Weekend Musings

This weekend was… intense.  And fun.  And stressful.  Ok, mostly intense and stressful.

Friday I skidaddled out of my office at 5 bells to go hit the bike trails to get in my 6 miler.  It was cold, and my legs felt amazing.  I ran a speedy (for me) “easy” pace at a nice and low HR INTO THE WIND (well the last 3 miles of it were anyway).  I was on cloud 9 a bit.  I brought my handheld along…. I know… I know… on a SIX MILER, but I have been insanely dehydrated all week long, and I figured this would help me get a jump start on hydrating for my long run the next day. 

I did 6 miles in 56:30 for a pace of 9:25.  Average HR: 151.

And then I got to meet up with Miss Megan and a bunch of her lady friends for drinks and dinner.  Ok, drink.  Singular.  Sad.  And because it was National Dessert Day, I had to celebrate it.  Sadly the dessert was pretty hohum.  I didn’t finish it.  (This happens approx. never in my life.  Or now, has happened approx. once.)

After downing twice as much water as beer (again, tear) I headed home to watch some Shrek with Kyle.  Interesting fun fact:  I think Kyle looks like Shrek on occasion.  He doesn’t like this comparison, but I think it’s HILARIOUS.  7am came and went, and I was still a-snoozin’.  Good thing it’s finally cool around here, because I didn’t head out for my run until almost noon.  Oops.

Attention:  16 miles is a long freakin’ way to run.  Last time I ran that far was during the Fargo Marathon.  And it sucked.  J

When I started out running my heart rate was crazy high, and my breathing was all wonky.  I’ve been feeling not quite 100% lately, so I’m not sure if it’s a cold/allergies/whatev.  I stopped to walk during my GU breaks, and had to refill my handheld 3 times (that’s 55 oz of liquid in 2 ½ hours if anyone is keeping track at home) trying to get my heart rate down.  Finally about halfway through the run, my breathing seemed to get “normal” and my HR chilled the eff out.  And it was pretty enjoyable.

I did 16 miles in 2:33:55 for a pace of 9:37.  Average HR: 160.  (High end of my long run range).

And then I planted myself in my chair and studied.  And took breaks to get Redrossa pizza and a Starbucks Pumpkin Spice Latte because I was nodding off in said chair.  And then I had to take my first midterm of my grad school career.  And I think it went well, but my brain was shot for the rest of the weekend.

And I watched zero football this weekend, which makes me want to punch a kitten.  And I love kittens.

Fargo Race Photos

For some reason I totally forgot that I should be waiting and excited for race pics from Saturday's race.  The Sioux Falls half pics were so attrocious (not me obvs, but the quality of pics) I've pushed them out of my mind.  But I was excited to see some come through last night.  So without further ado.

New. Favorite. Obnoxious. Running. Photo.

This was before my bonk. Can you have a bonk in a half? Because I'm certain that's what it would feel like.

This is in the 11-12 mile range I think.  So that means the smile is fake.

But ZOMG how cute are my new emergency tempo shorts? 

Answer:  super cute.

The guy in blue pulled away in the last mile, but I caught him during my 25 second kick. Bahah.

At the finish line with Megan.

This weekend I have my first long run that's over a half marathon, since.... oh... the Fargo Marathon.  NBD.  I'm hoping the weather's nice and I can just zone and enjoy the great fall weather for 16 miles.  Or I'll cry and curse Jenn's name for tricking me in to signing up for Philly.  jk.  She didn't trick me at all, I just prefer to have a scapegoat. :)

Hello lover....

I learned a very important lesson last Friday night.  No it was not, “do not eat any form of seafood the night before races,” but I should also file that one away in my cranium.  I learned that the stick (or in my case the rolling pin) and the foam roller are not created equal.  WTF!  I started using my rolling pin over 2 years ago to help work out the issues in my IT band, assuming it did the same thing the foam roller did. 

Until I tried out Megan’s on Friday.  I’ve been rolling like a crazy person since the Sioux Falls half, because I’m just so. GD. Sick. Of. being. Hurt.  After rolling religiously all week long, I hopped on her foam roller and was shocked that I still had muscles to roll out!  There were even a couple of spots near my knee that I’ve never been able to get a response out of from the rolling pin that were causing TEARS with the foam roller.  I rolled until I could roll no more (ok, really, I just couldn’t handle the pain anymore).

After completing Fargo pain free, my mission was to procure a new foam roller—stat! 

I hit up the local sporting goods store, and after hitting on some hottie in the hunting and fishing section (hubba hubba!) I had my new love!

We’ve already gotten in a couple of fights (meaning I’ve rolled twice and she made me cry.  Yes.  A she.  I imagine my foam roller to be a bit of an S&M chick with a whip!) but I’m willing to do whatever it takes to keep me from getting hurt every time I turn around.

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So with my big ZOMG MARATHON announcement out, I started marathon training on Monday.  I’m doing a 6 week Pfitz inspired plan that’ll hopefully get me 26.2 miles in one piece.  Wednesday’s workout was one I’d never done before 1,000m intervals.  Seems easy enough, right?  I mean, at least it’s not 1600m intervals, because those are a bigger B than my whip-crackin’ foam roller!

I was wrong.

They weren’t fun.

I had 9 miles to do with 5x1000m.  The recovery was stated at 50-90% of the time it takes you to complete your interval.  So naturally I skewed on the 90% side.

I did a 2 mile warm up and then got to work on some repeats.

4:50 - Felt like I was playing “catch up.” Usually I go out to fast and struggle to maintain. For some reason an 8:15 pace “felt” like 7:30s.

4:50 - Much better.

4:43 - Cruisin’ along.  What’s that?  Sideache.  Noooooooooooo!  I only have 48 seconds to go! That’s not long. Let’s countdown.  Pinching my stride while hauling now.  Longest 48 seconds of my life.

5:05 - From the first steps my sideache was back.  I toggled between slowing down to 8ish pace to get it to subside, and then hustling back, where it’d return.

Thought about calling it a day but decided I’d attempt to “toughen up” and do my 5^th one.

5:10 - Apparently I was pooped.  No energy.  No speed left.

And a two mile cooldown.  Who’s bright idea was it to put a speed workout in a 9 mile run?!?!? 

I did 9 miles in 1:25:22 for a pace of 9:29.

My repeats averaged a pace of 7:49.

The three that I didn’t die during averaged 7:39.

I was pretty ok with the workout until I calculated my total time for the 5k of speedwork and realized that it’s slower than almost all my 5k times for the past two years.  AND THOSE ARE WITHOUT 4ISH MINUTE BREAKS IN BETWEEN.  SHEESH.  Granted I was having my garmin clock .63 miles instead of .625, so that totally makes it ok right?!?!  :P

Oh well.  Guess I’m glad I’m running a marathon and not a 5k, eh?

Marathon?

What seems like a thousand years ago, Jenn had asked if I was interested in running the Philadelphia Marathon.  Since (at this time) I was pretty committed to the Mankato Marathon, and knowing my high incidence of injury after marathons I had to decline.  And then her trip back home ended up getting cancelled.

Well imagine my surprise when she decided she'd come back anyway to run the race, and ZOMG I SHOULD TOTALLY COME!  I was in!  To spectate!  Because 26.2 miles hurts.

But of course my brain wasn't satisfied with that, so before I knew it.........

Oops!

So I guess I'm training for a marathon now.....

My mom's response:  MAKE SURE YOU TAKE YOUR VITAMINS SO YOU STOP FALLING APART DURING THESE RACES!

Yes, it was shouted...  Or that's just the volume of my mom's voice.  Also mine.  Oh hai genes. :)

Fargo Weekend

Megan and I got in to Fargo after being pushed north the entire drive by the wind.  What's that 50mph winds?  Thanks for being today and yesterday instead of tomorrow.  Sweet Louisiana!  We headed straight to pick up our packets at the Civic Center.  It was a smaller pick up, but they did have some running clothes and GUs for sale, thankfully since I only had one at home.  When we realized the clothes was 50% off, we really got to work.  I found a sweet saucony tank for $9 and a pair of saucony (I think... I've already forgotten) nice heavy running tights (eew, I want to forget winter is coming) for $22--originally $90!

From there we checked in to our hotel, and laughed when we realized that the finish line was literally next to our hotel parking lot.  Next stop was our romantic pre-race restaurant Toscano.  We went there before Fargooooooooooo Marathon last spring, and we were seated in our "usual" booth.  

I ordered a delicious looking mix of asparagus, artichokes, mushrooms and tomatoes in a white wine sauce with shrimp, scallops, and lobster tail.  It came with a super gross flaky puff pastry which I didn't eat.  It. Was. Amazing.  (It also almost killed my intestines.)

Before I knew it'd destroy my soul.

Next it was back to the hotel to chill and get ready for the race.  After puttzing around getting my playlist ready, I decided to lay out (and still pick out) my race day outfit.  I pulled out my 3 shirts, and started to worry when I couldn't find my shorts.  Uh yeah... I didn't pack them.  A quick call to Scheels, and we had approximately 40 minutes to succeed in Operation: Nike Tempo Short Recon.  Megan may have shouted out, "Out of our way!  We're on a very important tempo short mission!"

I took a minute to ooh and ahh over the ferris wheel in the middle of the store, and then found the tempo shorts of my dreams.  Or close enough.  And I found a super sweet green and gold sparkly head band for Packers spectating.  WIN!

And then it was time to relax and put my feet up.  For real.  My legs were swollen.  Compression socks on!  Legs up on the wall!  Twitter feed catch up!

Saturday after the race, we showered up and sought out some delicious mexican food.  We tried to keep the consumption on the low end so we'd have room for delicious beers during the pub crawl.  Yes, this race was centered around Oktoberfest in Fargo, and we were all about that.  We started walking for downtown and could not figure out where we were supposed to go to start the pub crawl.  We finally found the center of the Oktoberfest and the bar nearby and learned that we were supposed to end our night there.  Well poop.  We grabbed a beer, and watched the weiner dog races.

We started hoofing it to the other bars on the list.... realizing that we had circled around most of them on our quest to find the pub crawl.  GD it!  There were a number of times that we remarked that we wish we had our garmins with us to track our walking miles.  Surprise!  We learned that bar #5 was actually the bar IN OUR HOTEL.  Meaning WE COULD'VE STARTED THERE!  AND HIT ALL THE OTHER BARS IN THE CORRECT ORDER ON THE WAY TO THE FINISHING BAR.  Ugh... failures.  At least we were getting some walking in to loosen up our legs!

At the very last bar (well second to last, but last bar we needed "punched" on our card), the bartender casually said, "you know they've been out of medals for the last few hours right?"  

what.

the.

eff.

Anger.  Until we learned there was a sweet dance party going on, and we were delighted to join in.  Everyone else was dressed in traditional German garb, and it was all sorts of swell.  Again, I must note:  It's REALLY nice not to feel injured after a race.  :D

A pub crawl "medaler" let us borrow his medal so we could take a "double medal" photo.  Apparently we just get a completion grade.  Wah.  At about 11pm we decided to find some food and call it a night. At one point, someone ran through a chained off area and didn't realize that there was a chain around her waist, and pulling posts along behind her for...quite... a while.  It may or may not have been me.  Don't ask why I was running.  I couldn't tell you.  Oh wait... RACE WEEKEND DUH!

Race Report: Fargo FM Half Marathon

We started our Saturday morning at 6:45am (yay late start and starting line literally outside our door).  Instead of jumping out of bed, I wanted to go back to sleep and not run.  Making matters worse, I had been having serious GI issues all night long, and the morning was even worse.  I tried to eat some toast and a luna bar, but they were making me gag.  This should be fun!  :)

We headed to the start and I continued to feel like crap.  TMI alert:  If there was an award for most bathroom visits in a 12 hour span, the award would've gone to me.  I laid down for awhile, rubbing my stomach, hoping it'd chill out.  I started to get worried..... there's NO WAY I could race with my stomach as upset as it was, and the clock was ticking.  I was concerned I was going to post my first DNS......

This is my "please don't poop yourself" smile.

Finally with about 10 minutes to the race start, I made my last bathroom visit, and the stomach cramps subsided.  Praise the Lord!  (is it wrong the praise the lord for pooping to stop?  that's a little weird, I must say....)  Megan and I lined up at the start line and discussed our race plans.  I decided I'd run "comfortably hard" for the first 8-10 miles, and then all out BTTW race the final 3-5 miles.  That's usually my best strategy for races.  Apparently we lined up WAY TOO FAR BACK because there was some massive dodging and weaving for most of the first mile.  I settled in to a comfortable pace, and at first glance, I realized that comfortable was 8:30.  Hell ya!  Maybe a PR would be a possibility!  I did some quick math and realized that if I could run 8:30s for the first 8 miles, and 8 for the last 5 I could have my sub 1:50.  Work time!

There were a TON OF TURNS on the course.  I knew it was going to be hard to not run WAAAAAAAY over 13.1, so I tried to run the best tangents that I could.  I was randomly getting side stitches very frequently for the first hour of the race.  I'd get one, control my breathing and get it to go away, run for another couple minutes and I'd have another.  Whenever I'm dehydrated running, I tend to get side stitches.  Given my dehydrated state, I knew I had to do some serious water gulping at the water stations.

1. 8:30
2. 8:29
3. 8:31 

Around mile 3 I realized I was starving.  I took my first GU a mile and a half early and was worried that I was going to screw myself over for the rest of the race, but since I had nothing in my stomach I was on the verge of E... at mile 3.  Oy.  Luckily for me, there was a surprise GU station at mile 5 to replenish my stash.  I've probably never thanked a volunteer as profusely as I did there.

4. 8:37
5. 8:27
6. 8:41 

About an hour in to the race, my side stitches subsided, but I started to lose some steam big time.  I took another GU at 6.5 hoping that'd help (I normally GU about every 5 or so miles, so I hoped it wouldn't mess with my stomach further).  I tried to just zone out and keeping on truckin'.

7. 8:45
8. 8:53
9. 9:00 

I continued on, counting down to the next GU break at mile 10, hoping that would give me the final boost I'd need to finish strong.  I knew that we'd be running right by the finish line at mile 11, and that'd be slightly disheartening.  I kept my brain busy calculating what I'd need to run the remaining miles in to get a skin-of-my-teeth-PR.  At mile 12 I did get a little surge and picked it up slightly (presumably from the GU).  I started calculating the minutes I had left of running (usually helps me mentally) and kept telling my body to "PLEASE START YOUR KICK NOW!"  Spoiler alert:  my body didn't listen.

10. 8:58
11. 9:13 

There was an out and back section around 11 and 12 miles were I looked for Megan.  I didn't see her, so I was worried she might be having some issues with her knee.  She was looking for me, and was afraid I was in a port a potty somewhere along the course.  We're worriers apparently.  Good news was that we weren't very far apart so that's why we weren't seeing each other.  The final mile was in to the wind, and that made me lose my will to live slightly.  Especially when I noticed there was a dude behind me using me as a wind block.  He passed me at the finish.  You're welcome for that dude.  My watch hit 13 and I still didn't see the finish line.  WTF?!?!?  I turned the corner and BAM!  There it was.  Oh.  Insert 15 seconds of hauling ass here.

12. 8:59
13. 9:21
.11 :46 (7:01 pace)

Yes, I posted my slowest mile of the day last.  Oops!

I ran 13.11 miles in 1:55:17.

Field Placement:	254 / 727 (34.9%)
Age group:	25 – 29
Group Placement:	14 / 76 (18.4%)
Gender Placement:	90 / 411 (21.9%)

Before too long Megan was in with her 2nd fastest half marathon time and grinning ear to ear.  Yayzies!  We both remarked about how nice it was to finish a race and not be limping with an injury.  WIN US!

Definitely not my best race, or my best effort, but I'm happy enough given how the previous 12 hours played out.  The race could've been a mess (quite literally).  I ran really well and just ran out of fuel way way early.  But I finished the race, and did so injury free, so that's good enough for now.  :)

September in Review + Devil's Workout

September In Review

Total Miles: 121.2 up from 114.5 last month. (86.1 miles from September 2010.)  Oh hai similar injury post SF half.... we see each other again....

Total Time: 18:56:33 up from 18:04:30 last month. (13:18:55 last September.)

Total Runs: 19 for an average of 6.38/run.

Highest weekly mileage:

9/26/2011 — 10/2/2011:

35.1 Mi

5:28:01

Favorite run: My 13.1 training run where my time was almost the same as the SF half time.  :P  It felt effortless and the weather was gorgeous.  And I ran through my old stomping grounds, which is always fun. 

Most hardcore run:  I always loathe mile repeats and tempo runs that are longer than about 4 miles, so I felt pretty b.a. when I knocked out my 3 x1600 m repeats and 7 mile run with 5 at tempo (in which I hit 1000 miles for the year without realizing it... so yeah... that's fun...)

Favorite race:  It didn't turn out at all like I expected, and in hindsight, I probably should've dropped out of the race, but I finished my 7th consecutive Sioux Falls half marathon, and only 3rd time going sub-2.  So I'll take it.
Bike Miles: 25.  Yay.  Only because of semi-injury.  Boo.

Favorite Jams: My heart's a stereo.  I've been listening to it on repeat for interval workouts.  LOVE.

_____________

Speaking of mile repeats, I had more to take care of on Monday.  When I was looking at my training program before starting the run I realized, "neat-o I haven't taken a rest day in a week, this should be fun!"  Luckily because it's race week I only had 2 x1600 m repeats on the schedule which doesn't seem as scary as 3+.  The goal pace of 7:37 was slightly daunting, however.

Not sure what's got in to me lately, but I knocked those puppies out in 7:30 and 7:29, and definitely had enough gas for more.  Bring on Fargo!  Oh yeah... I'm racing tomorrow.  So fingers crossed for me, eh?

And in horribly bad race photo news, here are some of the train wreck shots from the Sioux Falls half. 

So yeah........ it was just a smidge warm...........