Spring Race Plan

A few days before the Twin Cities race, one of my running friends mentioned to me that the half associated with Grandma's Marathon, Garry Bjorklund half marathon, was doing away with the lottery and was opening on Sunday. The Sunday we were driving home from the Twin Cities 10 Mile. Which got my wheels turning. If it's a really nice cool day, as it tends to be, we could have an additional shot at a really fast half marathon time in the spring. If it's a super hot day, well we just spent a lot of money ($lodging$) to run 13 miles and cheer on our friends who are running the full. I've also always wanted to do Grandma's marathon, but have been hesitant to sign up because when it's hot, it's HOT. In the back of my brain I thought that maybe if we loved the race for the half, maybe we could do the marathon in 2019 too. ALL THE PLANS, ALL THE FUN, ALL THE RACES. It's been a million years since I've done more than one marathon in a year, so we'll see how that shakes out.

BUT. At 5pm on the drive home from the cities, I got in the queue for the half marathon, and 13 minutes of it auto-refreshing every 2-3 seconds while I was on data on the verge of being over for the month, we got our spots! And the next day our hotel$$$.

So this spring we'll have two goal races: The Brookings Half in early May and Garry Bjorklund half in mid June. There are some fun winter races that I've always avoided in the past, but I think we'll make those happen this year!

Toni and I have a half in Chicago toward the end of January for fun, as well as a 4 mile race in early February. There's also a 5 mile race in March and April as check ins for our spring training. I can't WAIT! Although, I'm not entirely ready for the ice/snow storms/below zero temps/windchill in the -30. ahhhhh!

F^3 Lake Half Marathon Training Week 1

Week of November 20-26

Monday Planned: General Aerobic 8 miles with 2 sets of 5x150 strides
Monday Actual: General aerobic 5 miles with 2 sets of 5x100 strides. Since we did our long run on Sunday, we did less miles than planned. I apparently didn't look at the strides because I thought we had 100 m strides. Oops.

Tuesday Planned: Rest
Tuesday Actual: Core work and some calve work to try to unlock these huge knots in my legs!

Wednesday Planned: General Aerobic 3 miles
Wednesday Actual: 3 general aerobic miles with Maren at the 605 group run!

Thursday Planned: 8 miles including 4 or 6 mile Turkey Day race!
Thursday Actual: I couldn't find anyone to warm up with me, and was unsure about running in the area in the dark solo. Kept a super casual attitude about that race I guess. :P Ended up missing the finishing turn for the 10k, so ended up at 6.33 miles, and then found some buddies for a cool down mile!

Friday Planned: 4 Recovery Miles
Friday Actual: 4 recovery miles with some new running buddies! I had planned for it to be more of a recovery race so I had raced the day before and was going long on Friday, but it's so hard to watch your watch when it's pitch black out, so it may have been too speedy, but it felt okay.

Saturday Planned: Long Run 9 miles
Saturday Actual: I found a new running buddy to tackle 9 miles with me at 7AM(!!!!) Saturday morning. 605 was giving out goody bags to the first 20 people in the store, so that helped get me out of bed and to the store EARLY. Our friend Kristin joined us around mile 4. The miles just flewwwwwww by. It was such a fast run, and speedy fast too, but my heart rate was like: this is cool, we're cool. 

Sunday Planned: Rest
Sunday Actual: Since we cut our Monday run a little short, I had some recovery miles to take care of. And I didn't want to do them AT ALL. No one to run with, tired legs, and my bed just was in love with me. Solo runs suck. I did 3.5 miles.

Total Mileage Planned: 32 Miles
Total Mileage Actual: 32 miles

Weekly Reads: Once and For All

Once and for All is the newest book by Sarah Dessen. Sarah Dessen typically writes really sweet teen books, and I love recommending them to teens at my library. I was excited for the newest one. This one took a little longer to get into than normal, but once I was in, I was IN. It was a really sweet read.

My rating: 4 stars

Summary from Goodreads:

As bubbly as champagne and delectable as wedding cake, Once and for All, Sarah Dessen's thirteenth novel, is set in the world of wedding planning, where crises are routine. 

Louna, daughter of famed wedding planner Natalie Barrett, has seen every sort of wedding: on the beach, at historic mansions, in fancy hotels and clubs. Perhaps that's why she's cynical about happily-ever-after endings, especially since her own first love ended tragically. When Louna meets charming, happy-go-lucky serial dater Ambrose, she holds him at arm's length. But Ambrose isn't about to be discouraged, now that he's met the one girl he really wants. 

Sarah Dessen’s many, many fans will adore her latest, a richly satisfying, enormously entertaining story that has everything—humor, romance, and an ending both happy and imperfect, just like life itself.

Boston Trip Recap Part 2

Saturday was a chill lazy day around the house so I could rest my legs and be ready for my race on Sunday. I'm thankful there was race day packet pick up, because I failed to calculate how far Ipswich was from the suburb my friend lives in, which is basically on the opposite side of Boston. Sorry!

We made ourselves a charcuterie plate and drank some adult beverages. As you do for lunch on vacation, right?

Alice and I had a blast taking all of the selfies with fun snapchat filters.

And Sunday morning we were race bound! I was thankful for Daylight Savings allowing me to sleep in. A 6am wake up on race morning is unheard of. But a 6am alarm that FEELS like a 7am alarm is insane. I wasn't as thrilled with the temperatures feeling like it was 10:30am instead of 9:30am. There were so many people in coats, pants, and long sleeves. And Kathryn heard several mention I was crazy for wearing shorts. But wouldn't you know it, there were TONS of people shedding clothes throughout the race! And yes, I was too warm and dumping water on my head, per usual.

Sometimes after a race, you have to just sit down. Right there. On a curb that's literally crumbling under your butt. And take pictures, obviously.

After the race, Kathryn conveniently parked at the restaurant that gave out free post-race beers, so we took it as a sign to stop in. I enjoyed a Smuttynose IPA which was delicious and we had some okay fajitas and guacamole.

On the way home I was ready to crash so we made a trip to a Dunkin Donuts to help with the cause. It was a trillion degrees and I can no longer taste food. Thanks for the awesome first experience DD!

We didn't get home from the race until mid-afternoon so the evening was nice and chill and relaxing.

Monday morning we went out in search of good coffee and ended up at a super cute bakery. I love this wall art, probably because it reminds me of a light bulb. If my grandparents were still alive and Light's Bakery were still a thing, this would absolutely be necessary as their logo.

I hate to break it to you, but I really have the prettiest friends. Proof.

We did a little shopping (slash screwing around), before our sushi date.

Last Minute 2017 Goal REVISED

At the tail end of 2016, when my running was going well, I made the goal to run 1000 miles for 2017. I hadn't run 1k miles in a year since 2011 when I ran 1300+ miles. In my running career I've hit 1000 miles in 2009, 2010, and 2011. 2012 I was close with 924. Since then I've had 600-700/year and 2015 when I had 141.5. What?!? I've ran more than that in a month this year. Craziness.

Knowing I have big goals ahead, I've used my data from previous years as a guide. 2010 and 2011 were my two best years of running (all the PRs, all the strong races, all the speed), and 2009 served as an incredible base year cracking 1000 miles for the first time, landing at 1020. So for 2017, 1000 was the goal!

The online tracker I use allows you to put in monthly mileage goals as well as annual goals, and gives you a nice visual to see how far ahead or behind you are to that goal, how many miles you need to average per day to meet that goal, as well as what you are projected to hit based on your current progress. LOVE. I love data. And this little visual.

Most of the year I've been slightly ahead of that 1000 goal. But I never got overly confident, because I know that I tend to be more injury prone than the average runner. But as October was wrapping up and I had two full months to run 100 miles, I considered bumping up that goal.

Why not 1100?

So that's the new goal for 2017. Some of that is weather dependent, as it could turn very winter, very soon here, but I think it's a good goal to keep me right around 100 miles/month. Also some running friends are planning for a 20 or 17 mile long run on NYE, so if I needed some extra padding, I have that to fall back on.

What's your annual mileage goal?

Do you even track it bro? (jk) I'm constantly asking Toni what she's at for mileage, and she never knows and has to manually tabulate it every once and awhile when I get nosy. She also promised to give me a chart of our miles together and solo and I haven't even SEEN THAT RENDERING YET. :P

Are you someone who can run the year without breaking yourself? This has always been a back of the brain goal that I just don't think is attainable, but I'm still semi-obsessed with it.

Banquet 10k Race Goals + Maintenance Week

I took a brief poll on instagram the other day because I couldn't decide whether to run the 10k or the 5k on Thanksgiving. It's going to be so nice here, so I think I was excited when the vote swung to 10k. But then I had to think of a time goal. I want to run a hard 10k, but I'm not really sure what that'll look like. I haven't raced a 10k well in 3.5 years, so we'll see what that ends up looking like, but I'd like to be in the 8:30-8:40s for pace.

Maintenance Week November 13th-19th

Monday: Rest. I had plans to run with Toni after work, and then she was sick. And by the time I got home, I just couldn't get myself off the couch to go solo.

Tuesday: I had a horrible night of sleep Monday night and a run sounded miserable. Off to a great start this week! [sarcasm font]

Wednesday: Group run at 605 with company from my BRF. We're on the no-plan plan this week so we were thinking 3-4. I love when we do that, because we always end up going on the longer range. 4 miles done followed by yoga.

Thursday: Toni and I met up after work for some more miles. Since I didn't run Monday or Tuesday we opted for six, and I love how nbd 6 milers feel nowadays. That used to be a legit long run! #progress

Friday: Up and at em at 4am to make it to the coffee run for 4 miles and all the coffee after. Best way to start the day!

Saturday: Yoga at the brewery!

Sunday: 9 mile long run on the most beautiful winter day. If it could stay in the 30s with no snow or freezing rain or ice, I would love running a million times more!!

Total miles: 23.13 miles. Not quite the 25 I had as a goal, but pretty darn close!

Weekly Reads: There's Someone in the House

There's Someone Inside Your House is the newest book by Stephanie Perkins and a completely different type of book than I'm used to reading of hers. It reminded me a lot of R.L. Stine's Fear Street series, and was a fast read.

My rating:  3.5 stars

Summary from Goodreads:

Scream meets YA in this hotly-anticipated new novel from the bestselling author of Anna and the French Kiss.

One-by-one, the students of Osborne High are dying in a series of gruesome murders, each with increasing and grotesque flair. As the terror grows closer and the hunt intensifies for the killer, the dark secrets among them must finally be confronted.

International bestselling author Stephanie Perkins returns with a fresh take on the classic teen slasher story that’s fun, quick-witted, and completely impossible to put down.

Podcasts Take 3

I've picked up a few more podcasts that I listen to with regularity and wanted to share. I have an hour in my car to and from work every day, so I go through a lot of audiobooks and podcasts! If you've missed my previous posts, here are: 1, 2, and running specific!

Dirty John
This one is all out in its entirety, which I appreciate for binge-ability.



Sworn
A sister podcast of Up and Vanished (one of my all time favorites) looks at cases on a smaller scale, a handful of episodes at a time.



Strength Running
I am a nerd of the sport of running, so this more technical-natured running podcast really appeals to me. I always learn something which earns it an A+.



A Killing on the Cape
I was needing something new to listen to on my way to Boston so I downloaded this one, and I flew through all of the available episodes.

Heaven's Gate Podcast

I don't know why, but I've always been super fascinated with Heaven's Gate. I remember the heavy publicity surrounding the mass murder when I was in grade school, so I was interested in this podcast diving deeper into the cult.

What podcasts am I missing??