Happy 1 Year Runniversary!

Today, well tomorrow, marks my 1 Year Runniversary of more serious running. Last year I ran Allerton with Jen and Marissa and had a blast in our pink tutus. This year I tried it solo and for the first time ever, raced.

I met up with Mike (pace leader from the marathon) before the race and asked him about his goal time. He was hoping to keep at least a 9:30 pace and I was excited to hear that.

After the race got started, I tagged along and kept close to him as he aggressively passed MANY runners. If I hadn't been able to do that, I would have been stuck behind people and would have been no where near a finish pace of 9:30. I am not too familiar with trail racing so the single track parts were interesting. We exerted a lot of energy in the first two miles running between 8 min and 8:30 min. miles and I was worried I would be pooped before the race was over.

Fortunately people started settling into their paces and we were able to get to our comfortable pace as well. Mile 2-4 were still hard though because I was much more tired than I thought because of the speedy first 2 miles.

There were quite a few more ups and downs than I remember from last year. I really gave it my all and have never done that before. The finish could not come soon enough and I really thought I was going to pass out with only .5 miles left. I had no kick in the final stretch and was passed in the last 30 seconds by about 5 people. Nonetheless, I came in around 52:40, which is about 10 minutes faster than last years time. My Garmin also registered a course of 5.69 miles instead of the 5.5 miles it is listed as. I think it is partly because of my weaving in and out to pass people in the early miles.

Mike and I visited afterwards and enjoyed a donut from the wonderful food station provided by racers. They encourage racers to bring an item to share, needless to say, I mooched and didn't bring anything this year.

*Note to self, bring something next year.

Some upcoming races

Looks like my hamstring (fingers crossed) is on the mend. It is definitely not 100%, but it is coming around. I participated in a 5k muddy obstacle course race and had a lot of fun. That got me the running bug again and I'm now signed up for the Hot Chocolate 15k in Chicago on November 5th and I'm eyeballing a Turkey Trot Half Marathon in Schaumburg on November 26th. Conveniently, the half marathon training program I found has my running a 15k race the exact weekend of the chocolate race, I think this must be a sign!

I did my first speed training yesterday and it went quite well. I even saw a few 6s in my mile/hour at various points in the workout. It was just a short one..5x400, each week gets progressively longer. I'm keeping an optimistic mind as I enter those runs!

I'm still running...even in the rain!

I know it has been awhile since I've posted. I've consistently been running about 5 miles a few times a week and try to do a little longer run on some weekends. It has worked out for the most part.

This morning I was scheduled to run with Donna and it was sprinkling when I left the house. Needless to say, within five minutes it was pouring and after about 5 more minutes it was thundering and lightning.

I really have only run the rain one or two other times, but it was not this heavy and it was colder out so I had a rain jacket on. Here I am SOAKED after cutting our run quite a bit short.

Tuesday Track Workout

I managed to convince Mary and Cass to try out the track for a workout this morning. I was glad they were game because I knew I wouldn't do it by myself.

We met for our regular Tuesday 5:30am run near my house and ran the 1 mile to Parkland's track. I did not fully disclose what we would be doing because I wanted to leave some suspense. I actually dumbed down a workout that I did with Second Wind just because I didn't want us to kill ourselves the first time trying it.

So, we attempted a 400 at a quick clip, with Mary and I coming in around 1:31. We were exhausted...that was a bit too fast for us.

We slowed down the second attempt after a quick breather and pulled off 1:51, I believe. This beat the range I thought we were capable of doing 1:55-2:05, so I was pleased.

On our third lap, we came in at 1:47. I informed the girls that for our last 400 we had to beat our best time by 2 seconds. We were all able to do that.

We are hoping to try and do this once a week to see if the speedwork helps are regular pace. Each week we will switch it up a little bit or at least add on an extra 400. Today we just ran back to our respective houses, although Mary did crank out an extra 2 miles.

We did all meet up again later today at the gym for our Cycling Interval class. This was our second go at this one, and I think I'm hooked. It consists of 30 minutes on the bike followed by a 30 minute Cross-Fit typed workout. Today we spent 10 minutes getting through 20 squats on Bosu balls, 20 push-ups, and 20 core cross overs with medicine balls as many times as we could. I think I made it through each activity 3 times and did the squats a 4th time. I felt much better doing it tonight than I did last Thursday, so we shall see how it goes this Thursday.

The last part of class was devoted to balance work combined with stretching. If you want to see something funny, just come and watch me try this. I have known that I don't have very good balance, but it became quite evident last week when I tried this. I showed some subtle improvements, but I still have a lot of work to do.

This class seems to be the perfect fit for me and I'm glad that I tried it out last week.

Madison Half Photos

And I'm Back!

I don't anticipate updating as regularly as I had been, but I haven't stopped since the marathon. My runs have drastically decreased in length, but I've been managing to run 3-4 times per week. 3 weeks after the race, I put in an 8 mile run on the weekend for my first long run. I have since done a half marathon while up in Madison. It felt great to be back running and I wouldn't have put in that distance if I had not been part of a race. I have my eye on quite a few races coming up, all different distances. I intend to work on my speed a little more, but have not been tied to a plan just yet.

Done and Done

Four months ago, when I started on this journey, my goal was to finish the marathon. In my head, I had said I wanted to make sure I finished in under 5:30 hours.



As my training progressed and I became more comfortable with my marathon pace, I realized that I could probably make it in under 5:00. I knew that I have always told myself that if I was to actually run a marathon, I wanted to do it right. I wanted to truly run as much of it as I possibly could. In order to do that, I followed my training plan nearly to a T and, quite frankly, became obsessed. I tried to read as much as I could, talk to as many people as possible to get tips, and find inspiration through reading, going to running movies, and even running with a man who has been considered the most fit person on the planet.



While my running roots have always centered on "Running for Pride," this mantra came full circle towards the end of my training. As mentioned in a previous post, one of my later long runs was done with Allison and I used it as an opportunity to pick her brain about running marathons. I mentioned to her that I didn't want to finish the marathon thinking I could have done better. She said something that stuck with me, "You'd rather finish your first marathon smiling and feeling good, than come in barely finishing and feeling horrible." I took this advice to heart, and listened to my body, ran conservatively, and truly finished with PRIDE.


I ran as much of the race as I possibly could, which was nearly the whole 26.2, and passed a lot of people in the last 4 miles.



After the race yesterday, I couldn't quite wrap my head around what I had just done. Nothing had really sunk in. It all seemed a bit surreal. It wasn't until today, when I took a close look at these last few pictures, that I knew I did what I set out to do.


You'll have to enlarge these pictures, but I think you can see that I finished by Running for Pride. I came in with a smile on my face, just as my dad had predicted.

I enjoyed the moment, just like my friends told me to do.

I celebrated with those that had been a part of my journey.

(waving to my family and friends in the picture above and high-fiving my running mates below Mike in green, Donna in greenish, and Del in white--throwing water at me)

I finished strong...look, I actually have a stride, unlike any of the other pictures from the race when I'm in my "slow mode."

And I am proud.

4:56.39 will have a new meaning for me and that is thanks to all the people in my life. Thank you.