Yes it's Friday

It's Friday and my day seems to starting off on the right foot. My alarm went off and I actually got up and did my morning workout. Could this mean I'm out of my tired spill? I sure hope so, but I'm not taking any chances and I'm still sleeping in tomorrow.

 

Anyhow, it was a short run of only 35 minutes. Oh how I love recovery week and love seeing a 35 minute workout on my schedule. I guess my only mistake was wearing my purple spandex shorts that ride up... oh like every two seconds! It basically looked like I was running in my underwear today. I tried fighting with the shorts and kept pulling them down, but that got old. So I gave up and just went with the flow and kept running. I apologize to everyone who saw me out there this morning, it was not a pretty sight...

 

The rest of my day should go quickly as I have a fun dentist appointment for my crown, then I'm heading over to Ms office for a food truck lunch. If you don't live in DC, people are crazy in this town about food trucks! I'm not sure which ones are over his way, but I'm just happy to have lunch with him since we never get too.

 

After lunch? Pool time and I'm looking forward to it. The pool is usually empty on Friday which makes me a happy girl.

 

The rest of my weekend will be filled with swim,bike,run and hopefully a trip up to the bike store to get a new saddle and some rear water bottle holders. I have been slacking on buying the rest of what I need for my bike. And apparently I love spending money, so why not spend some more of it!!!

 

Happy Friday All :)

 

What are you looking forward to this weekend?  

Tired & More Tired

This week is not going so great for me. The past two days I have set my alarm and the past two days I have reset that said alarm so I could sleep more. I don't know what it is, but I just feel so tired this week. Even when my alarm goes back off I still want more sleep. As for my workouts, I'm not missing them, I'm just doing them at a different time. Yesterdays morning tempo run got pushed back to a lunch time tempo. Now I don't mind running during lunch, but when I push it my face stays red for at least an hour which makes me look silly at work. And actually my run went well with splits of: 7:21, 7:34, 7:36, and 7:17 (yeah negative split). So I guess I can't complain too much because I don't think the run would have went as well if I tried doing it half asleep with no real food in my stomach.

 

As for today, I had all the intentions in the world of going to Haines Point in the morning. When the alarm went off at 5:45, I turned that sucker off until 7. Which means another lunch time workout. I guess not a big deal. I would be more mad at myself if I actually skipped the workouts all together. I suppose doing them at a different time of day is not the end of the world.

 

Speaking of changing workout times, I forgot to bring my swim suit to work yesterday, which meant I could not swim right when I got off. Instead I went home and napped for 45 minutes, made dinner, and watched an episode of Nip Tuck. After all that I left at 7:45pm to go to the pool. This is super late for me because my eyes usually want to shut by 8:30. Regardless I had an ok swim and managed to swim 3000 yards. I actually thought I had counted some laps wrong because I finished so fast for me. I added an extra 100 at the end just in case and didn't count it in my total. I'm either really bad at math or I'm getting faster and surprising myself. Once I got home, I was still a little wired from the swim and didn't fall asleep until 11. Maybe this is way I was so tired this morning?

 

On a side note I bought chocolate and swedish fish after my swim last night. They tasted so good! I wish I wasn't such a pig because I would like some today but they are all gone.

Anyhow, as I am writing this all I am thinking about is sleep. Wish I didn't have to coach tonight so I could nap again after work. 

 

Happy Thurs All :) 

Three Things Tues

1. I went on a little bit of a spending spree last week and ordered two new bike jerseys from amazon. My second one came last night and it is so comfy! 

I bought the sleeveless nerd jersey because it's been so hot and will only be getting hotter during the summer. But, no, not this morning .... it was freezing at 35 degrees. I have already packed up all my winter cycling gear and was in a hurry this morning and couldn't find my gloves. Which left me riding to work with kitten mittens on. 

Yes these were the only thing I could find to keep my hands warm. At least they are cute even if I looked like a goof riding to work.

 

2. Speaking of bike commuting while on my way home yesterday down East Capitol Street a bee landed on my helmet. He landed right in the middle of it and I could see his stupid face smiling at me for about 100ft. I really started to panic because it wasn't flying off and we were staring at each other. If you know me, then you know I am scared to death of bees. I run, I scream, I cry. I tried to stay calm and pulled off the bike lane and jumped off my bike. I carefully removed my helmet with the bee still on it. Once my helmet was off I didn't want to shake it too hard and make the bee angry and sting me so instead I just threw the helmet on the ground and ran with my bike in the opposite direction. Umm, when I went back to get my helmet that stupid bee was still on it!!! Here his little butt must of gotten stuck in-between the helmet cut outs. Ugh, so I had to shake the thing out and it just laid there on the side walk then. I guess in the end I survived and felt a little silly, but I hope this never happens again.

 

3. Is it bad that I am thinking way ahead of myself and already basically have my race schedule mapped out for next year. Sigh... there is something wrong with me... 

Happy Tues All :)

Ironman Training Week #2

Yippie another week of training is in the books!

Last week marked week 2 of ironman training and week 10 of half ironman training. I felt pretty good through-out the week and basically have been wanting to shut my eyes at about 9 o'clock every night. One can never get enough sleep...

 

Anyhow, here's how my week went:

 

Monday:

Rest Day! Sort of. Did a 4 mile bike commute that is very easy and doesn't count towards anything besides a fast way into work. Later in the evening I jumped in with my gymnasts and did 20 minutes of gymnastics strength.

 

Tues:

* Bike ~ 2 hrs (32 miles) ~ I drove up to Greenbelt this day and checked out a new place to ride! The ride itself wasn't bad and it was the first ride with my new aero water bottle. I love that thing! It makes me or reminds me to drink more often! Although I'm pretty unsure of the whole nutrition thing on the bike.

 

* Run ~ 20 minutes (2.35 miles) ~ Did this as a brick run. My legs felt pretty heavy at the beginning of the run and I wasn't too happy when I saw a big ass hill to run up in the first half of a mile.

 

Wen:

* Run ~ 53 minutes (6.1 miles) ~ This run was a failed attempted at mile repeats. My legs were shot from yesterday's brick and didn't want to move. I did my mile warm up at an easy pace, then never left that pace the entire run.

 

* Swim ~ 55 minutes (3000 yards) ~ I had the pool to myself! Ok well there was three of us, but the pool was so empty. I can't remember my workout but was happy the entire swim.

 

Thurs:

 * Bike ~ 1:16 (20.5 miles) ~ I had training this day at work, so wouldn't be able to ride during lunch. So, instead I was out the door riding at 6am. It's pretty dark at this time, but I had my head/tail lights shining bright at Haines Point.  It was a good ride with good company because Mr. Grumpy aka M woke up and rode with me!

 

* Swim ~ 33 minutes (1750 meters) ~ I had to move my Friday swim day to Thurs since all DC pools were going to be closed on that day. I swam at Fairland's pool after coaching and had about a half hour before the pool closed for the night which meant I swam 1600 straight. I thought I wouldn't have time to fit anything else in but they hadn't blew the whistle yet so I was able to do a 150 meter cool down.

 

Friday:

* Run: 51 minutes (5.7 miles) ~ Friday fun hill day! Ok well it's really not that fun and my legs were killing me. I noticed on my second hill repeat at Capitol Hill that the Marines were also running hill repeats on the opposite side of the street. So, I shouted over to them and we really finished up our workouts together which was fun because others were sharing in my miserly. I did a total of 8 repeats then ran into work all sweaty and smelly.

 

* Since my swim had been moved from this day, it meant that I could nap on my back porch in the nice weather and go out to dinner like a normal person :)

Sat:

* Bike ~ 3 hours (50.3 miles) ~ The weather had called for rain all weekend but I really wanted to take a gamble and ride outside anyhow. I set up operation out ride the rain and wheels were on the road at sunrise (7am). The skies looked dark and cloudy so I had set up a 25 mile loop for M and I to ride. That way if it started raining we wouldn't be too far from our car. We finished one loop without rain and decided to keep riding and do one more loop. And guess what? No rain the entire ride!!! As for the ride itself, by legs felt like crap and were burning half the time. I also need to learn how to eat while in aero. 

* After biking, we made our way up to the multi sport conference were I was able to pick up my USAT challenge prizes (DC Tri Club won the overall competition)! We got this sweet hat that I love so much!

 

I didn't go to any of the speaking events, but basically just walked around and talked to different vendors and overall just had a good time. 

 

Sunday:  

* Run ~ 1:45 (12.17 miles) ~ I was only suppose to run 85 minutes but ended up doing a little extra this day. I ran a little over 4 miles from my house to meet up with Rachel and Erin and some other friends in Adams Morgan.

Once we all met up we did a 7 mile loop through Rock Creek Park. It was a fun run and I love running with others. It really makes the miles go by so much faster. My new goal is to find a running group to run with on Sundays or just meet up with friends. Once finished I ran with Rachel a little more as she was on her way to a class and I was one my way to the metro. There was no way I was going to run back home.

* Swim ~ 1:05 (3200 yards) ~ I love swimming on Sundays as it's the only day I don't have to feel pressured to swim my heart out because the pool will close before I'm finished with my workout. I can take my time per say and know I will finish the workout. It took my arms a bit to warm up but once warmed up, I felt ok. I did 1 x 1000, 4 x 300, and 10 x 100.

  

Once I got back home from swimming on Sunday I basically crashed on the couch and watched Nip Tuck the rest of the day.

 

Happy Monday All :) This week is recovery week and I'm looking forward to it! 

Random Friday

1. I wish I didn't implement the no drinking rule until after ironman because it's so nice out today. All I want to do when I get off work is sit on my porch and have a beer.

 

2. I wore compression leg sleeves for the first time today and loved them.

 

3. I did not own a foam roller until yesterday. Man have I been missing out

 

4. Yesterday during our company training they were talking about drug addiction. When describing the symptoms of addiction they described my addiction to triathlons perfectly.

 

5. Why does it have to be sunny and nice all week then rain on the weekend. WTF weather.

 

6. I rode in the morning in the dark at 6am for the first time this season on thurs. It wasn't so bad

 

7. My pool is closed today which means I get to go home today and do nothing. Ok well I still have to strength train

 

8. Avocados are like my new favorite food.

 

9. Going to the Multi-Sport Conference tomorrow. Should be a good time

 

10. I shower before I run in the morning, then run my 50 minutes right into work. Splash my face off and change into my dress clothes. I guess my thinking is at least my hair is clean for the day?

 

11. I still want another cat.

 

12. I can't sleep with socks on

 

13. Jason ordered a wedge for his bike the size of a backpack. I laughed so hard when I opened it yesterday

 

14. I don't really like nuun. It tastes weird to me.

 

15. I need to bring in more snacks to work. I'm starting to get to the point where I'm hungry all the time.

 

Happy Friday All :)

 

Hope everyone has a wonderful weekend 

Wordless Thurs:

The whole family is helping me out with ironman training including Kiwi!!!

Ok well, she is more or else teaching me I need lots of sleep...

Happy Thurs All :)

Exploring a New Area

It's that time of year again when the cherry blossoms are in bloom and a frenzy of tourists come into town to look at all the pretty pink trees. 

What does that mean to me, it means that the tidal basin is filled with tour buses, people, and cars who are not used to cyclists. With that said I am avoiding Haines Point during lunch and when I get off work. I'm not even sure how bad it is down there with the tourists, but I don't want to take my chances and get annoyed. Plus you all know I need hill work anyhow.

 

Yesterday I went into work early in attempt not to get stuck in the thunder storm, but I had no such luck. But something good did come out of coming in early even if I did get soaked, I got to leave at 3:30! This would give me plenty of time to ride home, jump in my car with boomer and make my way the 13 miles up to the Greenbelt metro station.

 

It only took me about 20 minutes to get there going straight up 295 which isn't too bad. I parked basically across the street from the metro near some apartment complexes that had street parking. I had spent half the day stalking mapmyride.com and looking at other people's routes in the Greenbelt area. I came up with a nice 35 mile loop, printed out a cue sheet and a map and was ready to check out a new area to ride in. Of course though once I parked my car, I realized I forgot my map and cue sheet at home and would just go off memory and hope I would not get lost!

 

The ride itself was great. The route I took was filled with a nice variety of rolling hills. It was so much more interesting than Haines Point. 

The streets were not too busy and some had a nice shoulder to ride along. I managed to only go about 10 miles before I felt lost and thought I had missed the road I was suppose to turn on. So from this point on, I really just started riding on roads that didn't look super busy and did a lot of little loops. As you can see my ride was a little crazy. 

I did like a nice little private road that went through some research laps and was restricted to traffic. Although the pavement sucked on this road and I thought my teeth might fall out. I'm not sure if I was allowed to be riding here, but I did so anyhow. During this part of the route I saw lots of cows and it actually stunk pretty bad. It's weird to think all this country landscape is just 15 miles out side a major city.

Once I got back to my car 32 miles later, I threw boomer in my trunk and did a 20 minute brick run around the apartment complex I had parked at. I was very thankful that greenbelt road (which is busy with lots of stores) was only about a mile from where I was. This gave me an opportunity to run into a gas station for a potty break during my run. Also there is a Chipotle right on the corner!!! This means on longer rides in the this area yummy food will await for me :)

 

Overall, I felt like I had a pretty good ride and it went so much better than Sunday's ride. I will def. be back in the area to cycle and love that's it not far to get too. You could even bring your bike on the metro and just take the metro up if you wanted. It's really a win win. 

Happy Wednesday All :)

A Weekend of Failures

I'm not even sure where to begin with my weekend of failures.

 

1) RnR Cheering ~ I wanted to go over to Lincoln park and cheer on all my friends and other runners. However, after looking at what time I needed to be at my gymnastics meet, I didn't have time cheer and go for my ride. So naturally my 2 hour and 45 minute ride that I was suppose to do won. Cheer, fail!

 

2) Saturday Bike Ride ~ Everyone rants and raves about Beach Drive and well I have never been. I thought this would be the perfect weekend to check it out and figured taking rock creek park trails would be the best way to get there. Wrong and Wrong. M and I left around 9 o'clock to make our to car free cycling. The ride down on the mall was not bad, but as soon as we got on the trail...OMG...a suck fest began. I hate trails and usually try to avoid them at all cost, so I'm not sure why I thought this was going to be any different. After an hour of weaving around walkers and baby strollers we had only gone 7 miles. Yes, 7 miles in an hour! That's ridiculous and not even a workout. I was super flustered and pissed that I was wasting my time when I didn't have the time to waste. We made it up to around the top of Adams Morgan's and there was still no site of Beach Drive. Yeah I feel like an idiot because I actually couldn't find the road, but the ride was already a bust and I called it quits. Riding that slow and on a trail takes every once out of me and I wanted to cry. I couldn't handle taking the trail back and just road through the city streets which = more slowness. 

So after a little over 2 hours of riding (if you want to call it that) I went 14 miles. As suspected a big waste of time and now I would just have to ride again on Sunday. Fail and some more fail!!! I will chalk this up to a nice leisure ride because it was nice out and M and I didn't get some good laughs out of it.

 

3) Saturday Run ~ I was suppose to run on Sunday, but with missing my ride I really didn't want to do all three sports on Sunday. I had 80 minutes of running on my schedule and had about 110 minutes before I had to leave for coaching. As soon as I got home from my bike ride fail I changed and was out the door running. It was hot and sunny by the time I left and normally I would have never left for a longer run at 11. The first couple miles of the run was fun and I joined in running on some of the RnR marathon course around mile 16. It was nice to hear the bands and cheer on the runners. I got a chance to talk to the juggler and also helped out with a guy who was cramping badly and just sitting on the side of the road. I would have loved to continue to run the course, but felt like a fake so went my own way. This lead me to running on the mall. My legs felt heavy and I ran out of water. Luckily the RnR volunteers let me re-fill my water bottle with the big tanks of water they had along Constitution Ave. This was a real life saver and helped me finish my run. By the time I made it back to my house, I had 9.5 miles on my legs. I wouldn't say this run was exactly a failure, but it def. was not one of my better runs. I am still not used to the warmer weather and struggled to finish.

 

4) Coaching ~ I couldn't even do this right. WTF. The meet I was coaching at was north west of Baltimore (53 miles from my house). I left giving myself an hour and half to get there. Who would have known it was going to take a half hour to go 2 miles! Ugh. Needless to say I was late to the meet. The competition had already began and my poor girls had no coach. At least the rest of the day went well and my kids did great despite the fact that their coach was late :(

 

5) Sunday Swimming ~ nope not a fail :) I actually had a really good swim and could have swam all day.

 

6) Sunday Bike Ride ~ Take two on my bike ride! I was not going to waste any time trying to figure out where to ride around the city and get flustered with stop and go riding. I figured it would be worth the 30 mile drive down to Prince William Forrest park. Of course there was traffic down 95 and it took an hour to get there, but somehow this was still better than dealing with a trail to ride somewhere. Once at the park I was greeted by a really friendly guy working at the visitors center. He gave me a map and showed me a 12 mile loop that cyclists do on the roads within the park. 

The park itself was great (it was me that was not great). All the roads are very nicely paved and some parts of the roads have bike lanes. And there was zero to no traffic so it really made for a safe car free ride. 

Now onto the ride itself. I have not rode any hills this year yet. Yes, I don't know why? But most of my rides have either been on my trainer or at Haines Point because it's easy to get to. This loop was filled with hills for the first couple of miles and the last few miles. Hill number one: I couldn't even make it up the stupid thing and had to walk. I'm still figuring out my gearing on boomer and honestly just need to practice more with switching gears and figuring out what works for me riding uphill. Anyhow, I hate walking my bike up a hill and started to get angry at myself. I had to walk a total of three hills on my first loop and felt like a total and complete failure. I basically felt like all my hard work over the past 8 weeks on the trainer has been null and void. That I just wasted my time and didn't get anything out of any of the workouts. I basically wanted to throw a little hissy fit and give up. I felt defeated. 

I rode back to my car and thought about it for 5 minutes. Then I remembered I really not the type of person who gives up on something after the first try. Gymnastics has taught me that. No one gets a skill on the their first try and you have to do the same skill over and over and over again until it gets better, until it is perfect. So with that said, I clipped back in and headed out for loop two. I made it this time without walking up any hills, but my legs were shot. I stood back at my car and decided I couldn't make it another loop. I don't know why I thought this? I cut my workout short by about 20 miles. That's a lot! As I driving home, I was getting more and more pissed with myself. I never give up on stuff and I just gave up on this ride because it was hard? Actually I have no clue why I didn't do another 2 loops. If I couldn't do this, how in the world am I going to finish Mooseman or Louisville. Err... a complete failure on my part and I only have myself to blame this time. I will not let myself do this again. There is no good reason why I skipped half my workout and yeah I'm still mad about it. At any rate I will be back here to ride as I thought it was great, plus well obviously I need hill work.

 

7) Cooking ~ To make things worse, while cooking dinner I went to take the chicken out of the oven and didn't use an oven mitt. Yes, that meant I used my bare hand!!! I realized how stupid I was when my finger prints where left on the hot pan. What was I thinking? Oh yeah I most not have been thinking at all. A total blond moment that left my hand hurting.

 

 

Hope everyone had a better weekend than myself and great job to everyone who raced! 

Hills, Hills, Hills

Hills: everyone loves to hate them! I myself am no different, but as evil as hills are I know that they will make me a stronger faster runner.

 

Every Friday for the about 8 weeks now I have picked out my favorite hill in our Nation's Capitol, Capitol Hill. Ok maybe it's not my favorite hill (do people even have favorite hills?) but it is the closest one to my house.

Capitol Before Sun Raise

It takes me a little over a mile to make my way to the Capitol which is a great warm up. Once there I either pick the Independence side to run up or the Constitution side. Both offer the same great hill, but I like to switch it up so I don't get board to death every Friday. Change of scenery is a good thing, even if it's only a small change. The hill itself is on the shorter side, but it has a nice incline so it definitely makes for a good workout.

Once on the Hill I usually do anywhere from 6-10 repeats. This can get boring and it reminds me of swimming laps because it's easy to lose count and you are just running up and down which = boring. Although I amuse myself by thinking about who knows what and the time actually goes by pretty quickly. I also get weird looks from the Capitol Police. I'm sure they are just jealous because they have to stand there instead of running the same hill multiple times or they just think I'm crazy.  

 

As for my speed up hill, I still need to work on this. I am holding right around a 8:50 -9 minute pace. I haven't seen much improvement on my pace since I started these repeats. But, I do feel like they are getting easier, so I guess that is something.

 

Anyhow, so if you see some girl running up and down Capitol Hill on Friday morning come say hello and join in on the fun :)

 

Happy Friday All! Good luck to all those who are running the RnR USA tomorrow. 

Three Things Thurs

1. I was really flustered when I left the pool yesterday. I usually swim between 4-5pm and the pool is not very crowded at this time meaning I get a lane to myself or just split an lane with another person. Yesterday was no different and I was splitting a lane with another guy going about my workout until I almost hit a third person head on!!! WTF, where did this person come from? I was pretty mad and let the guy know if he is going to share a lane that he needs to communicate with all the swimmers in the lane to let them know that we will be switching to circle swimming.  I could tell he was a new swimmer and there is nothing wrong with that, but just know some pool etiquette! And to top things off the last few minutes in the water (when the pool is basically empty before we get kicked out) someone swims across the lanes and I almost hit this guy because he came out of know where?!?! Regardless, I felt good in the water and feel like my swimming is improving a little bit.

 

2. I'm going to jump on the bandwagon and talk about the weather. It's lovely and perfect for riding. I couldn't be happier to be riding my bike outside in 80 degree weather in the middle of March instead of riding on my trainer. However, running is a little bit of an adjustment. Yesterday I ran around 12ish and it felt hot and my body just isn't used to running in the heat yet. Also, I fear if it's this hot now, that only means it will be an extra hot summer. I don't want an extra hot summer in the 100s with humidity up the roof. But what I am most scared about is August 26th. I'm scared it will be the hottest day of the year and I wouldn't be able to finish the race due to heat exhaustion.  

 

3. Rachel asked my yesterday if I would be interested in the Lake Anna Century. After I checked the date, she didn't have to twisted my arm too hard and I was probably registered for the event in about 10 minutes. I will only be riding the metric century (60 miles) but I think it's going to be so much fun. Plus it is in the lake anna area which means it will be good practice for the Kinetic Half. 

Happy Thurs All :)

St. Patrick's 8k Race Report

Sunday morning came way to fast even though my alarm was set for 7:30am. I wanted to jump back in bed but I was exited to run in the St. Patrick's 8k and we were out the door by 8:10ish all dressed in green.

Oh course by the time we got to the metro there was a 15 minute wait until the next train, which meant I started to panic a bit over if we would make it to the race on time. We arrived at Freedom Plaza with 15 minutes to spare and were greeted by a sea of green! 

I rushed to find bag check: why did I were extra clothes anyhow, who knows? But we made it! And I was ready to run my little heart out :) 

We ran into Rachel before the race and I wished her and Jason good luck before heading up the faster pace groups. 

I lined myself in-between the 7 and 8 minute pace group. I have actually never really "raced" a shorter distance race. Usually I just run these for fun with my one and only. But this year I was interested in seeing how fast I could go? With that said I had the great idea of just going out fast and seeing how long I could hold that pace for? I know this is not how you are suppose to race, but what the heck, I wanted to try it anyhow.

Mile 1: 6:46

There was a lot of runners, around 8,000 I think. I started in the perfect spot though and really didn't have to run around anyone at the beginning of the race, everyone was fast! I was just going with the flow and when my watch beeped at mile 1 at a sub 7 pace, I thought oh how neat, there is no way in hell I will be able to run this fast for another 4 miles...

Mile 2: 7:04

Yep, see I knew I couldn't run a 6:50 pace for more than 1 mile. Plus good lord, there is so many turns and curves on the course. I already knew this from past years running this race, but kind of forgot just how bad they were. I really had to slow down at each orange cone and basically do a 180.

Mile 3: 7:21

I'm seeing the girl who I was trying to kept up with kept getting farther and farther away from me and I'm getting mad. But, I am slowing down with each step I take and I'm just running out of steam. I basically throw in the towel on the mini race I had going on in my head and stop worrying about that other girl and just go into survival mode since my stomach was starting to get upset.

Mile 4: 7:20

"Oh thank you that there is only two more miles left. 2 miles are easy. I can do this." My overall goal anyhow was to do this run as a nice tempo at a 7:30 pace or below and I was doing that. I was tempted to grab some water at the second water stop, but just kept on running. As I rounded the corner of 3rd onto Penn I know we only had about a mile left.

Mile 5: 7:11

I really wanted to try for a negative spilt here, but my stomach started playing nasty games with me. And I really did try to push myself to go faster, but my body just wasn't too happy with me. I saw this poor kid running his heart out towards the finish line and thought, oh you poor thing, you see there is a little street you have to run down and back before the finish that he didn't know about. I caught back up to him and passed him on the out and back. I really didn't try to kick it into high gear until I was back onto Penn. About 100 meters from the finish line I started to dry heave while running. I thought: "please, please not again!" I had thrown up all over myself at the Baltimore Half a few years back which made for some nasty finish line photos. I somehow managed to hold it back this time, but not for long ....

Finish: 35:47 ~ AG 13/809 

As soon as I crossed the finish line I looked for a trash can. There was none. I walked over to the side of the finishers chute, leaned over and threw up in-front of all the spectators. I thought I was done, stood up, walked a little, but then threw up again. NOT.PRETTY. 

Afterwards:

The good thing about DC races is you run into lots of friends who also love to run :)

After I was finished, I made my way up closer to the finish line to watch for Jason to finish. There was a lot of people crossing the finish line, but somehow he spotted me before I saw him. He did great and finished with a 9:45 average pace. Then we made our way to the good part of the race: food!

I proceeded to stuff my face with not one but two bagels! Hey I was hungry. As we were eating our friend Amy, who also ran, joined us and we hung out for awhile just chit chatting about all kinds of stuff. While talking I guess they were interviewing the winner literally right next to us. I hope they didn't over hear us and put any of our nonsense into the interview :)

Overall:

I'm pretty happy with my run. Like I said this is the first time I actually tried to run fast during a shorter distance race. And I know every one's fast is different, but this was fast for me. I actually wonder why I never tried to run fast when I was in my 20s. What a waste. And even though I am so happy with my time, I still want to do better and go faster. At any rate, I will continue to work on my speed work and see how I improve...

Happy Tues All :)

Weekend Recap

This weekend was busy and lazy all mixed together.

 

I'll start off with Friday. I swam in the morning, then did a run commute to my root canal appointment. It was the worst run of my life and I struggled to maintain a 9 minute pace. Maybe I was dragging my heels because I really didn't want to go to the dentist's, I mean who does?

 

Anyhow, that evening we went out for Jason's 30th B-day! Yes he is officially an old man now!! I started off the night saying I was not going to drink anything, but than I had one beer, then another beer ...

When I woke up in the morning I was feeling under the weather from 4 beers total and was hungover which lead me to feeling like this most of the day:

Err...how did this happen? Yes I had a 2 and half hour ride to do. I waited to see if I would feel better as the day light was slipping away. I waited some more and attempted to get on my trainer at 5pm. After 10 minutes of spinning I had a splitting headache and just gave up. Yes I wasted my day of training and yes I'm mad at myself. And with that said I am giving up alcohol until after Louisville with one exception being my Vegas trip. Not that I drink very often to begin with, but I really don't want it effecting my ironman training. This is the last workout I'm missing over something stupid like this.

 

Sunday was a new day and a race day! Both Jason and myself were running in the St. Patrick's 8k. 

I love races that start at freedom plaza because they are close to home and easy to get to. When we arrived to the race start, there was a ton of people and a sea of green. It was exciting. Without going into great deals of the race, I had fun running and it was a great morning for it. I'll write up the race report tomorrow :)

 

Once back from the race, I packed my bags and headed to the pool for a easy swim. The pool was uncrowded and I felt good in the water.

 

After getting back from my swim I had just enough time to shower before Jason's family arrived for his B-day. We went to Match Box for lunch, then went and got some fro-yo! Yum and some more yum. It was a great visit overall. Although it was so sunny and so warm that I wished me and boomer could have went for a ride :(

 

And just when the sleep started to take over by body and I wanted to nap, it was time to go pick up one of my good college friends from the airport. She is in town for business this week and I'm so glad I got a chance to visit her!

 

So there you have it. I had a super lazy Saturday and had a jammed packed Sunday. 

 

Hope everyone had a great weekend!

 

Happy Monday All :)  

Another Race Weekend

Yippy! I have another race this weekend... The St. Patrick's 8k.

All races are good races even if they are silly distances like an 8k. I mean 4.97 miles. Come on. I'm just rounding up and saying it's a 5 miler.

I have ran this race just one other time and had so much fun doing so. But, I wasn't really racing it, I was just running with my hubby for fun. So, this year I'm going to actually race it.

I'm interested to see how fast I can run 5 miles in? Like all #goodideas I'm going to go out as fast as I can and see how long I can hold on. Sounds like a good race plan right? Oh course it does. But, I guess back to reality ... I would like to try to hold a 7:30 pace or better. I know this race attracts a lot of runners, so I will put myself somewhat near the front so I don't have to run around and zig zag through a bunch of people.

Other than that my goal is to have fun. After all it is a St. Patrick's Day race which means I get to run in funs things like this (although I don't own a green sparkle skirt):

If you are also racing this weekend, I'd love to meet up! Let me know!

Happy Friday All :)

Oops...I'm running a Marathon

As of yesterday I had no intention of running a marathon this year. I mean all my focus is on IM Louisville and I have no clue how my body is going to feel after August 26th. So with that said my fall race schedule has been left wide open and I wasn't going to register for anything until after IMKY. And if I did register for a race it was going to be something fun like a 70.3 relay or a 10k.

 

Well... then yesterday happened! The twitter world started blowing up about how the Marine Corp Marathon registration was opening up at 3pm. I had no clue it was race registration day and really didn't care to be honest. I still had no intention of registering for a marathon that was going to be 8 weeks after Louisville, but I wanted to check out what date the race was on because I was interested in the 10k and the 10k only.

 

I sent an email over to my one and only and asked him if he would be interested in the 10k and jokingly said he should run the marathon. Well to my surprise he responded with this:

 

"Sure, why not. I mean I will be running and biking already, so the marathon, lets do it. I'll need a training plan."

 

Which lead to a "oh shit, this is really happening" on my end. We had a couple more email exchanges and as 3 o'clock rolled I had the MCM page up and ready. Jason ninja registered at about 2:50 and told me it was open so I registered too without any server crash issues.

 

The race itself sold out in a record time of 2 hours and 41 minutes. I guess a lot of people like to run?

Anyhow, I haven't actually ran a marathon since 2005 and just recently started thinking about running another one. I really wanted to try to BQ at the next marathon I ran, but I know this will not be happening at the MCM. I will not have enough time to really dedicate to a training cycle, so I will just be coasting off my IM fitness and running this for fun with Jason. We had a blast at the last race we ran together and I expect this one to be the same :) Plus I think it's a first great marathon to run: it's close to home and there is a ton of crowd support. This marathon is going to be all about Jason and I hope enjoys every minute of it.

 Did you get caught up in all the hype yesterday and register for MCM?

 

Happy Thursday All :) 

Running Fun

This morning I was in a hurry to get out the door and basically put on the first thing I found. Which equaled getting dressed like a rainbow threw up all over me! Red shirt, purple shorts, and rainbow legs...

 

I don't mind looking a little silly while running, but once I made it into work I tried to make it to my office without anyone seeing me. No such luck! My co-workers laughed at me and asked why I was dressed like a clown :(

 

Anyhow, my legs are feeling pretty back to normal after the race on Sunday and I was able to do my run this morning (45 minutes) at a comfy pace and didn't pay attention to my watch. I did however totally under estimated how cold it was going to be. It's suppose to be warm today, so in my head that meant it would be warm in the morning too. I was wrong. It was chilly and windy and I wished I had on my ear warmer and some gloves.

 

On a side note, I got a little chaffed during the race and during today's run I got re-chaffed in the same spot which lead to some bleeding. So, ugh, the next few runs I think I will wear long spandex so my thighs don't rub together. It might also be a smart idea to use some slide glide, but then again no one said I was smart.

 

Happy Wednesday All ... only 2 more days to go until the weekend :)

B&A Half Marathon Race Report

I went to bed early the night before around 8:30ish. But I couldn't exactly fall asleep even though I was pretty tired. I didn't sleep that great and tossed and turned all night. I wasn't really nervous about this race, so I'm not sure what was up? My alarm went off at 5am and I just splashed my face with some water and proceeded to get ready. I was car pooling with Carly and she met me around 5:15ish as I continued to scramble around my house making sure I had everything needed. We were out the door by 5:30 on our way to Severna Park MD.

 The start/finish line was at Severna Park High school which was nice because we had a warm spot to hang out in! Plus there was plenty of bathrooms and a real toilet always wins over the porta-potties. We meet up with Victoria in the HS and hung out stretching and talking before the start of the race.

But, poor Jason... Carly and myself were so forgetful and he had to go back out to the car three times to get stuff for us! And the big thing I left in the car was my timing chip! Hello racing without an official time. I don't know what I would do without him.

We headed outside about 10 minutes before start time and lined ourselves up. It was a small race with a total of 1000 people between the marathon and the half. We wished each other good luck one last time and before I knew it I was running across the timing mat. 

Miles 1-3 ~ 7:26, 7:40, 7:58
I really went out a little too fast. I was trying to find my happy pace and I was really just trying to find some room to run. When I looked down at my watch after the first mile, I thought oh Shit! I'm running to fast! Since most of the half was run on the B&A trail the course was a little crowded at first. I ditched my gloves at the first aid station, but kind of wished I hadn't because I wanted them later. I keep seeing a guy in blue running near me for the first couple of miles and near the end of mile 3 I asked him what pace he was shooting for. We had the same goal in mind (8 min pace) so yes! I had a running buddy for the rest of the race.

Miles 4-7 ~ 8:11, 7:58, 7:51, 7:58 

Somewhere during these miles I think we ran over two wooden bridges! Let me tell you about these bridges, they were scarey. They bounced all over the place and I got really light headed while running over them and thought I might pass out. Since it was an out and back course I really was dreading running back over them. I also saw my co-worker at about mile 6 and it was a nice surprise to see her out there cheering. We had another co-worker running the full and he finished in 3:09! Anyhow, most of the course was pretty flat and I think around mile 6.5 we ran down which seemed like a pretty big hill. I thought wee...running down hill is fun, but I knew what goes down must come back up. I saw Victoria as I was running back up the hill and could barley catch my breath to cheer for her. But, really the hill was not that bad and it was pretty much the only one on the course.

Miles 8-10 ~ 8:10, 8:05, 7:56

As soon as we hit the turn around we really started to run into a head wind. I actually felt cold and wished I had my gloves back. As I mentioned the course is ran on a paved trail so there wasn't much crowd support. I think I would have gotten pretty lonely out there if it wasn't for my new friend and running buddy. We talked through out the race and helped keep each other on pace for the most part. I thought it was funny that he told me the only reason he runs is so he can eat cheese burgers. Other than that I can't really remember much about these miles besides the fact my hips were starting to hurt a bit at mile 10. I thought about eating some of my honey stinger chews but ended up not eating any of them and only drank from my water bottle a couple of times.

Miles 11- 13.1 ~ 7:54, 8:01, 8:07

I looked down at my watch as mile 11 beeped at me and I was happy to see a little higher than a 7:50 pace. I started to try to do some math in my head, but yeah it wasn't working and at this point I really just wanted to have my last two miles go sub-8. But, noo.... my legs started to really die on me! I knew it was only two miles and I could push myself for two more miles, but I was really struggling. I really started to slow down as I entered mile 12 and as I started to drift farther and farther away from my new friend he stopped running, turned around as he was waving his hand and said: "Sarah lets go! We have ran this race together and I'm not going to let you fizzle out with only .7 left to run." So, I put my big girl pants back on and caught back up to him. It really helped me to have someone out there to push me along. I'm not sure if I could have kept pushing myself if I wasn't running with him. Anyhow, the course spilt for the full marathons as the half marathons made their way back to the HS. I wished my friend good luck with the rest of his race as he was running the full. As I made way to the finish line I attempted to do a small kick even though I thought I might toss my cookies.  

I then spot Jason and Doug and gave a quick smile and wave and continued to run and pretended like I was having fun...

"Almost to finish! Keep Going"  Jason yelled!

Finish: 1:44:13 (7:57 pace)

Once I crossed the finish line I looked for the closest open grass spot and leaned over as I thought I was going to vomit all over the place. Luckily I did not and just dry heaved a bit which is just as nasty. Jason came and found me and got me some water. 

After catching my breath I went back over to finish line area and joined our cheering section so I could cheer on Victoria and Carly as they finished.

Overall:

This was a great little race that was organized well. I will def. come back again because I love this time of year to run and I liked the mostly flat course. On my own performance I did PR, but I only PRed by 43 seconds. I could have pushed myself harder at the end and wished I did. 

But I guess a PR is a PR and I can officially join the PR party that was going on for the day :) 

Happy Monday All :) 

B&A Goals Post

So my second race of 2012 is coming up this weekend!!! And I must say that I'm pretty excited about it! All races = good races!! 

I will be making my way up to Maryland to race in the B&A trail Half Marathon. 

Now it's not actually a real trail race, it is just ran on a trail much like the Mt. Vernon trail - a asphalted bike and running path. And the best part about the course ... there are hills at mile 2 and 7 with the rest of the course being mostly flat!!! Last time I checked, flat = fast!

Now when I registered for this race back in January I wasn't doing any speed work and really was just running to stay in shape during the off season. After I registered I started to add tempo runs back into my schedule although I never did make it to a track workout. I don't know what it is about track workouts, but there is something about being at the track at 5:45 in the morning when it's pitch dark out that doesn't appeal to me. I promise myself that I will soon be going as it is getting lighter out in the mornings.

 

Anyhow, with my lack of speed work, I still feel pretty good going into this race but I don't want to put too much pressure on myself and set myself up for PR failure. I have learned in the past that if you just go with the follow and listen to your body instead of looking at your Garmin the entire race good things happen. During the San Jose RnR half I became Garmin obsessed during the race and bonked at mile 10 leaving me to struggle my way to the finish line the last three miles and leave the course PR-less.

My last half marathon, The VA Freedom Half, I PRed at a 1:44:55 with a dead Garmin which resulted in  running with a pace group which was fun. I'm not going to say it was effortless, but it sure did take the pressure off.

Now, I would like to try to PR at this race. Anything under my current PR I would be happy with :) Since it's a smaller race of about 1000 runners, I'm not sure if they will have pace groups? If not, I guess I will just run and turn the sound off on my Garmin and see were the cards fall....

Happy Thurs All :)