The Need For Speed

I have no speed. None nada. Have you seen my speed? Where did it go? Oh, that's right. It was never ever here.

I ran a 5k last night and hoped to run it in a 28-something, to set a PR below my current 28:45ish. Instead I rolled in with a 29:36...nearly my worst 5k time. I'm not exactly sure what went wrong. I was feeling alright and my shins weren't hating me...I'm wondering if the heat just made it harder for me. I hate heat. I prefer fall and spring to this summer blahness. I did come home and do an ice bath in the bathtub...that was wonderful and I think my shins are starting to like me again for it.

So anyway, it sucked. Sucked sucked sucked. It kind of makes me wonder what the hell I'm doing training for a marathon. Can I really do it? I mean I guess I know I CAN, but will I have a Katie Holmesesque time? Can I beat Oprah?

Sorry for the drab post, I'm just swimming in slow-run-induced haterade today.

In other non-running news, my 20 month old sweet baby girl has decided to potty train herself. Bonus!

Week FIVE!

I can't believe that I forgot to post this on Monday. D'oh!

Week five goes like this:
Wednesday: 3 miles (5k race)
Thursday: 5 miles
Friday: 3 miles (or elliptical)
Sunday: 10 miles

My first double digit run! That's insane. I used to think people that could do 3 miles were THE SHIT, and now look at me! Oh yeahhhhhhhhhhhhh.

Now watch, I'll fall flat on my face and never finish it. ;)

Training Plan

I am attempting to follow this training plan but having been skipping a run eack week. My shins are a concern of mine (read: they hurt like a mutha!) and I don't want to injure myself. I think I've decided that instead of four running days, I am going to do the three that I have been doing, and add in a fourth day of cross-training. I need to do this for a few weeks and I hope that my shins will improve in that time. I stopped in at Runners yesterday and got some advice (and Gu!) from the nice guy there. If they don't improve...well, eff me! I swear I read about some guy that training for a marathon solely on an elliptical machine with no running whatsoever. I wonder how that turned out for him.

My 8 miler Sunday was fabulous! I stopped for water at 3.5 and 5 miles and finished up in the darkness. I guess the days are getting shorter already. Anyway it took 84 minutes not including the water breaks which is about a 10:30 pace. That's right about where my LSD needs to be I think.

I am doing a 5k tonight and it is disgustingly humid outside. My goal for tonight is 28 minutes. I just need to remember to start out slow - I always work myself up and start too fast and then tank, so I'm going to have to remind myself of that all day today. :)

A predicament and a revelation

I had a revelation last night. An "aha" moment for all you Oprah fans. It was during my midweek 5-miler which started out very bad. (I am having lower leg pain all around...it started in my shins and is now on the outside of my leg and I'm getting calf cramps. I'm icing and taking ibuprofen but it's not getting much better). Anyway, I was about 4 miles into my "run" and suddenly realized...

I'm not tired at all. I can go much faster than this pace.

So I did. For over a mile I "ran" considerably faster than I had been for the first few miles. And it felt great! I have no idea how much faster it was, but I could just tell. Don't get me wrong, I was NOT sprinting. It probably wasn't any better than a 9 minute mile, but still. It was faster!

So to sum it all up, I'm a lazy a$$ that doesn't "run" as fast as I am capable of. DUH!!! In hindsight it seems so obvious.

And for my predicament...there is a 5k next Wednesday evening that I have been looking forward to for quite a while now, mainly because it is a night race and those are hard to come by. I am a definitely a night runner jogger, so I'm confident that this would likely be my fastest 5k and I could easily set a PR. The problem, you ask? My husband is going to be out of town, and my regular backup sitter (aka: the in-laws) are busy.

Crap.

So I guess I need a sitter so I can run a race. It seems so silly, but I really want to do it. I have no desire to pay the $20 that a babysitter would cost me for 2 hours, just to run a race. I want to do it though, so I might have to suck it up. I have 6 days to figure this out. Hmmmm....


****UPDATE!****

I have a volunteer for babysitting! YEAH! Good ole Tony has no idea what he's getting into....those girls are.....monsters sweet angels. I'm sure he'll have a great time with them. (At least Kyler can help keep him sane.)

Thanks Tone!

Spunky little lunchtime run

It finally cooled down a bit here in the mitt (hehe that rhymed! as my 4 year old would point out :)), so I took full advantage and did my 3 scheduled miles during my lunch hour. I had only fueled with pop tarts and a Diet Pepsi for the day so I was skeptical of the quality of this run, but it was actually one of the best yet! My shin splints went away in the first half mile (as opposed to 1-2 miles) and I settled in quite nicely. The very best part is that I was FAST. Like lightning...If lightning traveled at a speed of a 9:40 mile. But for a regular 10 minute girl, this is GREAT.

Still pondering when I officially become a "runner".... I don't believe the "you're a runner once you have signed up for a race" crap. Sorry, I just don't. Maybe there is a speed limit. Or perhaps once I have a marathon under my belt, then I can be an official runner. But not a Katie Holmes marathon, that shit was a Scientolohoax.

Week Four

I'm sucking at this. The runs are going great, except for the tiny yet oh so important fact that I have been SKIPPING A WHOLE RUN for the past 2 weeks! Crud. Chalk it up to too many kids and not enough hours I suppose. And nightly swimming lessons. And a thunderstorm. And a vacation.

Carry on, jogger, carry on.

Today starts week four. I am determined to run the 4 required times. Fo reals. I mean it! The schedule goes like this:

Tuesday: 3 miles
Wednesday: 5 miles
Friday: 3 miles
Sunday: 8 miles

Sunday is uncharted territory for me. My longest run so far is 7.5 miles so 8 is a whole new dealio. It's all psychological, I'm sure. Right?

So to celebrate, I got some new shorts. (all together now... "of COURSE you did, Wendy.") But but but they were on saaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaale, she told the husband. ;)

I also got a new PINK clutch purse this weekend. It's official...I am out of control.

PS: I'm over the July humidity. Waiting until 8:30pm and still having to run in 80 degree weather is crap. I don't know how peeps in the southern states do it.

Stylus Stylin'

I love this new camera! Here is a sampling of the fam.

My sweet Delaney:


Crazy Maddie:




Me!

In running news, last night I tackled my hilliest route thus far. It was still 80 degrees at 9:00pm but I ran just over 3.5 miles at my normal pace. With the hills! Amazing.

Later gaters!

Cool site

I just stumbled upon this website. I'm glued!

http://marathonrookie.com

Perfect for the marathon virgin that is me.

Putting the Shop in SJB

I am sooooooooooooo friggin excited about my latest purchase!



My camera took a crap so I decided to make some lemonade out of my misfortune...and bought a new one! This one is MUCH better than the old one, plus it's waterproof AND shockproof! (I just hope it's Delaney-proof...that girl of mine can break anything)

Week 3

Today starts week 3 of my training! The schedule is the same as last week, but an extra mile on the long run:

Tuesday: 3 miles
Wednesday: 4 miles
Thursday: 3 miles
Sunday: 7 miles

I must admit that I skipped last Thursday's workout. During my Sunday Wednesday (not sure why I wrote Sunday!) run I had a LOT of shin pain and decided that it was better to take a day off than risk injury. My long run Sunday went surprisingly well. I decided to run to Sunday dinner - 6.5 miles from our house to my mother/father in laws. The distance wasn't a big deal, but we had steady 28 mph winds that I was running directly into for 3 of the miles. My time wasn't bad though...after all it was supposed to be a long slow distance run. It was a nice change of scenery too, but I could've done without the wiener dog and German Shepherd dog chasing me!

Added $14.00 into the Garmin fund, bringing me to a total of $29.00. Getting there!

Operation Garmin has commenced.

I have an appreciation for gadgets, especially those that occupy my ADD while running. And I need constant entertainment. I'm the type of person that plays Bubble Pop on my Moto Q while waiting for my email to load, all while waiting in line to pay for groceries. I don't like a lack of activity. I've had my eyes on the Garmin Forerunner 405 for a couple of months now.



I want one. I really want one. At the beginning of every run, when I press the start button on my Polar F4, I embrace my inner nerd and wish it was a 405.

Tonight during my pathetic attempt at 3 miles with shin pain, I got a great idea. I am going to save one dollar for each mile that I run, until I have saved enough money for a Garmin! Hopefully I'll get some birthday money and I'll put that towards it too. I'll have to calculate a tentative purchase date...definitely before the marathon though. I have started the fund with $15 for the 15 miles I ran last week and will deposit my weekly monies each Sunday. I better nerd it up and make a tally on my blog, huh?

I love running. I love shopping. This is PERFECT.

PS: Now don't get me wrong, I'm sure I could go and get the Forerunner tomorrow if I wanted to. But there is something to be said for scraping and saving for something that you really want. It makes it just that much better when you sprint into the store to go get it.

Week Two

Today starts the second week of my marathon training. My scheduled runs are:

Tuesday: 3 miles
Wednesday: 4 miles
Thursday: 3 miles
Sunday: 6 miles

Without getting ahead of myself, this week seems like it will be easy. Nothing I haven't done before and my social calendar is relatively empty (read: loser!) with the exception of a wedding on Friday.

My shins are still pretty tender and I lost my favorite ice bag so I'm going to have to find another one. Ziplocs just don't cut it.

My first 6.2

What a crazy week this has been! I didn't run on Tuesday because I was too busy packing for the lake, so I had to squeeze in a quick 3 mile run on Thursday. I probably shouldn't have done it because technically it was the day before my long run, but I needed the miles for my training. My shins are still cursing me, but they shut up with a little ice. ;)

We got up early Friday and headed into Lake City for the 2k fun run and 5/10k races. In one of my not so proud moments, this day turned out to be the first day I have ever forgotten one of my kids.

I still can't believe I did it, but in retrospect I guess it was slightly justified. There were 3 cars full of people that were leaving for the race. We were running a little behind and everyone scrambled to get in the cars. Matt and I had the girls but figured that Kyler was in another car. WRONG! Halfway there I started to doubt that he was en route. Once we got to the race site we confirmed this (BAD parents) and sent someone back to get him (thanks Tim & Tony!).

The 2k fun run was first. Maddie (4yrs) ran for a couple of minutes and then was tired. So it was jog. walk. jog. walk. jog. piggyback ride. walk. jog. piggyback ride. for 22 minutes. I didn't plan on it taking that long even if we'd walked, so it left me with literally about 3 minutes to take off the 2k bib and get ready for the 10k. And 0 minutes to get a much needed drink.

The race started out good. I am admittedly slow and found a nice woman that was running with the same goal - breaking 60 minutes. I stayed with her for about 20 minutes but then let her go on without me. I had a terrible shoulder cramp throughout the whole race (possibly due to jogging with a 40 pound kid on my back not 30 minutes earlier) and was nursing that a bit. I don't typically run the Galloway method but on this day I did. It was hot and I was tired, but I plugged along. This race wasn't incredibly organized...there were no mile markers and no recognizable guides, just spray painted orange arrows to follow. Anyway it worked, but I am a numbers girl and I like to know where I am at in the race!

I knew at about 53 minutes that I wasn't going to hit my goal. I was surprisingly okay with this...it was hot and I was tired. Besides, now I have a 10k time to beat! I ended up finishing in 1:02:35, to lots of family cheering me on!

Matt and Kyler ran the 5k and I wish I could have been able to watch. They both finished and I am incredibly proud of my non-runners!

Later that afternoon we played Survivor with the family. One of the events was running down to the road and back (0.8 miles each way). Of course I was stupid and did it but didn't go all the way. This day ended up being the most I have ever run in a day....so far.

Oh, and I am now down to a pathetic 8 healthy toenails. And I bet the latest won't be the last casualty!