Holy Hills. Alternately titled: The Hills Are Alive, With the Sound of My Screaming.

Catchy, no?

True to my word, I switched up my Tuesday easy run this week, so I wouldn't have two back-to-back easy runs. Because, honestly, what do I need to recover from after an easy run? The boringness? But I digress.

Today I decided to do 4 miles of hills in preperation for the Wild West Relay. Granted my legs were a bit stiff from the long run on Sunday, but they loosened up pretty fast. They had to! I made them run hills! Suckas! :) The first and last .8 (roughly) of the run were flat, but the middle (umm...let me grab my calculator..) 2.4 miles were a DOOZY. At one point I looked down and my pace said 11:xx. Aye aye aye. Poor little leggies.

Well that's teensy tiny, so pull out your bifocals if necessary because that's my elevation from the 4 miler today. Keep in mind that this is #1 or #2 hilliest route in my town, so my primary source of pain/prep for the relay.

Gain: 391 ft
Elevation Loss: 484 ft
Min Elevation: 1,404 ft
Max Elevation: 1,529 ft

First leg of WWR (7.3 miles)

Gain: 601 ft

Loss: 267 ft

Min Elevation: 5,500 ft

Max Elevation: 5,950 ft

Baahahahah.

But seriously, I'm SO EXCITED for this relay, even if it is going to hand me my butt on a silver platter. :)

For the 4 miles I completed it in 38:30 for a pace of 9:37. My Garmin Connect won't let me access my splits, but they were pretty close to that. Apparently hills also slow me down, it's the craziest thing.... ;)

I must say it's a s-t-r-u-g-g-l-e to go back to work after a 4 day weekend. Yikes. I'm finding myself read for a nap and it's only lunch. Yikes.

And I forgot to mention after the 9 mile run on Sunday my dead/drown due to my sweat gnat count on my chest was 8. Inhaled gnats: 3, including one that lingered--not wanting to go up or down for at least 2 miles. Snorted gnat: 1. That was probably the worst. YEOUCH!

Long Run + Great Weekend + 1 Rant

Have I mentioned yet how much I love the 4th? It's great.  :)  Taylor and I went to his friend's lake cabin and had to use the wipers the whole way there.  Yup.  Rain.  :(  With no sign of sunshine in sight.  We got in around 4pm and since it wasn't sunny, decided to break into some beverages.  I had some Fat Tires.  My new favorite beer.  Yum.  Since his dad's house is insane, we played some pool, some shuffleboard (yes they have a shuffleboard table) and just kind of hung out.  It was a blast.

Saturday morning we woke up expecting to have sunshine pouring through the windows, but again, just clouds.  :(  We decided to go out in the boat anyway.  We loaded up the coolers and headed out.  Day 2's bevs were Lienekugel's Honey Weiss.  My 2nd favorite beer.  :)  We boated over to a friend's cabin to pick them up and headed out.  Many, many MANY bathroom breaks were had throughout the afternoon.  At least 10 or so by me.  :(  Whoops.  At one point we got caught in the middle of a rain shower, but it was still a blast.

Saturday night we ate some good grub and hung out by the water watching the fireworks.  There were some seriously awesome fireworks.  It was great!  I also played bartender and made the most amazing vodka tonics.  Wowsers.  So good.  :)  We ended up crashing EARLY and tented out next to the cabin since one of the guys inside kept us up ALL NIGHT Friday with his horrid snoring.

Of course, sleeping in a tent causes you to wake up at 6am because of the sun, so we were up and at em early.  SUN!  We ran to grab our suits and went out in the boat.  Too bad that the couple we were with had to leave by 10am to head to work.  So off to the waterpark Taylor and I went.  :)  Shocking.  Most of our friends were either there or on their way there, so it was a great time.  EVERYONE was questioning why I was drinking water instead of chugging the booze like them, and I had to explain again and again that I was running 9 miles that night, and didn't think the alcohol would help me any.  The responses I got was that I was crazy/9 miles was a LONG ways/and probably again that I was crazy 10x.  

After 7 hours in the sun, and dinner at Old Chicago with Taylor's family, I was ready for my 9 miler.  Luckily for me, the sun was beginning to set, and the temp was down to 75-ish.  The run was pretty uneventful so I'll throw out some highlights (and lowlights).  

First up, the RANT.  My run took me past one of the country clubs in town.  As I was running up, I saw a lady, walking backwards on the trail, in the middle of the trail.  Keep in mind that this trail is very busy, and bikes are constantly whizzing by me.  Behind her was a tiny little "purse puppy."  As I approached, she turned around and started walking forward, and I noticed her dog wasn't on a leash.  I assumed the dog must have great obedience skills, so I soldiered on.  Of course the dog ran straight at me, and I had to stop.  Jump over him.  And continue running on.  Who does this lady think she is?  After this incident, 2 cyclists went by also, and I believe yelled something at the lady about not having her dog on a leash.  It wasn't TOO difficult for me to dodge the dog, but I can't imagine if I was on a bike.  That's just a wreck waiting to happen.  In my head, I was already formulating my screaming match at the lady.  In it, her name was Muffy (totally the old-money type of country club go-er) and her dog, Poopsy.  Either way, I vented completely in my screaming match in my head.  :)

Other than that, I tried a new Gu at Mile 4 of the run--strawberry.  It was disgusting.  Yuck-o.  It did the trick though and the run was a success.  It was kind of scary running the last 3 miles as I was pretty far away on a part of the trail that is very infrequently used, and surrounded by industrial buildings, and it was getting DARK.  I get spooked so easily.  :(  I think it helped to make me run a little faster.  :)

9 miles in 1:23:33 for a 9:17 pace.  

1 9:34 
2 9:30 
3 9:22  
4 9:24 
5 9:23 
6 9:30 
7 9:22 
8 9:00 
9 8:27 

Very consistent, which I'm proud of, minus the last 2 miles where I picked it up a bit, because I just wanted to be home.

When I came home I found Tay zonked out, fast asleep.  I definitely felt like the cooler/stronger one in the couple by going for a long run after the exhausting weekend.  WHOO!  Post-shower I was practically passing out waiting for my leftover calzone to reheat.  Wowsers, the tiredness hit me like a ton of bricks, and I slept HARD.

I have the day off today too, yay go me.  :)  I think Round 2 at the waterpark is in store.  

Foto Friday

I love holidays.  Especially holidays that I get off from work.  :)  This morning I slept in until the wonderful time of 8am and then set out to do my 4 mile easy run.  It's the craziest thing, apparently when you work your legs HARD in a tempo run the day before, they magically settle in to what your "easy" pace is supposed to be.  Because of that, I spent the run not really being conscious of actually running, and just spent the 4 miles checking out the scenery.  Other than the moment that I thought I was going to get attacked by a flock (seriously 40-50) of geese, it was a pretty smooth, relaxing run.

I did 4 miles in 38:03.

I'm counting down the minutes until Taylor is done working so we can take off for the lake.  We're going to one of his best friend's cabins to spend the weekend.  Unfortunately it's cloudy and rainy, so hopefully that clears up before I'm ready to sun myself. :)

For foto Friday, I thought I would share some pics from the 4th of July weekend from last year.  

On the 4th we went to Lake Okoboji and it was a blast.  Here are some pics from that adventure.

Me & my old roomie post-lake layout getting ready to go out.

Part of our group taking a van/shuttle from the camp site into town.  My first adventure to Boji.  I needed a nap around this time.  Ha.

The day before the 4th we hit up the waterpark.  After a few hours spent drinking in the lazy river, we had an insane photo shoot.  I think over 200 photos were taken.  Here are a couple of those.

Our crew having fun in front of the splash play area.

Just getting some sun.  I heart summer.

Have a happy and safe 4th everyone!

Just Needed a Little SPEED to Put the Smile Back on my Face

Sorry for the woe is me and my boring training plan yesterday. Thanks for all your suggestions. :) I've never had a training plan call for easy runs back to back before, so I didn't realize how crabby it would make me. I think I'm definitely going to try some hillier routes on the Tuesday easy run, which will make it not easy anymore, and will make me smile. Then I will do an easy/recovery run Wednesday, speed workout Thursday, and easy/recovery Friday. Presto change-o, I'm a happy camper again. :) Also, to help with my training for the Wild West Relay, I may also decide to do the easy runs in one day--one in the morning and one in the evening. Just so my legs know what it's like to run 10-12 hours apart.

This morning I had a tempo run of 5 miles with the middle 3 miles at 8:14 pace and a warm-up and cool-down. It was a tough run, but tough in a good way. One of those runs that makes you feel a little stronger just by completing it. I gave myself a +5/-5 second range for the tempo miles, and pretty dang good.
1. 9:34 (warm up)
2. 8:10
3. 8:15
4. 8:10
5. 9:00 (cool down. for some reason it's REALLY hard for my legs to go slow on the cool down part of a tempo run. it just feels sooooooooooo slow after being speedy for a bit. oh well.)

My ab started hurting just the last .2 miles of the 3rd tempo mile, and I was bummed thinking that I would blow the time, thus ruining my tempo run altogether (very overly dramatic on my part, I know) but was ecstatic when the mile came in the same pace as the first. I must've been running stronger during the rest of the run to make up for it. Go me. :)

About my race on Saturday: I'm beginning to think it didn't exist. Seriously. No results anywhere. No friends or family there to see it. Still no plaque in the mail (as I was told by the race director). Did it only exist in my imagination???? Hah. Luckily I have the t-shirt, that can be my proof I guess. But I'm bummed that I'm not able to look over the stats. Secretly, I just want to know how many boys I beat, since I think only about 10-15 beat me. Heheh. Such a brat.

June in Review
I can't believe it's July already!! Holy crappers. This it the time of month that I look back fondly on my training and make you re-read some highlights for my own amusement. Seriously, how do I have any followers? jk. I hope you like my babble. :)

Total Mileage: 80.4 (increase of 6.1 from last month.)
Time spent: 11:52:52
Number of runs: 19 (I didn't miss a single run in this training cycle, ya me!)
Average run distance: 4.23
Highest weekly mileage: 24.6
Favorite run: 9 mile long run--the one that got me EXCITED for the SF 1/2
Favorite race: Salute the Troops 5k (which may or may not have actually existed...) The one where I PR'd, won my age group, and took 1st place overall woman. Holler. :p

Goals
Also, I've been inspired by aron at runner's rambles to set a mileage goal for myself for the year. Yes, we're halfway through it, so that's "technically" cheating, but I've never ran for a full year. Lame, I know. I usually only run from April-September and then quit.

For the first 6 months of this year, I ran 378.8 miles. A few years ago, when I had intended on running my first full, but wussed out, I had set a goal to run 800 miles in that year. Based on my first half mileage, and the 2 halfs I will be training for during the next 6 months, I would like to hit 1,000 miles. EEEK! No. Let me rephrase that, I WILL hit 1,000 miles. Stay tuned.

Day 2 of 1/2 Training...I'm bored...

I started my HM training this week.  I thought going with a new training program would spice things up again, but I'm boooooored.  The training plan calls for 4 runs during the week, Tuesday, Wednesday, & Friday easy and Thursday speed work.  I'm already sick of running 4 "easy" miles.  Blah.  Maybe it was just the fact that my bed felt oh so good this morning that has me "hatin' on" the easy runs.  I was thinking I might spice up an easy Tuesday with some hill work--maybe just once or twice a month to give me something different to look forward to.  Maybe I just hate the 4 mile distance, I dunno.  Rant over.  :)

Obviously, this morning I did an easy 4 miles, and my splits are eerily similar to yesterday's.  I a consistent creature, what can I say?  I did 4 in 36:05. for a pace of 9:01.

1.  9:36

2.  9:18

3.  9:13

4.  8:56

No crazy creature sightings, but I did run the opposite way, so that's to be expected.

Last night I had some delicious sushi.  I really wanted to take a photo of my raw kaisen salad (lettuce, cucumbers, carrots, kaisen dressing, and tuna, salmon, and two other kinds of sashimi).  IT WAS AMAZING.  How do the food bloggers not feel like complete weirdos taking pics of their food at restaurants?  I really wanted to but thought I would get some strange looks.  :)  Needless to say, the salad and my shrimp tempura rolls were amazing, and I left feeling full, but not painfully full, like I usually do when I go out to eat.  That's the thing I love the most about sushi, you never get that uncomfortably full feeling.  

Speaking of food, I'm going to go eat a leftover fajita for breakfast.  Probably the best perk about morning running, is I have an excuse to eat un-breakfast-like foods for breakfast.  A girl has gotta refuel!

[To get a chance to win some SWEET Zensah products go to Chic Runner's page.  Or don't because I REALLY WANNA win.  :)]

On Today's Installment of Running with the Wilderness...

• I waved to a deer.  It didn't wave back.  Whenever an animal becomes aware of me, I always feel the need to wave to say hi.  The beauty of running when everyone else is still in bed, is that I get to wave to the animals without looking like a looney tune.
• I heard an obnoxious cyclist yell, "left, left, left, left..."  Since I was as far over on the trail as I could go without running in the ditch, I looked over my shoulder to see a goose honking instead of a cyclist yelling.  I'm beginning to think I'm not completely "awake" on my morning runs.
• I almost stepped on a toad.  Kudos to nature for making that puppy camouflaged to the fullest.  In this instance, it was almost NOT in the toad's best interest to be camoed.
• I think I may have been incorrect in my previous ostrich siting.  On closer review, I think it might be an emu.  Boring.

Today I had an easy 4 miles to do.  First run of my 1/2 marathon training.  WHOO!  I did 4 in 36:50 for a pace of 9:13.  

1.  9:25

2.  9:10

3.  9:18

4.  8:57

My legs were still REALLY tight, and I finally figured out why.

I thought that I was just really sore from the race, but couldn't figure out why that would be.  Then I remembered that on the walk home from the bar on Saturday to her hotel, one of Taylor's friends challenged me to a race.  Not to be one to turn down a challenge, I took off sprinting.  Of course, the hotel was much farther than we thought it was going to be, so that didn't help either.  Well apparently I haven't all out sprinted in, well, forever.  Even my "sprint" at the end of runs is really just a harder run.  I kind of wish I would've been wearing my garmin so I knew my pace, because I felt like I was flying.  I won by the way.  :)  It pays to not be a girly girl and wear chuck taylor's on a regular basis, although I am lucky that I didn't split my jeans, because those puppies are TIGHT.  Hah.

Some pics from the tourney this weekend.  This was pre-sprint to your death.  And pre-multitude of celebratory spirits.  :)

Race Report: Salute the Troops 5k

I already ruined the surprise, but now I'll go back to the beginning.

Pre-race goals:  About a week ago my goal was to hit 23:30 for the 5k.  I think 7:30ish pace is totally doable for 3 miles.  Unfortunately, after re-aggravating my ab, I didn't think that was a feasible goal unless I had zero pain on race day.  New goal was to break 24 minutes.

Also, I assumed the race would be somewhat small, but by some miracle, they were actually giving awards for age group winners (very uncommon for 5k's around here that aren't 500+ participants).  I REALLY wanted to place Top 3 in my age group.  Looking at results for smaller races in this area this spring, I realized that if I ran the time I projected myself to run, I would've placed top 3 in those races.

Race day:  I was all by my lonesome.  My parents had prior commitments, and the boy was out of town for a softball tourney.  I got to the race and started scanning the crowd for the big runners.  Those familiar faces who I typically don't see because I'm stuck looking at their backside because they are beating me.  :)  

The weather was great.  75 degrees with just a little humidity, and a nice wind/breeze.  Pretty shocking for a 10am start time.

The race wasn't chip-timed, so when they were gathering everyone to the start, I made my way towards the front.  I didn't want to have 5-10 seconds added to my time just because I started towards the back.  I figured this would be the point where the speedsters would show up.  Still no familiar race faces.  I did see one gal who looked like a strong runner, but she was clearly out of my 20-25 age group, so no threat to my Top 3 placing.  Whoo!  Also, there were a few gals directly behind me that looked in shape and could easily be wild cards and take my goal!

'

I ended up lining up right behind the 5-7 "serious runner boys" which was really odd to be up that close, but oh well.  Also, I created the GREATEST playlist the morning of the race, and Miss iPod wouldn't even TURN ON when I was walking to the start line, so I had to ditch it.  I've never done a race without music.  YIKES!

The race started, and it didn't take long for the crowd to thin out.  I stuck pretty tight with a group of 4 guys and we were off.  The first mile felt awesome.  I felt strong.  I felt like my stride was long and that my turnover was quick.  At this point, I knew I was the first girl (since I had lined up in front of all of them) and no one had passed me.  I did not want to look over my shoulder, because I knew that would only mess with me mentally to see someone on my heels.  

Mile 1 7:31

After the first mile, whenever I looked at the Garmin it really wasn't helping me at all.  Because of the trees and probably the clouds, it was showing my pace as 10:30, which I knew wasn't right.  I just tried to keep running strong.  At the turn around point, the 4 guys I was running with grabbed water to chug, and I passed them.  I struggle drinking water in 1/2s when running MUCH slower, no sense messing with it at this pace!  At the turnaround, my time was right at 12:00.  I knew I had to pick it up if I wanted 23:30, and could not fall off my pace if I wanted 24.

It was also at the turn around that I was able to get a look at where 2nd place chica was.  I estimated that she was about 30 seconds behind me and was capable of a strong finish/kick.  Don't ask how I evaluated that in the 1/2 second that I saw her--I think she had larger calves that just translated into STRENGTH and SPEED.  

Unfortunately, about the halfway point was when the ab started to hurt.  :(  It was just a dull pain for the first quarter of a mile, but even at a dull intensity level it was still effecting my stride.  I just kept looking at my watch telling myself to fight through the pain for x amount of minutes to the finish.  The highlight of this mile was when some ladies who were walking the 5k started cheering for me on their "out" portion of the out and back path "Way to go girl.  You're the first place girl!!"  Even though I was struggling, I couldn't help but smile.  BIG SMILE.  :D

Mile 2 8:00 boo

The last mile was pretty much a struggle there was an older dude and a guy about my age near me.  I passed the older guy and then set my sights on the other guy.  Of course, it was about that time that he started to pull away from me, so I was all alone.  No one behind, no one in front.  I thought I was running a race?  Where is everyone?!?  

Coming to the finish line, I was shocked by the screaming and cheering.  For such a small race, there was sure a ton of crowd support.  Which was awesome.

Mile 3 7:58

.1 :31 (6:17 pace)

Total time:  24:02

As I was coming through the shoot, I heard the guy go first place 20-25 age group.  The other guy corrected him, well yeah, she's the first girl to cross the line, she's first overall!  Music to my ears.

Of course, I had to run (ok, I walked, quickly) to my phone to call Taylor and tell him my news.  :)  I was really bummed at this point that none of my family or friends were there to share this excitement with me.  But it was really cool how many people came up to me after the race to say that they were trying to pace off of me (I was wearing an obnoxiously bright orange shirt, so that probably helped them).  :)

After the race was over, they gave out awards.  First place 20-25 women:  someone else.  What?  Has that ever happened to any of you?  Apparently the race organizers had planned to have age group winners and no overall winners, since the overall winner would obviously have won their age group, but the area running club that they had help them with the timing, etc. had thought the opposite.  Since I was the overall winner for women, they gave the age group winner to someone else.  Maybe that's really selfish of me to be bummed, but I am.  She didn't win our age group.  I beat her by a good minute and a half.  :(  Ok, rant over, but it's not like I'm going to win a whole lot of these in my life, so I'd like the hardware, thanks.

Also, because they hadn't planned on overall winners, they didn't have trophies/plaques for us.  They assured us they would get them made and sent out before next weekend.  Kind of got jipped for my first win, I'd say.  :)

Of course, because I was so ridiculously excited, my stupid self forgot to stretch after the race, and I am SO SORE today.  Seriously, you'd think I had run a 1/2 yesterday for how pained they are today.  Oh well, they deserve a day off for a job well done.

I wish I had some stats to share about the race, but I can't find the results anywhere.  It was a first annual run, and obviously, somewhat, unorganized so I'm not sure if they'll even post them anywhere.  I'm hoping they'll be in the paper at least tomorrow so I can get some stats.  :)  I think only 10 dudes beat me, so I placed pretty high overall out of everyone also.  I'm just so stinkin' proud and can't stop smiling.

If you haven't already, definitely scout for a small-ish race that gives out age group awards and train your little heart out for it.  It's a pretty sweet feeling to walk home (or be delivered to your home in 5-7 business days) with a plaque/trophy/medal of your achievement.  :)