not exactly at my best right now). But I really enjoy running with her, so I figured I'd run with her for as long as I could and if I had to send her off after 10 miles so be it.

The day came and I was nervous. We met up and started running. And It was awesome! We just ran. We talked and ran. The pace was fairly consistent, it did get a little faster towards the end. We did 20 miles at 7:45 pace. And I felt good! I was tired of course, but not any more tired than I usually get. I was a little sore the next day, but just a little.

I did a slow recovery run on Sunday. My legs were still a bit tired on Monday so I ran slow again, but I'm pretty sure I'll be running the marathon now. Hopefully AM and I will meet up for some more long runs too!

Completely unrelated, here's a pic of my little Emily.

Screaming Chicken

2011-06-29T05:38:00.000-07:00

Nick calls me Katie Kaboom sometimes. He tells me that I'm crazy and that my craziness reminds him of a cartoon character called Katie Kaboom. The way he describes it: Ms Kaboom is a loveable sweet character, but then she gets angry and turns into this super crazy chic. Then he showed me a clip, and admitted I'm not really like her, but that I can go from sweet to crazy chic in mere nanoseconds. I love it when Nick tells me this stuff. I like to ask him random weird questions and see what he throws back at me. I asked him once, "What type of car do you see me driving? Let's assume money isn't an issue." His response, "Why do you ask me these questions? I don't know...probably a screaming chicken." I was all, seriously, a chicken car? I almost went Kaboom, but then he explained what a screaming chicken was, and I was impressed with the uniqueness of his answer. Now I want to drive a firebird...

In other news, I've registered for the BayState Marathon in October. I have no idea what my goals will be. Right now I just want to build a base and feel strong again. I'm going to give myself 5 weeks to build my mileage, then I'll figure out what I should be doing pace wise.

Recovery is hard

2011-06-21T05:39:00.000-07:00

A whole month blogging hiatus! Yikes! Recovering from my marathon has been tough. I haven't been injured. But my running mojo has disappeared, and although I keep trying find it, I haven't been particularly successful.

After the marathon, it took about two weeks for me and the family to fully recover from our ailments (which included a ridiculously scary Emily vomiting episode about 5 days after the marathon).

With recovery in full swing, I started running regularly again. I even did a few speed workouts, which went quite well. I thought I might try to run some fast 5K's this summer. It's been a long time since I've broken 20 minutes, but I've been pretty close the last couple years. Well I ran a 5K last week (see awful picture above), and I was sorely disappointed. I wound up running 21:09. Granted it was at noon in 90 degree heat and I was the 6th overall finisher out of 50, but not even breaking 21 minutes was a huge disappointment. Also, my knees were killing me afterwards. Not IT band hurt. I know my knee issues aren't caused by running. It's from being on the floor a lot with Emily. The last few months we've moved her diaper changing area to the floor (just to be safe). It's a killer on my knees...

Even before the 5K, my running has just been lackluster. I'll have a good day here and there, but mostly I'm just blah. Part of the problem is sleep. I average 5-6 hours of sleep a night, which simply isn't good enough for me, but that's where I am. Emily is the happiest, cutest baby during the day, but she really struggles in the sleep department at night.

I had been planning on running the BayState marathon in October. After Providence, I told my friends and family that I'd be doing the half instead. I woke up this morning and thought to myself...I want to run the marathon in October. I don't know why, but I do. Nick told me I need help, to which I replied "good point, maybe I should get a coach." He shook his head and said, "that's not what I meant." Nick tells me fairly regularly "You're crazy, I love you, but you're crazy with a capital K..."

So here I sit, thinking about running BayState. I guess I'm still undecided, but right now I want to run.

Cox Providence Marathon Race Report

2011-05-03T16:31:00.000-07:00

Thanks so much for the kind comments! I wasn't even sure that anyone would see the post given it had been a while since the last time I posted. Anyway, on to the race...

The race itself is actually less interesting than the events surrounding the race. The entire week preceding the marathon was quite simply a disaster. The kids woke up with low grade fevers about a week before the race, which turned into a nasty chest virus. Nick had to travel for work. There were several visits to the pediatrician's office. Kaylee wound up on prednisone. Emily had croup. Then of course I got sick too. The low point was when Kaylee had a coughing fit and vomited while I was trying to get Emily ready for bed. Emily was already grumpy because it was past her bedtime and she had croup. I didn't want to put her down because crying would only make the croup worse. Blah! Disaster! Obviously, I survived. My mom came and helped out a couple days, which was nice not only for the extra set of hands, but for the company too. Then Nick came home about 24 hours before the marathon and had a fever too. Lovely.

I didn't even think about the marathon most of the week. On Thursday afternoon, I asked my mom what she would do if she were in my shoes. Would she run? She said she'd go to the race and make the decision at the last minute depending on how she felt. So that's what I did. To be brutally honest, I did not want to run. I was tired. And I was afraid. Once I make the decision to start a race, I want to see it through if at all possible, and it could have been a really bad day. I was definitely more sick than my last marathon and less rested, where I suffered greatly and wound up running a good 45 minutes slower than I expected.

I learned a lot from my last marathon debacle though, and tried to step up to the line with a plan that would hopefully see me through the race relatively unscathed. I have asthma and when I get sick, it gets worse. During my last marathon, I didn't realize that one of my inhalers greatly increases my heart rate. As a result, what was a comfortable pace during training, wasn't a comfortable pace on that day. Half way through the race I started having chest pain, and from there I had to alternate walking with running in order to finish. It. Was. Ugly.

What I've learned since, is that running doesn't actually impact my asthma as long as I adjust my pace properly. Also, my increased heart rate due the inhaler is fine as long as I adjust my pace. The key is to ignore what I think I should be running and simply run at a pace that breathing is easy. That, of course, isn't always easy to implement.

My second issue was going to be lack of rest. There wasn't anything I could do about that. I'll say it again, I was afraid. It could have been a really really bad day. I was also scared that I'd not only have a bad day, but then be extremely exhausted and go home and not be able sleep because the kids were still sick. At the same time, I didn't want to skip it and then regret it. Definitely a pickle.

Anyway, I went. I was not enthusiastic. I was not mentally prepared. I was tired. I was scared. But I ran, and I'm glad I did. The whole race was a struggle. Even the first mile. Did I mention that I was tired? I am amazed that I was able to run the time that I did.

A lot went wrong leading up to the race, but everything that went wrong was out of my control. I tried to maximize what I could control, which was:

My training. It was solid. I knew that. All of my training paces were actually right on for a 3:22 even though my goal was 3:30. Also, when I started having IT band issues I immediately backed off. I stepped up to the line with no injuries. My IT band was fine throughout the race, and didn't hurt after.
I needed to be focused on being patient and running what was comfortable for my breathing. The entire race was a struggle, but I just kept telling myself to get to the next mile. I never really hit "the wall," although I did slow down once I hit mile 24.
I needed to fuel. I drank 50 ounces of electrolyte sports drink during the race, and I was ridiculously thirsty when I finished. I couldn't have done this without my parents. They were on the course and swapped out my bottles more than once. I have never drank so much during a run. I think it must have been because I was sick that I needed so much. I also took a gel every 30 minutes until I got to mile 20, when my stomach decided no more. I am certain that the race would have been a complete disaster if I hadn't fueled well.

That's it. It wasn't the time I trained for, but sometimes there are factors that are out of our control that change the game. I'm please that I was able recover and still run a reasonable race. Which, by the way, was an 11 minute PR. I'm also happy that I actually qualified for Boston, even if I can't get a number because my qualifying time is barely qualifying...I think it's sort of funny. It's like my brain and body knew just how fast it had to run to qualify and refused to run any faster. ;)

Oh, I'd also like to give a shout out to Pam, who made the first 10 miles of the race bearable. She ran up to me and another girl, Shelby, who I met at the start and asked if I wrote a running blog! So cool to have someone recognize me! She talked the whole time, and I mostly listened because I couldn't really talk. It was the best part of the race.

This was taken around mile 15. Looks painful, right?

I didn't look too bad at the finish though...

By the skin of my neck...

2011-05-01T15:48:00.000-07:00

It's been tough on the home front. The kids got really sick, now I'm sick, and not more than 4 hours a sleep a night for about 10 days now. I wasn't even sure if I should run. Honestly, I didn't really want to run. I'm tired. But I did run, and somehow I managed to pull a 3:40:51 out of my butt. I seriously cannot believe I did it...

I survived my last 20 miler before Providence

2011-04-13T16:17:00.000-07:00

Yeah, there I am after my last 20 miler today. In all my sweaty glory. Phew. I feel so much better having run that last long run. My IT band did act up about 75 minutes into the run, and I thought I was done. I decided to keep going though. It was a risk, but without this run my last long run would have been 6 weeks before the race...turns out the initial tightness didn't get any worse. It was distracting and irritating, but I got through it. Also, very boring. I decided to run on the treadmill. The treadmill is flat, definitely has no camber, and has more give than the roads. It just made more sense, but wow, did it require focus.

For obvious reasons, I've been looking into the whole IT band thing and found that lots of people wind up with IT band issues 3 or 4 weeks before a marathon. Big surprise. It's an overuse injury, blah, blah, blah, often caused by weak hip flexors, running on cambered surfaces, running too much too fast. For me, I think it's the hip flexor thing. My hips are in a constant state of soreness. Note to self, work on hips.

During my IT band Google fest, I stumbled onto some people who seem to have good luck using KT tape to help get them through IT band issues. I just happened to have some KT tape, so I thought, why not? And had a go at it. I do think it helped. Plus, it makes you look like you're going into battle, and that's just cool.

Anyway, I haven't been able to run longer than 7.5 miles since this whole business started, and I managed to finish the 20 miler. It's been 10 hours since the run and my knee hasn't hurt walking around or going up or down the stairs. That's something. (My hip flexors are sore though, hmmm.)

With 17 days to go, I think I'll be taking a lot of time off. I'll run a few more times, but I've trained as well as I can. Now it makes more sense to rest (given that seems to be the only real solution to calming down an irritated IT band.) Of course, I'll keep foam rolling. I've also discovered the glory of a rolling pin. If you can't make it hurt enough with the foam roller, go ahead and have at it with a rolling pin. That's what I say. I did have a sports massage that focused on myofascial release, and I'll have one more before the race.

But mostly, I'll be chilling in my super sassy lime green compression socks. Eating, thinking, and dreaming marathon. Good luck to all you Boston runners out there! I can't wait to follow everyone!

I need a new set of legs

2011-04-07T06:02:00.000-07:00

I'm still here! Last week was a little irritating and to be perfectly honest, I just don't feel like blogging about it. Nothing catastrophic. The week generally went fine. I did two interval workouts; a 4 x 1 mile workout at 10K pace and a Yasso 800 workout at 3:25 pace. Both went well. I had my long run scheduled for Saturday, but Kaylee woke up with a stomach bug so I skipped it. She was recovered by Sunday and decided I was long run bound. About 5 miles into the run, my IT band started acting up. It was bad enough that I had to stop.

I tried running again on Monday, but only made 3.5 miles. Tuesday I made it 4 miles. Wednesday I decided to take off. I'll probably try running again today. I'm honestly not sure what happened. I'm generally not running on cambered surfaces and I don't think I've drastically increased my mileage. (I ran more miles in the 6th month of my pregnancy than I did in March.)

I called a massage therapist that has experience with myofascial release. I've read that some runners with IT band issues have good luck with this type of massage. From what I've read, it's like foam rolling on crack. Sounds like heaven, right? (That's me being sarcastic.) I have an appointment. I'll give you all the gory details next week.

To stay sane, I've started rowing again. Because I haven't had any issues running in over a year (and because running is my passion), I haven't used the row machine in forever. I do have to say that it feels pretty good. I forgot how good rowing can feel...it's so smooth...ahhhh. That probably sounds weird, but I like it. Unfortunately, now that I'm in reasonably good running shape, the row machine doesn't even make me sweat. Obviously, if I rowed hard I'd sweat, but then my muscles wouldn't be able to sustain the activity for an hour.

That's where I'm at, sidelined for now. I'll keep you updated.

On a random note, I'm so excited to follow Boston this year! I read Kara Goucher's blog, and I'm so hoping she kicks some major running butt! And good luck to the rest of you Boston runners out there! It's so close!

How do you look at garmin data?

2011-03-28T11:57:00.000-07:00

I love my Forerunner 305. I love recording my heart rate, distance, and pace. I don't, however, love the Garmin Training Center software. I would like to take my data and tweak the graphs or even just copy and past the distance and pace columns into a blog post. Neither is possible with GTC. What's up with that? I mean really, no copy and paste function? Am I missing something?

I find the GTC software frustrating. I'd like to import the data into excel, but from what I've seen I'd need to create some sort of script to filter the data into a more readable and useful format. I've heard some people use SportTracks? It looks like the older version of the software is no longer supported and I'm not sure I really want to spend $35 on the newer version. (Especially when I'm not really sure what it does.)

What do you use to view your garmin data? I see many blogs posting the distance and paces of their half and full marathons. I'm guessing that you don't manually enter that data into a post. How are you copying and pasting data? Teach me please!

On to training...last week was a bit lackluster. I managed to get in the miles, but the recovery from my long run took longer than I expected. (Like all week.) My legs are finally feeling recovered, which is good because with only 5 weeks to go I need to start running speed workouts. I have another long run scheduled for the end of this week. I was planning to run another 3 hour and 20 minute run, but I'm tweaking the plan a bit. I honestly wasn't expecting that 3:20 would get me to 24 miles, and another 24 mile long run might not be what I need at this point. Now my plan is to run 22 miles or 3:20, whichever I get to first.

I ran my first speed workout yesterday. I find it challenging to follow the directions for many interval workouts. This workout was a 4 x 1 mile workout at 10k pace with 800 meter recovery jogs. Normally, I'd disregard the 10k pace and run the repeats at 5K pace (or faster), but since I'm trying hard not to get injured I decided I'd try to follow the directions...mostly. Using the Mcmillan running calculator, I looked up what my 10k pace should be based on my most recent half marathon time. Apparently, Mcmillan thinks I should be running 6:55 pace for a 10k, which seemed reasonable. I did the workout on the treadmill so I ran the first repeat at 8.6 mph or 6:58 pace at a 1% incline. Then I got a little faster for each mile (6:53, 6:49, 6:44). I also changed the recovery time. Rather than running a half mile between intervals, I ran 2 minutes. I ran the warm up and recovery jogs at 8:34 pace, and the cool down was at marathon pace. I was satisfied with the workout because I mostly managed to do what I was suppose to, but it didn't feel super challenging.

And I have to wonder what the interval run was meant to accomplish? I found it on a Runner's World marathon training schedule, but I've seen similar workouts on other marathon schedules as well. It's definitely not meant to be a VO2 max workout, or the pace would be 5K. Wouldn't it be more beneficial to run a tempo run at that pace? A few weeks before the half marathon I ran a 5 mile tempo run at 6:56 pace. Maybe tempo runs make you more likely to get injured? Anyone want to weigh in?

Marathon Training Week 6 (3/21 - 3/27)
Total Miles: 50
Total Time: 7:11
Average Pace: 8:37 min/mile

Marathon Training Week 5 (3/14 - 3/20)
Total Miles: 57.1
Total Time: 7:40
Average Pace: 8:03 min/mile

Marathon Training Week 4 (3/7 - 3/13)
Total Miles: 42
Total Time: 5:51
Average Pace: 8:21 min/mile

Marathon Training Week 3 (2/28 - 3/6)
Total Miles: 52.2
Total Time: 7:17
Average Pace: 8:22 min/mile

Marathon Training Week 2 (2/21 - 2/27)
Total Miles: 50.25
Total Time: 7:15
Average Pace: 8:39 min/mile

Marathon Training Week 1 (2/14 - 2/20)
Total Miles: 50
Total Time: 6:40
Average Pace: 8:00 min/mile

The hardest easy run I've ever done

2011-03-22T04:22:00.000-07:00

Getting ready for that long run!

Last week was good for training. At least I think it was good. Hopefully I didn't run too hard. My whole mantra for this marathon training cycle is running wise and preventing injuries (while at the same time meeting my time goals). I don't want much.

Anyway the week was good. I didn't have any tempo or interval runs planned, just some marathon paced runs and a long run. I wound up running faster than marathon pace everyday, except on my long run day. Sometimes 20 seconds per mile faster, and I really wasn't running hard. My average heart rate never went above 141 for any run.

I blame canceled running dates for some of the speedier days. I usually have two runs during the week with other people, which forces my pace to be slower, but last week I was ditched. And of course, left to my own devices, I tend to run a bit faster than I probably should. I blame that on my ridiculously low heart rate. It's like my cardio system wants to run faster, but my body threatens me with the possibility of injuries. Stupid body.

Then there was the long run. I was planning to run for 3 hours and 20 minutes, and I did, and I covered exactly 24 miles (according to my garmin). It was the hardest easy run I've ever done because I've never run that long for a training run. Also, the course I did was very challenging. The garmin claims I ran 4170 vertical feet. Apparently though, the garmin is woefully inaccurate when it comes to calculating vertical feet. As a result, I'm not sure how I can accurately convey the hilliness. I know I spent at least 45 minutes running up hills. There was a hill that was 3/4 of a mile long from the base to the top that I ran twice, and a number of other hills in the 1/4 mile range. Good times.

I ran the whole run at a fairly even pace. I started around 8:25 pace and stayed right around there for most of the run. I had a few miles under 8:00 (downhills probably). I had a brief moment at around 19 miles, where I couldn't help but wonder what I was thinking. (I still had more than 40 minutes to go.) The thought passed quickly though. It also happened at the point where I was passing my house for the second time. It takes a lot of mental fortitude to run right past your house after running 19 miles. Around mile 22, I got my second wind and starting feeling good again. I wound up running 7:49 for the last mile. I was shocked by the last mile. I hadn't realized that I picked up the pace. Oh, and my average heart rate...138.

Once I finished, I drank some water, ate a banana, used the foam roller, and took an ice bath. I wasn't too stiff for the rest of the day, but I'm a bit sore now. My goal for this week is to run slower, recover, and not get injured.

I have a question for you, how much (and what) nutrition do you take in during long runs? I drank 20 ounces of water and took 5 gel shots. That gave me 500 calories for a 3 hour, 20 minute run. I think I could have used more water, but that's all I could carry with me...

Marathon Training Week 5 (3/14 - 3/20)
Total Miles: 57.1
Total Time: 7:40
Average Pace: 8:03 min/mile

Marathon Training Week 4 (3/7 - 3/13)
Total Miles: 42
Total Time: 5:51
Average Pace: 8:21 min/mile

Marathon Training Week 3 (2/28 - 3/6)
Total Miles: 52.2
Total Time: 7:17
Average Pace: 8:22 min/mile

Marathon Training Week 2 (2/21 - 2/27)
Total Miles: 50.25
Total Time: 7:15
Average Pace: 8:39 min/mile

Marathon Training Week 1 (2/14 - 2/20)
Total Miles: 50
Total Time: 6:40
Average Pace: 8:00 min/mile

Where have all my toenails gone?

2011-03-16T05:58:00.000-07:00

Yeah, yeah, super gross. I don't generally think about my toes. Really, it's just best if I ignore them. Yesterday, however, I was in the locker room and I overheard a group of ladies talking about their toenails. You know, how awful they were, blah, blah, blah. Just from the context of the conversation, I was able to glean that they have never actually seen toenails like mine. Sigh. (They clearly never run either.)

Of course, then I started thinking about my poor sorry toes and their nails. My nails are just awful. At any given time, I can be missing six nails (that includes my big toes). It's always the same six nails too. Besides just your typical running trauma, it's also likely that a few of those nails have a fungus because some of them grow funny. They don't look like the pictures I've seen of nail fungus, but something fishy is definitely going on. (And no, I'm not going to post any pictures of my toes, it just wouldn't be right.) I've been waiting to go to the doctor because it wasn't until I was pregnant that I realized a few of the nails might have a fungus. So classy, right? And now I'm breastfeeding, so I'm still waiting on that doctor visit. Sometimes I try odd things like soaking them in vinegar. It's one of those home remedies I've read about on the Internet. I don't think it helps. It smells ripe though. I've also tried some over the counter antifungus liquids, but they don't seem to do anything either.

Other than my toes and their funky nails my feet don't really look all that bad. My skin looks normal and everything. My toes though, they sort of look like someone took a mallet to them. Oh well...

In other news, only 7 weeks until the Providence marathon! How did training go last week? I took it easy. I did a few marathon pace runs, which were uneventful. I did a 12 miler, which seemed downright short after the previous week's long run. My total mileage for the week fell a bit short though. I wound up with 42 miles in four days. I took 3 days off. I meant to take 2 days off, but was feeling lazy and tired on the 3rd and decided to take another day. I don't regret taking the time off. I've been tired. My runs this week have been better and I have another long run planned for Saturday! I'm planning on running for 3 hours and 20 minutes. Good times, good times...

Marathon Training Week 4 (3/7 - 3/13)
Total Miles: 42
Total Time: 5:51
Average Pace: 8:21 min/mile

Marathon Training Week 3 (2/28 - 3/6)
Total Miles: 52.2
Total Time: 7:17
Average Pace: 8:22 min/mile

Marathon Training Week 2 (2/21 - 2/27)
Total Miles: 50.25
Total Time: 7:15
Average Pace: 8:39 min/mile

Marathon Training Week 1 (2/14 - 2/20)
Total Miles: 50
Total Time: 6:40
Average Pace: 8:00 min/mile

8 weeks until Providence: the good, the bad, the ugly

2011-03-07T16:41:00.000-08:00

The Good
I had a great long run this weekend. I was running for time, rather than distance. Three hours of time to be exact, and wound up covering 21.5 miles (8:22 average pace). I ran the last five miles at marathon pace (8:00), and my average heart rate was 138. My legs were stiff when I finished, but I used the foam roller and took an ice bath, and wasn't sore the next day. I also managed to practice taking in nutrition. I'm simply awful when it comes to making sure I take in enough fluids and such while I run. During the run, I drank 25 ounces of water and sucked down 4 gu packets. My pee wasn't particularly concentrated the rest of the day, so I'm giving myself a thumbs up in the hydration camp. I also had two marathon pace runs during the week. One on the treadmill and one outside. For both, my average heart rate was 136. I've also started running at a 1% incline on the treadmill. At first, it felt hard, but I don't even notice it now.

The Bad
I'm beginning to realize why I generally run too hard. My heart rate is low. From a cardio perspective, I don't feel like I'm working hard at all. The rest of my body, however, is tired. I don't feel like I'm running all that fast, but my legs are tired. Actually, all of me is tired. I'm sure some of that is having a 6 month old in the house. Last night, for example, she was up every 2 hours. Nothing serious. I'm sure it's just her teething or getting ready to meet some milestone, but it puts a damper on my sleep. I don't think it's just having a baby around though. I have to wonder if my body is a bit worn out from the running I did in college. Because my legs are feeling shot, I skipped the tempo run this week...

The Ugly
I absolutely love running. That's why I do it. I don't really see the point otherwise. I didn't love my long run this weekend, and that makes me nervous. Somewhere around 2 hours and 20 minutes, I was thinking, "hmmm, three hours seems a little excessive, this isn't as much fun as I imagined." I know we all feel like that from time to time, but I don't want running to become a chore (because then it would completely defeat the purpose for me). Hopefully it's just that I'm running more miles recently, taking care of a baby, and yada yada yada. Does running ever feel like a chore to you? How do you get out of your funk?

Marathon Training Week 3 (2/28 - 3/6)
Total Miles: 52.2
Total Time: 7:17
Average Pace: 8:22 min/mile

Marathon Training Week 2 (2/21 - 2/27)
Total Miles: 50.25
Total Time: 7:15
Average Pace: 8:39 min/mile

Marathon Training Week 1 (2/14 - 2/20)
Total Miles: 50
Total Time: 6:40
Average Pace: 8:00 min/mile

Cox Providence Marathon Training

2011-02-23T07:33:00.001-08:00

Holy cannoli batman! Only 9 weeks before I run the Providence Marathon! It's just dawning on me that's really not far away...

Many moons ago, I wrote a post on lessons learned from my last disaster of marathon, which occurred a few months before I got pregnant in 2009. (Note: I can't seem to locate the post due to poor tagging. Therefore, I've learned yet another lesson; tag your posts appropriately.) Anyway, during that last training cycle I ran entirely too hard, wound up sick and injured, blah, blah blah. I came to the conclusion, that a crazy person such as myself, needs a shorter training cycle. This doesn't really mean that I haven't been training, but I tell myself I'm not training. Yes, I can be a bit strange, but now we're off topic.

For the Providence marathon, I decided that the week leading up to the half marathon would mark my first week of official marathon training. My first long run was the half marathon plus warm up and cool down, which gave me 17 miles for the day. So what does the rest of my plan entail? I'm so glad you asked!

I'll run a long run every other week. This gives me 4 long runs that should be 20 plus miles each. I don't have specific distances for the long runs planned. I'm going to run for time (rather than distance), and aim to keep my heart rate in my easy zone. I plan to run 3 hours, 3:20, 3:20, and then back down to 3 hours. I'm hoping this will keep my craziness in check.
Also, rather than worrying about running fast all the time, I'd like to try to keep my weekly mileage higher (between 48 - 62 miles).
There will be 1 tempo run every week (or every other week depending on how my legs feel) between 6-8 miles.
There will be 1-2 marathon pace runs every week between 6-10 miles.
Everything else will be easy. I'll just be aiming to get in the miles. I know some people hate this philosophy, but when I was in college we had two very hard workouts a week and all other runs were just about getting in the miles, not about pace. I was a lot faster then than I am now, so maybe there's something to that...
The running calculators claim I can run a 3:22, which is based on my 1:36 half from last week. I plan to train for a 3:30. I'm hoping that this might help prevent injuries, and set me up to run a 3:35 so that I can run Boston on my birthday! Because I so want to run Boston on my birthday! Deep breath...I just got overly excited there for a second...

How long are your marathon training plans? Do you follow specific plans or do you make up your own?

Marathon Training Week 1 (2/14 - 2/20)
Total Miles: 50
Total Time: 6:40
Average Pace: 8:00 min/mile

Marathon Training Week 2 (2/21 - 2/27)
Total Miles: 50.25
Total Time: 7:15
Average Pace: 8:39 min/mile

Racing photography really gets my goat

2011-02-22T11:32:00.001-08:00

There I am on the left, finishing the Hampton half, with awful form...On the plus side, I do sort of look like I'm flying. The photo is courtesy of Capstone Photography. Does anyone else find race photography annoying? I completely understand that they need to make a living. And I would be willing to pay a low price for a couple low resolution digital photos just for blog posting (low res pictures aren't good for printing). However, I have no interest in their prints or mugs or mouse pads or paying $35 for a single high res digital photo.

It's interesting that I can purchase a 20 inch by 30 inch poster of myself, but I can't spend a couple dollars to download a 256 pixel by 364 pixel thumbnail. Really, a poster? Who wants a poster of oneself? And running? I love to see race photos, but not life size photos. I simply don't look that good. And it would totally clash with our home decor.

This is why I usually bring my own personal photographer to races. He has a super fancy camera with multiple lenses. And the best part? He does it because he loves me! Yeah, I'm talking about Nick. Unfortunately, I can't always drag him to races. There's this whole thing about watching the kids while I'm off and running. I don't see why he can't be in two places at once...Am I being unreasonable? Probably.

Getting back to the point, downloading a cheap low resolution photo isn't an option, which really gets my goat. Obviously, I did download the photo, but you're not suppose to, and I generally don't do things that I'm not suppose to do. I'm a rule follower. Good, bad, or indifferent, it's just in my personality to follow the rules.

Ah well, seeing as I already broke the rules, here's another race photo of me below. What do you think about race photography? Would you be willing to spend a dollar or two for small digital photos? Do you purchase posters of yourself racing?

Hampton Half - 1:36:11

2011-02-20T17:06:00.000-08:00

This will be short. Maybe I'll write more in a few days. I ran the Hampton half marathon today. My goal was to run 1:40 or better, and I wound up with 1:36:11! Yay! Not a PR, but it's been a rough winter for me (with a new baby and yucky sicknesses). Therefore, 1:36 is looking pretty good to this running lady.

The race went went okay. It was cold and windy and after 7 miles or so my chest started to feel tight. Running hard in the cold is a trigger for my asthma. While I was running, I felt like I could run faster, but I felt like I couldn't run faster. Yeah I know that makes no sense, but to me that's what the asthma feels like. I feel like I should be moving, but just can't seem to do it. I did manage to run negative splits for the first 10 miles. My first mile was 7:42 pace. The miles just kept getting faster until I hit 7:08 pace for a couple. Around 10 miles, I started slowing down a bit. The last three miles were still faster than 7:42 though, which felt good.

I didn't taper for the race. My mileage this week was right at 50. The half was important to me, but the marathon in May is more important, and with my lack of good training this winter I didn't feel like I could afford to taper. I'm glad I didn't taper, I'm not sure I could have run much faster in the cold anyway.

According the training calculators out there with a 1:36 half, I should be able to pull off a 3:22 full. I don't know what my training paces will be yet, but with the new Boston marathon standards I'll probably train for a 3:30 and hope for 3:35.

Oh and I'd like to say congrats to my mom who ran 2:02:01. Go Mom! She actually wanted to run slower than that because she's running the Hyannis marathon next week, but I think the cold probably made her move faster.

I'd also like to say congrats to Ana-Maria, who is a running rock-star! She ran 1:32 and was the 3rd female finisher! Awesome!

Maybe I'll have some pics later in the week!

Hampton Half in 5 days!

2011-02-15T05:10:00.000-08:00

I'm still sick. Blah! My sniffles turned into another cough, but not as bad as the previous cough. My heart rate is higher than usual, but not crazy high. Just before I start running it's about 70 (20 beats higher than usual, but still lower than it was with my last cold). The half marathon should be interesting...my goal is to run 1:40 or better. I honestly have no idea how realistic my goal is.
The real goal for the half is to figure what kind of shape I'm in. I'm running a marathon on May 1 and need to determine what pace is realistic for that race. I'd like to qualify for Boston. Boston will be on my birthday next year. What better way to spend your birthday, right? (Nick says statements like that only prove that I'm off my rocker.)
Despite my poor training and lack of dieting, I have reached my pre-pregnancy weight. It took 5 months. I'm a little surprised. Emily is exclusively breastfed and hasn't started solids yet. With Kaylee, I didn't take off the last few pounds until she was eating solids for a number of months.
I'm glad that I'm back to my normal weight, but I still don't look great. My belly looks deflated, but I wasn't happy with my belly until about 1.5 years after Kaylee was born. It just takes times (at least for me).
I find the heart rate discussion interesting. I had no idea that during races your heart rate is 5-10 beats higher than usual. It's interesting though, the last two years I've started running with music during races, but not to help me run faster. I find that listening to music at the start (of a 5K especially) I am more relaxed and less likely to run the first mile too fast. In fact, a lot of the music I listen to when I run is slower. I know this contrary to what most people find helpful. Not running too fast at the beginning of a race is a real challenge for me though. It stems from my cross-country days. My coach trained us to run the first 400-800 meters of a race as a sprint. In cross-country, the start is like a funnel. If you don't get out fast, you'll be stuck. Road races are just different (and most of the races I run now are longer than a 5K)...Anyway, I wonder if the music helps keep my heart rate down?
144 is my body's favorite training heart rate. I've run several runs from 6 miles - 13 miles at many different paces from 7:45 pace to 9:15 pace that all had an average heart rate of 144. The pace is faster or slower depending on how I feel, but my body seems to settle right at 144.
For the half, I think I'll aim for a heart rate in the 150-160 range for the first half of the race. Then ignore the monitor and just run by feel for the rest of the race.
My mom is running the half too, but as a training run. She'll be running the Hyannis Marathon the next week. Her training has been phenomenal. She did a 22 mile run last week, and she's still feeling strong. She's a little nervous though. Her long runs have been on the treadmill because of all the snow. She's thinks that might be bad. I say if she can stand running a bunch of 20-22 milers on the treadmill, then she's ready for anything. What do you guys think? Do you think long runs on the treadmill are a detriment to marathon training? Have any of you had to do a training cycle on the treadmill? I'm sure she'd love to read about others' experiences (and so would I)!
Here's a random photo of my little ladies taken with my new favorite iPhone app (Hipstamatic).

The new year is challenging me

2011-02-08T11:56:00.000-08:00

In my last post, I wrote that I was on the road to recovery. Well, I wasn't. A few days later I developed a hacking cough. One of those that keeps you up for hours at night. Kaylee developed her first ever ear infection and Emily croup. It has been a tough winter for us. The kids recovered fast, but Emily's sleeping pattern devolved into this wake up every half hour for mommy thing that was killing me. And I had that terrible cough for a little over two weeks. So even when Emily gave me a two hour respite, I wasn't sleeping, I was coughing.

Things are better...I think. I'm not coughing. Emily is sleeping again. Kaylee is happy. Yet, we seem to be fighting off yet another cold virus, but right now it's all sniffles and not much else.

My running has simply been all over the place. During the whole mastitis episode, I took 12 days off. Then with the coughing thing I took off another 6 days. Finally, I just starting running really easy. "Really easy" was making sure my heart rate stayed between 140 - 150, which was 9:30 pace at the time. My heart rate has been so high. Usually before I start running, my heart rate is around 50. While I was sick, it was between 80 - 90 (that's before the running even started). Just crazy!

I'm concerned that I won't run my half marathon well, but what can I do? It's not like I can cram training, and I don't have a lot of control over being sick. I did manage a 13 miler last week at 8:38 pace with an average heart rate of 142. A couple days ago I ran an 11 miler at 7:49 pace with an average heart rate of 144, which sounds good, but it felt harder to me than 144 should feel. Today I ran a 7 miler at 7:19 pace, but I forgot my heart rate monitor. It felt fairly hard though. I really have no idea what I'm in for with this half marathon, but I'll be there ready to find out. When I reminded Nick that I had a half soon he responded with "you're still running it?" To which I replied, "of course!" It might not be pretty, but it's still worth the run...

Oh I had a question for those of you who use heart rate zones to train. I've sort of figured out my "zones," which are as follows:

Zone 3: 134 - 152
Zone 4: 152 - 169
Zone 5: 169 - 187

My question is: what zone should you be in when running a half? I'm guessing zone 4? And what zone should you run a full?

Au revoir 2010, hello 2011!

2011-01-13T04:58:00.000-08:00

It's a bit late for a 2010 review. Heck, it's a little late to be writing about goals for 2011, but what can you do? The last month has been rough. My family and I caught this awful cold before Christmas that continues to plague us! Fortunately (and oddly), baby Emily didn't get sick, just the rest of us. Also, two weeks ago I was diagnosed with mastitis, which nearly killed me. Okay, I'm being overly dramatic, but it was bad enough that I didn't run for 12 days and didn't even contemplate or think about running for the first 10 days! That's unlike me. Anyway, I think I'm finally on the road to recovery.

Let's see what is there to say about 2010? Well, I spent most of it pregnant. I was pregnant from January until the end of August. I took most of September off from running to recover from the birth, and by October I was back at the hamster wheel. I raced my first and last race of 2010 on Thanksgiving, where I ran a 5K in 20:25. I was pleased with my only race of the year. Emily had just turned 3 months old and I had only been running for 2 months.

I wound up running a total of 1942 miles for 2010, which is an average of 37 miles a week. That 37 miles a week assumes 52 weeks, given that I took 4 weeks off I really averaged 40 miles a week. Cool beans. Not as much mileage as some, but in 2010 I was able to consistently run with no injuries! I haven't done that in years! After college, I didn't think I could run more than 30 miles a week without getting hurt. And last year I did 40 miles a week while pregnant and 20 plus pounds heavy! For me that's amazing.

Overall, it was a great year. I had a healthy baby girl, ran lots of miles, and stayed healthy. It doesn't get much better. I also had the opportunity to run several races with my mom, which was awesome. I so badly wanted to participate in races, but didn't want to race while pregnant. Running with my mom was a sweet deal. I've never run a race without actually racing before, so when we'd go to races I'd look at her times and make goals for us (without telling her of course). We ran a half marathon together when I was 13 weeks pregnant and it was a great time.

Now what's in store for 2011? I don't do New Year's resolutions, so I don't have one to share. I do have some goals though. I actually made these goals while pregnant. Here were/are my post preggo running goals:

Turkey Trot 5K, November (goal 21:45)
Hampton Half Marathon, February (goal 1:40)
Providence (COX) Marathon, May (goal 3:40)
Chelmsford 4th of July 2 miler, July (goal: 12:40)
Moose on the Loose 10 miler, August (goal: 1:12)
BayState Marathon, October (goal: 3:30)

Technically the turkey trot was in 2010, but I'll just go ahead and say that I'll be running the same turkey trot in 2011. The time goal for the race will have to change...maybe I should make a leap and say I want to break 20:00. The rest of the goals still look reasonable to me. The BayState goal might change. If I qualify for Boston in May, then I might run BayState with my mom. She's pretty close to qualifying for Boston and it would be cool to go to Boston with her.

And completely off topic, we finally have a family picture with Emily! She's sleeping in it, which is ironic because she never ever naps. Anyway, happy new year everyone!

Garmin Forerunner 305

2010-12-29T05:48:00.000-08:00

A few of you asked about the iphone app that creates the ~~overexposed~~ artsy photos. It's called Hipstamatic. I used it for the above photo. I like the overexposed look. It hides those pesky skin imperfections, but I digress.

The real reason for the picture is to show off my new toy, the forerunner 305! I'm so excited to use it that I thought I'd wear it to work! No, not really, I just put it on for the picture. I am excited to run with it though. I had it on my Christmas wish list. It's funny a co-worker asked me what I thought I was getting for Christmas, and I told him about the Garmin. He's not a runner, so he looked a little puzzled. And then he asked, "What if you don't get it?" (He seemed to think it was unlikely that any husband would buy his wife a gps running watch.) To which I replied, "Oh, I'll just order one after Christmas." Nick did in fact get me the 305 for Christmas though. He's good like that.

I know the 305 is a bit bigger than the sleeker 405, but I've read a number of complaints that the 405 doesn't work well if it gets wet. And the 305, although older, seems to be the favorite (according to Amazon reviewers anyway). So that's what I wanted. I'm really excited about the heart rate monitor. I've always wondered what my true training heart rate is, you know, without having to stop and take it manually. (And now I'll have an accurate method of measuring it!) I'm hoping that maybe I can start training using heart rate zones. Maybe then I can make sure my easy days are actually easy days. We'll see.

Christmas was good. Well, the whole family was sick, but we had a really low key day so it wasn't too bad. I'm still sick actually. Last week I didn't run much (less than 20 miles), but that's how it goes sometimes. I did manage a 12 mile run at 8:15 pace, so that was reasonable. And I've already run a 12 miler this week too. So I'm sick, but now I seem to be able to run as long as I take it easy.

I hope you all had a great holiday! Oh and what type of GPS watch do you use (if any), and what's your favorite feature?

Asthma & Christmas Decor

2010-12-22T09:51:00.000-08:00

On the training front, I did manage another 43 mile week. I also managed to slow the average pace to 8:06. But,(yes there is a but), now I'm sick. And the kids are sick. Sigh. That's the way the cookie crumbles, I suppose (whatever that means).

I haven't mentioned my asthma in quite some time. I haven't needed to mention it. I haven't needed an inhaler in over 6 months! Now I'm back on the highest dosage of Advair. I'm also taking my albertol inhaler every 4-6 hours and a steroid nasal spray. Yikes! I forgot what it was like to have a deficient immune system. Stupid immune system!

I've been feeling a little cocky about my whole asthma situation. I may have prematurely added a little swagger to my step. I didn't even need an inhaler for my 5K turkey trot, which was running hard in the cold (two of my biggest triggers). So this week I've been knocked down a peg or two by old friend, asthma. I imagine it will take a couple weeks to recover back to a steady state. I'll let you know how it goes.

On a more fun note, I was reading this post on Chasing the Kenyans and thought I'd add share some of my favorite Christmas decor. The first picture below is a picture of our tree taken with a new iphone app that Nick found for me. Basically is processes the photos you take with your phone in real time and makes them artsy or old and decrepit, depending on your point of view. As a result, you can't really see many of our ornaments. We have lots of typical ornaments in the way of Santas, bulbs, and candy canes. But we have a bunch of Katie geek ornaments as well. I'm a big Star Wars fan and for the first Christmas in our house I wanted to find some of those Hallmark collectible Star Wars ornaments, but with Hallmark you can only get them the year that they came out. So Nick found someone on Ebay who was selling their entire Stars Wars collection for a very reasonable price! It. Was. Awesome! Here's what some of the ornaments look like. We don't have all the ornaments shown in the link (maybe half) and the pictures really don't do them justice but you get the idea...Yeah, I know, I'm a geek of mammoth proportions. (And now you know too.)

The second picture is of Kaylee and I decorating the tree this year. I am serious, when it comes to the tree decorating. So serious (not really I just look really serious for some reason).

Our Tree

Kaylee and I decorating

Training, Ballerinas, Goucher

2010-12-14T08:05:00.000-08:00

Please forgive my complete lack of focus today. My mind in spinning...

First, I ran 43 miles last week! Woo hoo! Yeah, I know, not a crazy accomplishment, but I was pleased. Overall, it was a good week of training. 5 days of running, one long run (12 miles), 4 good maintenance runs, and an average pace of 7:53. I do need to be careful though. Some days I'm still only getting 4 hours of sleep and 6 hours of sleep is a good day. Translation: I'm tired. And realistically, an average pace of 7:53 is probably too fast. I like to run fast. It's not always the smartest way to train, but I'm a sucker for a fast clip. I can easily be persuaded to run slower, however, if I have other people to run with. When I'm at work I've been trying to run with other people for two reasons really. The first being, I love social running. The second being, it helps me slow down. When I run with other people, I don't think about pace at all. So, I had a great week, but I'd like to see my average weekly pace decrease to about 8:15ish to help prevent long term burn out.

Totally off the beaten path, but burning on my mind, is this whole fat ballerina controversy. In case you haven't heard a New York Times critic singled out ballerina, Jenifer Ringer, as having "looked like she'd eaten one sugar plum too many." The picture on the left was taken during the performance he was critiquing. I don't know about you, but it doesn't look to me like she has a sugar plum problem. For whatever reason, this whole controversy is bugging me, which is interesting because I don't usually think much about weight or ballet. Seriously though, look at that picture. That looks hard to do. Some are arguing that because ballet is an art, it therefore means ballerinas should expect that type of criticism. And, I don't know, maybe that's true to a certain point, but look at her...she's not fat. Also, I can't imagine a ballet dancer being able to do what she's doing in that picture and be fat. Maybe I'm just being overly sensitive because I'm pretty sure I'm not as thin as her, and I don't want think that I have a sugar plum problem. (Note to self, no more sugar plums.) What do you think? Does the critique bother you or should it be expected in her line of work?

On another completely random note, do any of you read Kara Goucher's blog? Holy cannoli, is she fast. I mean, I knew she was fast, but reading how she's running 2.5 months after the birth of her son is just nuts! The lady is speed demon! I can't wait to read how she does in her January half marathon.

My first long run post baby!

2010-12-09T12:15:00.000-08:00

I managed a 12 miler today at 7:34 pace! Being a bit time limited and sleep deprived, I get way more excited than I should anytime I run. Maybe I'm getting extra happy endorphins, beats me, but running makes it all good. I really don't understand. I can't figure out how running doesn't feel like a chore. The setup and cleanup surrounding my runs take almost as long as the run itself. I setup lots of toys and books for the Kaylee meister and I have to drag the swing downstairs to where the treadmill is. Then I have to hope that Emily feels like taking a nap in the swing (it's actually the only time I use the swing, now that I think about it.) Then my run consists of me watching Emily and wondering if she's going to get irritated as well as participating in Kaylee's pretend play as much as possible. You know, pretending to eat snacks that she's prepared for me. Yet, I'm still loving the running whenever I get to go.

I will say my absolute favorite time to run is at lunch time the couple days I'm in the office. I get to go outside and sometimes I even get to run with other people! Cool beans!

Technically I'm in training for a half marathon in February, but I have absolutely no training plan. Well, I have my long runs planned, but other than that I'm flying by the seat of my pants. And you know what, I'm loving it. I'm enjoying running for the pure love of it. We'll see how that works out for me in February. Right now, I'm thinking it will work out just fine, but that could be the endorphins talking. ;)

My Mom breaks 25:00 in the 5K

2010-12-01T05:09:00.000-08:00

I haven't been blogging much. It may have something to do with the crazy baby and toddler I have. Nah, that couldn't be it...

Seriously though, things are going well for me, blogging just hasn't been one of my priorities. My running is so-so. The last three weeks I managed to run an average of 30 miles a week. I'd rather be around 45 miles a week, but it's just not in the cards at this point. I'll get there soon enough I'm sure.

I have most of my speed back, but I need to get some of that endurance back too. The long run is where I'm lacking. My longest run since the birth has been 9 miles (at 7:35 pace). My longer runs tend to be faster because I'm trying to get in as much mileage as possible before the baby objects.

The turkey trot was my first running test. My goal was technically to run around 21:45. Secretly though, I wanted to run 19:58. I wound up with an official time of 20:25. Last year, less than a month before I was pregnant, I ran the same race in 20:19. And this year the course was slightly longer! So I didn't achieve my secret goal, but I'm still pleased with where I'm running. The race didn't kill me. I ran hard without feeling completely wiped later, which is sort of important when there's a newborn around. I feel faster than I did last year, and I don't yet have a good mileage base (for me). My next test drive will be a half marathon in February, where my published goal is 1:40. I haven't decided what the stretch goal should be yet. I will say that I'm playing it relaxed this year. I just had a baby and I'm not really looking to set any PR's. Mostly I just want to run. I know that after the first year (or two) finding time to run and sleep and eat well will be easier, so for now I'm playing the patience game.

Here are my race stats:
Thanks4giving 5K 2010
Age Group: 1st
Female: 4th
Overall: 26/827 (top 3%)

Now on to the important news...my mom did, in fact, break 25:00 at the turkey trot! According to the official results she ran 24:59! She is simply amazing! She's only been running for three years now and she's doing incredible. She'll be running the half marathon in February, but just as a training run because she's running the Hyannis Marathon the next week.

Oh, and I realize some of you might be wondering about post pregnancy stuff. No, I haven't lost all the weight yet. I'm still lugging around 5-6 extra pounds, but last time I was 5-6 pounds heavy until Kaylee was a year old, when breastfeeding was greatly reduced. I'm expecting the same will be true with Emily. Even with the extra weight, I do fit into all my clothes. And obviously it doesn't seem to be slowing my running down. To be completely honest, I'm not trying to lose weight. I eat when I'm hungry and try not to when I'm not. I don't plan to worry about it until I stop breastfeeding. My total weight gain for the pregnancy was 23 pounds. Pretty typical.

There's one last tidbit I'd like to share with all the mamas out there. For some reason, people keep telling me I should have a whole bunch of kids because clearly I was meant to have babies given how smoothly the pregnancy and post pregnancy have gone. People seem amazed that I already look just like I did before I was pregnant and that I'm already running. At first, I was a bit taken aback. All I could think was "I didn't think it was all that easy and I certainly don't look like I did before I was pregnant." Now I've started telling people, "maybe I make it look easy, but it's not."

I know that I don't write about how easy or hard all the pregnancy and post pregnancy stuff might be. I'd like to write more, but I just haven't had the time. I just wanted you to know if you might be pregnant or have a new baby at home and find things challenging, that I do too.

I swear my face isn't as fat as it looks in this pic...

Aren't my mom and dad cute?

20:27 5K

2010-11-25T08:24:00.000-08:00

13 weeks post baby and I ran my first 5K since last Thanksgiving today. My time was 20:27, and my mom's garmin clocked the course as 3.2 miles. I've run the course a number of times and it was slightly longer today...

My mom ran too with a time of 25:02. So close to breaking 25:00! Oh and let's not forget my dad. He ran too. He's been injured for a number of months and just started running again.

Thanks hubby for getting up at 6:00 and watching the kiddos while I ran! And Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Not pregnant and so ready to run...

2010-09-29T12:29:00.000-07:00

Baby Emily, 7 lbs 4 oz, 19.5 inches

Yeah, it's been a while...baby Emily was born the last week in August. She's healthy and pretty typical as far as newborns go. You know, eats a lot, poops a lot, doesn't sleep much at night, likes to cry, and is super cute.

The birth was okay. Depending on your point of view, I was either really lucky or not so lucky. I think probably lucky. In case you don't know, my first baby came into this world via an emergency c-section due to fetal distress. I had general anestesia. It was not such a great experience. This time around I planned to attempt a VBAC, but the VBAC success rate is less than 40% at the hospital I was delivering at. The odds weren't in my favor, and I can't even begin to express how much anxiety I had about the possibility of having another c-section. So when my water broke before any contractions had started, I thought I was done for. Doctors expect the baby to be out within 24 hours of your water breaking. Twelve hours after my water broke, I still wasn't having strong contractions and I was only 2 cm dilated. At which point my doctor gave me 3 options; stay the path and hope in 12 hours I could dilate another 8 cm and get that baby out (unlikely), let them give me pitocin and try to jump start labor, or get prepped for a c-section.

I really wanted to avoid pitocin, but I wanted to avoid a c-section more, so pitocin it was. I was going natural, so once the pitocin was given things got a lot harder. I had to be continuously monitored, so I couldn't walk around and the contractions got really intense. I went from 2 cm to 6 cm in an hour, from 6 cm to 10 cm in another hour, and 30 minutes after that Emily was born. It was absolutely the hardest, most intense, and let's not leave out graphic experience of my life. I did manage to successfully VBAC a healthy baby without an epidural though, so yay me. Towards the end of the labor Emily started showing signs of fetal distress. It turned out that she had a knot in her umbilical cord. Like a real knot. They said she must have swam through the cord at some point during the first trimester. Those umbilical cords are nothing but trouble!

The birth was pretty tough, and I wound up with a few tears. As a result, I was told no running for 4 weeks. The first two weeks I had no desire to run at all, but I was ready to go by week 3. I managed to wait 3.5 weeks and then I jumped on the treadmill and ran 3.1 miles. I averaged 7:30 pace, so the next day I was sore. My comeback is slow going. Only averaging 2-5 hours of sleep a day means I can't go back to running crazy miles, but it seems my speed is doing ok. The other day I ran 6.2 miles in 47:20, with the first 3.1 in 22:00. I can live with that...for now.

That's my story. Oh, and in case you're wondering, the day Emily was born I ran 7 miles at 10:59 pace. At the hospital, the nurses kept telling me that walking might help jump start labor, and I just kept thinking if a 7 mile run didn't jump start labor then shuffling around the halls certainly wasn't going to do it...

38 Weeks Pregnant, Oh My!

2010-08-17T12:18:00.001-07:00

Yeah, I'm still here and running and pregnant. My running has greatly slowed down, but that's fine. Below you can see a chart of my paces and a chart of my overall miles run per week during this pregnancy. My weekly mileage hasn't decreased too much, but my pace (over the last three weeks) has slowed by about two minutes per mile. Admittedly, the slow down primarily has to due with walking breaks. My actual running pace is still around 10 minute pace, but I'm also walking, which slows the overall pace. The pregnancy is progressing well. I've gained 21 pounds and with only 1.5 weeks left I don't expect to gain much more. The doctor is pleased with my overall health. So we'll be keeping our fingers crossed that about a week from now we'll have an uncomplicated delivery.

Running has definitely gotten more difficult over the last three weeks. I'm hypothesizing that the baby is sitting on my bladder, and every time I run I feel like I could pee my pants at any second. I haven't though, so that's a plus. I imagine that peeing my pants would make a mess of my beautiful treadmill. Other than my bladder being in a constant state of wanting to release, I don't have any complaints. My back doesn't hurt, my knees and hips are holding up nicely, and I'm breathing easy.

In fact, I received the nicest compliment from Nick last week. We finally had a week where the stars aligned and we were able to go for a four mile run together. It was about 80 degrees and ridiculously humid, but still great to actually get outside. When we started I could tell he was taking half strides, and it looked like he was trying hard to run as slow as I needed to run. After a mile, I was in my running groove and feeling good. We finished the four miler at 9:50 pace. Not even close to my pre-pregnant self, but I was still quite pleased. As we finished Nick turned to me and said, "I wouldn't even pretend to be in the same league as you as far as running is concerned, but it's a bit demoralizing running with you when you're almost 9 months pregnant. You're freaking amazing!" Isn't that sweetest thing you ever heard?

People also keep saying things "you probably can't wait to get that baby out." Truth is though, this pregnancy really hasn't been bad. I don't have too much trouble sleeping. My biggest issue is needing get up to pee a lot. Sometimes I have trouble sleeping because I feel some anxiety. Last time around the birth didn't go as smoothly as we would have liked, but everything that went wrong was just bad luck and completely out of our control. Which is partly why I feel anxiety. It's not like I have any lessons learned to make this birth better. There's really nothing we could have done to change things.

Oh, I do sometimes get swollen feet at night time. I've found wearing compression socks at night does wonders for swollen tootsies! I wake up in the morning and there's no swelling at all! So if any of you are pregnant out there, compression socks are awesome!

Click to view a larger more readable version.

34.5 weeks pregnant

2010-07-21T09:51:00.000-07:00

I've been on a blogging hiatus, but I appreciate all the comments on my last post. Because I never got around to addressing the comments, I wanted to mention a few things here. First, it seems a few other pregnant runners have the same calf tightness issue as me. I wonder if that's a common problem among pregnant runners and what might actually cause it? Maybe the big belly and the shift in center of gravity? There was also a question regarding if Nick and I run the same pace. And the answer is sort of. He really only runs easy, but his easy pace is what my easy is suppose to be. (If I run by myself I have a tendency to run faster than my paces dictate I should). As result, we make good running partners. Lastly, Michelle kindly offered to read my ultrasound (for the boy/girl debate) if I had the prized picture, but alas I don't. I did have another ultrasound last week though and the technician said "looks like a girl." I tried to look for the hamburger or turtle, but I don't know...I think I saw a hamburger (girl). I guess we'll know for certain in about 5 weeks.

Above you can see a picture of me at 34 weeks pregnant. Wow, I'm 8 months pregnant! That's just so crazy to me. Last time around, I had to stop running around 8 months because I was having asthma issues, but I don't seem to be having any breathing problems this time around. So yay, me!

I know I haven't blogged in a while, but I've still been running. The last couple weeks (instead of blogging) I've been in full on nesting mode, where I've been getting everything ready for the baby. Being the engineer that I am, I made a thorough baby to-do list that had 50-60 items on it. Everything but 3 - 4 items has been completed. Yes, we're now ready for the baby, I think. I partly wanted to get things done early because Kaylee's birthday is at the beginning of August and I want to be able to focus on that rather than baby stuff.

Okay, okay, I'll tell you about my running now. I'm getting slower. You can see my progressively slower paces in the chart below. Yes, I make charts of this stuff. People like me do that. Anyway, I'm still super fast compared to my last pregnancy. At this point last time around, I had to stop running, and the month prior to that I was averaging 10:20 pace. Needless to say, I'm pretty pleased with myself. To be honest though, running is actually easy when compared to chasing around a toddler while pregnant. I go to a parent/child Little Gym class with Kaylee and that's harder than running. They want me to hop around, gallop, and touch my toes. I can't even see my toes. How am I suppose to touch them?

Anyway, that's where I'm at...still running, getting ready for the final stretch of being pregnant, and planning Kaylee's birthday. Good stuff.

Training Journal 6/28 - 7/04
Total Miles Run: 50
Total Time Running: 7:40
Average Running Pace: 9:12

Training Journal 7/5 - 7/11
Total Miles Run: 40
Total Time Running: 6:07
Average Pace: 9:10
Total Miles Walked: 7
Average Pace: 16:00

Training Journal 7/12 - 7/18
Total Miles Run: 40
Total Time Running: 6:12
Average Pace: 9:18
Total Miles Walked: 9
Average Pace: 16:00

Dubbed "Bizarro Runner" by Husband

2010-06-30T10:36:00.000-07:00

Hmmm, Bizarro doesn't seem very eloquent. I do like being compared to a "super creature" though. You'd probably like some sort of explanation as to why I've been dubbed "Bizarro runner." Here goes...

I run for the love of it. Nick also runs. He doesn't love running though. He runs to maintain his general fitness. We often have debates that center around running, which occur simply because I love to talk to about running and training (and I enjoy goading him a bit too). Mostly Nick thinks I'm crazy, which I take as a compliment. During one our running discussions he dubbed me "Bizarro runner," which by his definition is a "backwards runner."

It's rare that Nick and I have the opportunity to run together, but we do enjoy it whenever we get the chance. About once a week, if we're lucky, we'll get to go out for a run together. We run completely differently though. I start slow, and get faster, and faster. He feels better running faster at the beginning and slowing down later. He finds it incredibly perplexing that I can continually speed up over the distances I run and not die. Thus, my new nick name of Bizarro was born.

Now at almost 32 weeks pregnant, I think my Bizarro runner status is going to be revoked. The last week or so I've started slowing down, and instead of continually getting faster as the run progresses I generally maintain the same pace. Sniff. Sniff.

Speaking of running pregnant...it's definitely getting harder. My legs just feel dead. Sometimes my calves feel extra tight. My heels feel a bit sore too. My breathing is fine, my back isn't sore, and the baby belly doesn't bounce. But my legs feel dead. Stupid legs. To my amazement, my weight gain is still hovering around 16 pounds. When Kaylee got sick I actually lost a couple pounds. I wound up taking three days off from running and ate all kinds of yucky food like Burger King. And I lost weight? Now that's bizarre. Not only is Burger King sort of gross, but it's loaded with salt. Not at all good for the pregnancy bloat factor. Anyway, moving along...

All my prenatal doctor's appointments are going well, and I'm still measuring perfect. But running is getting harder. Not that I'm complaining. I'm so happy to be running! It keeps me sane. I don't worry about gaining weight and I feel like it keeps the crazy hormones at bay. It just means that I might be slowing down more in the coming weeks, and that's okay.

Oh on a completely random note, have any of you ever heard the old wives tale that if the baby's heart rate is under 140, then it's probably a boy? This baby's heart rate is almost always 135. Always. Now, during our ultrasound they said the baby was a girl, but I'm having doubts. What you think?

Training Journal 6/21 - 6/27
Total Miles Run: 46
Total Time Running: 6:50
Average Pace: 8:55

7 months pregnant, huge, and still running

2010-06-23T05:56:00.000-07:00

I've been on a two week hiatus from blog country. Mostly due to being tired. I'm a fairly busy person, but truth be told I could find time to blog in the evening hours. The issue right now is that when eight o'clock rolls around, I'm a zombie. I blame my zombie state on being 30 weeks pregnant. That's my story, and I'm sticking to it. Anyway, I do have a number of random tidbits to share with all my blogging buddies.

The New Doctor
I met my new OB last week. She's gets the Katie seal of awesomeness approval. It felt a little odd going to see her just to meet and talk, but it was important to me to have a new doctor that shares my general philosophy towards birth. You see, last time around I had an emergency C-section. I'm the 1% that actually needed to have general anesthesia, and I didn't give birth at a backwards hospital. It was Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, which is consistently named one of the top 50 hospitals in the country for OB. This time around I'm trying for a VBAC (still at Beth Israel). Not all doctors are thrilled to have patients that want to try a VBAC. Hence my desire to meet the doctor before simply changing over. Our philosophies align quite nicely, so I'm pleased. It also seems that she has a number of patients of who run during their pregnancies. She even indicated she thought running might increase my chances of a successful natural birth. Good stuff all around.

Nike Free Update
Last week I was able to start running in my Nike Frees again. I had to wait a few weeks for that blister on my arch to heal. I don't know how you guys get blisters to heal, but I have the darnedest time. I can't get band-aids to stay on. I even bought a box of band-aids that claimed to be like "duct-tape." And the sticky parts really did look like duct-tape, but even those wouldn't stay put. Basically I wound up wearing the (very large) band-aids at night and going band-aid less during the day, which was fine but it took two weeks before I felt comfortable trying out my Frees again. I've probably run 40-50 miles in the Nike Frees now including an 11 miler, and I'm happy with them. I'm not having anymore blister issues and overall they feel great! I'm not really a Nike shoe fan when it comes to running, so I'm surprised that I like them as much as I do.

New Running Skirt
A week or so ago I received a late birthday present in the mail. A ridiculously cool maternity running skirt! Truth be told, I've had my eye on this skirt for a few months, but after reading this post over on Marathon Mama I was too chicken to buy one. Running cloths have been giving me some major issues during this pregnancy. I get chaffed and cut constantly. It might sound crazy, but the discomfort from my running cloths has been the most difficult aspect of running for me during this pregnancy. Every time I get into the shower it's a shock. And yes, I'm using glide. I've used more glide in the last 6 months than over my entire running career. My regular size running shorts are cutting into my hips, but larger shorts cause even worse chaffing. It probably has something to do with the fact that I run 8-11 miles at a time. If I was just going 4, then I don't think it would be an issue. Anyway, the skirt is amazing! It's a few inches longer than most running skirts, doesn't ride up, and doesn't chafe or cut me. I try to wash it every day. It's my new favorite...

Running Pregnancy Paces
Over on the left, you can see a graph of my weekly average running paces throughout my pregnancy. If you click on the graph you'll be able to actually read it. It's funny, the first trimester is all over the map. The second trimester consistently hovers around the 8:38 per mile line. I'm only a few weeks into the third trimester, but it's clear that my paces are getting slower. From here on in, I expect my pace to drop off dramatically. During my last pregnancy, I was averaging 10:20 pace in my 7th month. I'm expecting that over the next few weeks I'll slow down to somewhere around there.

My Poor Buttercup
At the end of last week Kaylee came down with a nasty stomach bug. Kaylee is almost never sick. Seriously. She's never had an ear infection and never needed antibiotics. Of course, she's had colds, but her only symptom is a runny nose that clears up in a few days. This is the sickest she's ever been. It was absolutely awful. She threw up for 27 hours and wasn't able to eat solid food for almost three days. We thought we were going to have to take her to the ER, but her pediatrician assessed her dehydration status on Saturday and had us stay in the office for a few hours to try and see if we could get her to keep down some juice and Pedialyte in hopes to avoid an ER visit. Luckily we didn't have to go to the ER and she is finally back to her usual self. On the downside, I had three days of almost no sleep and wound up sick (not vomiting though). I seem to just have a cold, which has unfortunately triggered my asthma. The last 3.5 months I haven't needed my inhalers, but now I'm back on them. I'm hoping that within a couple weeks I'll be able to stop using them again. We'll see. On a more happy note, we bought Kaylee her first real pair of sneakers. Now she only wants to wear sneakers and she keeps telling us that "these are my first pair of running shoes!" Yesterday she picked out some crazy polka-dotted shorts to wear and told me that "these are my running shorts for when we first go running together." Nick has plainly stated that I'm creating a monster, but I don't think so. She's so cute!

Training Journal 6/7 - 6/13
Total Miles Run: 56
Total Time Running: 8:19
Average Running Pace: 8:54

Training Journal 6/14 - 6/20
Total Miles Run: 36 (Kaylee's sickness limited my mileage)
Total Time Running: 5:23
Average Pace: 8:55

28 weeks pregnant with a race report

2010-06-08T12:09:00.000-07:00

Two weeks ago, I had a shock with my doctor abandoning me. Sniff, sniff. And just to make things even better I received a few irritating pregnant comments. Last week, however, was much better. I'm fairly certain I found a new doctor. I have an appointment to meet her; hopefully I'll like her.

Also, there was a workplace fun run last week! It was advertised as a 5K, but the fitness center fellow who measured out the course informed us at the start that it is was actually a 3.2 miler. Then he said, "well, if you want to be technical it's closer to 3.3 miles." Ahhh, non runners are so funny, aren't they? If it's closer to 3.3 miles it can hardly be called a 5K, but that's okay. It was a race to get people out and moving. There were 40 people who ran, mostly men (a number of others walked). It was a lot of fun! I've been looking forward to the fun run because I miss racing and I knew this would be low key. I wound up running 23:37 and being conservative and assuming that the course 3.2 (rather than 3.3) that's 7:22 pace. I was pleasantly surprised. I didn't really race or run super hard, so I'm pleased with the pace. Plus, I'm packing on an extra 16 pounds now...ugh. Oh, also, I was the first female finisher and came in 6th overall.

Being as pregnant as I am, I did receive a lot of attention before, during, and after the race. To my relief, though, it was all good. Only the company nurse seemed concerned, but she's older and not a runner (so I'm not counting her). Everyone else had fun cheering me on. A guy I passed even shouted out "great job, my wife ran until a week before our baby was born and it was great." I was surprised because like I told Nick "who wants to get passed by a pregnant lady? I wouldn't..." People were surprisingly gracious. Below you can a picture of me running the race at 27 weeks and 4 days pregnant. The guy in blue, who ran with me most of the way, had a 3:20 marathon debut. He finished a good 30 seconds ahead of me, and apparently complained to all the running guys that I pushed him to run faster than he wanted to. (I only know this because Nick was in the locker room and later divulged the information to me.) I don't believe him though. He looked just fine to me.

You see that baby belly peaking from the bottom of my shirt?

Overall, running is still going well. I am slowing down though. My average pace from week 14 - 25 was between 8:33 and 8:43, but the last few weeks the average pace has slowed to 8:46 - 8:48. I would expect that at some point soon there will be another slow down. I'm surprised I haven't slowed more given the extra 16 pounds I'm lugging around. I guess I'm adapting well to being HUGE. Anyway, below you can see my stats. Oh, I almost forgot, I had my gestational diabetes test and I'm not diabetic. YAY! They also tested my iron levels and I'm not anemic either, so double yay!

Training Journal 5/24 - 5/30
Total Miles Run: 50.35
Total Time Running: 7:22
Average Running Pace: 8:46

Training Journal 5/31 - 6/6
Total Miles Run: 46
Total Time Running: 6:45
Average Pace: 8:48

Running, Random Rant, and Nike Frees!

2010-05-26T11:20:00.000-07:00

Last week I had another good running week. Well, a bit slower, but still good. I ran 57 miles at an average pace of 8:48. My fastest run last week was an 8 miler at 8:09 pace, slower than the previous week's 7:55 pace, but instead being 50 degrees it was 65 degrees. I'm not going to complain. I'm pleased with how my running is going.

I had a prenatal visit this week, which has nothing to do with running, but I'm feeling compelled to share my shock. Don't worry, all is well with me and the baby. My shock came when my doctor informed me she'd be leaving the practice on July 18 and her replacement wouldn't be ready until September. I'm due at the end of August so that leaves me with 6 weeks of pregnancy and probably a birth with no doctor. I. was. shocked.

She explained why she's leaving, and I get it. She has a one year old son and had expressed concerns to her employer about working 80 hours a week right from the baby's birth. The hospital sort of tried to alleviate her concerns, but they didn't really, and so a year later she's still working like crazy. I do completely understand her reasons, I just wish it wasn't happening during my last 6 weeks of pregnancy. Oh well. I think I've found another doctor, but I still need to make phone calls and an appointment to meet her.

And to make my craziness complete, now that I'm huge I'm starting to get more comments at work. I work with mostly male engineers, and in case you were not aware, many engineers have a tendency to be socially challenged. Something that usually doesn't bother me. They're nice people, they just have trouble socializing at times. Anyway, I received an interesting question to the affect, "hey have you been drinking lots of beer and eating lots of pizza?" Along with another comment/question that went something like, "Oh my god, you're pregnant, but last week you were running, is that safe?" Honestly, sometimes I'm at a loss with how to respond to such questions. I try to take them in stride, but it just so happens that I received both right after I found out my doctor was leaving, so they irritated me more than usual. I actually think they might have offended Nick more than me. He offered to break some heads, but I declined his offer.

I know many of the lady readers out there have been pregnant. Did you receive any odd/interesting comments or questions during your pregnancy? Do you feel like sharing? I'd love to hear them!

Okay, so that was my random rant for the week, back to some running news. I finally broke down and bought a pair of Nike Frees! I've only run in them twice (a 9 and 10 miler), but so far so good. During my second run I did get a blister on my arch, but every pair of running shoes I've ever owned require a bit of break-in period. You might be wondering what made me finally take the Nike free leap (or maybe you're not but I'm going to tell you anyway). Well, here's the deal. My Mizuno Waveriders are decent and fairly light, but I've noticed that they are extremely stiff, making it difficult to run with a forefoot stride. They pull on my heels. I also have a pair of Nike racing flats that I run in from time to time, but they are so light that running in them is really like running barefoot, which often makes my calves sore. The Nike Frees have a bit more support than the flats, but they are much more flexible than the Mizunos. I'll have to run in Frees a bit more, but I do like them thus far. Here's a picture for your viewing pleasure. I didn't take the picture, but these are ones I bought.

6 months pregnant and a picture to prove it

2010-05-12T05:31:00.001-07:00

Yup, that's right, I'm six months pregnant. Or 26 weeks, but who's keeping track? Right after I posted last week, I was ecstatic to learn that both Kara Goucher and Paula Radcliffe are pregnant too! Their due dates are one month after mine! It sounds like they're still training fairly hard too. I found this interview with Kara and she mentions doing 1 mile intervals. Not that I plan to go and start running intervals or tempos now, but it's just nice to read that their doctors have okay-ed some harder running. Also, I feel like if they can take time off from racing for their pregnancies then I don't feel so bad missing a whole year of racing. And it will just be fun following them over the next few months.

As far is running is concerned, last week was a good week. The two days I ran outside were about 50 degrees, simply perfect running weather, and I wound up doing one 8 mile run at 7:55 pace and my heart rate didn't go above 120! The other outside run was another 8 miler at 8:01 pace. It's really funny my outside runs are so much faster than my treadmill runs. I wound up running 57 miles last week the average being 8:40 pace, so my treadmill runs are much much slower. I'm not really sure why. I think my stride is shorter making it harder to run faster. Honestly though, it's probably why I'm not injured. I've been thinking about my running and I can't believe that I've been averaging more than 45 miles a week for 6 months now with no injuries! That's amazing for me. It must be the treadmill. That's the only thing that's changed in the last 6 months. Well that, and me being pregnant, but I'm pretty sure carrying around an extra 13 -14 pounds isn't helping me to prevent injuries.

This is a bit random, but running with a toddler around has become interesting. Kaylee makes all these interesting statements that are constantly making me laugh. Here are a few Kaylee quotes:

If she hears the treadmill slow down, I might hear "Mommy why are you slowing down, can't you go faster?"
If I try to pick her up after I run, I'll get the protest "Mommy you're all sweaty, you need a shower."
Sometimes after I run she'll say "Mommy, I smell you..."
More than once she's said "Mommy can you put your socks back on." (I'm missing several toenails.)
She'll do laps around the house and when she's done she'll say, "Phew, I just ran 20 miles."

Okay, below you can see a picture of me 6 months pregnant with my Kaylee meister patting my belly. She's super cute.

Training Journal 5/10 - 5/16
Total Miles Run: 57
Total Time Running: 8:14
Average Running Pace: 8:40

Running pregnant, the good, the bad, the ugly

2010-05-11T11:57:00.000-07:00

Thank you for all the great comments to my last post! Obviously I love words of encouragement, but I also love it when commenters share their own experiences.

Admittedly, I've dropped off the blogosphere the last few weeks. Work has been busy and I just haven't felt like blogging. I've still been running though. Just not blogging. Anyway, let me give you a pregnancy update. I'm now 24 weeks and 3 days pregnant and weighing a good 12 pounds heavier. (If you're lucky maybe, just maybe, I'll post a preggo picture next week. I know you can't wait, right?) At my last doctor's visit (22 weeks), everything checked out perfect. Good blood pressure, good baby heart rate, normal fundus measurement, etc. So all is good on the pregnancy front.

It's funny though, the last month (or two) I've been anticipating a running slow down. I'll say to myself, "self, I think this will be the week that my pace is going to take a dive." That slow down hasn't actually happened yet. Well, I'm slower than pre-pregnancy by almost a minute per mile, but I'm still consistently averaging a pace somewhere between 8:33 and 8:43 per mile for my total mileage each week. My pace range is anywhere between 10:20 and 7:40. Yes, that's a wide range of paces. My runs go something like this; the first mile might be 10:20, the proceeding miles continually get faster, the last mile might be 7:40 and my average pace for a 10 miler might be 8:40ish pace. Just in case you're curious, my pulse is generally between 110 and 136, which is reasonable for a pregnant lady. Anyway, as I enter my sixth month of pregnancy next week, I expect that my girth is going to slow me down soon. I'm actually amazed that my pace has been consistent given my 12 extra pounds.

Moving on to the good, the bad and the ugly of running pregnant...

The Good
Running helps me keep my bloating under control. I try to watch how much salt I take in too, but if we go out to eat, forget it, I could be bloated for days. Running also keeps my digestion moving. Pregnancy can cause, ahem, constipation (and yes I realize that might too much information for some, but it's true) and running has helped me avoid that. When I'm running, I don't feel bad about the weight gain that comes along with being pregnant. For even though my girth is expanding, I'm still running strong. And it just makes me feel good in general. I could be feeling tired, then I run, and then I feel better.

The Bad
My legs have no spring. When I explained to Nick that my legs seem to have lost their bounce he sort of laughed and said, "welcome to my world all the time." I miss my springy legs. And although I know it's silly, sometimes I worry that I won't be fast again. Like maybe I won't get those springy legs back after the baby is born. I know it's ridiculous. Six months ago I ran a 20:15 5K, which was post Kaylee so obviously it can be done. But at the same I think wow 20:15 is so much faster than I am right now.

And for the last bad...pregnancy tends to bring out huge amounts of anxiety in me. When I'm feeling particularly anxious, I can't help but wonder, if (heaven forbid) there was something wrong with the baby, are people going to blame it on my running? This has got to be my biggest fear, and for me the hardest part of continuing to run.

The Ugly
Moving on to a less serious note, none of my running cloths fit right, which in turn causes chaffing and cuts. If I wear a loose sports bra I wind up with chaffing, and if I wear a sports bra that slightly too tight I get cut. My thighs chaff, and the elastic around my shorts is cutting me. Most of the time I don't even notice I've been chaffed or cut until I jump in the shower. Then it's very noticeable. I use a lot of glide. But glide can only do so much. I'd be willing to buy some new running cloths, but I'm honestly not sure what to buy to fix the issue. I've figured out which sports bras don't cause issues, so that's good. Shorts though, I'm not so sure about. I've been thinking maybe a larger size of spandex shorts would be good, but I'm terrified of buying a pair only to find out that they ride up and make me look ridiculous. Anyone have suggestions for good pregnancy running cloths?

Training Journal 4/19 - 4/25
Total Miles Run: 51
Total Time Running: 7:19
Average Running Pace: 8:36
Total Row Machine Miles: 6.25
Total Time Rowing: 50:00
Average Row Pace: 8:00
Total Cardio Time: 8:09

Training Journal 4/26 - 5/2
Total Miles Run: 42.1
Total Time Running: 6:06
Average Pace: 8:42
Total Row Machine Miles: 7.5
Total Time Rowing: 1:00
Average Row Pace: 8:00
Total Cardio Time: 7:06

Training Journal 5/3 - 5/9
Total Miles Run: 45.2
Total Time Running: 6:29
Average Pace: 8:36
Total Row Machine Miles: 11.5
Total Time Rowing: 1:32
Average Row Pace: 8:00
Total Cardio Time: 8:01

After Preggo Race Plan & New Preggo Pic

2010-04-20T17:00:00.000-07:00

Holy cannoli, all the Boston madness is killing me! As a result, I've been fantasizing about a time that I can once again be training to qualify. Obviously that won't happen until after the baby is born, but I can still read about training, dream about training, live vicariously through others who are training. Do you see a trend here?

Oh by the way, congratulations to all those who actually ran Boston (as opposed to fantasized about running)! I was ~~stalking~~ tracking about 10 people throughout the day, including a couple people from my high school, one of which ran a 2:40! Go Pat Benson! He finish in the top 250! Just nuts! I also tracked a person from work and approximately 8 blogger buddies. I'm totally impressed with everyone!

Turns out Boston 2012 is on my birthday! When I nonchalantly mentioned this to Nick a few days ago, he just shook his head and said "I guess I know what we're doing on that day." To which I replied, "I don't know...I need to qualify first. But if I did qualify, wouldn't that be the most AMAZING birthday ever!" He just sort gave me this look. Like maybe he didn't agree with my ideal birthday plans.

Then I started thinking about marathon training. I've been running for a long time, competing for a long time, but running a half-way decent marathon hasn't happened for me. Yet. And when I say half-way decent, I don't mean to say anything bad about those who have run slower, but according to my most recent (pre-pregnancy) 5K, 10 miler, and half marathon times I should be able to break 3:20. Yet, I'd be pretty happy just running a 3:40, and even that has eluded me. Shakes fists in futile frustration. I try to remind myself that I've only run two marathons. Nick reminds me that perhaps a fall marathon isn't the best idea for me. I always get sick in the fall, which is what happened in those first two marathons. In my mind though, a spring marathon doesn't sound all that appealing either. You never know what the weather is going to be like in the spring. It can be much warmer than ideal. I think I might try for both a spring and a fall marathon. Give myself two shots at qualifying. (Nick is reading this right now and I'm willing to bet he's shaking his head and has a queasy sensation in his stomach.)

Just a brief sidetrack...Nick, my hubby who claims to despise running, came home on Monday and starting telling me all about the history of the marathon. How historians don't all agree that the fabled Pheidippides ran 26 miles to give that famous victory message. But he did find that before the battle of Marathon, Pheidippides was said to have run 150 miles from Athens to Sparta in two days and then back again to request Spartan aid. More historians believe this run actually took place than the Marathon to Sparta run and that he didn't die. Wow. That's all I have to say. He went on to tell me that often when they want to break the world record for the marathon they have pacers that the leaders follow until around mile 18, where the pacer steps out and the group races the last 8 miles. Pointing out that running a marathon requires more strategy than I've used in the past. I asked if he wanted to be my coach. He's declined the offer. He said there would be a conflict of interest. His interest would be me running less, while my interest is running more. But I digress...

Back to post preggo plans. Devising a racing schedule post baby is tricky. For one, I'm going to be tired. And Nick is going to be tired. And racing will mean spending time away from the family. As a result, I've designed a post baby race schedule that only includes 6 races in the first year. All of which are local. The worst one will be the Providence Marathon in May. Providence is probably approximately 1 hour and 14 minutes away (according to Google). So that will mean maybe 1.5 hour drive there, arriving an hour early, running time, and driving home time. Realistically, it's probably an 8 or 9 hour day. My hope is to enlist the whole family for help. Maybe I can get my parents to drive me around, while Nick's parents can help him out with the kids. That's the downside to running marathons. If you have a family, you need to have a strong support system to help you. And you're really asking them to make sacrifices for you, which I hate doing. Maybe I should ask for that for my birthday. Katie marathon day. No presents required, just 9 hours of time devoted to my desire to qualify for Boston.
The other races aren't so bad. At worst, the Hampton Half and the BayState Marathon are half day affairs. I live 20 minutes from the BayState Marathon start line. It doesn't get much more convenient than that.

My racing schedule has been planned such that I should be able to come up with a realistic marathon goal time. The first race will be a 5K taking place 2.5 months after the baby's birth. Honestly, I have absolutely no idea what to expect from that race. Expectations may vary widely depending on whether I have a natural birth versus a c-section. A c-section will require no running for 6 weeks, so you know...I might not be able to expect much if that happens. At least it will give me a starting point to work with though. Also, the race is 20 minutes from my house, so again, it's convenient.

Aside from just having a racing plan, I need a training plan too. I've started reading Advanced Marathoning and Racing Weight. I'll write about that later though. This is starting to get long, and I still want to tell you how last week went.

Okay, last week...was a good week. A solid 49 mile week. No aches or pains. I actually did one 8 mile run at an average pace of 7:52 per mile, which was a total shock. I ran outside and the weather was just perfect for running. I guess that's what happens when the weather is nice. I'm 5 months pregnant now, and below is a nice 5 month preggo picture for your viewing pleasure. My girth is still increasing. I've gained about 10 pounds now. Apparently all my running isn't preventing me from gaining weight, which is fine. According to all those pregnancy weight gain charts I'm right around normal, not a bad thing. Anyone brave enough to share their pregnancy weight gain?

Not sure why, but I look sort of hypnotized by the camera.

After Pregnancy Race Plan From November 2010 - October 2011 (My goals are WAGs and nothing more at this point.)

Turkey Trot 5K, November (goal 21:45)
Hampton Half Marathon, February (goal 1:40)
Providence (COX) Marathon, May (goal 3:40)
Chelmsford 4th of July 2 miler, July (goal: 12:40)
Moose on the Loose 10 miler, August (goal: 1:12)
BayState Marathon, October (goal: 3:30)

Training Journal 4/12 - 4/18
Total Miles Run: 49
Total Time Running: 7:02
Average Pace: 8:36
Total Stationary Bike Time: 1:47
Total Cardio Time: 8:49

20 weeks 3 days pregnant

2010-04-13T05:10:00.000-07:00

By the end of this week, I will be half way through my pregnancy. Depending on what time of day you weigh me, I've gained 7 or 8 pounds, I've managed to maintain a fairly decent physical activity level running anywhere from 40 - 55 miles a week, and all my prenatal doctor's visits have gone well. Including my "big" ultrasound, which indicated we'll probably be having another baby girl! Girls rule, boys drool! Just joking...The thought did occur to me (briefly) if we had 3 more girls, I could fulfill my dream of being a girls cross-country coach. There are probably easier ways to become a girls cross-country coach though, right?

Overall, the pregnancy seems to be going well. Oh, and I can still fit into almost all my pants which is always nice (the low waist styles of today can take credit for that). The only thing driving me mad is that I'm not sure if I've felt the baby moving yet. I'm pragmatic enough to attribute anything that could be baby movement to gas. This should happen somewhere between 16 and 22 weeks (the baby moving, not gas). I don't remember when I could feel Kaylee moving around. I'd feel a lot better if I could just feel that kid squirming a bit. I can be seen talking to my belly from time-to-time, "baby can you hear me...hey, kick me in the kidneys already!"

Being almost half-way through my second pregnancy, I thought I might share a bit of my preggo exercise philosophy with the blog-o-sphere. When I was pregnant with Kaylee, I was averaging 9 hours of cardio exercise a week. This was split evenly into running, the stationary bike, and rowing. I kept that level of exercise up until just over 8 months pregnant when I had a sudden run-in with asthma. I didn't know at the time it was asthma though. I stopped exercising almost all together. I simply couldn't breathe, but I didn't understand what was going on. I thought it was just being so huge and pregnant. I did wind up going to the doctor for it and it took a few weeks to get it under control. My peak flow was less than half of normal when it was at its worst. Once I had things under control, I went back to walking and biking for the last two weeks. During my first pregnancy, my exercise philosophy was inspired by The Girlfriend's Guide to Pregnancy. A book where the author suggests that exercise during pregnancy was risky, gaining 70 pounds was inevitable, and nobody looks good while pregnant so why bother type of book. It powerfully motivated me to prove her wrong. I also already knew from research and my doctor that exercising (for me) was perfectly fine.

This pregnancy I've had a slightly different motivation. I read Exercising Through Your Pregnancy by James Clapp as soon as I found out that I was pregnant. Don't judge the book by its ridiculous cover. It's really quite good. Clapp included a number of studies that indicated that running through pregnancy had a number of benefits to both the mother and baby. The studies he conducted found the most beneficial exercise was actually weight baring versus non-weight baring (i.e. running versus biking). As a result, during this pregnancy I've been less focused on overall cardio time and more focused on running, which works out for me because I enjoy running the most anyway. None of Clapp's running subjects had low-birth weight babies. All the babies were within the normal weight range, and all were healthy. He did, however, find a correlation between increasing or decreasing running mileage during the last trimester with birth weight. Basically any increase in mileage correlated to slightly lighter babies, whereas any decrease correlated to slightly heavier babies. Again, all the babies were within a normal weight range. Knowing that, my plan is to start decreasing my mileage somewhere around 30 weeks. I've been averaging approximately 45 miles a week during this pregnancy. During the last 10 weeks I'll slowly cut back to perhaps 35ish miles a week. This, of course, assumes that I'm still healthy and able to run. Anyway, I'm predicting a 8 pound, 6 ounce baby. (Kaylee was 8 pounds, 4 ounces.) Any predictions?

Now that I've bored you with all my preggo talk, I might as well share how last week's running went. Running last week was great. No aches and pains. I had one 8 mile run where I averaged 8 minute pace and it was easy. Not too shabby. The deal with that run was it wasn't on the treadmill. With the treadmill, I feel compelled to be conservative. I almost never average anything faster than 8:30 pace, and often I'm a bit slower than that, but outside I just run how I feel. This almost always happens to be between 8:00 and 8:20 pace. I haven't been outside much though.

So there you have it...my preggo running philosophy and last week's running.

Training Journal 4/5 - 4/11
Total Miles Run: 45.32
Total Time Running: 6:34
Average Pace: 8:41
Total Row Machine Miles: 5
Total Row Time: 39:10
Average Row Pace: 7:50
Total Cardio Time: 7:13

A Mixed Bag

2010-04-06T12:10:00.000-07:00

Mama got new shoes!

Specifically the Mizuno Wave Rider. Ooooh, aren't they pretty! Wave Riders have always been good to me, and they're not too clunky at 8.6 ounces. For a while, I went to the Mizuno Nirvana, a much heavier shoe weighing in at 10.5 ounces. The reason I went to the Nirvana for a bit was because my Wave Riders seem to wear out fast, but after reading Born to Run and trying some barefoot running on my treadmill I really wanted to go back to a lighter shoe. I seriously considered the Nike Frees, but one I was too chicken to try to them and two they weigh 8.2 ounces (not far off from my beloved Wave Riders). In the end, I opted for my favorite shoe. My hesitation to try the Frees stems from the fact that any pair of Nike running shoes I've ever owned have torn up my feet. I can't explain it, but my feet and Nike's just don't play well together. Anyway, new shoes were a must. I've been running in a pair that have approximately 1200 miles on them! Yikes! Not only are they pretty worn out, but they're ripe too. I don't usually wait so long between shoes, but I was having a lot of trouble deciding what shoes I wanted to buy. I was also trying to figure out what size I really am. Since pregnancy I've been having all kinds of toe nail issues. I've lost about half my toenails, including my two big ones. Sigh. I think I might have needed a bit more space in my shoes for swollen pregnant feet, but I didn't want to buy a bigger size and then have them be too big. I did opt for a bigger size this time a round.

Reunited with the concept row machine!

For our one year anniversary, my hubby bought me a concept2 rower. I'm a little odd. I much prefer exercise equipment to jewelry. In fact, I don't generally want anything...except exercise related equipment. Nick says this makes it difficult for him to buy me presents, but I digress. I love the row machine! It's such a great workout. Last fall when I wanted to run a 5K turkey trot yet I was still injured from marathon training, I did almost all my hard interval training on the rower. And I did manage to run a 20:15 5K even though my injury wasn't completely healed, so I believe strongly in the rower. The downside though...it is hard! I love that it works the whole core, arms, and legs, but it's so hard! Your entire body is engaged. As a result, I find it difficult to get into a zone. Therefore, since I've gotten my glorious treadmill, the rower has been sitting all by its lonesome self. Until about two weeks ago, when I decided I needed to cut back on running a bit. I tentatively got back on the rower, expecting it to be too hard, but it wasn't! I actually found it to be much easier than running. Weird. I'd like to get my running miles back up there, but my preferred method of cross-training is definitely the rower.

Where I stand with this running while pregnant thing.

I'm over 19 weeks pregnant! And just in case there are any other pregnant ladies wondering, I've gained about 7 pounds so far. As far as running goes, last week was better. My calves feel better. The weird shin splint thing went away. So all I was left with was a sore left hip/butt from a fall that took place with slippery socks on a wood floor. The hip was sore all week. Towards the end of the week I opted to take two days off from running. This was hard for me. Any other exercise I do now seems too easy. I can't even get my heart rate up on the stationary bike with the resistance turned all the way up, unless I do intervals, and I don't want to be doing intervals while pregnant. Even the row machine seems easy, much easier than it's ever seemed to me. As a result, I just want to run, but my hip was complaining. Anyway, I got in 40 miles and close to another 3 hours of cross-training on the row machine and bike. All in all, not a bad week.

Training Journal 3/30 - 4/4
Total Miles Run: 40.35
Total Time Running: 5:46
Average Pace: 8:34
Total Row Machine Miles: 12.1
Total Row Time: 1:35
Average Row Pace: 7:51
Total Stationary Bike Time: 1:25
Total Cardio Time: 8:45

The old balled up newspaper trick

2010-03-30T04:55:00.000-07:00

Here in New England the skies have opened up and we're being deluged with rain. Again. During the monsoon a couple weeks ago, it occurred to me to share a super trick I've acquired to dry out sopping wet sneakers, but I forgot. Sorry.

My roommate/teammate freshman year in college introduced me to the old balled up newspaper trick. At first, I thought she was off her rocker. I was wrong. Balled up newspaper shoved in sopping wet running shoes is absolutely ingenious!

Here's the process. First ball up some newspaper. I usually use two large sheets per shoe, but I'm sure more motivated people could squish in more. Once you have a ball of newspaper shove it into that nasty wet sneaker, and keep shoving in balls of newspaper until the shoe is full of newspaper. Leave it over night, and the next day your shoes will be dry! If they're really wet, you may want to replace the newspaper after a few hours.

I swear by the newspaper method of shoe drying. When I was in high school I'd throw my wet shoes in the dryer. I can't believe my parents let me do that...or maybe they didn't know...anyway, the dryer would sound like it was going to explode. I'd also sometimes stick my shoes on the furnace. Not really a good idea either. They can melt. Of course, in high school and college there was only one pair of shoes to run in. There was no extra pair and so I always knew I had to run in them the next day. Now a-days most of us have several pairs to run in, but the newspaper trick is still great because it helps keep your shoes from being stinky. Did any of you already know about the newspaper trick?

Okay, so I'm compelled to share a bit of my running experience from last week. Normally I'd just skip the narrative, but if there are any other pregnant lady runners out, there they might be interested. Last week was another running flop. I'm now 18 weeks pregnant. At the beginning of last week, I felt like I had shin splints. Something I haven't experienced in over 10 years. It was weird. I took a day off and that helped the shin splints, but I was also having calf cramping when I ran longer than 7 miles. Blah. I started to run slower. Then near the end of the week I fell. Not while running, and nothing serious, but my left hip took most of the punishment and I had to take another day off. I ran yesterday and everything seemed decent. No shin splint pain or calf pain. My hip is still a bit tight though.

I think my aches might be due to a little weight gain spurt. Around the time I had a positive pregnancy test, I gained three pounds, but until last week that was it. Then I woke up at the beginning of last week and overnight I gained four pounds. I'm wondering if I needed a little time to adjust to my sudden additional weight? Just a hypothesis. At the end of the week, I wound up with a total of 38 miles, but I didn't feel too bad about that because I also spent an hour on the row machine and another hour on the stationary bike. This next week is going to be better. I can feel it. ;)

Training Journal 3/22 - 3/29
Total Miles Run: 38
Total Time Running: 5:30
Average Pace: 8:41
Total Row Machine Miles: 8.1
Total Row Time: 1:01
Average Row Pace: 7:32
Total Stationary Bike Time: 1:10
Total Cardio Time: 7:40

Preggo Picture

2010-03-23T06:44:00.000-07:00

Ana-Maria asked for a belly shot...here it is fellow blogging buddies. Me, four months pregnant. I opted for a photo in work clothes because quite frankly my workout clothes are unflattering. I'm definitely popping out more than I did in my last pregnancy (stupid abdominal diastasis). I'm okay with that though, most days. ;)

Generally I find I'm pretty much okay with just about anything pregnancy can throw at me, as long as I get to run. Running is my meditation. It evens out those ridiculous pregnancy hormones that can make one feel crazy. Oh, you have no idea what I'm talking about? Well, maybe it's just me then. It also makes gaining weight easier to swallow. I still worry about gaining too much weight too fast, but I'm not obsessing over it.

Last week wasn't such a great running week for me. Monday I was a bit tired and after not taking a day off in several weeks decided to take the day off. Tuesday and Wednesday I ran and felt fine, but Wednesday night I got a sore throat. I woke up on Thursday and my sinuses felt like they were going to explode. I had chills and my muscles were sore. Ugh! I took Kaylee to a gymnastics/gym class that requires parent interaction, and when they had me hopping on one foot I thought my head might explode. That afternoon I did try to get on the treadmill. My general methodology for running when ill is to try it. Sometimes I get going and actually feel better. Not so that day. I quit after 10 minutes. I went to bed at 8:30 and felt slightly better Friday morning. I didn't run Friday either.

Having to take two days off in a row leads to other issues. I find I can keep my asthma under control usually without medication as long as I don't have to take more than a day off at a time. So by Friday night I needed my inhaler. Blah! I hate taking my inhalers.

Saturday morning I hopped on the treadmill and did fine. Sunday too. I'm still have sinus pressure, but it's not as bad, and it seems to be the worst at night. Hopefully that will go away within the next couple days. At least I'm running again!

Training Journal 3/15 - 3/21
Total Miles: 40
Total Time Running: 5:39
Average Pace: 8:28

Hynes Tavern 5 Miler RP

2010-03-15T16:35:00.000-07:00

I convinced my mom that this Hynes Tavern 5 miler road race would be super cool. So we both signed up. I was a little miffed with the cost. It was $30. Yeah, $30 dollars for small local 5 miler seemed a bit steep to me. I swear I'm not cheap, just practical. The race was definitely worth the price though. Awesome tech long sleeve shirts, a very cool finisher's medal, and clocks at every mile. It's one of the most well organized races I've run. Well organized races are just awesome!

Although the race itself was well done, the weather was miserable. Basically the same weather we were blessed with for BayState. 38 degrees and a lot of rain. It really wasn't so bad though. Bad weather seems more tolerable for shorter distances. I had a great time listening to people banter around us. I have this feeling that only the really hard core runners showed up, and they're a blast to listen to! After the race, my mom kept saying, "there were only lunatics there today!" I pointed out that she too showed up for the race, but she's still not convinced that she's of the hard core persuasion.

The actual running of the race was fairly uneventful. Mostly wet...and cold. My mom ran well. Turns out she was feeling tired too, so she ran even better considering she wasn't feeling up for it. Our splits were:

Mile 1: 8:30
Mile 2: 8:30
Mile 3: 8:30
Mile 4: 8:50
Mile 5: 7:47

Afterward my mother told me that she was seriously considering stopping at mile 3. And I said, "Hmmm, cold, wet weather is powerful motivation for not stopping eh?" She agreed. Anyway mile 4 was definitely the most challenging aspect of the race for her, and then she was able to kick it in with an awesome last mile! I am amazed that she ran such an incredible last mile feeling tired and yucky. Her PR in the mile is 7:40, so she almost ran a mile PR at the end of a 5 miler! Nice! Our final chip time was 42:07.

Here are some photos from the race. I love them! Everyone looks so hard core!

Okay, I am not disgusted that my mom is drinking water (which is how it looks). I'm really trying to figure out if she wants to stop and walk while she drinks, because I cannot drink from those paper cups unless I'm walking.

Here I look like I'm really hurting, but I swear I wasn't. The cold wetness was a little uncomfortable, but I was actually very comfy throughout the race. It was only at the start and finish when I wasn't running that I had trouble. Oh and yes, I'm now 16 weeks pregnant, which you can't really tell from the picture (only because it isn't a profile shot though). I do have a baby belly now. I have to glide my belly before I run to prevent chaffing. Phew, that was a little embarrassing to admit!

Speaking of running in general, my overall running this week was great. I've been feeling good. I ran a bit faster and longer than last week. Not on purpose, it just sort of happened. Today I was feeling tired though, so I opted to take the day off. It's been almost 3 weeks since I've felt tired enough to take a day off! Before that, I was taking one or two days off a week. That first trimester is exhausting!

Training Journal 3/8 - 3/14
Total Miles: 55
Total Time Running: 7:49
Average Pace: 8:31

Why I'm not racing...I'm pregnant!

2010-03-07T12:27:00.000-08:00

15 weeks pregnant to be exact! Phew, it feels good to share that with my fellow blogging buddies! Obviously I'm still running. I ran through my first pregnancy and loved it. Also, my OB is completely on board with my running. Her only caveat was that I should be able talk while I run, and if I can't talk then I'm probably running too hard.

Now that I've rediscovered racing (after taking seven years off), not racing is really hard. That's why I'm living vicariously through my mother. She can race, and I can help her out by being a running buddy. I have a few more races lined up for her. We'll be running a 5 miler next weekend, and if she's willing and available I have a 10K lined up for the beginning of May and a 5 miler lined up for the end of May. That will probably be my last non-race race. At that point I'll be heading into the third trimester, and who knows how I'll be feeling.

During the last two weeks, I've noticed that I'm feeling more energetic. My average weekly pace is getting a bit faster without additional effort and I don't need to go bed at 9:00 pm every night. Also, I don't constantly feel like I'm going to yak, which is nice. It's funny, for the first 12 weeks or so, I felt nauseous all the time, except when I was running and for about 3 hours after I ran. I'm glad I'm past that!

What do you think about running during pregnancy? I'm interested to hear from you all. I've found a number of lady runner blogs that shared their pregnancy running, and was surprised to see that they received a lot of negative feedback. I guess people have strong opinions about such things. I'm not sure what they were basing their opinions on, but it was still interesting to see. I also read Exercising Through Your Pregnancy by James Clapp. He conducted a number of studies on pregnant runners and the results were all in favor of running. And the runners in his studies were running 60 to 90 minutes a day, so they were serious ladies.

Training Journal 2/22 - 2/28
Total Miles Run: 44
Total Time Running: 6:22
Average Pace: 8:40
Total Stationary Bike Time: 60 min

Training Journal 3/1 - 3/7
Total Miles Run: 52
Total Time Running: 7:29
Average Pace: 8:38
Total Stationary Bike Time: 40 min

Gorgeous Blogger Award

2010-03-01T16:34:00.000-08:00

Okay, so I have no idea what it means to be a gorgeous blogger, but I'm still thrilled. In the words of Fancy Nancy "gorgeous is even fancier than beautiful." Yes, I am quoting an imaginary character from my one of my daughter's favorite book series. And no, there's nothing wrong with that! Anyway, Julie over at Julie's Running Blog has bestowed this honor upon me, and as I understand it I am now suppose to share six things that you probably don't know about me. Boy are you in for a surprise!

1. Throughout my teenage years I belonged to a program call Civil Air Patrol, which is an auxiliary of the Air Force. Think of it like the Boy Scouts, but way cooler. I had the opportunity to do all kinds of crazy stuff. I participated in cold weather training. You know, camping in a tent in February with no showers or toilets. I learned how to navigate the woods with a compass, how much food one should carry while tromping around the woods, and what type of equipment is essential for survival. When I was 16, I was one of a dozen cadets selected to fly around with Swedish Air Force for almost a month. It was part of an exchange program and I had the opportunity to meet other teenagers from 40 other countries. During that trip, I even got to visit the arctic circle! Oh, and fly in a jet trainer. It was an experience of a life time. When I was 17, I commanded a drill team that won the Northeast regional competition and was flown via a C-130 to the National Drill Team Competition. I'm sure that doesn't mean anything to you, but it was a big deal. I've also flown in a KC-135, which is a refueling aircraft, and I was in the aircraft when they refueled a fighter in the air! I also participated in Search and Rescue missions. I could go on, but you probably get the point. It was a huge part of my teenage years. Most of my good friends from my teenage years were in the program, and many of them later went on to join the Marine Corp, Army, or Air Force.

2. When I was growing up I wanted to be an astronaut. That was why I originally joined Civil Air Patrol. Actually it wasn't until recently that I decided I didn't really want to be an astronaut. A few years ago my direct supervisor encouraged me to do some more research into the whole astronaut thing. And I did. What I found was most astronauts aren't selected until their late 30's or early 40's, so I still had plenty of time. I also found that they work 80 hours (or more) a week, you have to live in Florida or Texas, and have to spend long periods of time away from your family. None of that sounds at all appealing to me anymore. I think the idea of being an astronaut sounds magical and romantic to me, but the reality doesn't sound so great.

3. I'm an electrical engineer. My specialization is signal processing and communication theory. I am currently working part-time, and my work is focused on satellite communications.

4. I'm an extremely pragmatic person. I never believed in soul mates or needing someone to complete me. During a philosophy course, my professor asked the class why people fall in love. I responded, "it's necessary for procreation and continuation of the species." I'm pretty sure he had never heard a similar response because he was speechless. A few years later I met Nick. And I fell hard. Definitely love at first sight. I can't explain it, it just was. We were engaged six months after we met, and only waited that long because we didn't want people to think we were nuts. We've been married now almost seven years.

5. I was the student speaker at my undergraduate college graduation. I don't know how other colleges select the senior speaker, but at my college if you have over a certain G.P.A. (I think it's 3.6), you are invited to enter a speech for review. Then they go through a selection process. I almost didn't submit a speech. It was towards the end of the semester and I was working late on my senior project the night before the speech submission was due. I called my mother and told her I didn't think I would do it. (I was sooo exhausted.) She told me I would regret it if I didn't submit something. She was right, and I knew it. I stayed up into the wee hours and submitted something the next morning. I found out later that I was a controversial choice. My undergraduate school was Catholic and primarily liberal arts, so they weren't fond of an engineer speaker. I was the first engineer major ever selected to speak.

6. I love to travel! I've traveled to Poland, Holland, Russia, England, Germany, Italy, France, Sweden, and most recently Japan. Well, it was actually about three years ago. I like to ask Nick these philosophical questions that drive him crazy...one day I asked him if he could travel anywhere, where would he want to go. He had to think about it, but eventually he came out with Japan. I told him we should go; I suggested that it be our big adventure before we embark on the adventure of having children. We had a great time, and he still talks about the trip often! He tells Kaylee about it, and tells her that maybe one day we can go back as a family when she's older. Traveling is on hold for now. The thought of traveling with a young child stresses us out, but eventually we'll be off and traveling again.

Phew, that was a lot to share in one post! So, were you surprised?

Hampton Half Marathon Photos

2010-02-25T15:00:00.000-08:00

I finally found race photos from the Hampton half marathon! There were a few interesting photos, but the Capstone prices are outrageous! First off, I have no interest in prints, which is mostly what they're pushing. Seriously...we live in a digital world, and I am a digital girl.

They do have a few options for digital prints. For a 300 pixel digital print they want $20! For a single photo! 300 pixels is probably the resolution of the pics below. I'm guessing they just strip off the Capstone Photography proof. That's just ridiculous. Anyway, here are some photos courtesy of Capstone Photography.

My Mom Running Strong

At the beginning of the race...we did lots of weaving

Me with my eyes closed. I do that a lot.

Finishing! I'm smiling because I can see the clock!

Hampton Half Marathon RP

2010-02-24T11:14:00.000-08:00

Sunday I ran the Hampton half marathon with my mom. Because I haven't been racing (more on that next week), I'm living vicariously through my mother. I'm not sure how she feels about that...after my last post my mom preemptively emailed me letting me know that her goal would be to run 9:00 minute pace for the half. I thought this was a great goal because that gave us a finishing time of 1:58, breaking that two hour mark!

Let's give some background to my mom's running. She's been running a bit over two years now. Before that she never ran, only walked or biked. She has a great build for running though. Anyway, when she started she just wanted to be able to run a 5K, and her goal was not to be last. She went from training for a 5K, to training for a half-marathon, to training for a marathon. She was planning to run BayState, but a new house and job a month before the marathon interfered with training. Probably not a bad thing considering how miserable the weather was at BayState. She ran her first half marathon last May and her time was 2:04. So this was her second half. And she broke 2 hours! She did great!

For the first 4 miles, we were averaging 8:30 pace. By mile 9, we were averaging 8:40 pace. By the time we hit mile 10, my mom was starting to feel a bit tired. You know how the last 5K can be in the half. We slowed a little and then she got a cramp. She was so frustrated, but I told her we'd be fine. We crossed the line at 1:57:35! That's 8:58 pace! Woo Hoo!

It was a great day and a great course. Very picturesque. I had a lot of fun running. I have a few more races lined up for my mom. I'm just waiting for her to tell me, "No more! You're insane!"

Here are a couple pictures I found online from the 5K. I'm hoping to have some half marathon photos to share soon!

Here we are with less than 0.1 to go!

Talking after the race...my eyes are closed.

Training Journal (2/8-2/14)
Total Miles Run: 41.25
Total Time Running: 6:05
Average Pace: 8:50
Stationary Bike Time: 1:05

Training Journal (2/15-2/21)
Total Miles Run: 45.35
Total Time Running: 6:43
Average Pace: 8:53
Stationary Bike Time: 1:40

Racing: a crazy runner's viewpoint

2010-02-10T04:41:00.000-08:00

Over the last week, I've read two posts that discussed racing attitudes. The first was over at Running and Living, where she discusses how runners who race have different goals from those who run for fitness. She mentions how many times her goal in a race is to suffer. The suffering and pain let's us know we're pushing our limits. The post is great, but I couldn't help thinking when I read it that I just don't think of racing that way. My goal when I race is almost always the same...to run as fast as I can. And yes, I've said that to people who ask before a race, and yes, they often look at me funny.

Inevitably, running as fast as one can run in race will come with a certain amount of discomfort. To me though, the discomfort or suffering that comes along with racing is something that's in the background. I know it's there, but it's not my focus, it's not why I love racing, and during some of my best races I haven't even noticed it. Running fast is why I love racing. I realize that might sound a bit ambiguous. After all, one person's fast can be another person's slow. Maybe I should say, running as fast as I can on any given race day? Besides the goal of running fast, I do have specific time goals for every race I run. I almost always have a stretch goal, which I often don't accomplish (but I do sometimes). I have a more realistic goal, which isn't easy to accomplish, but it's more realistic. Finally, I have a goal that I tell myself if I meet it I won't be disappointed. Sometimes I miss all three goals, more often than not I'm able to achieve the middle goal, and rarely I achieve the stretch goal. I always feel compelled to have a stretch goal though, regardless of the fact that I often miss it.

What it really comes down to though is, did I run as fast I could? I can miss all three goals for a given race, but if I ran as fast I could that day it's hard for me to be too disappointed. For example, I ran awful at the BayState Marathon in October, but no matter how many times I go through that race in my head I just don't think I had a faster time in me that day. That was as fast as I could run. Yet last spring I ran a 5K in 21:45, a time many people would be happy with, but I was so disappointed in myself at the end of that race because I just knew I hadn't run as fast as I could. That's the question I always ask myself at the end of a race, did I run as fast as I could today? And if the answer is yes, I'm usually happy.

That brings me to the second post I read regarding racing on TRI'ing to balance it all. She talks about pre-race rituals and how no matter the race she always gets nervous. She writes "There is something about putting your toe to the line and committing to mentally and physically challenging yourself for a 110% effort that just gets me riled up." I love this quote! Yes, this is how I feel every time I race, and I believe that although stated a bit differently, that Running and Living was trying to make the same point.

Okay, now this brings me to why I was really thinking about racing attitudes. Sunday I ran a 5K race, but didn't race it. This was the first time I've ever run a 5K and not raced it. Not racing during a race was much more difficult than I thought it would be. On the plus side, I didn't get nervous or worked up. What's funny though, is I still had goals. I ran the race with my mother, and I didn't realize this until long after we finished the race, but I had three time goals based on her last 5K time. Basically, I had goals for my mother, because yes I'm crazy. I guess if I'm not going to run as fast I can during a race, I want to make sure someone else is running as fast as they can...my poor mom.

There were no timing chips for the race and we made the mistake of starting farther back from the start. It took us at least 20 seconds to get to the start line and weaving through the crowd really slowed us down. We got through the first mile at 8:50 (which was the official time and about 50 seconds slower than I was hoping for). So of course, I started picking up the pace. My mom, being quite the trooper stuck with me. We crossed the second mile mark at 7:40 pace. Then I settled down a bit. I could tell my mom was running hard. The last mile was 8:10. Our official finish was 25:30, but by my watch it was 25:10 (5 seconds from her PR)! And her second mile was a PR in the mile! So she ran awesome. What I find funny though, is the fact that although I wasn't racing I still needed to have time goals even if they were based on someone else. I'm such a crazy runner!

Training Journal (2/1 - 2/7)
Total miles run: 39.1
Total time running: 5:45
Average pace: 8:49

Vomit is Yucky

2010-02-03T06:36:00.000-08:00

My week was more interesting than I expected. During my run on Monday, I wound up with a weird cramp in my hamstring. I stopped the run around 8 miles, decided to cut back my weekly miles to 40-43 miles, and spread the miles a bit more throughout the week. This meant that Sunday I had a 10 miler planned. (Usually all my miles are run by Sunday.) But alas, it was not meant to be. Kaylee, my tiny tot, had a bit of diarrhea and vomiting on Saturday night. It wasn't too bad actually. She had diarrhea once and vomited once. We spent Sunday recovering. Do you have any idea how mad a toddler can get when you won't let them shove their face with food, and make them eat more slowly? Let me tell you...she was peeved. Anyway, then Sunday afternoon came and I started feeling nauseous. Like really nauseous.

I managed to keep all my insides on the inside until about 1:00 am, when I woke up, ran to the bathroom, and vomited. Ewww. I hate vomiting. Really, really, hate it. The whole experience is so violent for me. When Kaylee threw up, it was like she burped and out came a bunch of gross stuff. Nothing more to it than that. I throw up, and and it's like my body is trying to expel some of my internal organs. For about 24 hours, I was vomiting. And I didn't start eating anything for about 36 hours. I was able to take sips of Gatorade here and there. I broke a bunch of blood vessels in my face. At least I think I did. All around my eyes are red spots. They look like freckles, but are red. My throat was messed up too. When I took a look with a flash light, it looked like bloody hamburger. Lovely, I know.

My stomach bug got me thinking about eating disorders. I honestly have no idea how someone could be bulimic. I just can't stand the thought of vomiting, never mind doing it on purpose. Then there's anorexia, and you know what, I don't like starving either. I'm just miserable when I'm hungry and weak. Oh yeah, and I like to eat, let's not forget that.

So my week didn't turn out exactly how I planned, but I still ran 33 miles. I have no idea what will happen this week. I haven't run yet. Just haven't felt like it. We'll see. I'm going to play it by ear and see what happens.

Training Journal 1/25 - 1/31
Total Miles Run: 33
Total Time Running: 4:57
Average Pace: 9:05
Elliptical Machine: 9.1 miles at 7:08 pace
Stationary Bike: 1:30
Push ups: 5 sets of 16

Surviving the Treadmill and Avoiding Injuries

2010-01-26T11:46:00.000-08:00

My running week was fairly boring. There's not much to say when all your miles were on the treadmill, you didn't run any workouts, and don't have any planned races in the near future. I did get in another 47 miles though, which is good.

I've received a number of comments and read a number of runners' blogs that have a lot of trouble with the treadmill. I'm not in love with running on it, but I don't mind it either. Obviously being outside with the wind on your face is the preferred running method, but I guess I'll take what I can get. So far, my longest run has been 11 miles, which I've done a few times. Most of the time I'm running 8 or 9 miles. My general methodology is to start slow and slowly increase the speed throughout the run. I'll start somewhere between 9:00 - 9:30 pace and slowly increase the speed until I'm running my last mile somewhere between 7:30 - 8:00 pace. The average pace is usually between 8:30 - 9:00 minutes. This is generally how I run typical training runs outside too. I start slower (although probably not as slow as 9:30 pace) and get faster throughout the run. My racing strategy is completely opposite, however, I go out fast and usually slowly drop off. I enjoy leaving nothing in the tank. ;)

There are a few advantages to treadmill running. Given that I often have injury issues, I've been doing a lot thinking about injury prevention. I've also been thinking about how I managed to run so many miles in high school and college without suffering from constant injuries. It suddenly dawned on me that nearly all of my running during those years was done on trails. Even all our races were on trails. Trails are softer. There are roots and rocks to avoid, which means you have to have a smaller stride to avoid ankle sprains and such. It wast my senior year in college that I started to run mostly on the roads. I had an odd class load that forced me to run mostly by myself, and by the end of that year I was totally hobbled. Running on the roads must have been the main contributor to my injuries. Apparently running 55-60 miles a week on the roads didn't agree with me.

The treadmill is similar to a trail in that it's soft and it seems to force me to have a smaller stride. Trails would still be preferable, but that means having to drive somewhere to run. When time is limited that can be hard. Not that I think exclusive treadmill running is the key to injury prevention. For one, if you run too much too fast overuse injuries will still occur. And obviously running on a treadmill simply isn't like running outside, which is where all races occur (not to mention being more enjoyable in general). I'm simply suggesting that if you have issues with injuries, running on trails may help. If trails aren't available for you to run on, you might want to consider supplementing your outdoor running with a couple days of treadmill running. Just a thought...

So how does one survive a treadmill run? You can listen to music, which I might do if Kaylee is in bed. We also have a TV and DVD player near the treadmill. I'll pop in a movie and watch it muted with the subtitles on. Yeah, sounds odd, but the treadmill motor can be a bit loud. Also, if Kaylee is running around she likes her music on, and she likes to talk to me while I run. I also think varying the speed helps. As nice as it sounds to run a constant pace, I'm just not sure that people were realistically meant to run that way. We inevitably vary our speed throughout a run. I imagine trying to run a constant speed on the treadmill for 11 miles is even more monotonous than changing it up a bit.

Actually, I find running on the treadmill easier than doing the row machine. Sometimes I do 10K's on the row machine and it takes an enormous amount of concentration and discipline for me to finish. I can't watch a movie while I row. I have to focus the whole time. It's exhausting, which is probably why I haven't done the row machine in a while. A shame really, because rowing is an incredible workout that I really believe helps with running performance.

Training Journal Summary (1/18-1/24)
Total Miles Run: 47
Total Time Running: 6:56
Average Pace: 8:51
Total Time on Stationary Bike: 1:03
Push ups: 7 sets of 15

Can you do pull ups or chin ups?

2010-01-20T04:57:00.000-08:00

Last week I was all about push ups, how great they are, and how I don't do any other upper body strengthening exercises. Then I saw Michelle's comment asking if I can do an unassisted pull up, and I realized I had failed to mention the true genesis of my upper body routine.

My college coach also had us lifting weights. I could bench 3 sets of 10 of more than a 100 pounds, but I still couldn't do a set of 10 push ups correctly. And to make matters worse, I was gaining weight. I am one of those people who will gain weight when lifting heavy. Once I realized this, I stopped lifting and focused on the push ups. After a while, I realized that exercises like push ups don't make me gain weight and they make your arms look great. There are a few other exercises (besides push ups) that fall into that category. For instance, pull ups and dips are incredible upper body exercises. Similar to push ups they work the whole core. Dips aren't too bad to do. In the past, I've worked my way up to 3 sets of 7-9. Pull ups, however, are wicked hard! The only way I've ever been able to do an unassisted pull up (technically a chin up) is by buying a pull up bar and hanging on it every day. I'd hang and pull and pull and pull some more. Eventually I was able to do 3 unassisted chin ups. There's no way I could one now, but I still have the bar...I'm tempted to pull it out and start hanging on it again.

Push ups, pull ups, and dips combined make for a kick butt upper body workout. The only reason I don't do dips and pull ups is primarily a lack of time (or perhaps laziness). Usually if I have a little extra workout time, I run. I do still have that pull up bar though...

Moving on to another interesting topic, have any of you heard of Athlinks? I don't remember how I stumbled upon it last week, but it's crazy. I looked up my name and it found all kinds of race results! Even a few of my college races. I'm not really sure what it's used for. Other than stalking fellow runners perhaps? It was cool to see some of my official results though. I've only been keeping track of my race times for the last two years, so anything before that I'm never really sure of. Do any of you use Athlinks? If so, what do you use it for?

I guess I haven't mentioned my training yet. Last week wasn't bad. I managed to run 47 miles thanks to my new treadmill. Say what you want about the treadmill, but I love it. Yes, it's a bit monotonous, but I can do it with my toddler playing nearby. Kaylee is so good when I run. She never goes near it while it's on, and is generally happy playing with her toys and listening to her music while I run. So yeah, it's awesome.

Training Journal 1/11 - 1/17
Total Miles Run: 47
Total Time Running: 6:46
Average Pace: 8:38
Total Stationary Bike Time: 1:35
Push ups: 4 sets of 15 (pitiful I know)

My Secret Upper Body Exercise

2010-01-13T04:27:00.000-08:00

Lindsay, from Chasing The Kenyans, asked what I do to get my arms and shoulders tone. It's funny...I get this question a lot, but the truth is I don't do anything crazy. My secret is...wait for it...push ups! Yeah, I know, not much of a secret, and when I tell people they don't usually believe me. Seems so simple, but those push ups (when done correctly) are hard!

It all started freshman year in college. My coach instructed us to do 3 sets of 10 push ups 5 days a week. He also showed us the correct form. When I tried it for myself in my dorm room, I realized I couldn't even do two consecutive push ups correctly! I was beside myself with irritation. I mean, honestly, how hard could it be. As it turns out, for me, getting to 3 sets of 10 was difficult. I worked at those push ups every day. By the end of the season, I could finally do my sets. Then I started making a set longer, until I could 20 as a set. Then I started adding sets. By my junior year, I was doing 6 sets of 20 push ups 5 days a week. Sounds like a lot, but it only takes about a minute to do a set of 20. Push ups are great because you don't need anything special to do them. You can do them anytime, anywhere. And unlike certain weightlifting exercises, push ups work your whole core.

Truth is, push ups, are the only strengthening exercise I do for my upper body. I don't lift weights. Not that I'm against lifting per se, I'd just rather be running or doing some other form of cardio with my precious workout time. I do love the row machine, which I discovered after college. When I'm training for a specific race, I try to do one or two row workouts a week. The row machine is cool because it works most of the same muscles as push ups (plus some others), and it's also a great cardio workout.

Here's where I have to admit that I've been slacking off a bit when it comes to the old push up routine. I don't do 6 sets of 20 like I did in college. I do try to do 3 sets of 20 most days, but the last month or so I've fallen off the bandwagon. Sigh. Now that I've written a whole post about them, I feel compelled to get my butt in gear and start up the routine again. I'll let you know how it goes. What do you guys do to tone your upper body? Do you have any stellar secrets to upper body toning?

In other news, I've still been tired. I'm off the inhalers again, which is great, but I still have a runny nose. I guess I'm not completely over whatever I had. It's okay though. I managed to squeeze in 40 miles last week, albeit slow miles, but still...

Training Journal 1/4 - 1/10
Total Running Miles: 40
Total Running Time: 6 hrs
Average Pace: 9:00
Total Stationary Bike Time: 2 hrs

My Lost Decade of Running

2010-01-05T13:07:00.000-08:00

A few running blogs I peruse have done reviews of their last decade of running. This, of course, made me think about my last decade of running. I began the decade with some intensity and competitiveness with my college running from 2000 - 2001, where I ran my 18:24 5K PR. After running in college, I was a bit hobbled, just ran for the love of it, and didn't race for the next six years (with the exception of the Disney Half-Marathon and Mt. Washington Road Race). At some point in 2008, I decided I wanted to run races again. I ran my first marathon in October 2008. I was a little more serious in 2009 and raced a few 5K's, a 10K, two 10 milers, a half-marathon, and another marathon. Other than my dismal marathon time, I'm pleased with my races from 2009. I want to run faster though.

In short, 2009 was a decent running year, but I lost a whole six years of potential racing during the past decade! I was running 25-40 miles a week during those six years, but not racing at all. And you know what really made me want to race again? Well there are two reasons actually... one, after Kaylee's birth I just wanted to reclaim something that was for me. And two, the first allergist I saw regarding my severe asthma symptoms told me I might never be able to run a marathon with my asthma. I hate it when people tell me I can't do something. Really, really despise it actually. Just ask my hubby or parents. I was more than irritated. So, of course, I switched doctors and started training for a marathon. That spurned my last year and a half of racing. Funny how an irritating man could have woken up my running beast. I can't believe the beast managed to stay quiet for so long. I'm still mad at that silly man who told me I couldn't do it (what was he thinking anyway), but maybe a little bit grateful too. After all, it was his discouragement that lit a flame under my butt.

I haven't quite figured out what I'll be doing in 2010. I'm sure I'll run a few races. I just haven't settled on anything at this point. I am resolved, however, to never let my running beast hibernate again. Running fast is too much fun...

On a side note, training last week was blah. I was sick most of the week. All that bravado last week about not needing my asthma medication...well I caught something nasty and starting wheezing up a storm. Needless to say I had to start taking the inhalers again. I had to force myself to exercise. It's hard to find the motivation to exercise when you can't breathe. It was worth the effort though. Exercise does seem to alleviate some of breathing issues (as long as I take it easy.) Today I'm feeling a little better and hoping that I'll be back off the medication in a few days. Oh also, there are some pictures below for your enjoyment.

Training Journal 12/28 - 1/3
Total Miles Run: 29.5
Total Time Running: 4:22
Average Running Pace: 8:52
Total Time Biking: 3:31

A Cross-Country meet in High School! Admittedly, this was taken more than a decade ago, but still, it's sort of a cool picture to have. When my coach saw this picture he told me I wasn't running hard enough (because I was smiling), and he had better never see a picture like that again. Yikes!

A wet miserable college meet. Spikes were invented for days like that.

My half marathon this past May. My form is awful, but I look serious.

My Christmas Present!

2009-12-30T05:31:00.000-08:00

I mentioned a few weeks ago that all I wanted for Christmas was a treadmill. I know...I don't want much, right? I also mentioned that we went to the super special treadmill store just before Christmas to order the one I wanted. It finally came on Sunday! I felt like I had to wait forever! Okay, maybe it was only two weeks, but seriously...it's cold out there.

Side note, can you believe they deliver on Sundays? Nick was talking with the setup guys and they said during the winter they're delivering seven days a week! They were delivering treadmills the day before and the day after Christmas. And in the summer time it can be so slow, they sometimes take whole weeks off.

We can officially claim that we have a home gym now. There's the weight bench (not mine). Then there's the stationary bike, row machine, and now the treadmill. I have laid claim to all the cardio equipment, although technically Nick had the stationary bike before he even met me... technically (it's really mine).

The basement is full of awesome workout equipment and toys! This is nice because it's cold outside. The cold doesn't usually bother me, but it's starting to bother me a little. The actual running in the cold is fine, but afterward I'm freezing for the rest of the day. Also, my skin is so ridiculously dry that every time I take a shower it stings. I know, I know, suck it up, right? Anyway, the cold and snow also means I can't use the running stroller so the treadmill is awesome!

Have you been wondering which treadmill we picked? Our general selection criteria was how well it will stand up to beatings. I like to really test the durability of cardio equipment. My parents like to tease me; technically, I broke two pieces of their cardio equipment when I was younger. So durability was important. Also, I don't need a lot gadgets or gizmos. Speed, incline, pace, that's all I need.

In the end, Landice came out on top. These treadmills are pretty sweet. There's a full one year warranty that includes labor, and a lifetime warranty on all the treadmill parts, ALL the parts...that's rare. There are two downsides to the Landice brand. One, there are no bells and whistles in regard to the electronics. Something I don't care about, but others might. And two, it is expensive, but these treadmills last so long that when you fill out the warranty card there's a space to name a person to inherit the treadmill warranty when you die. Okay, that sounded only slightly morbid, but still, durable. In case you're wondering, I've endowed my treadmill to Kaylee.

In other news, Christmas went well, but my workouts fell off a bit. Not so much because I couldn't fit them in, but more because I didn't feel well. Saturday I had actually laced up one sneaker and was beginning to lace up the other, when I decided I was too tired and opted to take a nap instead. This is very uncharacteristic of me, but for whatever reason I was ridiculously tired. I did get in one good run last week. I did a nine miler, started at 8:34 pace, worked my way down to 7:00 pace, and wound up averaging 7:59 pace. The rest of the week was pretty much a flop.

Training Journal 12/21-12/26
Total Miles Run: 16.6
Total Time Running: 2:17
Average Pace: 8:15
Total Time Stationary Bike: 4:10

Running with Asthma

2009-12-22T07:12:00.000-08:00

Asthma, as defined by moi, is a big bad bully standing between me and my running. That's all there is to it. Asthma is simply my own personal irritating obstacle that I plan to eliminate. I'm working out the details.

I was diagnosed with "moderate persistent" asthma just after Kaylee was born. Symptoms popped up during my eighth month of pregnancy and were severe enough that I had to take prednisone for it. I was hoping the trigger was hormonal, but it didn't go away after Kaylee was born. Eventually I went to an allergist who tested me for every allergy under the sun, but to no avail. It seems my trigger is not allergy related.

I probably had mild asthma as a child, but not bad enough to actually get a diagnosis for it, and I only ever had an inhaler when I was extremely sick. Now though, it's a completely different story. Sometimes it's worse than others. Over the summer, I thought maybe the whole asthma thing was getting better, then came September. When I visited the Allergist in late September and told him I was having more trouble but no trigger that I could pinpoint, he suggested the temperature change. "Really?" I asked skeptically "because 60 degrees doesn't seem all that cold to me." To which he replied "True, but a few weeks ago it was 80's and 90's." I was training for a marathon at the time so we went through what my game plan should be, which mostly consisted of me taking my various inhalers at the appropriate intervals. The marathon did not go well. Asthma being a big factor to the over all badness (although admittedly not the sole factor).

After the marathon, I diligently stuck with the inhalers, but was still having issues. I tried a week hiatus from exercise, still no better. A week after that, I stopped taking the inhalers. They weren't really helping anyway. That same week I decided I'd still exercise, but only what I could do without wheezing. A "just keep moving" approach. I think it worked. That first week was hard. My chest felt tight all the time and my running/biking was extremely slow, but the next week the tightness was a little bit better and I got a little bit faster. Then I threw in some workouts, which went well too. On Thanksgiving, I ran a 5K and did fairly well for someone who couldn't breath a few weeks earlier. I did use both my Advair and Albuterol inhalers the morning of the race and I did wheeze a bit for the rest of the day, but overall the race was a success. Since the 5K I haven't been taking either of my inhalers. My chest is still tight when I wake up in the morning, but I'm not wheezing, so whatever. I think some of the chest tightness might be from the dry air. Winter time is so much drier and the heating system makes the air even drier.

Just keep moving is my new asthma treatment. For me that means at least 60 minutes of cardio a day (running, biking, rowing). It doesn't have to be hard, but it has to get done. The day before the 5K I did 80 minutes on the bike and totaled 9 hours of cardio that week. I'm sure there must be a scientific explanation of why this is helping. I don't know what that explanation is though. I'm also sure that what I've done isn't the solution for everyone, and I would never suggest that anyone exchange needed medication for exercise. I am pleased that I seem to have discovered a method of dealing with my asthma without constantly being on drugs.

What are your thoughts? Anyone out there have asthma? Do you think I'm crazy?

On another note...I only got 30 miles in this week. Arg! That Sunday snow storm threw my schedule my schedule off.

Training Summary for 12/14-12/20:
Total Miles Run: 30.5
Total Time Run: 4:21
Average Pace: 8:33
Total Stationary Bike Time: 4:45

Training 12/07 - 12/13

2009-12-15T23:00:00.000-08:00

Running last week went fairly well. It was tricky with the snow. Last Monday the snow was melted enough that I was able to run with the running stroller, but then on Wednesday we got slammed with another eight inches of snow. The fuzzy photo to left was taken with my phone mid Wednesday morning. Thursday it was about 40 degrees, but there was too much snow to run on my narrow busy road. I wound up driving to a wide quiet back road and used the stroller there.

My days of running stroller use are numbered. I've been lucky that there have been a few warmer days. I don't feel comfortable running with Kaylee if it's under 40 degrees. Without the stroller, it's hard for me to run much more than 28 miles a week, but...we went treadmill shopping last week! I'm excited to report that we ordered a treadmill. I knew which one I wanted before we went to the store. I called ahead of time to make sure they had a floor model to look at and run on. And I ran on a few others too just to make sure! I'm crossing my fingers that it will be in before Christmas, but not holding my breath.

I know as runners the treadmill is a last resort, but where I am in my life without a treadmill my running is going to be severely limited. I'm really excited to have one. I've been slowly trying to make my up to 40 plus miles a week, but the weather, lack of stroller use, and early darkness are getting in my way. It's ridiculous because I'm not training for anything right now, but thinking about how I'll get in my miles actually stresses me out.

Do you get stressed if you can't run the miles you'd like to (even if you're not technically in training)?

Training Journal Summary
Miles run: 36.4 (14 with the stroller)
Time running: 5:19
Average pace: 8:45
Time on stationary bike: 4:00
Pushups: 4 x 20

I Found a Garmin in my Dresser

2009-12-12T03:15:00.000-08:00

True story. Hmm, where should I start. I'm hopeless. That's a good start. When it comes to gadgets I can be utterly hopeless. I did in fact find a Garmin Forerunner 101 in my dresser drawer a few days ago. I'm not sure what I was trying to find, but out came a Garmin. And I remembered immediately that my little brother (who's nearing the end of his training to be a helicopter pilot in the Marines) gave me that Garmin four years ago! And at the time I thought, "Oh that's cool." But then I never wound up using it. Like I said hopeless. Now since I've been doing an abundance of running blog reading, the whole idea of a Garmin has started to intrigue me. So when I found it in my drawer I was all "Oh look at this! I have a Garmin! Woo hoo!"

I immediately looked it up, and found even though it's the oldest of the models it works just as well. It just doesn't have the bells and whistles. Things such as a PC connection option. Needless to say I was excited. From what I've read, the biggest complaint of the Garmin Forerunner 101 is the batteries. They take AAA's, and only last approximately 13 hours. When I opened her up, there were no batteries inside. A great stroke of luck for me given that four years of old AAA's could have been a complete disaster!

And we had AAA's in the house (score)! I just threw in some batteries and went running! I didn't even need to read any instructions. Well, I don't read instructions anyway. Whenever I get something new I just pull it out of the box, turn it on, and go from there. This is not the way Nick works. He does read instructions. I'm not allowed to setup gadgets for the home. He says my methods are...less than ideal. Usually I just stand over him giving him friendly encouragement like "just turn it on already!" and "is it ready yet!" Anyway the Garmin worked as soon as I turned it on.

I was so excited because for the first time last week I had to run on a route that I hadn't mapped out. It snowed again on Wednesday and this time we had eight inches, so my street isn't safe to use with the running stroller. People drive fast on my narrow road and with the snow I can't just jump into a neighbor's yard when someone comes at me fast. Thursday I drove to a set of quiet back roads and ran there. I had no idea what the distance would be, and here is where the marvelous Garmin came into play! It told me I ran 6.9 miles at 9:07 pace, which I thought was very considerate of that Garmin especially considering how I've ignored the poor thing for the last four years.

I took it to work on Friday and ran my usual 7.5 miles, curious to know how accurate Mr. Garmin would be. The Garmin reported 7.6 miles at 8:10 pace. Hm, pretty darn close. And it's not like my work loop is a certified course. We drove the car around the complex to figure out how long a loop was (not the most accurate method perhaps but good enough for training purposes). Nick and I have also figured out where the 1/4 mile mark is (we did this through trial and error no measuring at all). The Garmin says it's actually 0.24 not 0.25, which is too close to even argue. We've also identified the 5K spot. Again, we didn't measure it. You just a get a feel for things running the same loop over and over. The Garmin said we were being a little conservative there and identified our 5K spot as being 3.2 miles rather 3.11 miles.

In short, Garmin passed the test. I'm so excited to run all my home loops with it now. When I run at home I'm so much slower, but home is also a lot hillier. I'm wondering if I was too conservative when I figured out the distances (which I did using Google maps, but I'm not sure that tool was made with runners in mind). We'll see!

Hey little brother, it took a while for me to figure it out, but I love your Christmas present! Thank you so much!

Do we have any Garmin lovers out there? What do you like best? Have you found it to be accurate?

Winter Running

2009-12-08T11:27:00.000-08:00

This was the view from our kitchen window on Sunday. New England is so crazy. The fall has been so temperate that I forgot winter was coming. And boom December comes in with some snow right away! This particular storm was fairly mild. We only had 3 or 4 inches, but it was that wet heavy snow that stuck to everything. I did go running on Sunday. It is hard to run in the snow. The streets were clear, but people drive like lunatics, there aren't many sidewalks where I run, and it's slippery. So there you have it...not my favorite for running. What really irritates me, though, is that once it snows the running stroller isn't safe to use. I did manage a run on Monday with the stroller, but only because most of the snow had melted. Now without the flexibility of the running stroller, my running becomes trickier. Sigh.

If it weren't for the snow (leading to my inability to use the beloved running stroller), I would love running in the winter time. The way I see it, you can always put more clothes on when it's cold out, but there are only so many you can take off when it's hot. But alas, I can't control the weather (shakes fists at the heavens).

So what's a running girl to do? This running girl has asked for a treadmill. I used my sweetest voice and said, "I would really like to get a treadmill and here are my completely logical and sane reasons for ~~needing~~ wanting one...blah blah blah." It might interest you to know that somehow I included less likely to get injured on my list. To which Nick replied nervously (because one must be delicate with a running fanatic), "Ah, really? Because I thought that running less would lead to less injuries." Silly man! "My logic is sound," I replied. "I don't disagree with your logic...it's just that sometimes, you, ah, have control issues when it comes to running." I smiled, "Don't worry about that! I'll make sure to increase my mileage appropriately. And it's all I want for Christmas!" Ultimately, he agreed. So it looks like we'll be adding a treadmill to the basement to go along with the row machine, stationary bike, and weight bench!

Oh, and look at that...it's snowing again. I wonder if I can get that treadmill before Christmas...

Running at Work

2009-12-06T03:21:00.000-08:00

Okay, the picture has little to do with the post, but it's cute, right? And I did take it this week after a run. Alright back to the topic...

Some of my best running days are at work. Work can be flexible (obviously as I only go in two days a week). As long as I can work around any meetings I'm free to go nuts running at lunch time. Of course, this is only made possible by the gym and locker room we have. Yes, I am spoiled. Anyway, for me, it's the best time to run. I don't have to worry about the weather or the running stroller. This week, however, I had a class. I had exactly 55 minutes at lunch. What to do, what to do...Eat lunch? Check email? Visit the hubby? Go running? I opted to run a quick 4 miler, which was tricky given that I had to change, run, shower, and eat something in 55 minutes. I made it back to class with like two minutes to spare and a gross protein bar from the vending machine.

A few co-workers noticed my lunch fare and the questions started rolling. I'm one of five ladies in my 60 person department, and I'm probably 15 years younger than the average. As a result, I have a tendency to get noticed even without the running factor. Running, though, really piques everyone's interests. They talk to me with awe in their voice like I'm a member of a new species of humans that...run. It's cute really. They asked how far I ran, how fast, how often, what races I do. Of course, starting that line of questioning was their mistake because I love talking about running (and myself) so good luck getting me to stop fellas! I do find it funny that they're so interested. For instance, the how fast do you run question, I'm just not sure what a pace actually tells a non-runner? I certainly don't mind the discussion and generally enjoy being the center of attention (for things like running anyway), but I don't think they really understand.

There are also the guys at work that go to the gym. Now those guys are hardcore. Some of them do an IronMan every year, others do the half IronMan, a few run marathons. These guys are more like 20-25 years older than me, but they're awesome and so much fun to talk with! Because I'm one of the few ladies around, I attract a lot of attention there too. They're always so impressed with my times, which is funny because many of them run about the same times as me or faster. For whatever reason though, they think I'm crazy. Nick tells me that he has street cred now that he runs with me at work. People feel bad for him. He tells me this is a compliment. I trust him.

Anyway, I'm so lucky to work at a place where there are runners to chat with! And even the non-runners show interest. Do the people you work with show an interest in running? Do you ever run at work?

Training log:
Monday:

Stationary bike workout
Warm up
8 x 3 minutes hard
3 minutes easy between intervals
Cool down
Total time: 90 minutes

Tuesday:

4.4 mile run at 7:39 pace
60 minutes easy on the stationary bike
2 x 20 pushups

Wednesday:

4.4 mile run 8:18 pace
60 minutes on the stationary bike (6 x 2 minutes hard)
4 x 20 pushups

Thursday:

7 mile run at 10:10 pace (with the running stroller)

Friday: Rest

Saturday:

7 mile run at 8:45 pace
2 x 20 pushups

Sunday:

7 mile run at 9:45 pace (snowy and icy translates to slow)
1 x 20 pushups

Total Running Miles: 30
Total Bike Time: 3:30
Total Pushups: 9 x 20

Training 11/23 - 11/29

2009-11-29T18:00:00.000-08:00

Monday I did my first track workout in...I don't know how long. Probably since college. Although I can't argue that there are tangible benefits to running track workouts, I'm not particularly fond of them. I opted to do the workout because there was a time when I could run the 5K much, much faster than I can now, and I want to be fast again. That means track work. As I was running circles, I came to realize that if I really want to be fast again I'm going to need to join a running club. Track workouts by myself just aren't going to do it. I need other runners around me. My local running club actually meets at the high school track that I did my workout on, which is running distance from my house. Not a bad deal.

The aftermath of my college running days prevented me from joining a running club or even racing for a number of years. Don't get me wrong. I LOVED running in college. I loved my team and my coach, but after academics I gave them everything I had left. When I graduated I was a hobbled mess, with no desire to ever race again. I never stopped running though. After having a baby, the desire to race again has re-emerged. I've run a few races here and there, but I haven't honestly used the best methods for training. I need to commit to a real program. I need other runners around me that share my passion.

I won't be joining a running club immediately. I have some other priorities, but sometime in the not too distant future I see myself running with a group. For now, I want to concentrate on slowly increasing my mileage and running properly. I'm not going to worry about speed. Once I'm happy with my base, I'll think about getting faster.

Oh, back to the track workout, I had planned to do a 400 m, 800 m, 400 m, 800 m, 400 m, 800 m, 400 m with 200 meter jogs in between intervals. It's a great speed workout before a 5K. I wound up skipping the last 800m and my jogs wound up being 400 m. I just haven't been on the track in such a long time. Also, I despise 800's. I've never been able run a decent 800 workout. It always left my college coach puzzled. Besides slow 800's and longer rest than I should have taken, the workout went well. I wasn't wheezing afterward and the legs felt good. And my turkey trot went well, so it was worth the effort.

Monday:

Track workout
1.5 mile warm up
400 m = 1:25, 800 m = 3:06, 400 m = 1:26, 800 m = 3:14, 400m = 1:28, 400m = 1:28
400 m jog between intervals
1.5 mile cool down
Total = 6.25 miles
6 x 20 pushups

Tuesday:

80 minutes easy on the stationary bike
4 x 20 pushups

Wednesday:

80 minutes easy on the stationary bike

Thursday:

5K race
1 mile warm up
3.1 miles at 6:31 pace
2 mile cool down
Total = 6 miles

Friday:

7 mile easy run at 9:50 pace

Saturday:

80 minutes easy on the stationary bike

Sunday:

7 mile easy run at 10:20 pace (with the running stroller)
5 x 20 pushups

Total Running Miles: 26
Total Stationary Bike Time: 4 hours
Total Pushups: 15 x 20 sets

5K Turkey Trot

2009-11-26T16:06:00.000-08:00

First off, Happy Thanksgiving! I ran a local 5K turkey trot this morning. I was a little nervous coming off a bad marathon in October, a groin pull, and having had a recent flare up of asthma. I wound up doing great though! I ran 20:15 by my watch, but the official results say 20:19. There were timing chips, but they must not have used them. Arg! Regardless it was a great run. It's been eight years since I've broken into the 20 minute range. Now I'd like to get back into the 19 minute range!

I crossed the first mile at 6:20, and felt awesome. I was holding back a bit because if I go out too fast I could wind up wheezing my way through the last two miles. I felt good the whole run. It's been a long time since I felt strong running a 5K. It was nice.

My parents ran too. My mom's first 5K debut was last year at the same race. This year she ran with my dad and crossed the finish line a whole 4 minutes faster than last year! Go team Mom and Dad!

I hope everyone out there running turkey trots had a great day! Happy Thanksgiving!

Here are some stats:
Overall finish: 31/692
Age Group: 2nd
Pace: 6:31

Training 11/16/2009 - 11/22/2009

2009-11-22T05:59:00.000-08:00

I've been working hard to fix my running form. The last year or two I've developed huge strides and an arm swing fit to knock out a boxer. As a consequence, I land hard on my heel and well in front of my pelvis leading to all kinds of irritating injuries. The last two weeks I've focused on reeling in the stride and not worrying about speed. I've noticed that when I force my myself to have a shorter stride my arm swing automatically calms down. Ugh. It hasn't been easy though. I feel awkward. At this point, running the wrong way doesn't feel right, but running the right way doesn't feel quite right either. I'm committed though. If I can fix my running form anomalies, perhaps I can kick this injury thing and go back to running more miles.

During the last run of the week, I finally started to feel more comfortable with a shorter stride. It's also the first run in a long time that I've run at home without the tiny tyke in tow, and she was not happy about me running without her. She, with her squinty eyes, informed me that she wanted to run with mommy too in her running stroller. Then she gave me sad eyes. Finally she agreed to play with daddy, and of course she had a great time with the big guy while I was off pounding pavement.

I'm still crossing my fingers, and hoping that I can pull off a reasonable 5K turkey trot time. I'm hesitant to share a goal because I'm just not sure what to expect coming off an injury and a bad marathon. Last year I ran 21:15. I'd really like to break 21:00. I'll let you know how it goes!

Training Log:

Monday:

Off. Well sort of. I spent the day (7:30 am - 5:00 pm) re-grouting our tub/shower area. My hands are sore, and did you know...grout is messy, like really messy?

Tuesday:

7.5 mile easy run at 9:00 pace
Stationary bike workout: warm up/cool down, 3 x 1:20 hard, 4 x 2:00 hard, 2 minute rest between intervals, total 53 minutes
2 x 20 pushups

Wednesday:

7.5 mile easy run at 8:11 pace
60 minutes easy on the stationary bike
5 x 20 pushups

Thursday:

Stationary bike workout
Warm up/Cool down
Intervals: 4 min, 3 min, 2 min, 1 min, 1 min, 2 min, 3 min, 4 min
Half rest
Total time = 90 minutes
5 x 20 pushups

Friday:

90 minutes easy on the stationary bike
1 x 20 pushups

Saturday:

Row workout
20 minute warm up on stationary bike
5 K row at 19:58
20 minute cool down on stationary bike
2x 20 pushups

Sunday:

7 mile easy run at 8:33 pace

Total Miles Run: 22
Total Bike Time: 5:33
Total Rowed Miles: 3.1
Pushups: 15 x 20

Me and My Food

2009-11-20T09:03:00.000-08:00

Just for reference, I'm not one to obsess over food. I like to eat, and I'm not biased. I enjoy the fruits and veggies as well as the brownies and cupcakes. I'm an equal opportunity eater. Running helps too. It's much easier for me to maintain a healthy attitude towards food when I'm running.

When Kaylee started eating solid food, I started paying closer attention to food labels and ingredient lists. As it turns out, Kaylee has an issue with soy called FPIES, and you wouldn't think so but soy is in everything. Specifically soy bean oil and soy lecithin. This means we can't eat out unless we bring food for Kaylee. The result has been we eat out much less than we once did, and most of our food is made from scratch.

So I'm thinking, hey we eat pretty darn well. Then I read this blog post, where Mary Iron Matron eats 5 servings of fruit and 7 servings of veggies everyday! Holy cannoli Batman! And here I thought I was doing okay with my struggle to eat 5 servings of fruits and veggies combined. As a result, the last three weeks or so I've made a huge effort to increase my fresh fruit and vegetable intake. Now I'm up to 9 servings combined on most days. My biggest fear with increasing fruit and veggie intake was convenience. I don't have a lot of time to cook and salad can be irritating to prepare as well. I've been eating things like apples with peanut butter and baby carrots with hummus. Oh because that was the other fear, not being satisfied. I don't have time to eat all day long and I'm grouchy when I'm hungry, but peanut butter and hummus keeps me satisfied.

Now that I've gotten accustom to the routine, I'm enjoying it. I didn't make the change to lose weight (although I wouldn't mind if I lost a couple pounds). I just want to be healthy and set a good example for my tiny tyke. I do think it's making a difference in how I feel. To be fair though, the family has been sick on and off since the end of September, so I might just be feeling good because I'm not sick anymore.

And of course, as always, in the back of my mind I'm wondering...will it help me run faster?

Ode to my Running Stroller

2009-11-15T15:11:00.000-08:00

One of my absolute favorite baby contraptions is the running stroller. In fact, it's on a short list of baby devices that I believe are essential to my standard of living. It's right up there with the car seat and crib. Obviously I could live without it, but I'd probably be grumpy. Up until recently, I was running with the stroller three days a week. And last year I was using it five days a week. Most of my marathon training was done with Kaylee keeping me company in the stroller. She has dutifully aided my training by continuing to grow big and adding the essential weight I need for better training (or so I've convinced myself).

Recently though, my love of the great running stroller has waned. The groin injury I have seems to be exacerbated when I run with it. Nick and I did a seven miler with the old stroller today (family run day is imperative). I haven't used it in two months, and immediately noticed the groin twinging when I started pushing it. Nick and I took turns pushing. I noticed that when Nick pushed, his form changed. He started landing on the inside of his foot, rather than the outside. I'm not sure why, but pushing the stroller causes some gait change that bothers me now. It's so sad...I think I'll have to retire the stroller. Sniff, sniff...

Training 11/09/2009 - 11/16/2009

2009-11-10T13:02:00.001-08:00

I soooo want to run a turkey trot on turkey day. I'd like not to completely embarrass myself though, yet I'm also recovering from an irritating groin pull AND the whole family has been sick the last two weeks. Arg! Anyway, it was my first week running again and I've felt heavy and blah, but not hurting. Yay! I have absolutely no idea what I should expect to run for a 5K with no speed work and relatively little running to back me up. I have been cross training like an animal and doing a few 5K row workouts. Hopefully they'll help. Only time will tell...

Monday:

5K row 19:49
60 minutes easy on stationary bike
3 x 20 pushups

Tuesday:

4 mile easy run 8:25 pace 62 degrees and cloudy
60 minutes easy on stationary bike
2 x 20 pushups

Wednesday:

5K row 20:20
60 minutes easy on stationary bike
3 x 20 pushups

Thursday:

90 minutes easy on stationary bike
3 x 20 pushups

Friday:

7.5 mile easy run at 8:33 pace 50 degrees and cloudy
2 x 20 pushups

Saturday:

Stationary bike workout:
15 minute warmup
2 x 12 minutes hard
2 minutes rest between
20 minutes cooldown
80 minutes total
3 x 20 pushups

Sunday:

7 mile recovery run at 10:15 sharing running stroller duty with hubby
1 x 25 pushups

Total Miles Run = 18.5
Total Bike Time = 5:50
Total Miles Rowed = 6.2

My Running History

2009-11-09T05:57:00.000-08:00

I'm not usually so self-absorbed or focused on what I've done in the past. Lately though, I've tried to think back on PR's from high school and college, and I'm forgetting. For instance, I'm pretty sure my PR in the mile was 5:35 in high school and my PR in the 1500 was 5:04 in college, but those results can't be found on Cool Running so I'm not really sure anymore. And I can't for the life of me remember what my PR's were in the 2 mile or 3000 (not exactly my favorite distances). I know I crossed the 2 mile at 11:30 the day I PR'd in the 5000 in college. I'm listing what I remember below, and I've started a search for race results. Perhaps someday Kaylee will want to know her mom's running times.

Personal Records:
1500 meter: 5:04
Mile: 5:35
3000 meter: ???
2 Mile: 11:30
5K: 18:24 (2 times both at Tufts track 18:30 was my next best at PC)

College Race Results

Codfish Bowl XC Invitational 20:01 5KFranklin Park September 27 1997
Codfish Bowl XC Invitational 19:35 5K Franklin Park September 26, 1998
Codfish Bowl XC Invitational 19:38 5K Franklin Park September 25, 1999
NCAA Division II Regional Cross Country Championship 23:50 6K November 7, 1999
New England Collegiate Championships 19:19 5K Franklin Park October 16, 1999