July in Review + Driving Miles vs. Running Miles

I survived another month of training. WHOO! That's a success in and of itself. :) This morning's easy 5 marked the last run of the month.

I downloaded some sweet new tunes to help motivate me to run, and AGAIN was upset at my iPod when it had an error message this morning and didn't update at all. I spent 90% of my run nexting through the songs because I'm sooooo sick of hearing the same crap over and over and over and over..... Guess what I did before I even stretched when I got home? Restore ordinal settings. Take that stupid iPod. That'll teach you to act up. Hopefully she stays in line from now on.

Anyway, other than the iPod frustration, the 5 miles were good. I still had some soreness in my quads, so I kept the pace easy. That is until I spotted a runner just slightly ahead of me on the trail. Somehow I managed to pick up my pace. It's official: I'm TOO competitive. Without even consciously thinking about it, I decided I wanted to pass someone during an easy recovery run.

When I glanced down at my g-man and saw 8:40 as my pace, I made myself slow down. Stupid guy. Go figure, he exited the trail before I even had a chance to catch him, so all of that was for nothing. :p Oh well, it kept me entertained at the very least.
I ran the 5 miles in 46:27 for a average pace of 9:18. At least I'm consistent in that arena. Yesterday's 5 was an average pace of 9:17. Too funny.

1. 9:42 (hey, I tried to make it an easy run to start. see. here's proof!)
2. 9:26
3. 9:18
4. 9:02
5. 8:58

July in Review:
(this is the part where I tell you how awesome I was for the month of July... :p)

Total Mileage: 130.4 My first month EVER of hitting 100 miles of training, and I greatly surpassed it!! This is an increase of 50 miles from last month. :s No wonder my legs have been tired this week. I think it's also steep since I didn't do a race this month, and I usually take a rest day or 2 before and fo sho another after.

Time spent: 18:24:28

Number of runs: 22

Average run distance: 5.9

Highest weekly mileage: 30.1

Favorite run(s): 10 mile long run with the digestive issues and the first legit 2 a day (technically the 2nd run of it)

Most Hardcore run: Hands down, death in the form of speed work.

Favorite race: None. Waah. No racing for me this month. :( Am currently scouring race postings to make sure that I have at least one fun race to do through my fall training for the Dallas White Rock 1/2. No racing makes Jeri cranky.
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Something interesting I noticed the other day and thought I would share. I usually put gas in my car about once a month. I drive to work, and to Taylor's, and to run errands around town, but that's about it. I always like to see how good of mileage I'm getting, so I restart my odometer at the start of the month. I usually drive about 220 miles/month, and this month is no different. But compare that to my miles ran, and I'm only 90 away!! I should really get a bike so I can bike to work some days to reduce the miles driven. How B.A. would it be to say that you run more than you drive in a month?!!?

What??!?! It's Foto Friday....well geez. :) In honor of one of my best buddies turning 25 tomorrow, here is my homage to our friendship.

I got 99 problems but a friend ain't one..

Yes, we do match in this picture. That's how we roll.

Sword fight at Fry'n Pan. Why not?

Funky camera. Homecoming.

First night I hung out with Codie. Greatest. College. Story. Ever.

Awww... <3

Hardest. Workout. Ever. + 2-a-day(ish)

Wow I really left you guys in suspense, didn't I? Did she or didn't she do a two-a-day??? She didn't. :) By the time we had made dinner, I realized it was unrealistic to think that I would get a run in without feeling like revisiting my shish-ca-bobs (sp?) on the side of the road, so I put the kibosh on that idea.

After getting zero sleep (or so it felt) Tuesday night, I nixed my early run. EEK! I don't think that's happened since becoming a "morning runner." Go figure, once I decided to go back to sleep, I couldn't. Just my body further reminding me not to try to adjust its running schedule. Luckily I had time to do the run after work, and the weather was cooperating. Sort of. It was in the low 60s and on and off raining/misting.

I had 6 miles to do: 1 mile warm up. 3 x 1600 m @ 7:42 pace (YIKES!) with 800 m jogs in between. 1 mile cool down. The plan had actually called for an 800 m. job after the warm up and before the cool down, but that seemed a bit excessive. I typically don't need a "recovery" job after my warm up. :p Of course I added a mile to my easy run on Thursday so I wouldn't lose any mileage for my week. Go figure.

Going in to this run, I knew it was going to be tough. The 1600 pace was slightly faster than my 5k pace of my PR (24:02/24:04 depending on who you believe, haha) so I knew I was going to have to haul my booty to make my time.

Mile 1: I took the warm up mile nice and easy at a 9:31 pace. I quickly stretched out everything that needed to be stretched, and then got ready for pain.
Mile 2: 7:40. Weird. I feel like I could throw up after that. That was not fun. At. All.
Jog 1/2 mile: 4:54 (9:45 pace). Funny it's VERY easy to slow down your pace when you're dreading to get to the end of the 1/2 mile jog.
Mile 3: 7:45. I had some slight ab pain, but just kind of a dull, "hey, remember me? I'm still here...watch it...." sort of reminder. Thankfully.
Jog 1/2 mile #2: 4:42 (9:42 pace).
Mile 4: 7:36. I have never wanted to quit a run more in my life. Honestly. I was in pain. No pain that shouldn't be there, just pain at running at this pace for the 3rd mile. I had to talk myself out of not stopping for at least the last 1/2 mile of this, and am uber proud that I didn't. I honestly didn't think the pace would be this quick either. I thought I had slowed down to 7:50-8:00 because of how heavy my legs felt. As soon as this mile was done, I stopped and dry heaved for a good 3-5 minutes. Starting to become NOT A FAN of the post-run almost puke session. :(
Mile 5: 9:27. Cool down. Glorious, glorious cool down. You know what I love most about a cool down? It signals the END of the hardest workout ever.

That's a 7:41 pace for the 3 hard miles. WHOO!

Maybe I'm just a baby, but that's the hardest I've ever pushed myself, which is surprising. I was very competition while competing in sports in high school, and truly thought I was pushing myself to be better and faster than my teammates, a lot of times running with the boys because I was the fastest girl. But I don't ever remember feeling that "all out" mentality during a tough/hard workout. Oh well, it's nice to know that I have an extra gear there somewhere, it just takes some almost puking to get to it. :)

The best part of the run is that it was rainy, especially during the last 1/2 when I really needed to feel cooled down. On top of how much I sweat and how rainy it was, I was a sight to see when I got home. Taylor got to my place shortly before I was getting ready to shower. When I went into the bathroom to turn the shower on, he was confused, "Didn't you already shower?" Then it hit him, "Eeew, you're just the sweaty? Gross. Go shower." :D He loves his little sweat bug. Don't worry. :p
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This morning I was up and at em for an unofficial 2-a-day. Since it was less than 12 hours, I kind of count it as such, but I won't be offended if you don't. :) I just really need to prepare the ol' legs for running that close together for the Wild West Relay that is in one week! Whoa.

This run sucked. Bleck. I think my legs and stomach were still tired from the previous ass kicking run. It honestly felt like I had JUST stopped running those 6 hard miles and decided to tack on another 5 to the end. My legs felt heavy. My stomach felt jostled and borderline nauseous. I had to stop quite a few times because I was slightly lightheaded and dizzy. All in all, sucky run. I did make it home in one piece. YAY. :)

5 miles in 46:25 for a pace of 9:17.
1. 9:17
2. 9:17
3. 9:28
4. 9:24
5. 8:58

Pretty fast splits for a recovery run, but I honestly felt like I was running 10:30 mm. Seemed like I was just plodding along.

I kind of feel like I'm getting a little burnt out from running so much. EEK. I've dreaded my last 3 runs so far. I'm SUPER excited for the Wild West Relay next week, but unfortunately it fell during what should've been my "cut back" week on my 1/2 training program. Instead of doing 24 miles, I'll be at 31 still. I think I just need to remember to try to put a race every 4-6 weeks into my training programs, because it keeps the training runs from being to monotonous, and gives me something to look forward to in the short term. Someone please remind me of this comment when I'm making my 1/2 training for Dallas in December. Thanks!

Easy Run + Early Foto Friday + 2 A Day?

Foto Friday came early this week.  Just because this pic is too cute to wait.  :)  Somehow the red sunglasses were stolen/lost by my drunk booty at some point during the night.  :(  Taylor was less than pleased, to say the least.  Too fun.

This morning I drug my butt out of bed, but did NOT want to run.  Usually once I'm up in the morning, I'm excited for my run, but not today.  I think I need to stop eating dairy.  :(  This is probably obvious for those of you who know that I'm lactose intolerant but I l.o.v.e. cheese.  But my consumption of it as of late has made me feel like crap.  Last night after Tay's softball games, we went to Old Chicago and I had a roasted tomato/spinach calzone.  It was awesome, but my stomach was not very happy this morning.  Dairy out.  Or else I need to be more consistent with taking lactase pills when I do eat it.

Anywho, the 5 miles was pretty uneventful.  Gorgeous sunrise to enjoy, so that was nice.  But it was definitely cool this morning at 5:45am.  It got me thinking about what I'll do once it starts to get cold.  Shortly after the Sioux Falls 1/2 Marathon on September 13th, it's going to be cold, and dark early in the morning.  I'm afraid if I go back to being an after work runner, I'll come up with awesome reasons not to run.  :(  We'll have to see I guess.

I finished the 5 miles in 46:32 for an avg. pace of 9:19 (supposed to be 9:40 now, but close enough).  It felt "easy" except for the first mile.  Which, coincidentally, was my slowest mile.  Weird.

1.  9:51

2.  9:16

3.  9:23

4.  9:04

5.  8:58

Now, I'm bored.  And I'm contemplating doing my easy 5 that is slated for tomorrow, tonight.  Make it my 2nd 2-a-day run.  I'm going to try to convince loverboy to come out for a bit of it with me.  I could really use to sleep in tomorrow, so it'd be great to get it out of the way tonight.  Unfortunately, that would probably mean that I would be antsy tomorrow, and would want to run anyway.  I think I have the running fever.  EEEK!

First Double Day + Long Run Report

Busy weekend = no blogger/running update. It also means that I haven't had a chance to upload any data from G-man to my computer, so any times are from memory.

Thursday night was my first official double run. Thursday morning I did a kick ass tempo run, and had planned to do an easy 4 miler after work Thursday night. After battling a horrendous headache all day at work, my ibuprofen finally kicked in and I had a super fun run. There is an "outdoor campus" pretty close to my place, and I see people running on the trails there when I start out on the bike trails, and decided to check it out. I figured running on dirt would be just what the legs needed/wanted for run #2 of the day. I was right, it was awesome. I felt like a little kid running through the dirt trail deciding at the fork in the trail whether to take a left or a right, laughing to myself when I'd come full circle without realizing it. I could've ran on the trails forever. Except that it was getting dark out, and I'm slightly directionally challenged without the sun to guide me, so I high tailed it out of there once the sun was no longer visible through the trees. I did have a chance encounter with a raccoon that almost scared the pants off of me. After 2.25 miles there, I decided to run a short route around my apartment area to make it an even 4. Let me tell you, running on dirt really slows you down. My pace for the first 2 miles and change were around 10:15-10:30. The last part was closer to 9-9:30. SUPER fun though, and will definitely be back for another easy run. I think the legs will thank me.

Friday was Taylor's brother's rehearsal dinner. Food was good. 1 glass of wine + 1 short glass of beer over a 5 hour span (much better than the drinking fest that was the last two weekends) was good. Company was good (two of Taylor's HS friends were back in town, and they're two of my favorite friends of his). I somehow convinced Tay that 1am was a good bedtime, and I didn't have to go to the final bar of the night. Unluckily for me, Taylor had been drinking since 10am when the groomsmen went golfing, so he was a snoring machine. I promptly kicked him out of bed, and was bright eyed and bushy tailed for my 7am long run wake up call.

I snagged a banana to eat on the way back to town and had decided to start my run at a different spot on the trail since I had to drive back to town anyway. It was super fun to switch things up, even though about 3 miles of the 10 mile run were on the same part of the trail that I run all the time. I decided to take this 10 miler easier than last week's. Most of my splits for the first 5 miles were right around 9:10. The next 2 I aimed for 9:00 and the last 3 I ran as hard as my legs wanted to. Which ended up being around 8:45-8:50. My overall time averaged out to a 9:00 mm pace. I had a blueberry pomegranate GU Roctane around mile 3.5 and I think that's the best flavor I've had yet. It was pretty tasty. :) I'm trying to think of any weird sightings that I had throughout the run, but I must've been zoning because I can't think of any.

Edited to add splits from the G-man:

1. 9:29 2. 9:06 3. 9:10 4. 9:07 5. 9:12 6. 9:02 7. 9:00 8. 8:58 9. 8:44 10. 8:16

Saturday was the wedding and reception. It was a blast. Somehow I only managed to take one photo. Perhaps Foto Friday it will make an appearance. :) I am still in recovery mode today from the festivities, so lucky for me I have a rest day today. Yay for shuffling the schedule last week!

OH! I also hit 100 miles for the month during my long run. I totally forgot about it until I was entering it into my running blog. I feel like I should've done a celebratory run/dance/shuffle at .4 of the long run, but alas. Maybe next month. :)

brain pain + tempo run

I sure do love getting to sleep in on Thursdays. 4:30am? No way. I even reset my alarm after it went off at 7am, this girl needs her beauty sleep. I finally got up at 8, and was out the door at 8:30 for my tempo run. 6 miles, 4 at 8:19 pace. Slightly excited, as I’ve never done a tempo run with more than 3 miles at a tempo pace.

Folks, it is HOT at 8:30am. Bleck. I should’ve just gotten up to do my run and then gone back to bed. Yet the bikers were still wearing pants and jackets. Crazy bikers. I did actually see a dude wearing old school sweat pants. I think my jaw dropped, as I had already sweated through my lightweight tank.

But on to the run, I did the first mile at a very leisurely pace. When my time popped up, I was kind of shocked at how slow it showed. I haven’t ran a 10 mm for quite a while. But oh well. Kicked it in to the tempo pace. First tempo mile beeps in at 8:31. Whoa. Not even close to the pace I was shooting for. At this point, I decided that my legs couldn’t do that pace for whatever reason, and would just go at an 8:30 mm pace if that’s what they wanted.

Except that the next 3 tempo miles came in at 8:11, 8:12, and 8:08. So now I’m thinking there’s something a little fishy going on with the old G-Man, because honestly my level of exertion was almost identical for all 4 miles. While doing my final mile cool down, I was able to determine that my Garmin had lost ~.06 miles in the first couple of miles (based on the landscape markers for my out and back). After tacking the extra .03 to each of the first miles, the splits seemed much closer.

Officially unofficial splits:
1.03 9:57 (9:40 pace)

2.03 8:31 (8:17 pace)

3. 8:11

4. 8:12

5. 8:08
6. 8:51 .04 :21

6.1 miles in 52:15 for a pace of 8:34. My tempo miles were a pace of 8:12, which I think was the goal pace of last week's tempo that my legs seem to have memorized. I'll take it. :)

As soon as I walked in the door I SLAMMED two glasses of water. But I’ve had a monster headache all day. It’s days like today that I wish I worked in the medical field and could just hook myself up to an iv during my break to rehydrate. I can’t seem to take in enough water. Boo.
After my shower, I did manage to make an AWESOME green monster. I haven’t had one for a few weeks, and it cooled me off right away. I had a huge handful of spinach, some vanilla soy milk, half a scoop of whey protein powder, 3 strawberries, and half a banana. Nom. I did get some somewhat strange looks from my co-workers for my breakfast though.

Tonight I am attempting my first legit 2-a-day run. I have an easy 4 on the schedule tomorrow, but Taylor’s brother is getting married Saturday and their rehearsal and dinner is tomorrow night. I’m guessing it won’t be an early night and waking up so early to run tends to make me want to crash at about 10, so I figure this would work out perfect. Plus then my legs have tomorrow off in preparation for the long 10 on Saturday. I’m hoping to run off my headache. Ugh.

5k results + Carb Overload

Guess what I got in the mail today?? :D Finally validation that this race really did exist. Also, they finally posted the official results of the race too (only 3 1/2 weeks later, but still better than not at all).

Official time: 24:04. Boo. My Garmin said 24:02 which I deem to be more accurate with a non-chip timed race and me starting 4 rows deep, but whatev. Besides as my co-worker/intern said, at least you weren't a few seconds faster with this problem. It'd really suck to think you broke 24 minutes only to find out a few weeks later that you didn't. Excellent point co-worker/intern. :)

Age Group Place: 1 of 4. (If I would've known this prior to the race, I think I would've changed my pre-race goal from placing in the top 3 in my division. Ha.)

Gender Place: 1 of 23.

Overall Place: 11 of 58. Missed the top 10 by 10 seconds. Grr. Oh well. He seemed A LOT farther ahead of me than 10 seconds. :)

Funniest thing about the race (which most of you won't get because you don't know my last name, but oh well, do some research if you want, you'll get a kick out of it) the Male Overall Winner's last name is Heavy. My last name is an opposite of sorts. I really wish this would've been a larger race, because that would've been a SWEET headline. When I told my bro, he told me I should submit it to Letterman. Good stuff.

This morning I had an easy 5 miler on the schedule. It was easy, but it sure was boring. I had a little bit of tenderness in my left hammie, but I'm hoping it was just thanking me for the awesome hill workout yesterday. I did 5 miles in 47:44 for a pace of 9:33 (supposed to be 9:46...close enough eh?)

1. 9:42

2. 9:35

3. 9:35

4. 9:32

5. 9:18

When I looked at my Garmin it said that I had burned around 580 calories and I was shocked! Yesterday it said right around the same amount, and I just assumed I burned way more on the hills. Score. But when it said that today, I figured something must be up. To my surprise, my settings had reverted back to the default: Male/150 pounds/1.1.70 DOB. Stupid expensive watch.... :p

I somehow managed to eat my weekly amount of carbs today. For lunch. YIKES. I had 2 leftover breadsticks from the Olive Garden (YUM) for an appetizer. Haha. And then met an old roomie for bagels, where I ate 2. Ugh. I'm going to go into a bread-induced coma this afternoon. But sooooo tasty in the process. :)

hills, hills, hills

I did hills this morning, and they didn't kill me. [Insert pat on the back here.] In no way do I feel completely prepared for the Wild West Relay that's in....oh..17 days...but man I feel a heckuva lot better. This morning I had 5 miles of hills to do, so I set out on the route that I did two weeks ago except with an extra .5 mile added on (to up it to 5 miles total). I felt like a machine. Each time I would get to the bottom of the hill, I would look up, sigh internally, and before I knew it, I was at the top. It was the craziest thing. Perhaps I was still half asleep, but even so, I'll take it.

Close to the turnaround point was the high school track that I've been eyeing to do speedwork at (it's only a mile or so from my place, I ran from Tay's this morning). I decided to veer off course to check to see if I could get in. That place is locked up tighter than Fort Knox! I did spy an area of the fence that is a good foot off the ground, so I could crawl under if I REALLY wanted to, but I'm such a wuss when it comes to getting yelled at, I'm sure I won't. Plus, it's a Catholic school, so I'm fairly certain that intruding on their property would subject me to eternal damnation, and I'm just not sure if it's worth it. :)

On the way back through the hills, my iPod died (of course) and realized that despite how good I felt, I was breathing HARD. Of course hearing myself made me convince myself (slightly) that I was actually tired, even though I wasn't. Does anyone else like listening to their iPod to drown out their breathing? Because I definitely do. Yowsers.

I did the 5 miles in 47:08 for a pace of 9:26.
1. 9:33
2. 9:13 (!!)
3. 9:35 (part was spent running somewhat aimlessly around the track looking for an entrance)
4. 9:36
5. 9:09

I have an intern in my department that I've been training for the last month or so who is also a runner, training for his first marathon this fall. So of course, we spend the first chunk of our morning talking about our runs. When I told him what hills I ran, he didn't believe me! He was thoroughly impressed, and I, again, patted myself on the back. Hah.

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One of my personal goals for running is to do a race in every state. I know some of you crazy people are already on your way to becoming maniacs, but I just don't ever see myself getting that nutty about marathons (we'll see after I finally do one, I guess). But I'd love to do some half marathons in some cool locations that I've never visited, or randomly do a little 5k or 10k while in a different state for whatever reason. Part of this goal is being accomplished this fall/winter. In August, I'm doing the Wild West Relay, knocking Colorado off the list. And in December I'm doing the Dallas White Rock half marathon, crossing Texas off my list.

While looking at the leg maps for the WWR last night, I was reading the directions when I saw "Enter into Laramie county." Wait. Isn't Laramie in Wyoming? By George it is! I get to run from Colorado to Wyoming on my second leg of the race. Too cool. PLUS, that totally counts as a "race" in WY in my book. Two birds in one stone, I'd say. :)

In other news, I finally got back on the strength training boat last night with some push ups (35, holla!) next to the muscle machine aka the boyfriend, and some intense ab work. Both arms and abs sufficiently hurt today, so I'd say it was a success. I need to keep doing this, especially the ab work, because it seems to keep the ab pain away. A strong ab is a happy ab. I should totally make a shirt with a smiling ab muscle. My God I'm random....

Also, I had the MOST AMAZING dinner ever last night. Again I should've taken a photo but it just looked toooooooooo good to wait. All day I was craving avocado, so I basically planned the meal around getting me a healthy amount of avocado in my tummy. I ended up making a grilled wrap with smoked turkey breast, pepper jack cheese, a teeny tiny amount of ranch, tomatoes, and AVOCADOS all rolled up and pressed in my sweet panini machine. (Thanks Ma for giving this to me 4 Xmas' ago, I finally found it still in the box and use it all the time now!) Oh. My. God. This was amazing. Something about p-jack cheese and avocado together hits the spot EVERY time. The wrap was followed up by some super juicy watermelon. Pretty much the greatest dinner time experience of my life. I was probably patting myself on the back between bites. And by probably I mean, most definitely.

Oh hey. I just noticed that my run for today put me over my total mileage for June. And it's only the 21st. Hey-o. :)

10 miles, I kicked your @$$

and subsequently, you made my digestive system your bitch.  Touche.

But let's back up, shall we.  :)  Saturday Taylor and I went to the big jazz festival that was in our town this weekend.  I somehow managed to resist the temptation of the funnel cakes, cheese curds, indian taco deliciousness.  Small lie.  I did have a small bite of Tay's fry bread.  Nom.  He's not a big jazz fan, so we went to his hometown to hang out with some buddies.  Since I didn't get the wine that I was craving on Friday night, I decided to have a glass.  Merely hydrating for the long run, I told myself.  The wine did not hit the spot.  So I followed it up with a TALL glass of Fat Tire.  Mmmmm.  That hit the spot.  Unfortunately, these 2 drinks took me from soberness to not so sober in a very limited amount of time.  Whooops.  We also split a buffalo chicken pizza.  Holy crap it was good.  But yes, I'm an idiot as I'm lactose intolerant, and didn't have any lactase pills on me.  Also, it is very possible that I have a mild case of IBS, this will come into play later in this story.  [If you're keeping tabs at home, this is long run #2 that I have fueled with pizza and beer.  I'm an idiot.  :)]

Then we went back into town to the jazz festival with his friends.  In his mind, jazz is bearable when he can drink large amounts of beer.  Decent reasoning.  :)  Drink 3, 4, and 5 followed over the course of the night.  Luckily 4 and 5 were teeny tiny glasses of cheap wine.  But still not the ideal way to spend the night before a long run.

I woke up early and realized that I didn't really have anything to munch on to fuel up, so I ate a sugary cereal bar.  Definitely not ideal, but better than nothing.  My stomach, was NOT happy with me.  I laid on my bed reading magazines begging it to chill out or just "process" all the bad (meaning the buffalo pizza that was still lingering) so I could go out for my run.  Luckily, it was nice and cool this morning and would be until 11am, so I had some extra time to wait.  Finally, an hour later, I was ready to run.  :)  Within the first .2 miles I thought I had to turn around and hit up the rest room again, but thankfully it was a false alarm (the only bathroom on this route is 3.5 miles in, that could be brutal).  And I was officially off.

Some things worth mentioning:

• My ab started to hurt during the 2nd mile.  The pain was so intense I had to stop a couple of times to try to stretch it out.  Just as quick as it came on, it was gone.
• I had an Espresso Love GU for the first time and liked it quite a bit.  Except I thought it tasted more honey-like than espresso-y.
• Not nearly as many runners/bikers out as last Saturday.  Is everyone in this town on a Saturday long run program?  It was kind of boring without the extra people watching.
• Not to disappoint:  I saw a lady biking, with a big basket in the back for her yorkie.  The yorkie was wearing sunglasses.  I literally laughed out loud when she biked past me.
• I saw a lady jogging in cut off jean shorts and a fitted tee.  It was random.  I practically get chaffing just walking in jean shorts, I can't imagine how that worked out for her.  :s
• I saw a badger for the first time in real life.  At first I thought it was a fat squirrel, but when I did my double take I realized I was wrong.  The only reason I was about to identify it as a badger is because of Wisconsin's mascot logo.  Ha.
• I had a biker ask how far I was going, which was kind of random, and another tell me I was "running strong" on the last mile of my run.  Literally made my run.  :)
• Ab started hurting again towards the end of mile 9.  The pain (or possibly the exerted effort at that point) caused me to feel pukey/nauseous, which was interesting.
• I actually spent the first few seconds post-run dry heaving outside my apartment.  Eew.

It ended up being a really great run.  I wanted to shoot for 9:00 pace doing an under/over method/negative splits/progression run.  At the halfway point I was 30 seconds over the pace, so I knew the last five miles had to be averaging 8:48 to hit my goal pace.  (Does anyone else love a good math problem while running?  I love figuring out math in my head because it makes me forget I'm running.)  :)  I hit that pace and then some.

I felt really strong on the back half of the run, but started to feel sick the last couple of miles (as I mentioned above).  It was only mid-60s when I was running, but I started to get goosebumps and feel chilled during the last couple of miles.  Granted, it was in the shade for a bit of the run and it was breezy, but I know my body temp wasn't cool.  When I got home my fingers were swollen to the size of sausages.  This has happened during each of my half marathons, but still not sure why.

I'm wondering if I got sick because I over-hydrated.  ????  It was MUCH cooler than it has been and I know I sweated much less than I have on my recent long runs, but I still stopped and drank at the water fountains on the course (4 in total).  Or it could've just been because I was pushing hard and my body wasn't used to it.

Either way, I've felt sick all day.  My stomach still hurts, and I almost feel like I have food poisoning it is so upset.  :(

Ponder that and let me know your thoughts.  It's also completely acceptable to give me a virtual slap in the face and tell me to suck it up because I'm being a wuss.  I won't be offended by that.  :)

Here are my glorious splits.  Totally worth the last 9 1/2 hours of pukeyness.

1. 8:59 2. 9:10 3. 9:11 4. 9:05 5. 9:00 6. 8:49 7. 8:41 8. 8:42 9. 8:18 10. 7:51

I did the 10 miles in 1:27:50 for a pace of 8:47. Whoo. Plus I was super psyched at the last 2 mile times. :)

A Running Buddy (?!?) + A Therapeutic Run + Foto Friday

Do you remember the other day when I "jokingly" mentioned that I might facebook stalk an old kind of high school pal to see if she was looking for a running partner?  Well.  I was only kind of kidding.  And by kind of, I mean, not at all.  :)  I waited a couple of days after the initial encounter, so as to not seem too eager, before sending a wall post, 

"Hey! How was your run on Saturday? If you ever need a running partner, let me know. I'm sooooooo bored with running by myself. Do you live near the bike trails?"

to which she replied,

"i would love to run with you!!!! i'm bored with running by myself too! let me know when you wanna go!" (whoa I almost posted that including her response to where she lived.  that would've been baaaaad..)

Whoo!  So of course I follow up with a "private" message with a brief (ok, not so brief) overview of where I'm at with my training, days/times I run, and roughly the pace I'm running, with a mentioning that I wouldn't want to slow her down if she's much speedier than me, which she very well could be.  But that's the number one quality, in my book anyway, about a running partner is to have someone slightly faster than you to help to push you.  Either way, it'll be good to have someone to meet up with for a run a week, or part of a run a week.  Plus, since I'm a loser at making friends with girls (seriously, I'm that girl who has like 3 close girl friends and then only boys, lame) maybe we'll become besties, and braid each others hair, and have sleepovers, and do boy talk.  Ok, jk.  But it would be sweet to have another gal pal.  :)  

No worries, I will keep you (thoroughly) posted on his this partnership unfolds (as if you had any doubt).  (Overkill on the parenthesis yet?  I thought so...ugh.)

This morning marked my first legit morning run of the week.  My goodness have I enjoyed not waking up at 4:30am.  Luckily I barely slept last night, so it was actually easy to get out of bed.  Don't you hate when that happens?  Grr.  But there was a lot of stuff that was weighing heavy on my mind and my heart.  It's amazing how much a run can just clear your mind and help you put everything in perspective.  Things aren't 100% better, but at least I was able to understand my thoughts on a more rational level.  

I did 5 miles in a leisurely 46:48 for an avg. pace of 9:22.

1. 9:20 
2. 9:33 
3. 9:23 
4. 9:23 
5. 9:06

It was FRIGID outside this morning.  Silly me packed a pair of shorts and a t-shirt to take to Tay's to run in and it was 52 degrees at the start of my run and only 48 once the wind was factored in.  Don't worry I managed to work up a sweat to cover my goosebumps.  I made the bikers look like pansies when they were going by in sweatsuits and hats.  WUSSIES.  :)

I have a long run of 10 planned for Sunday, but am contemplating doing it tomorrow morning instead.  Given that it's almost 11pm and I'm blogging, my night has been fairly low-key.  It'd be kind of fun to see how the body reacts to a long run without pizza and beer to fuel it.  We'll see.  ;)

For Foto Friday, I am going to share some pics of the Packers game I went to the fall of 2006.  Speaking of besties, I miss her, and I wish she'd return to the states from saving the world because I want to seeee her.  :)  The summer after college, she lived in Ohio and I went to visit her.  We drove to Detroit to watch the Packers play the Lions.  I'm a HUGE Packers fan, and a HUGE Brett Favre fan.  This was the first year that he said he was going to retire, so when he didn't, I knew I had to get tickets as it could (but ended up not being) be my last chance.  Here are some pics from the day.  Beware, I was VERY EXCITED.  :)

Pre-road trip 'bucks.  Not that I NEEDED anything extra.  :)

Below:  Meg was trying to get a pic of me with the field in the background.  Right before she snapped it, Brett ran right next to me right by the goal post.  This is the happiest you will EVER SEE ME.

above:  first huddle of the game.

Harry Potter Review + Easy Run

Holy crap!  I forgot to even mention HP-HBP (as the kids are calling it these days ;))  I went to the 12:03am showing on Tuesday night, and at the age of 25, was probably one of the oldest people in the theater.  Not surprising.  I forgot how much I can't stand high school/junior high kids.  WOW.  They are annoying and obnoxious, and catty.  I would've gladly paid more money to have an adults only theater.  

Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince was my second favorite book in the series, behind The Goblet of Fire, so I was super stoked to see this movie.  I loved it.  I re-read all the books around Xmas, so I'm sure they left out some details and such, but because it's been awhile, I don't remember the details, so I can't complain.  I actually can't wait to see it again when I'm not deathly tired.  Also, I'm slightly in love with Miss Luna Lovegood.  (Pictured left).  She cracks me up.  :)

To keep on with my Wild West Relay training (which is really just my 1/2 marathon training with some modifications), I planned to do my easy run the morning following my evening tempo run.  By my calculations, for the relay my legs will be 9-12 hours apart.  I had planned on getting up at 4:30am with Taylor, but my eye was still bothering me, so I went back to sleep.  I called in sick to work for the morning, since I knew my eyes wouldn't be able to handle 8 hours of staring at the computer (I was right, they were killing after being at work for 3 hours this afternoon!)  I went out for my run at 8:30am this morning.  While it wasn't my second run for the day as I had originally planned :( it was less than 12 hours apart, so it worked for me.

The easy 5 didn't feel too much different than they normally do after a day of speed work.  The legs were a little heavy, but that's to be expected after running so hard the day before.  All in all, it wasn't bad, and I think 2 easy runs (one in the morning, one in the evening) would kind of be a fun way to "spice up" easy runs that I sometimes get bored with.  Also the miles were really consistent which was cool.

1.  9:25

2.  9:24

3.  9:26

4.  9:27

5.  9:09 (I always just want to be DONE during that last mile and can rarely slow down my pace, oh well.)

I finished the 5 miles in 46:53 for a pace of 9:23.

Post-work I got to enjoy my leftover shrimp fajitas, YUM and am now catching up on SYTYCD while the lover boy is at class (he's not a huge fan, weird).  :)  I could really go for the other half of my watermelon though!  

A Diagnosis + A Tempo Run

I finally went to the doctor.  Nope...not because of the ab pain that's been plaguing me for 4 months, but for my poor eye balls.  :(  I've had what looks like pink eye for the last few weeks.  I get this eye condition at least twice a year (it stems from my stupid allergies), and it's more of a pain the butt than anything.  It usually clears up on its own, and the times it hasn't, I've had to empty my pocketbook to pay for the teeny tiny bottle of drops.  On top of the pain and extreme redness in my eye, it decided to start being extremely sensitive to light.  As in, on my drive to work at 11am my eye was pouring.  Once I got in to the office I had to turn my light off and shut my window and still my eyes were killing me.  

I went to the eye doctor and got diagnosed with allergic conjunctivitis.  My stupid Rx was $64 for the GENERIC brand.  Ugh.  So annoyed.  I work for a non-profit, I'm a poor gal.  I'm fairly certain that the price for the drops per fluid mL is more expensive then crack-cocaine.  I'm guessing anyway, not too big on the street drugs.  The doctor instructed me no contacts for the next 4 days.  I thought about telling him I couldn't run with my glasses on, but figured it wouldn't be worth it.  :)  He put some anesthetic in my eye while I was in his office, but it started wearing off shortly after I ret

urned to the office, so I just called it a day.

After an amazing nap, my eye felt a lot better and I decided to take on my tempo run.  I waited until 9pm so that it wouldn't be too bright outside for my poor little eyes.  :)  I had 5 miles to do, 3 miles at a pace of 8:14.  Again I gave myself +/- 5 seconds for a range.

Mile 1 - 9:41 (warm up).  I saw a funky little animal.  It looked similar to a ferret, but not as long and was dark black.  I've never seen anything like it.

Mile 2 - 8:18 contemplated stopping for some mulberries that were growing next to the trail

Mile 3 - 8:06  Gnat #1 dive bombs into my left eye (still infected eye but lesser of the two).  Stop.  Remove.  Continue run.  Immediately after, gnat #2 dive bombs into the same eye.  I yell, "You've GOTTA be kidding me!"  Stop, remove.  This must ward off any future gnats, because that was my last encounter of the evening.

Mile 4 - 8:09  It was getting way too dark out, so I was just trying to haul booty to get home.

Mile 5 - 9:02 (cool down).  nothing exciting to report about this mile, other than Taylor drove by me 2-3 blocks from my apt. and didn't even recognize me.  Turd.

I finished 5 miles in 43:18 for a pace of 8:40.  The tempo miles pace was 8:11.  Whoo.

The one amazing thing about the run was the fireflies.  I've always had an obsession with fireflies.  They are so beautiful, and just scream summer time and happiness to me.  It was really fun running on the trail sans headphones, just listening to the evening and watching the small light show by the bugs.  It was great.  And my ab didn't hurt.  Double bonus.

When I got home I ate half of a watermelon to hydrate (along with water, of course, but I just couldn't stop eating it).  Nom nom.  Needless to say, I think I had to go to the bathroom about 6 times during the 8 hours I was sleeping.  Hah.

I'm cheating on morning running with HARRY POTTER!

Oh 'arry Potta, I heart you. I may or may not have had the movie premier date written on my calendar back in December (or whenever they re-announced the premier date). Since then I had planned on attending the midnight showing, because I am a NERD. (Sidenote: I ALSO may or may not have re-read all the books this winter in preparation for the movie release.) I even did some rearranging of my work schedule so I wouldn't have to come in to work 4 hours after going to bed. Call me Hardcore for Harry. With this sort of planning, obviously my running schedule had to be tweaked a bit also.

There was no way I was going to wake up at 4:30am to run if I had no shot at taking a nap at some point during the day. I don't care how fabulous the movie is (oh, and it's gonna be) I would be falling asleep after being awake almost a full 24 hours. That doesn't fly with this sleeping beauty. ALSO, it was storming this morning. And I only had my new pretty CLEAN shoes with me at Taylor's, and I refused to get them dirty on their christening run.

To accommodate the random schedule I did a easy 4 after work today.  Except that it was anything but easy.  :(  We had a storm the last hour of work today, so of course there was a blanket of humidity left in its wake.  Ugh.  That and I couldn't get my legs to slow down.  Which caused my ab pain to start, which IMMEDIATELY made my legs slow down.  Tricky job body, tricky tricky....  I was hot, I was sweaty, I was HUNGRY.  Blah.  I was actually supposed to do 5 but decided to flop my easy 4 from later in the week with this one since it was being so craptastic.  Luckily, the last mile felt pretty good, so it was only the middle too that suuuuucked.  I left my Garmin at home, so I don't have my splits here is what I can recall.  4 miles in 37:11 for a pace of 9:18.  

1.  9:01 (whoops)

2.  9:25

3.  9:38

4.  9:07?  I remember the first three, but didn't look at the 4th.  If my math is correct, that would be the difference. If not, who cares.  :)

After the run I had a green-ish monster to cool off (and to hold me over for a late dinner).  I was out of 'naners, so I used 5 strawberries instead of the 3 I usually use, what teeny tiny amount of spinach I had left, and a kiwi along with some protein powder, vanilla soy milk and ice ice baby.  It was actually really really good.  I was kind of getting sick of the banana's overwhelming taste in them, so it was a nice change of pace.  Plus the kiwi gave it a ZING.  :)

Tomorrow I will do my easy 5 after work at about 8pm (or potentially my tempo run depending on the weather). And then I'll hook back up with morning running on Thursday morning (which will be a true biatch I'm sure) with a tempo run. To help my legs get ready for the Wild West Relay in 24 days (!!!!!!!!!) I'll be doing an easy 4 miles Thursday evening. My first double day. WHOO!

Now I'm off to eat some delicious shrimp fajitas at Chevy's with my old roomie and HP fan. Then we'll be spending a couple of hours waiting in line at the theater to ensure we get a good seat. EEEEEEEE! So excited.

Hey Everyone, Come See How Good my Feet Look!

Apparently beer and pizza is good fuel for a long run.  Who would've thought?  Friday night we went to a friend's house for some bean bag fun, and I decided to have a couple of beers to enjoy the summer night.  A couple turned into three, followed by a mix drink at the bar, along with 4 slices of 'za.  Luckily I followed them up with a huge glass of water and refused to drink ANY more when offered.

Saturday I woke up feeling just peachy and got ready to set out for a 9 miler.  I've yet to do a long run early in the morning, so I failed to fuel before the run.  Luckily, it didn't seem to effect me much.  The run was ridiculously consistent for the first half, and then I allowed myself to pick up the pace on the back half.

1. 9:13
   
2. 9:13
3. 9:12
4. 9:14
5. 9:09
6. 9:03
7. 8:59
8. 8:46
9. 8:05

I did the 9 in 1:20:58 for a pace of exactly 9:00.  Some highlights of the run:

• I saw a mommy and baby deer around mile 5 1/2.  I was so excited I pointed it out to a runner in the opposite direction, who thanked me for showing him.  Once he had ran by, I checked to make sure no one else was looking, and waved.  :)
• I saw a chick with fabulous abs and she inspired me to be dedicated with my ab work so I can run sans shirt and spike envy in people who see me.  Ha.
• I took a Mocha Gu at about 3 1/2 miles.  Every time I have one, it gets a bit easier to suck down, but still not good.  I think they help though, so I'll keep on it.
• Go girls!  I saw about 8 or 9 female runners to every 1 male runner.  That was pretty sweet.  Every time I saw another chica I wanted to yell out, "Girl Powa!"  In a British accent like the Spice Girls.  I refrained.  I figured waving to animals was quirky enough.  I did see a lot of women running together, and it made me jealous of not having a running pal.  Sad.
• I did run by a girl who went to my rival school for sports.  She was their star basketball player that I always had to guard and try to keep her from scoring her season average of 25 points.  Maybe I'll facebook stalk her to see if she's looking for a running buddy.  I'm a genius sometimes.
• I also saw an old coworker and his fiance, who used to play on my intramural basketball team in college.  Small world, small town, small bike trail.  :)
• Light colored tops show off nippage much easier than darker tops.  Light pink tank was a poor investment.  I apologize for anyone who saw me miles 2-9.

After the run I attempted ice bath #1.  I stretched, chugged some water, ate a cereal bar and started filling up the tub.  Mental note for ice bath #2:  Start filling up tub during stretching time, so it's actually FULL when you're ready to use it.  Apparently my tub is slooooooow.  I had time to clean/scrub the toilet while it was filling!  I wanted to get a pic to commemorate the momentous occasion, but Taylor was still snoozing HARD, and my camera is so old school that

 it doesn't have the self-timer option.  Oh well.  To give you a mental image, I through on some swimsuit bottoms and an old school high school track hoodie, hood up.  I did have to tuck the bottom of the hoodie in to my sports bra, so it wasn't sitting in the water.  Um...that was a bad idea, as that's one of the um...sweatier areas post-run.  It was covered in sweat.  Yuck.

The initial shock of the ice bath was kind of intense, but after that it felt pretty awesome.  I definitely could've used more ice, but I only had a couple of buckets full.  Most of it had melted when the 15 minutes were up.  Next time, I need to remember how thick my quads are, the water was about 1/2 an inch to low to cover them completely.  :(  

After a successful long run and enduring my first ice bath, I was off to the running store to celebrate with a new pair of shoes.  :)  I knew which ones I was looking to get, the Nimbus 11 in pink, but I thought I would look around before.  Lucky for me, I found the Nimbus 10's (with the wonky side lacing) in pink, in a 7 1/2 on SALE.  Boom.  I swear I have the most average shoe size, so I rarely find my running shoes on sale.  So excited.  I decided to try them along with the 11's on to see which I preferred.  I previously had the 9's and HATED them, so I wanted to make sure the 10's had been updated enough.  

Both shoes felt exactly the same to me, and the 10's were $30 cheaper.  Guess which ones I chose.  :)  I figure by the time these ones are maxed out on miles, it will be close to the new 

release of shoes, so then I could get the 11's on sale.  Maybe that's wishful thinking, but it sounded like darn good reasoning to me.  I also got some Espresso Love Gu's and some Blueberry Pomegranite.  I'm hoping for deliciousness.

My apologies on the make-up free face and frizzy hair.  This is as cute as I look on Sundays.  :)

My brain took a break this morning + Foto Friday

This morning sucked. Which sucks, BUT that means I got my crappy run out of the way for this training schedule, right? Amen. I had 5 miles to do at a recovery/easy pace and for once, I didn't feel like going a lick faster. That speed workout yesterday took it out of me. Phew.

But let me back up a bit. I hate people who hit the snooze button. Let me rephrase that, I hate people who hit the snooze button causing me to wake up repeatedly when I would much rather be sleeping. In college, all my roommates that were avid "snoozers" had kicked the habit about a month in to living with me. The wrath of a tired Jeri can cause intense transformations, I guess. Taylor's alarm goes off at 4:30am, which would be fine if he got out of bed at 4:30am, but he doesn't. He lays there until 5ish hitting snooze over and over again. I like to stay in bed while he's getting ready for work, allowing me almost an extra hour of sleep, genius. EXCEPT that he keeps hitting the damn snooze button, causing me to not fall back asleep at all, and be crabby.

When I finally got out of bed, I didn't want to run, but I knew I was too awake to go back to sleep. After talking myself out of not running, I finally got ready, only to find that I had left my iPod at home. Grr. Strike 2 Friday morning, seriously, you're on my poop list.

Strike 3 came in the form of poor mathematical skills. To be honest, I'm actually really good at math (Toot toot. Yes, that's me tooting my own horn.) My job requires a lot of math, and I'm proud that I can do a good chunk of it in my head. However, these mathematical skills are not awake before 8am.

Since I'm pretty bored with the trails by Taylor's apartment, I decided to run to one side of the trail for a mile and back (2 miles) and then a mile and a half in the other direction and back (3 miles) for a grand total of 5 miles. The distance to the trails is .2 miles. I knew this, and was factoring this in to the distance, or so I thought. At one point I even thought that I needed to only run 1.3 miles in the 2nd direction to get the correct distance, but then argued with myself that I would end up .4 miles short. And who wants to run around an apartment parking lot for .4 miles? (You know you'd do it too, don't scoff at me.)

Wrong-o. I was right the first time. Unfortunately, I didn't realize this until I was at the roughly one mile remaining marker, and still had almost a mile and a half left. The fact that my legs were DEAD, it was insanely humid, I was tired, crabby, still hating the snooze botton, and no iPod tunes to drown out my negativity did not help.

Oh well. I survived, and I'm probably stronger because of it. One this is for sure, I will be doing my tricky math the night BEFORE I plan these weirdo routes to avoid any extra length in the future.

The only good news to report, is that I actually hit my slow target pace, for the first time, um...ever. Also, my training log is back up on runnersworld PHEW, so I can report my stats. :) 5.25 miles in 51:06 for an avg. pace of 9:44. Target pace: 9:46. BOOM. :)

For Foto Friday, I thought I would include some sweet pics of the softball tourney of Tay's.

My arm looks way weird, but I think I'm trying to get my bev out of the photo. :)

The guy to my left is the one I raced after the bars back to our hotel. If you need a reminder, I won. :D

I really like this one of us. :) We struggle at cute pics, so I get excited when we succeed.

One of the other gf's who made the trip. Good times.

EEW! The treadmill is sweating....

oh wait...that's me.

This morning I woke up to a horrendous thunder storm. I was bummed because I was looking forward to the track workout I had planned, but was really just TIRED. So I snoozed for another hour. Gotta love coming in late on Thursdays. :) When I got up, it was still storming, so I headed to the gym. Blah. I kind of hate the gym, but it's better than being struck by lightning I guess.

Today I had my first workout with mile repeats. WHOO! For my 5k training plans, I had been doing 400 m. so I was excited to switch things up a bit. The plan called for a 1 mile warm up, 2 x 1 mile at 7:46 mm, 800 m. recovery after each, and a 1 mile cool down.

I set to work and away I went. And on came the sweat. Phew. I think this is seriously the most I've EVER sweat. I was silently thanking myself for being smart and wearing black running shorts instead of something like that would make it look like I peed myself, yikes.

The first mile felt strong, but the second mile was a struggle. Oof. It would've been interesting to see this workout on a track as I had originally planned, to see if I would've been able to maintain the pace when I was tired on the second mile, or if I would've backed off and picked it up at the end to compensate (that's usually my style).

Holy freak out. I just went on to runnersworld.com to check my running log to post some stats from my run, and my log is coming up blank. Fingers crossed that's a weird glitch in their system, or I'm going to freak out!

Okie dokie. From memory, the first warm up mile was around 9:22. First mile repeat was 7:42, followed by 4:57 1/2 mile recovery. Second mile repeat was 7:41 with the same recovery. Cool down mile was around 9:40. If you want to add those together, you would come up with my total time for 5 miles. You would then be able to calculate an average pace.

At one point in the run I looked down at the control deck (?) of the treadmill and thought the treadmill was sweating. WOW! It must be REALLY humid in here, I thought like an idiot. Look at all the sweat spots on the piece in front of the actual belt that I'm running on. Yuck. Then I looked to the treadmills to the left and right of me. Weird, they're not sweating. As I again faced forward, I saw a huge thing of sweat fly from my arm to the treadmill screen (?), drip down onto the base on the treadmill. Oh. Wow. That's me. Awesome. :)

In other news, I think I need new shoes. On one hand: YAY! I love new shoes. On the other hand: Ugh. I'm broke. Can't you wait? Right now my shoes have about 270 miles on them (I'd give you the exact amount but a certain WEBSITE appears to have lost my INFORMATION!!!) I should end up hitting about 120 miles for my training this month, and will desperately need new shoes by then. Plus, I would like to have the new shoes broken in for the Wild West Relay.

Also, I'm not sure if it's because my shoes are wearing out already, or if it's because of the increased mileage lately, but I'm starting to get callouses on my toes in places I never have before am feeling some shin pain post-runs. I had horrible shin splints in high school and do NOT want those to reappear, so shoes will apparently be fit in my budget asap.

Asap as in Saturday. :) After my long run, I think I'm going to head to the local running store to have them do that thing where they check your running style or whatever (please insert the technical much smarter sounding terminology here) to make sure I'm in the correct shoes. It's not a gait analysis because it's not with the treadmill, it's the thing you stand on that determines where your weight naturally lies....I think anyway.

Asics Nimbuses (Nimbusi? Nimbuseseses?) have always worked, but I'm just interested to see what they say. If all goes well, I should be the proud new owner of these puppies by Saturday afternoon.

They're so...pink. And I'm not really a girly-girl/pink girl. But darn it they're cute. And they don't come in green, which would've been my first choice.

Alright, I'm going to go back to checking runners world obsessively to make sure they haven't lost my running data for the last 2 years, because that would be less than awesome. :(

New Running Clothes + Hissing Geese

Yay for new running clothes! I had bought a lavender running tank from Target to wear for my race a couple of weekends ago, without trying it on (because I'm an idiot) and when I got him it did not fit. As much as I love clothes that cling to the love handles, I think I'll pass. PLUS, since it was so um..form fitting near the hips, guaranteed that puppy would ride up big time once I started running. So back to the store she went.

I had just planned on getting the same tank in a bigger size, but shocker, they only had XS and XXL left. THEN I spotted the green bra I've been dying to get on SALE. Jackpot. I love these Target bras (although I know some of you despise them) and love when they're on sale for $12. I usually stock up. I will admit that 2 of the 6 that I own are "duds." They're super stretchy material and are about as supportive as, um...nothing. These two appear to be top notch, and CUTE.

Then I saw these tanks. Which...eh...are definitely not the cutest. But they're lightweight, the bank panel is a mesh-ish (hah funny made up word) breathable material AND, most importantly, they are lose on the hip area so no possibility of rideage. Nothing bothers me more than having to tug down my top every .15 miles. Last time I wore the "wrong" tank, I ended up tucking it IN to my running shorts so I wouldn't have to mess with it anymore. Talk about fashion faux pas. I felt like a wrestler, ick, they always seem to do the shirt tucked in thing when they workout. ALSO, the tanks were only 10 bones. Can't go wrong with a price like that. Plus since I was returning a $20 tank, it made me feel like this trip was so much cheaper than it really was. ;)

Last night, when I got home from work, I went to my fridge to cross off my 4 miler from the schedule, and -GASP- realized it was supposed to be 5!!! Of course I had a mini freak out (because one mile is a HUGE difference, side note: I'm an idiot.) Then I saw that Thursday called for an easy 4, and it would be an easy flop to just do 5 then. Which is probably a good thing, because another mile of hills yesterday would've probably been the death of me. I think I'm going to have to make a second copy of the schedule to post to Taylor's fridge, since I seem to be doing most of my morning runs from there. I'm sure he'll just love me bringing more crap over to his place. Hah.

This morning I had an easy 5 miler on the schedule. Because of the hills yesterday, my legs were a little sore/tired, so it was nice to take this one slow. There were a couple of random things worth mentioning from the run.

First, my run took me very close to the airport in town and I ended up running under a plane taking off. I wish I was a good judge of distance, but it was CLOSE, and it was REALLY cool, until I immediately thought, "oh crap! what if this thing crashes, I'm donzo!"

Secondly, I'm sick of geese. Seriously, I love all animals. But I'm starting to hate geese. There was a ginormous gaggle of geese (3 points for alliteration) on the trail this morning. Usually when this happens, I'll run off in the grass as far from them as possible to keep from making them mad. Well, of course, today a family of bikers was coming in the opposite directly and took their jolly sweet time getting through. By the time it was my chance to go by they were fired up and hissing at me. I let out a little yelp and started hauling some booty. Last thing I need is to be chased by a gaggle of geese :) in the middle of my recovery run! Stupid birds. Don't they see me waving to deer? I can't be a bad person. QUIT HISSING!

I ended up doing the fiver in 47:49 for a pace of 9:34 (supposed to be 9:46). But my splits were pretty darn close for the first 3 miles, after that I just got bored and wanted to go home to watch Saved by the Bell. ;)
1. 9:42
2. 9:42
3. 9:40
4. 9:28
5. 9:15
Oh Zach Morris, you are such a heart throb. :)