Right on schedule

My pre-race freak week is proceeding swimmingly. Last night I had my pre-race nightmare, and it was a doozy. Not only was I late to the race, but it wasn't just a footrace, there were many Amazing Race style challenges along the course. One involved a maze through a Chinese restaurant kitchen. Since I had started so late, and I hadn't prepared for the challenges, I ended up with a DNF because I couldn't finish the course within the time limit. It was humiliating.

In real life, this has been a tough week to squeeze in the miles, so it's a good thing I'm officially tapering. I was able to run after work two days this week, one with Sami in the buggy. Today I had an all-day work thing, so I missed my usual Thursday run. I'm planning on doing an easy mile or so tomorrow to keep my legs moving. I'm very nervous about Saturday, but all that work over the winter is now hay in the barn, and truthfully not much I do this week could improve my performance.

And look! The weather forecast is amazing.

Freak week

My last long run before the 10 Miler was this Saturday. It went fine, 7 miles at a 10:40 pace. I felt pretty crappy the whole way, and did not feel like I was going that fast. I am just now getting over the chest cold that has given me a smoker's voice and deep, throaty cough for the past week or so. On my weekday runs, I was getting just warm enough to loosen everything up so that I felt pretty good by the end. On Saturday, I warmed up, felt good, but by the end was really, really feeling the congestion in my chest. I was good and whooped by the end.

Also, my foot was hurting. For a few miles, I was convinced that I was coming down with plantar fasciitis a week before the race. When I took off my shoe, I realized what the problem was. Thursday night, I got a number of mosquito bites on foot, three on my arch. I have an unusually strong reaction to mosquito bites, and by Saturday morning, they were so swollen that they looked like one giant welt, and of course every step was pounding on this welt. No wonder my foot hurt. Here's what they look like tonight:

(My foot doesn't realy look that weirdly elongated, it's the angle and the macro setting.)

Not so bad, but this is day five after the bites, when most normal humans wouldn't even have a mark. Saturday night, they were so itchy and painful that I actually took a Benadryl. I hate it - I only take Benadryl when I have no other options. The last one I took was when I had a bad case of hives about 7 years ago. I took a single child's meltaway, and spent 24 hours being groggy and sluggish. And my foot still itched.

So here I am, days away from the race, with an itchy, painful foot, the remnants of a cough and cold, and pumping my body full of performance-reducing drugs. Once the Benadryl wore off enough that I had a return of cognitive function, my pre-race freakout started. I think 5 days before race day is a new record for me.

I tried to silence the demons with a run after work tonight, but running in the heat freaked me out. I'm trying to embrace the anxiety, and harness it. I've got 10:15 on the brain, bad.

tune up - MJ8K race report

I didn't really have my pre-race freakout, Sami took care of that for me, having her first ever (and hopefully last) night terror night before last. If you have never experienced this, it is truly unsettling. Your toddler screams and cries in her sleep, is unconsolable, and there's nothing you can do but wait it out. So I didn't come in to the race as rested as I would have liked. Add to that the cold that I've been fighting working its way down in to my chest, and I was basically treating this run like a training run.

But when I got there, I felt pretty good. I warmed up for a mile, and the congestion started clearing up. The weather was great, chilly, but not super cold. I saw lots of friends, and was in a great mood by the time the crowd finally started moving. I wasn't exactly sure where the start line was (I hit my watch at the balloon arch, but I was almost .1mi short at the end, so I'm pretty sure the start was farther back).

I started running with a friend, and we chatted and braced ourselves for the hills ahead. The hill in Lexington, near the 1 mi mark was pretty killer, and I was glad I had warmed up before the race. The course twists and turns, and I'm never exactly sure of the route ahead, but I did know that after a lazy downhill down the Mall, there was that killer hill up McIntire. I put my head down, shortened my stride, pumped my arms, and ran up that hill. I looked up at the top, and realized I'd left my friend behind.

As you might imagine, there's a big downhill after this big uphill, and I took full advantage of it, and flew down. Some twists and turns, and then another massive, killer uphill. This hill is my nemesis, and I don't think I've ever run the whole thing. It is long and it is steep. And I RAN up that long and steep hill.

I took a well deserved gulp of water at mile 4, just on the other side of the hill, and set my sights on the finish. I ended up very close behind another runner as we made the final turn before the chute, and I was thankful that she kicked it in to high gear, too so that I didn't have to either awkwardly pass her or feel like I could be finishing harder.

And that was it! I was done, and my watch said 47:57. Truthfully, I was probably about 30 seconds slower than that, since I hit start after I crossed the actual start. But my overall pace on 9:47 and my freakin' awesome negative splits are right on the money. I can't believe with the two most killer hills in the second half of the race that each mile was faster than the next.

(UPDATE: Official gun time was 48:46, 9:50 pace; no chips at this race, but I figure it took about 30 sec to cross the start.)

I've been on a great streak of meeting goals and setting PR's, and I hope I can keep it up for the 10 miler in two weeks. Between now and then, I need to seriously consider my goals for the race. My goal of 10:30/mile might be too conservative. I've trained so hard, and had a magically wonderful snow- and illness-free winter that it would be a shame to not try for something a little faster. I have never had a streak of more consistent training, and with two little kids, I'm not likely to again any time soon. Based on my 5K's, my 2 mile time trial, and now today's race, I think that 10:15/mile is definitely within my reach.

To put it in perspective, my previous PR's in both the MJ8K and the 10 miler were in 2007. The 8K PR was 10:43/mi - almost a minute/mile slower than I ran today. My 10 miler PR a few weeks later was 11:10/mi.

It's terrifying to set a goal of 10:15, knowing that I might not reach it, especially knowing that I'd be really, really close. After meeting or beating all my major goals this season, I would be crestfallen not to meet the goal I'd been working for all this time. But what's the point of setting a safe goal? Would the woman who ran a marathon while still nursing a 10 month old set a safe goal?

Go big, or go home.

10:15, here I come.

it's all downhill from here

12 mile run this morning. 11:13/mi, which is acceptable for a training run, but almost a minute slower than I hope to run the race. The good news is that I got to try out the new finish, and boy is it ever fast! The last mile of the usual course takes you through a series of rolling hills that are murder on every part of your body including your psyche after 9 prior hilly miles. The new last mile takes you down, down, down, down, and then down a little farther.

Today's run I had textbook negative splits for about the first half, and then my splits started creeping back up. Long story short, I took gatorade again (will I never learn?) and at mile 10, even though my legs, heart, and lungs felt fine, I had to screech to a halt and walk for about 5 minutes to avoid unpleasant consequences. Ida walked with me, and we were running again less than a half mile later, but I was not feeling my best. Still, we hit that last mile and without even trying, did it in 9:30.

9:30, people! If I can do that whilst trying not to vomit (or, um, anything else, ahem), at mile 12, then surely I can do that or better at mile 10, with no gatorade on board. Oooooh, I am so liking this. I'm really starting to think hard about my race strategy. I want to run 1:45, which is a 10:30 pace. I think I can actually do significantly faster than that, but I don't want to blow my whole race by going out too fast, and forgetting about the hills in miles 7 and 8 which are killer. But knowing that I've got a super fast last mile, that will allow me to comfortably keep it slow in the beginning, knowing that I can make up a minute or more at the end.

Only two more Saturday runs before the race! Both are 7 miles - the MJH8K plus warmup/cooldown next weekend, and just a straight 7 the week before the race. The past couple of weeks have not been good for me, training wise - I've traveled twice, I've been fighting a cold, and both The Supportive Husband and the kids have been sick. This coming week especially I really want to focus on getting those weekday miles so that I can feel confident that I've prepared as well as can be for the 10 miler.

and one more thing

Speaking of challenges and victories, I ran a 5K on Saturday, and got another PR! I ran the two miles from my house to the start, and was holding back enough so that I'd have enough juice to get home, and lo and behold, despite the cold and the wind, and despite dying on the hills in the last mile, I beat my New Year's time by 9 seconds. Go me!

in pursuit of victory

I haven't been blogging much - my training is a little bit on autopilot. Nothing earth-shattering, no epiphanies happening on Saturday mornings. It's not very interesting to contemplate the same old same old.

I did go to the shop a week or two ago to adjust my program. I had two main concerns. First, I want to run a half-marathon at the end of April, and I needed to add on the appropriate recovery and training weeks after the race. Second, I'm having trouble getting my midweek mileage in. Six miles on a Wednesday just isn't going to happen. I've been trying to run more days, and many days I was waking up to run a few miles in the dark and cold, and then slogging out a few on the treadmill. Cynthia immediately unburdened me, and put X's through my 6 mile midweek runs. She told me that she didn't start training seriously until her youngest was 10. And it takes her a fraction of the time to run 6 miles. Apparently, the demands of parenting don't discriminate based on how many times you have won the Marine Corps Marathon. By the time Cynthia and I were gabbing about kids and parenting, Mark was able to join in.

Can I tell you how humbling and inspiring it is to have the full attention of two of the sport's greats? I'm barely even a middle of the pack runner, and at that moment, I felt like my training program was every bit as important as anyone with an outside chance of winning a major race. And you know what? It is. To Mark and to Cynthia. To me.

Running has the great gift of meeting you exactly where you are, yet always presenting a greater challenge, no matter your level. My goals may not be as speedy as as an elite athlete, but they are the goals of an athlete nonetheless. My 10:15 stretch goal pace for the 10 miler is no less significant to me than the eventual winners' will be to them. I'm proud to be part of a sport that has room for everyone, and room for everyone to grow, stretch, and be challenged.

It's not the heat, it's the humidity

"It's not the heat, it's the humidity."

That's what we say about our Virginia summers. There's a lot of truth to that statement, although even a dry 90 still feels pretty stinkin' hot to me. In the wintertime, it's not the cold, it's the wind.

This winter has been particularly cold. Not record-setting cold, but very long stretches of below-normal temps. It's pretty common to have 60 degree days during the winter. Just not this winter, it seems. On Tuesday it just about cracked 50, and I wore shorts and a t-shirt to run in. By yesterday it was back to the 30's, we got some snow, and today was cold again.

And windy.

In my particular microclimate, snugged up against the base of the Blue Ridge, we get some pretty serious winds. It's just relentlessly windy. When I popped out at lunchtime for a quick run, I just could NOT handle the wind. It wasn't even that bad. Often this winter, certain spots on my route where the wind is concentrated, I have to lean against it hard just to keep my footing. Today was nothing like that, but in the sunshine, I alternated between feeling warm, and then having the warm ripped right out of my body by an arctic blast.

My intention was to do the five miles on the program for today, and add in the hills I was supposed to do on Tuesday, but didn't get around to. I figured I'd do about a 1.5/2 mile warmup, do the hills for about another .5-1, then do a 2 mi cool down. It didn't shake out like that at all.

First, the cold and wind. So demoralizing. When I set out to train through the winter, I didn't foresee that I'd be training in ACTUAL winter, I figured I'd get our garden variety Virginia winter (see 60 degrees, above). Second, all that winter has kept me indoors a lot. I'm fighting a little SAD right now, and getting motivated is hard enough without feeling physically brittle. Third, I picked the wrong hill. Way too steep. My hill perception is all messed up (see base of the Blue Ridge above). And finally - speedwork AND distance? Am I nuts? Yeah, I am. There's a reason that Coach Mark puts the speedwork on the low mileage days.

Blah blah, aches and pains, blah blah, tired legs, blah blah, I did my hills, put my tail between my legs, and hobbled home.

Cool running

Make that freakin' freezin' running.

It was 18 degrees when I left my cozy house for the track for the two mile time trial. Mark couldn't get through his spiel fast enough - my teeth were chattering by the time we headed out for our warmup. My usual running buddy was there, which was a happy surprise, since recent events in her personal life had pretty much taken running off the table for a while. We chatted and chattered our way through the two mile warmup, getting caught up.

Back at the track, we did skips and strides to further warm up, and I tried my best to coherently formulate my strategy. It came as a big surprise to me during marathon training that I love track workouts. They really speak to my inner math nerd, and focus my brain in a way that road and trail runs simply can't. All morning the numbers 2:26, 9:45, and 19:30 were running through my head - the lap, mile, and two mile paces that would translate to a 10:30 10 mile pace. With the extreme cold, I didn't think I had much chance of hitting them without a struggle. Plus, rather than resting last night, I went to a girls' night out at the home of fellow blogger Jen on the Edge. And of course, I wanted to look good, so I wore my highest heels, and then I was feeling shy, so I had to have a glass or so of wine. Not my usual pre-race regimin by a long shot!

My legs were so cold when we actually started the time trial that I really had very little sense of how fast or slow I was running, so I paid careful attention to my watch. I actually hauled out the old Timex for this, though I kept my Garmin on my other arm to track my totals just in case. The first 100 went by in about 40 seconds. Not bad. At 200 I was around 1:15, right on target to come in a little slower than 2:26 for the first lap. My numb legs were hitting their groove, and if I could just keep a lid on my speed the first few laps, I knew I'd cruise to 19:30. The first seven laps went like this:
2:28
2:27
2:25
2:24
2:22
2:21
2:20
Hello, textbook, it's me. I've been a good girl and studied hard. And my last lap was, wait for it....

2:02

For a grand total of 18:53.

YEEEEEEEEHAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!! My only regret is that I didn't push just a little harder on lap 7, I really had a lot of gas left in the tank at the end of the two miles. But hey, I'll take a 9:27 pace. My New Year's Day 5K 9:29 pace wasn't a fluke.

I can't begin to describe the utter satisfaction that comes with logging my fastest times EVER at the ripe old age of 36, after having kids. And to be on the track this morning, a really fine collegiate facility that has seen some gifted athletes, to be pounding away on that surface makes me feel like I'm just beginning to scratch the surface of what my body can do.

Resolutions

I'm not big on resolutions. Being inspired to make changes in my life doesn't typically happen on an arbitrary day on my calendar. But in general, I hope that this year will bring a renewed dedication to my training, among other things. For me, this resolution began one July day when I got stressed and had a terrible run. No run before or since had been that bad. And while my training hasn't been everything I want it to be, I have hit some huge goals since then. I've PR'ed in 4 miles, 5K (twice), and 10K. I've done all my long runs for the 10 miler training program. I've been getting up long before dawn and strapping on my reflective vest to get in my miles. I've even, horror of horrors, logged some serious miles on the treadmill. Six months in to this resolution, I'm doing pretty good.

Fast forward to an icy January morning. I decided not to run at 6am in the dark because I was worried about not seeing any patches of ice left from the previous day's precipitation. So I got up at the usual time, and was walking down the driveway in broad daylight to my car when my feet slid out from under me, my bags went flying, I landed hard on my backside and hands, and I may or may not have shouted my favorite expletive. Once I got the wind back in me, I picked myself up and loaded up the kids for school and headed to work. As the morning went on, I got sore and stiff in all kinds of weird places, and could not get comfortable. So after work, I headed to the gym for some stretching and treadmill time.

And of course, it was packed with resolutioners. I am a HUGE advocate for personal fitness. I'm a believer in the power of physical activity. I think everyone should do it. But somehow, when unfamiliar faces start showing up at the gym and hogging the treadmills, I can't help but resent the presence of the unfit. It shouldn't make much of a difference to me - I haven't yet had to wait for any equipment, and truth be told I want my gym to keep its awesome satellite location 1.3 miles from my front steps, so I should welcome newcomers. But I've been through this before, and I know that most of them will fade away long before their 60 day trial membership is up. Maybe my resolution should be to help the resolutioners keep up the good work and fighting the good fight, and crowding my gym every day of the year.

So keep it up, resolutioners! I'll only resent you for a few more weeks, and then we can be friends, okay? But if you leave my gym and never come back, I'll resent you forever.

Happy New Year!

The New Years Day 5K was cancelled last year due to snow, so I feel like I've been saving up for this one since 2009. Today was my best shot at a sub-30 5K, after the Turkey Trot disaster.

Except I just wasn't feelin' it. An 11am race on NYD sounds awesome, but truthfully, it just means that I'm up with the kids by 7, and spend 4 hours waiting around to run, when I really want to get on with my day. It was rather dreary this morning, and by the time I was driving up Millington, I just felt unprepared and unmotivated. More than that, I didn't want to run unless I knew for sure that I'd break 30 minutes. I didn't want the disappointment again.

But I'd paid my money a month ago, and figured that I'd better just man up and do it.

Just before the start, I ran in to some women from the Saturday group, and my surly solo self begrudingly accepted a buddy. She kept me honest the first part of the race - it's hard to go out too fast when you're chatting about kids and wineries and whatnot. Without even breathing hard, we did about a 9:50 first mile. A little faster than I intended, but not out of the ballpark. The turnaround came up so fast it surprised me, and a glance at my watch showed less than 15 minutes!!

With a mile to go, I left my buddy behind, and switched gears. There's a long, gentle uphill in the last mile, and I wanted to have some gas in the tank and time in the bank before I hit it. And I did, in spades! I have never passed so many people in my life. Pick, pick, pick, everyone in front of me soon ended up behind. I was working, but I wasn't exhausted.

I turned the corner for the last tenth of a mile or so and could see the finish clock reading 28 something. Hell yeah. I could walk and still get a sub-30!

But I ran hard, and crossed the finish time at 29:24 by my watch. Even by the official time (I started way back in the pack), I was still well under 30 minutes.

I ran a 9:29 pace!! Much faster than I ever anticipated. And I felt awesome when I was done! I could have kept running that fast for another few miles at least.

What an awesome way to start the new year!

(For those of you keeping track at home, I had fabulous, textbook, negative splits! 9:52, 9:30, 9:14. Now THAT'S how you run a 5K!!!)

Merry Christmas to all!

I've been dutifully training, despite the cold, wind, snow, dark, and more cold. The Saturday long run group was to take two weeks off, but at the last minute, the Saturday run got moved to Friday, Christmas Eve, so I got one more group run in before the end of the year. Next Saturday will be the New Year's Day 5K.

It was just a delightful run. I had a bad couple of weeks, training-wise, and a terrible day or two life-wise. Driving to the track this morning, I was in one of those "run or cry" moods.

I picked running.

Lo and behold, who should be our group captain this week but Coach Mark himself. He even ran a few miles with me and some other slowpokes - talk about a Christmas miracle. I wasn't fast today, and my hip was definitely crabby about all the cold weather, but I reached a level of zen in my run that I don't often find. I was running with three other women, and we chatted until we got to a hill, and then we'd all get quiet and chug along, and then we'd chat again.

All is right with the world this Christmas Eve. Wishing you joy and peace this holiday.

fly the airplane, not the door

The stats - I ran a 30:04 (by my watch - took about 1:20 to cross the start line, more on that later) and while it is a huge PR, I was really pissed about it. I was so close to a 30 min 5K - four seconds! - and I still had gas in the tank at the finish. So many mistakes on this race.

First and foremost, my watch. What is it with me and watches? The Nike+ has a foot pod that talks to a watch. Just before the start, I checked to make sure the watch was linked to the foot pod. And I got a brand new error message - it said "WALK AWAY." WTF? Are you KIDDING me? The gun went off just as I was having an oh shit moment. I had muscled my way ahead of all the baby joggers and non-runners, so was only seconds from the start at that point.

When I was flight instructing, an important part of my lessons was teaching my students how to deal with distractions. Flying, like life, is full of them. Getting sidelined by distractions in the air can be extremely hazardous, as a quick look through NTSB reports will show. It's something that even the most seasoned pilots can experience, but is particularly dangerous for novices. In an effort to cultivate the skill of prioritization, when my students were particularly overburdened, such as on final approach to land, I'd reach behind them and pop open the door.

No, it's not dangerous. The doors on light aircraft will typically open about a half-inch, posing no danger to occupants. True story, I once flew for almost 50 miles with an open door before I noticed. But, it's ever so tempting to drop everything and try to shut the door. Which, due to physics (google Bernoulli if you're interested), does not want to shut. So you're stuck wrestling with a door that you can't shut, meanwhile, you have basically given up controlling the aircraft, which is a much more dire situation than having a wee bit extra ventilation. I'd let my students dig themselves into a (metaphorical) hole with this door trick, then I'd take over the controls, land safely, and we'd pull on to a taxiway where we'd have a discussion about prioritizing.

My lecture always started and ended with this maxim: Fly the airplane, not the door.

So when my watch didn't link with my shoe when the gun went off, what should I have done? Flown the airplane. I should have just said "screw it" and run across the start and done my best to pace myself. I still would have been in a pack of once a year runners, so I was in little danger of going out too fast. By the time I broke free, I'd have been in the longest uphill section, and it's kind of impossible for me to go too fast on those. And then it's downhill to the finish, where you'd better be going as fast as possible anyway.

So what did I do? I flew the door. I did exactly what I spent years telling my students not to - I gave in to the distraction and lost sight of the real task at hand. Yes, I pulled off to the side of the course before I crossed the start and spent one minute and twenty seconds making my watch talk to my shoe. And I barely even looked at it during the race. All that minute and twenty seconds got me was flustered and stuck in the pack.

When I crossed the finish shy of my big goal, I was so pissed I wanted to punch a hole in a wall. I didn't spend any time socializing or milling around, I just sulked back to my car. I'll have another chance at the 30 minute 5K on New Year's Day, and I guarantee I'm not going to blow my chance because my stupid watch - something that has nothing to do with my legs - doesn't work.

I am begrudingly thankful for being reminded of such an important life lesson. Fly the airplane, not the door.

slow boat

Today I had a lovely run after work. I ran just over three miles in 33:03, a 10:56 pace. After so many runs hovering around the 10 minute mark, I'm remarkably satisfied with tonight's run.

Why? Because some days you run for speed, and other days you run for love.

My now TWO year old has been on the verge of a cold for a few days now, and came home from school today with a low-grade fever, an incessant cough, a drippy nose, and the need to be near her mama. Her mama came home from work with a day's worth of fluorescent light still rattling in her brain, and a need to leave the vestiges of the cubicle out on the pavement.

The original plan was for The Supportive Husband to entertain both kids on the playground while I dashed off three speedy miles, but one look at wee Sami, and I knew that wasn't happening. For a moment, I cursed myself for working through lunch rather than using that time for my run. But then my spirits lifted when she said, between hacks, with one rheumy eye spilling a tear down her cheek, "Mama, buggy ride?" And how could I say no?

A cup of milk, a box of raisins, and off we went into the warm evening. Even in her weakened condition she sang songs and chattered the whole way. I stop to pick up dropped raisins, to wipe her nose, to give her a drink from my water bottle. I picked not the greatest route for the buggy - some big, long hills that are just unrunnable with a combined 50 pounds of child and buggy to push up. So after a while, I quit looking at the pace on my watch, and sang songs back, found more raisins, wiped the nose a few more times. We watched the sky turn from daylight blue to twilight gray, and the web of contrails light up a brilliant pinky orange.

And when we got home she settled on to my shoulder in the way only sick kids do, and made those 10:56's feel like victory.

junk miles

I've heard this term before, referring to those weekday runs that you do not for speed or tempo, but just to put hay in the barn, so to speak. The kind of runs with no real agenda, other than accumulating a few miles to keep your legs working, and to justify your long run mileage.

I'm coming to love my junk miles. Don't get me wrong, I crave distance, mostly because I know I'll never have speed. But popping out at dusk on a fall evening for 25 minutes of loping along, just because I can, is delightful.

After such a long, hot, impossible summer, I am reveling in the cool weather. Rather than fight against the short days, I'm fully embracing them. I've got all kinds of reflective gear - a vest, a headband, bracelets, - and a headlamp, and suddenly there are a million more hours of the day available to me to get my fix. I usually run early in the morning, rather than in the evening, because it just fits better with our schedules, but today I had the chance to run at dusk, and I took it.

It was disorienting, running as it is getting darker and darker, when I'm used to starting out in the pitch black, and running as the sky begins to glow. I hadn't brought my headlamp, so just minutes into my run, I couldn't see where my feet were going to land. Once I got over the needing to see, it was a pleasant kind of sensory deprivation. I spied several other runners, also in their reflective gear, out for their nightly constitutionals. It's rare for me to see another soul on my morning runs.

I did see many more cars than I see in the morning - people headed home at the end of the workday. The pilot in me worried about ruining my night vision from the oncoming headlights, but the runner in me just chuckled and kept trusting her feet to the abyss.

it had to happen sooner or later

I've had such a string of great, uplifting, inspiring runs, that a dud was bound to come my way.

I went for a 3 mile run on my lunch break and it sucked. Suuuuuuuuucked. Suh-hucked. I had a very busy, stressful work morning, and I was so looking forward to blowing off some steam. The second I could break away, I dashed out the door and away I went. Yes, I started out too fast. Rookie! And then I underestimated my route mileage, and realized that I was going to have to do some creative doubling back to get up to three. So then I was tired, burnt out, and running around in circles like an idiot. By the time I finished, I could barely walk, and for some odd reason the pressure of my hat on my head made me feel like I was going to puke.

I usually walk and stretch after a run, but today I sat the f*** down.

But, ever the optimist, I looked for the good in my lousy run.
-It is a PERFECT fall day today. I mean, PERFECT. Cool, clear, beautiful foliage. Oh, your heart just sings on days like this, and I'm grateful to have been outdoors.
-I ran 10:10's. This was the most jaw-dropping for me. My sluggish, crappy run is 10:10's. That's pretty freakin' awesome for me.

breaking the barrier

I have officially signed up for the 10 Miler training program, and the planets all aligned and I actually got to go to the group run. Regular readers of my blog (both of them) probably know that one of my taglines about running is that I run to be alone. I suppose I'll have to eat my words after this morning.

Coach Mark was there giving us a pep talk. Again, he talked about the Kenyans, which always makes me snicker - I am about as un-Kenyan as you could get, even ignoring the fact that I might be one of the whitest women on the planet. But truthfully, listening to Mark evangelize about running is one of my happy places. It's his words that helped me find my identity after Max's birth. Even if he never remembers my name, he always addresses me as an athlete, for which I am eternally thankful. As much as I complain about standing in the cold to listen to him remind us to hydrate and wear layers, I truly enjoy it, and find it comforting and inspiring that someone so legendary in our local running community has made it his life's work to be a coach to athletes like me.

Amongst the sea of unfamiliar faces was another mom from Sami's daycare. We ended up running together and chatting the whole time, and I never even glanced at my watch. When I got home, I uploaded my run and found this:




What the WHAT?!!

I held a steady 10 min/mile pace while gabbing. Huh. How about that. I'll admit that my running partner was far less short of breath than me, and was probably holding herself back, but it was an altogether comfortable and pleasant run. And fast!

Maybe I need to reconsider the solitude thing.

The big picture is that for the first time ever, I can actually conceive of doing a 30 minute 5K, and not dying or vomiting from the effort. I still have another 20 seconds/mile to deal with, but I honestly think it's doable. I have three weeks until the Turkey Trot, and I doubt I'll be able to do it then, but it's always been a fast race for me. And the next opportunity will be the New Year's Day 5K, which has the advantages of being flat and at 11am.

A 10 min/mile pace has always been both a mental and physical barrier for me. And I almost didn't notice that I ran right through it.

Race Report: Fall Classic 10K

It was every bit as cold as I had expected at the start. Luckily, I parked within sight of the start line, and just hung out in my car, jamming to my iPod until nature called. My heart sank when I realized that using the portajohns meant basically exposing myself to the chilly weather. No thank you! I snuck in to a nearby hotel and found an empty, warm restroom, with running water, soap, paper towels, and muzak. Awesome!

Once at the start, I bumped in to Jen of Jen on the Edge! Yay! She's a newbie runner, but is pretty badass as far as I'm concerned, because she walked there from her house (1.5 miles away!!) and her husband was going to come pick her up after the race on a tandem bike.

The race started with a sharp right turn and a hill. Chugga chugga. I kept a careful eye on my pace, and held back - I didn't want to run out of steam, because I knew a really big hill was coming in Mile 5.

After the uphill, it was mostly flat, and then a long downhill to the river. My first mile was about 10:30 - a little faster than I had intended, as I was shooting for 10:45's.

At the water stop at mile 2 (10:15 on the split), I took some gatorade, and headed down to the path by the river. I love this stretch. I have done a few training runs on it in the past, but since it's not near where I live, I don't come here nearly often enough. I noticed frost on the ground, and geese on the water, and just let my body do its thing while my mind doodled around. It was entirely pleasant, which was great, because after this lovely stretch I knew what was coming.

The 3 mile mark was somewhere along the path, and I hit it in 10:06. So that's what it's like to run on a flat course!! I was pretty sure that would be my fastest mile of the day.

And then happy time was over, and it was time to go up a huge hill. Oy. I used to live in that neighborhood, so I already knew what was coming. It was even steeper and longer than I remembered. The 4 mile mark was partway up the hill, and my split there was 10:17. I'll be honest, I think I was walking at that point. I must have really been flying on the flat part to squeak out a 10:17!!

The hill topped out, and it was back to mostly flat, and I reached mile 5 in 10:31, which was pretty good for me, considering that I had walked a little and was not feeling so hot at that particular moment. The good news was that I was through with the hardest part of the course!

I wound up all by myself for basically the last mile of the race. Which I quite enjoy, except I escaped the notice of the officer directing traffic at a busy intersection and had to wait quite a while before I could cross. Both he and the race volunteer apologized profusely for not stopping traffic sooner, but I told them quite honestly that I enjoyed the break.

And then, ZOOM. Downhill. Feeling good, lots of fuel still in the tank, and it was time to make it happen.

I hit mile 6 in a 10:05. That's right, people. Negative split. Can I get an AMEN!

Down the downtown mall, zigging and zagging around pedestrians, and across the finish.

Final chip time: 1:04:14/10:20 pace.

I did a little internet research and found my 10K PR to be 1:06:37/10:45 pace. This was during marathon training four years (and one kid) ago.

I smashed my PR. Second race in a row. I can't begin to describe how awesome it feels. I'm running faster now than I ever have, and I know I've got more in me. I spent most of today trying to slow myself down. For the first time ever, I feel that a sub-10min pace for the shorter distances (5K, 10K) is within reach. Could this be the year that I break 30 min in the 5K?

Pre-race freakout

I think I mostly keep a blog so that I have somewhere to vent during my pre-race freakout.

Vent 1. It is going to be very cold tomorrow morning. Until just a couple of weeks ago, I could hardly run at all during daylight hours because it was so hot. The temp at gun time is supposed to be 31 degrees. Fahrenheit. I have spent the last 30 minutes in a made scramble around the house trying to find a toque and some gloves. And yes, I'm having a real crisis about the layering issue. Don't get me started.

Vent 2. The t-shirt. It sucks, and they didn't have my size. This race was NOT CHEAP and I'm stuck with an ugly, too-large shirt. Grumble grumble. Maybe I'll wear it as my top layer and shed it at the start. Heh.

Vent 3. Did I mention this race was NOT CHEAP? And in addition to the shirt sucking, the packet also sucked. A bunch of coupons for stuff I don't care about, and two samples of Wheaties. I am not kidding. Not even a course map or information sheet. And, their website sucks, is confusing, and keeps opening up new browser windows.

Vent 4. It's a for-profit race. I don't run very many of these - they're a relatively new addition to the running scene here. I like having more options, I do. But give me a down home CTC race any day, where all comers are welcome, you get a welcome dose of information overload, the registration fee is reasonable, the website is spartan but functional, and a worthy charity gets the money.

Vent 5. I keep track of times and PRs for all my races on a spreadsheet, and for whatever reason, I only have 1 entry for the 10K distance, and I KNOW I've run it at least twice, and possibly three times. This is pissing me off, because I don't know what my PR is.

I had a couple of short but speedy runs this week, so I'm hoping that I blaze tomorrow. I'm not super familiar with the course, but I know there's one killer hill in my old neighborhood. I'm hoping for a PR, but between the cold and the big hill, I think that's a stretch goal for me tomorrow. And, see Vent 5, I'm not even sure what that PR might be. Argh.

So, I got my freak on, looks like I should be in good shape for tomorrow.

Fall high

The past few weeks have been pretty uninspiring, as running goes. A few weekday runs, maybe a longish run on the weekend. Pushing the buggy with 1 kid or 2, or sneaking out by myself at dusk.

Last weekend, I did one of my usual Saturday gigs - I pushed both kids in the buggy to the gym, and took a group exercise class while they tore it up in the kid room. It's about 1.3 miles to the gym, and the class usually is a nice combo of cardio and strength - just enough cardio to make me feel better about only running 2.5 miles on a Saturday. Last weekend, there was a sub, and my "Athletic Conditioning" class morphed in to "Super Ass Kicking Cardio Blast." We even did plenty of running around the building, way more than I was expecting. I was pretty spent by the end of the class, and pushing two kids home in a buggy that could probably use a little air in the tires was enough. I was done!

This morning, I had the rare luxury of both sleeping in (well, as much as you can when your kids wake with the sun) and going for an actual run, all by myself!! I decided to hit the Monticello Trail, and off I went in the cool morning. It was about 50 - perfect running weather. The leaves are just now turning and beginning to fall, and around every curve in the boardwalk was another heartbreakingly beautiful glimpse of shafts of sunlight through the fall canopy.

How lucky am I that one of my regular routes was also Thomas Jefferson's route back in the day? How many people get to enjoy a beautiful fall Saturday run at a World Heritage Site?

I needed to do about 5 miles today, and I ran up a half mile, and back down, then all the way up, 2 miles. The run downhill was fantastic. I was properly warmed up, and I just let my legs go. I glanced at my watch a few times and saw an "8" in front of my pace, pretty outstanding for me. And according to Nike +, I ran my fastest mile ever (or, at least in the last couple months since I started using Nike +). I couldn't have slowed down if I tried. The endorphin rush was phenomenal.

At the bottom of the hill, I stretched for a moment, and then headed straight for the city market for a taco, the best recovery food ever.

Welcome, Autumn!

And with autumn comes blessedly cooler temps - I can run at 10am on a Sunday, instead of having to get up at the crack of dawn on a weekend to beat the heat. I can run at 5:30pm without endangering myself. It's bliss.

This past year has been so hard for me to keep up my running. I look back at some of my blog entries, and I'm amazed that I've kept going at all. There's been so much illness, so much snow, so much record-breaking cold weather, record-smashing hot weather, that it's a wonder I have kept up training (even though it's not for more than a 10K) and set a PR in the 4 miler.

Autumn does this every year to me - the crisp, cool air rushes through, clears out the gnats and the stale air, and makes me feel like there is hope. Oh, the spring races I am planning!

And as my youngest leaves her babyhood behind, I'm getting little glimpses here and there of what it is like to have just a little more ease in my day. Not that parenting gets easier, but that so many of those tiny yet incessant demands on my time are easing up. I don't have to carry her everywhere, which means I don't have to make two trips from the car into the house at the end of the day. I don't have to completely mince every bite of food, which means that mealtime goes just an eensy bit faster. She can participate in dressing and undressing herself, which means getting her ready in the morning or in her jammies at night goes just that much more quickly.

And her brother - he can actually help with so many chores. He's not quite five but I can give him a dinner knife and soft things to cut up to help prepare dinner. I can give him pre-measured ingredients and he'll mix them together. He can buckle himself into his carseat. They'll both take their dishes to the sink or dishwasher.

When I think of every little thing that I do as a mom for my kids, things that people without kids just don't even consider, I wonder how it is that I get anything else done at all, let alone have a full time job! It's death by a thousand cuts - sure, it's only 30 seconds to pour another cup of milk, but I do that 3 times a day (at least) for each child. That's three minutes a day I spend just pouring milk. And I haven't changed a diaper (I do that 4-5 or more times a day, at about 2 minutes per), run a bath (2x/day, 10 minutes per), made a meal, reminded a busy boy to go to the potty, put a bandaid on a scrape, read a bedtime story, or soothed a toddler back to sleep in the middle of the night. How is it that there are even enough hours in the day to do all those things?

Yes, in case you were wondering, I am Superwoman.