Google Calendar

A few weeks ago someone put a google calendar into their blog to show their training schedule. I can't seem to find that awesome blogger now but would very much like to do it. Any suggestions about how to sync my google calendar with my blog? Or perhaps one of the kind (and few) people who reads my blog and is part of the larger running blogging community might remember who it was who did this and I can follow up with her... Thanks!

ok, so this isn't me swimming. but my swim was awesome and this picture is awesome. amazing what you find when you google image search something as simple as "swimming"...

2000m in just under 40 minutes. had to actively not get competitive with the very fast and trim woman in the lane over from me. but the water is so soothing that i was able to let most of that stuff go, most of the time.

tri plans are on. i only wish i didn't live on a grad student stipend so i could afford a new bathing suit and a pair of padding cycling shorts. i guess thats what birthdays are for...

an actual run

for the first time since January 1 i actually got out for a run. in order to be extra kind to my ailing foot/posterior tibialis i drove over to the Toftrees Trail and did the whole things on the soft macadam and mud. it was the slowest run i've been on since september but i was a run. 5 miles, just under 50 minutes (with a stretching break at the turnaround at miles 2.5). truth be told i didn't have a ton of pain. more like a nagging sensation and some increasing tightness in my left arch. the biggest thing, which i was somewhat aware of while running then acutely aware of when i finished and did a nice walk cool down was the degree of hypervigilance and fear i was experiencing the whole time. not exactly a relaxing way to run ;-)   

but it was a run. and i was glad to be out there in the 40 degree drizzle. i'm also a big fan of mud crusted sneakers...

i seemed to have missed the boat on 2010 resolutions but i have been slowly devising a plan for the coming year... in part all of my life decisions (including training possibilities and races) are having to wait until february 22 when i will find out where i will be working/living next year so there is no real use in trying to make plans until then. but, just between you and me -- i have my sights set on a triathlon. went on an awesome swim a few weeks ago and am planning to hit the psu pool this afternoon or evening. if i enjoy this swim as much as the last one (or even half as much) then i think i am going to set the wheels in motion. i have a training plan all mapped out in  my head. if the swim goes well, i'll post it here tomorrow.

lemonade

evil posterior tibialis. evil. perhaps i should be scolding the evil spiked heels i was wearing that caused the injury, not my poor foot for being abused. regardless. very little running going on in these parts. went for a 5 miler with james on new year's day before settling in to watch football. have at this point been on 8 of my 14 interviews and james has been on 7 of his 13. next week we have 5 total - me at Yale, U Wisconson Madison, and Temple University; james at U Wisc and Brown. Gonna be a hectic week. With workouts kind of at a minimum and lots of continued bad eating (feels like the holidays never ended in terms of food) I have been making a point to do a lot of walking. Have been getting in between 3 and 6 miles a day. So hopefully despite the lack of good running or long running (both sorely missed and needed) I'm still making my way toward 1000+ with Mel and her crew. (1000 mile club details).

Tomorrow we are off to New Haven. Am hoping to get in a run or hike in Madison on Tuesday if the weather cooperates. Otherwise I'll be powerwalking in the airport terminals...

bad blogger

i haven't blogged in forever. i also haven't run in forever. i'm a bad run blogger :-(

interview traveling has been pretty crazy and with 4 interviews in a 9 days, during which time i wore spiked heeled boots for 8+ hours at a time, i royally screwed up my left foot. serious posterior tibialis issues. bad scene. no running. ginger walking at best.

sunday was the first day i was able to go to my gym (we're back home for 6 days before heading back out for more interviews) and thoroughly enjoyed every minute of my 75 minutes on the elliptical. yesterday i had what seemed like my first good workout in ages. 40 minutes on the arc, 40 minute crazy circuit of chest, back and legs. this morning i went to the Y with james and (after a 3 week long itch to do so) i finally went for a swim. 2000m in 40 minutes. felt awesome. its been years since i swam laps. don't know why i don't do it more often.

ankle is flared up a bit this evening (unfortunately from kicking while swimming i fear). hope it doesn't get any worse.

year in review?

very little running has gone on this week. i've been "recovering"... well more like i've been hitting the gym for weak-ass workout, complaining, and stressing about interviews/travel. yesterday james and i finally hit the road, drove to boston in the crazy storm, dropped off the girls (kitties) and turned around to drive back down to west haven. right now i'm sitting in a starbucks about a mile from the VA where he is interview this morning. although starbucks NEVER has free internet, conveniently the friendly's next door's signal is reaching in here just enough to allow for some nice blog reading. as i caught up with all of my blog-stalking, i read Mel-Tall Mom's inspirational post. i am not completely decided on my  goals for 2010. but it is good to think about what has happened this year. if i count back to this day last year (rather than 2009 calendar year) there have been many excellent things that i accomplished and that i had the good fortune of happening to me. 1) I got married! - December 14, 2008. I can't believe this Monday will be our anniversary! 2) I shared my favorite place in the whole world with my new husband - Honeymoon - December 15-22 in Sugarbush VT.  3) My first first author paper was published. 4) I completed P90X and was the fittest I have been since high school. 5) I finished collecting my dissertation data. 6) I put in 20 applications for Internship next year and am in the midst of a whirlwind tour of the northeast with my beloved as we interview for more than a dozen of these positions. 6) I took up running and in 12 weeks went from zero running to a 1:52 half-marathon.

After James finishes with his interview in a few hours we are going to try to snag some Pepe's Pizza before heading back to Boston. It gave me a swell of pride (joy?) to think that we, in the next 2 days, will go on a 9 mile run called "3 Ponds", and that I will be able to run the whole thing. Over the summer (the last time we were visiting my parents) we went on this run and, while James was a great sport about it, I had to do way more walking than was cool with me and it took us over an hour and a half to complete.To me, this is the beauty of running. An accomplishment (or progress) is measurable and I am able to give myself some credit for it. This is hard for me in other areas.

Will think on those 2010 goals and get back to you... :-)

Race Day - Nittany Valley Half Marathon

My first half marathon is in the books! Unofficial time was 1:52:00. The snow/ice was only an issue for the first 2.5 miles and then on the steep downhill at 7.5-9 miles. I felt pretty great for the first 10 miles and then slogged for the last 5k. Having told the race "story" to the 3 people in the last 3 hours, I'm a little tired for a full race recap. Here are my splits:
mile 1 - 8:05 - trying not to fall on ice
mile 2 - 8:04 - still trying not to fall (watching others do so)
mile 3 - 8:09 - james handed me water and gushers at mile 2.9. having a support team rocks
mile 4 - 8:24 - this is where the 3 mile long ascent began
mile 5 - 8:45 - still climbing
mile 6 - 8:20 - second wind? still climbing
mile 7 - 8:19 - crested the hill at 6.25 where yuko was there to take my jacket, give me more water and gushers and generally cheer wildly!
mile 8 - 7:55 - steep downhill, trying again not to fall or lose complete control of my legs
mile 9 - 8:05 - actually still feeling pretty good, still going downhill :-)
mile 10 - 9:04 - 3 hills in this mile - legs starting to feel very heavy, just pushing through
mile 11 - 8:47 - a little bit of a flat - legs a little numb, grabbed water at a stop and hands got very cold
mile 12 - 9:06 - just holding on - can't feel legs, can't increase turnover - into the last big hill
mile 13 - 9:42 - all straight up hill - holding on for dear life - vowing not to walk
mile 13.1 - 1:07 (7:27) - could not see finish line so didn't know when to kick, kicked late. oh well.

Afterward, huffed and puffed, gave back my timing chip, drank water, then more water, got stiff, stretching, felt faint, then returned home. Felt generally calm afterward but not elated like after Spirit of Pittsburgh. Race could not have gone better. 1:52?!?!?

Here are some pics from the race

race face (according to james)

now this is what i call a race face. a chilly race face...

my butt and ugly stride - at mile 1.5

sucking wind at the finish line (while removing earbuds)...

trying (unsuccessfully) to capture the crazy dried salt on my face and neck.

post-race smiley thumbs up. not quite as attractive, but hey I just ran a HALF-MARATHON!!!













No finisher's medals or bibs for this race but I intend to wear my race t-shirt to work tomorrow as proof of my accomplishment.

Thanks to James and Yuko for being my awesome support team!

t-minus 12 hours

There was definitely more snow than anticipated today. I'd say at least a few inches. The first 2.5 miles of the course (on a gravel track around a large field) are going to be messy, slushy, and wet. I hope the roads thereafter are better.

 

With the weather being what it is I'm feeling even less confident in my time goal. But I guess I will put it out there for the record... I would really like to break 2 hours. I know that on a first race my only goal should be to finish (and with these conditions maybe thats a pretty reasonable goal), but I really want to go sub-2:00. On a flat course I think I could go much faster, but these hills intimidate the hell out of me. I basically sat around today eating carbs (soft pretzels, fruit, pasta) and not doing anything physical. So hopefully I'll have lots of glycogen for those hills tomorrow.

Gonna try to relax now and get some sleep. 

26 hours

26 hours until race time and its snowing. Forecast indicates that the snow should end before midnight with a total accumulation of approximately 1 inch. In past years they have been able to get the roads clear before the race with more snow than this so hopefully this shouldn't have too big an impact on race conditions. Most recent hourly forecast says 30 degrees at guntime and 34 degrees by noon. With windchill its only going to feel like 20 degrees at the start and a max of 26 by the end of the race. Winds are going to be between 5 and 10 mph, not the 20+ we've been having this week, but still will be a factor to deal with on the very open 3 mile stretch of the route near the airport.

All this is making me feel a little better about my tentative decision to wear a windbreaker over my tech shirt. Hopefully I won't be too hot. This will be my first run of the season (or at all for that matter) in a jacket. I reserve the right to throw my jacket on the ground and leave it for dead at any point on the race (although hopefully if I need to do away with it I can give it to either James or Yuko when we do fuel handoffs on the course.

Still not sleeping well. Legs feel a little tired this morning but am struggling to stay away from the gym. Foot is nagging me a little. Should stay barefoot as many hours today as possible.

Thanks!

Thanks to everyone (new bloggy buddies) for the well wishes and votes of confidence! My support team is coming together -- thanks James and Yuko -- and I'm starting to feel the pre-race jitters/excitement. I'm glad to have something to distract me from these incoming job interviews. The mix and mingle of good, bad, exciting and frustrating news is so draining. I can't control the outcome of this race but at the very least it isn't an insane drawn out impotence-stress-fest for the next 2 months. And good day or bad, good race or bad, at the end of the day Sunday it will be done and I will have tried (and hopefully accomplished) something new.

I've been ruminating a little bit about goals for race day but am not quite ready to put them down on bloggy paper. I'm going to go hit the gym for some easy elliptical, stretching, and core work and will think more about them. The difficulty I am having is in coming up with fair goals for the hilly course. I know I can run 10+ miles on flat (or gentrly rolling) terrain at an 8:30ish pace but with these hills I could be slowed down a lot. Here is the elevation profile.

last short run

After getting about 4 hours of sleep last night and then hurdling myself back into the same madness as yesterday, I finally made it out for my last short easy run before this weekend's race. I had hoped to trial my race day outfit but no such luck, its about 20 degrees warmer today than is expected Sunday morning. Oh well. The wind from Tuesday was still in full effect so I got buffeted around for my quick 4.25 miles and tried to keep my pace at 8:30. I have basically avoided hills all this week on my runs which is very nice for confidence but is likely giving me an unrealistic sense of what my 8:15, 8:30, and 8:45 paces feel like. I am hoping that come Sunday the adrenaline (and caffeine) will give me a little boost to help with the crazy hills on the course.

ate some swedish fish on my run (just for kicks, not like i needed the fuel) and they also seem to sit well with my stomach. so swedish fish and gushers will be the fuel of choice for sunday. still gotta figure out the water situation.

run: 36:00min 4.25miles 8:28pace  47degrees, overcast,winds~20mph

2nd to last run before NVHM

The weather channel has been threatening snow for this morning since Sunday, but when I woke up the sky was merely overcast and the ground was dry. I had sort of been looking forward to a run in the elements. I've only had one snowy (actually it was sleet, in October) run and there was a wild quality to it that I very much enjoyed. But really, I'm not complaining. I have also been meaning to try out my second pair of running tights (reebok play dry tights) but haven't found a day cold enough to do so. A quick check of the weather indicated that today was the perfect day, 35 degrees as I was heading out. I opted for a short sleeve tech t-shirt instead of my normal tank. This seemed to be the perfect combo. In fact, it was quite chilly outside. And the wind was out of control, gusting to well over 20 miles an hour. It took a solid 2 miles for me to feel warm, and break a sweat. Usually after 5 minutes I'm there. I really wanted to run 5 solid miles between 8:15 an 8:30. This is the pace that I would like to aim for on the flats and down hills of the course this weekend and wanted to get a feel for my turnover and stride at that pace. With the wind holding any kind of steady pace was difficult - into the wind it was hard enough to stay upright and moving forward, with the tailwind it was hard not to fly forward much too fast. You can see from my splits (8:19, 7:58, 7:50, 8:18, 8:30) the two miles where I had the glorious tailwind. At mile three I tried out my prospective race fuel, GUSHERS!!! I've never had gushers before, but they had a good mix of pure suger and other carbs, and were cheap and gelatin-free. Turns out they are pretty awesome. No cramps or GI upset after taking them. Easy to down 90 cal package in 2 mouthfuls and the liquid inside each gusher helped with the chewing and swallowing. In fact, I didn't have my handheld with me and had no problem getting them down. Did I mention the delicious candy taste?!? :-) 

Somewhere around mile 3.5 of the tempo run, a girl blew past me (I didn't hear her until then as I had my ipod blaring - Disturbed, Three Days Grace, Breaking Benjamin) and I had to put my ego to the side and just let her go (she looked to be going sub 7:30, and that is simply not me). I planned the tempo section so I finished as I approached the .7 mile hill leading back to my house. Usually I trudge up this hill and watch my last mile split crash and burn. Today I turned the corner onto this hill and that headwind hit me full boar. I shortened up my stride (a lot) and just kept my head down. After cresting the hill, stopping my watch and  grabbing my knees (you know, the usual) for a minute or so I went back around the block at what was supposed to be a 9:30 pace but ended up closer to 9:00 for another 1.3 miles.  Got home and did some stretching. Finally a good run!!! Lots of mixed up variables today - new tights, new fuel, no handheld, unexpected weather conditions. I definitely think tights could be a good idea for race day, I'm surprised to say. Now I'm going to have to do some serious thinking about my handheld. It was awesome not to have that weight to carry. Maybe I'll convince James to bring me water at strategic locations throughout the course. I'll have to look into that.

2 miles warm up
5 miles tempo   8:19, 7:58, 7:50, 8:18, 8:30
2 miles easy   hill .7 mile 6:06 (8:45) into strong headwind, 1.3 miles @ 9:00
15 minutes stretching

last "long" run before NVHM

Traveling and running don't go well together. Either that or I'm still psyched out about this race. On Thursday morning James and I went out for a nice easy morning run before heading to Hershey for the Thanksgiving. It was pleasant to go at an easy pace and to be able to talk throughout. We picked a relatively flat route and didn't push on the hills. I had a near accident about 4 miles in but thankfully a gas station was open and I made it to their restroom just in time. On Friday morning after much food and merriment we got up early (my parents still sleeping, uncharacteristically) and went for an easy run. I was having a little bit of tightness in my left ankle/achilles and wasn't sure it was a good idea to go out at all, but figured I could stop at any point. We only went about 3.5 miles before I sent James on his way and I walked for a bit to stretch things out. I'm still not at a point that I can run consecutive days without things getting a little hairy. Gotta give my joints/ligaments/tendons more time to get strong enough for more consistent training. For now I'm glad to have the elliptical, arc trainer, gauntlet, etc for cardio on the other days of the week.

11/26/09   6.5 miles, 57:43, 8:52 pace

11/27/09   3.9 miles, 36 min, 9:14 pace

We ended up cutting our travel plans short so I was able to keep my "long run" for Sunday rather than having to squeeze it in on unknown terrain in Hershey. I woke up this morning to some serious GI troubles and had to delay my departure by about an hour before I thought I would be safe to go. I basically did the same run as 3 weeks ago (my last solo long run) except this time it sucked. I had it in my mind that I did the first four close to 8:00 and the next 5 at 8:30-8:50. So I went out with a similar plan. I should have checked my log, this was not how I did the run last time. Last time I actually intentionally went out slower (8:15 for first few miles) so as not to crash and burn. This time, I crashed and burned. First 2 miles 8:00, next 3 miles 8:05, 8:10, 8:20, then crashed and next 3 miles were terrible with multiple times stopping to grasp knees, suck wind and curse the hills (9:02, 8:55, 8:44). Didn't add any extra loops to the run and ended it just short of 70 minutes. It did not leave me feeling any better than last week's NVHalf Training run about the hills on the course.

11/29/09   8.3 miles, 1:09:50, 8:24 pace

 I think that basically the first 2 months of running went well because I didn't have a lot of expectations for myself. Now that I am a little further on I keeping setting these expectations and making plans and goals; I think its actually making it harder to enjoy myself or to feel good about myself. A few steps forward, and now a few steps back. I'm looking forward to this race being over so I can spend some time just building a stronger base. I may have rushed into this distance. Sigh.

psyched out

up until the spirit of pittsburgh it seemed like every week i could feel my running getting stronger. over the past 2 weeks it feels like with every run i am slower and losing confidence. i learned my lesson from last week with too much mileage too soon and this week after my twelve miler (horrible and slow - note to self: must fuel during long runs) i took two recovery days despite feeling that i could have run yesterday. today i went out for a 5 mile run. just wanted to do one of those runs where i settle into an 8 minute pace and go...  well i did 4 miles at an 8 minute pace, sort of. the first two miles were a few seconds over and then i cranked on the next two for 7:50ish miles. but it felt hard. the whole time. and when i hit my turn around at the end of easterly i decided to ease off. figured i could just run a 9 minute pace the way home...but it felt hard (i always seem to be slow heading west on easterly - i think its windy there???) and i gave up and switched to modified fartleks. run hard, get tired, walk, regroup, repeat. did that the 1.8 miles home. that was hard too. how is it that this pace feels hard now when i was able to do it for an hour earlier in the fall? this half marathon is psyching me out. big time. and it sucks. boo.

quick and dirty

its been a crazy week and somehow i've neglected writing. after my awesome run on saturday i went on another outstanding run on monday. i then ran with the nvrc on tuesday for a hills workout. it was brutal and i was not ready. we did a 6 mile course that is all entirely up or down hills, with no flats. in the end i think my pace was around 8:30, but it was brutal. i had to walk more times than i'd like to admit. i ended up doing some serious minor harm to my legs. for the net 36 hours i was in some significant pain in the lower calves and ankles. i had planned to run track on thursday before heading out for our interview in syracuse, but when thursday morning rolled around i still had some significant sensation in my left ankle/calf and decided on just a few easy miles around my house. was one of the worst runs i've had in a long time. tried to run around a 9 minute mile in order not to overtax the system, but i actually think that the slow pace may be part of the problem. there is definitely something about my stride that changes when i go very slow and/or am fatigued. its that feeling of my feet slapping the ground, rather than landing lightly, that seems to precipitate pain later in the day.

i didn't workout yesterday, figured the spiky high heeled boots i was wearing for my interview were risky enough. so hopefully my feet will behave today on the 12 miler i have planned. wish me luck!

new long run distance = new definition of a mid-length run distance

On Saturday at 8:30am the NVRC had a scheduled long run leaving from Rec Hall that covered a significant portion of the NVHM. Marty Mazur led the slowpokes (which included me, Lee, and his son Ben) while Meira led the speedsters (about 8 of them). We ran out Curtin and straight into the tailgate madness (PSU vs. Indiana starting at noon). Strangely enough, this was the first time I have ever been close enough to any of that to smell the smells and be surrounded by all the people. Needless to say, I was glad when we passed the 1.5 mile mark and got away from all of that. In order to avoid heavy football traffic on the airport road (part of the race course) we cut through some trails that run parallel. This was not bad until the trail got really narrow and we had to start climbing over things and pushing aside branches and whatnot. I wasn't a huge fan of this "bushwhacking" section, but it was nice to mix things up a little bit. We then jumped in to the course in the hilly part around mile 8 (of the course) and covered some rolling terrain. Eventually this evened out for a nice mile or so of relatively flat and open course before we hit the last 2 miles of the course which are known to be brutal (lots of praying and walking said to occur) due to a continuous ascent. I was wanting to test my hopeful pace for this section to see what it would feel like. This meant that I deserted my group temporarily but then twice had to stop (turn off minny) and wait to get within ear shot of marty to find out which direction I was supposed to be going. I felt pretty good about the hill. Only felt like my heart was going to explode towards the very end. I think the trick will be not to look ahead. It looks much worse (especially with the increasing steepness over time) than it really was. Or at least, with 7 miles under my legs (who knows about 11) it was manageable. Somewhere along this hill we lost Lee and Ben. As we came to the final turn of the course, we once again headed into the tailgate area. This kind of busy-ness and density of people makes me want to throw elbows and sprint through. Marty seemed a little tanked at this point (in addition to being popular and people wanting him to stop and chat) and I had to hang back so as not to desert him. At this point (in the last mile and a half) our pace slowed down a bunch. Although I am trying hard to be a good joiner and team player and all that stuff, its hard for me to run slower than I know I could be running. Especially on Saturday, when this was my first 10+ mile run, I was looking forward to hitting that 10 mile mark and seeing the time I was at, so slowing down with half a mile to that point was frustrating (but I kept it in check). I did a little dance (more like a skip and a hoot) when Minny chirped mile 10 and then as our "finish line" came into site I briefly left Marty and ran it in at full speed to see what was left in my legs.

10.41 miles 1:34:15  9:03pace

We stood around for the next 15 minutes or so stretching, chatting, and waiting for the speedsters to get back from their 14 mile loop. I was feeling pretty good. No pain. Handheld worked excellently and my all-natural kiddie fruit chews made for excellent mid-run fuel (mile 5 I think I took them). After we all split up I headed to PETCO to buy toys and then to PAWS to visit with Tarzan again only to find out that since my mother's application was approved that they didn't ask the foster mom to bring him in. I visited with some of the other cats for about an hour before heading home. Didn't feel nearly as wrecked throughout the rest of the day as I have with past long runs.

Sunday I woke up from a weird dream (involving racing, and riddles, and competition with siblings, and losing one's footing) and felt down in the dumps that I wouldn't get to go on a nice Sunday long run, as I have had the pleasure of looking forward to for the past 6 weeks or so. Had trouble shaking that crappy feeling all day, even after heading to the gym for some elliptical and foam rolling (my usual Saturday workout).

Yesterday I woke up and decided that even if Monday is not a running day (I've been sticking to T, Th, Sun), that I could run on this Monday because of the Saturday long run. I planned to do a little out and back on Blue Course, with the turn around at the top of a hill around 2.5 miles in. Around 2 miles into the run I started debating with myself about changing the route to a shortened version of the long run I did a little over a week before. Having looked at that route a number of ways I had the sense that I could make it around 8 miles. So instead of turning around when I crested the hill, I followed down the back side and jumped on the bike path. This run, which had been glorious in the reverse direction was quite tough in this direction. From mile 3 on it was uphill pretty continuously for 3 miles. Having taken the long run nice and easy in terms of pace, I wanted to push this run a little more. I decided that the first four miles around 8:00 and then next four under 8:30 would be very good, given the terrain. The first four were pretty easy actually and Minny chirped at 31:xx. Having pushed mile 4 to keep the pace, the next 2 miles of hills were tough and my breathing was effortful. Those miles were 8:26 and 8:15 or so. I then got a little bit of a reprieve on College before turning back on Blue Course and home. Last 2 miles were around 8:20. I wanted to pick up the pace a little but it seems like after my turnover slows its hard to speed back up, especially when there are hills in the mix. The whole run was very windy, but the sun was nice and warm on the skin.
Overall: 8.13miles    1:06:20  8:09 pace 

As soon as I got home I started to have some foot issues, deep pain in the inner ankles. It lasted most of the day but is feeling alright right now. I haven't quite been able to nail down what it is about the run after the long run that leads to this pain. My new hypothesis is that I wear these cheap faux running socks on my early week run, and the tight "support" band around the arch might be doing something funky. I don't know. Today, NVRC is doing hills. I'm going to try to join although I'm not sure how back to back runs will go.

track thursdays!

joined the NVRC for my first group track workout today at lunch. a nice 1.5mile warm up to go over to the track. after arriving and stretching a little, marty announced that we will do relay pyramids. "what is a relay pyramid?" you say...basically, you team up and trade off running different length intervals. marty and i were partners so it went as follows. M runs 200, R runs 400, M runs 600, R runs 800, M runs 1000, R runs 1000, M runs 800, R runs 600, M runs 400, R runs 200. being the slowpokes of the group it seemed like a good idea to partner with marty but the catch was that I ran my final interval completely alone on the track with every other person standing at the finish line waiting for me. thankfully i still felt kicky at that point and power sprinted the whole thing. i know that people actually do this workout on their own and that seems crazy to me. last week when i ran those 400's i basically did equal distance on and off. this was pretty different. on the recovery people basically stood around and waited (or when your partner had an uneven distance, shuffled across the track to the other side to await their arrival). so the total distance covered was relatively shorter than with an active recovery. it definitely allowed me to go faster than i would have otherwise. watching speedsters flying past me and around the track at different angles didn't hurt either. humiliation is as good a motivator as any ;-)    but really, this is a super nice group of people. meira, a freakishly fast distance runner, happens to also be super friendly and cheered me on every time i went by her (her rest interval was my work interval). i need to pay more attention to the nice things people say so i can cheer similarly. i'm not very good at that at this point.

workout was as follows:
1.5 mile warmup  12 minutes
400m        1:36 (6:24)
rest
800m        3:24 (6:34)
rest
1000m      4:17 (6:37) 
rest
600m        2:34 (6:31) 
rest
200m        :32  (4:21) 
3.1mi cooldown jog with a cramp most of the way. at the most painful 9:45 pace i have ever experienced. but smiling the whole way.

for the first 10 seconds of that last 200 i felt like this:

tarzan

i'm going to have a new brother!!! my mom's application has been approved and tarzan is going to join our family and move to his forever home the weekend after thanksgiving.

tuesday

i'm not a big fan of tuesday running. i don't know what it is, but i always have the most foot pain on tuesday, feel the most tired and slow, and am gripped by the most pessimistic thoughts on my tuesday runs. frustrating. today i had 10k planned. the first 3.8 miles is downhill (on average), following by a large hill (.6 miles up, .4 down), following by another steep hill followed by a continuous climb all the way home (1.4miles). my goal was to average a 9:00/mi pace but knowing that the hills were coming i wanted to bank a little time on the descent so i could do more like 9:30 for the climb at the back end. my run pretty much mapped my plan to a tee, except that it sucked and was hard. clearly i'm a wimp, i don't like when it feels hard. fooey.

splits: 8:44, 8:13, 8:15, 8:37, 8:55, 9:00, 1:50 (9:10)

time 53:37; distance 6.2 miles; pace 8:39.  mission accomplished, i guess.

forerunner rocks!

a perfect day for a run. it was near 50 when i left the house for the schedule 9 miler this morning. i was determined to maintain a more reasonable pace than i normally do on sunday because this was going to be my first run that was intended to go considerably over an hour and i know that somewhere around 50 minutes that 8 minute pace is not sustainable (yet). so my plan was to run the first 5 miles at a sub 8:30 pace and then the last 4 miles at a sub 9 minute pace. seemed doable despite the rolling hills and large climb from 5.3 to 6.1 miles. and indeed it went just as planned. first 5 miles run at a comfortable pace, allowing myself to increase my turnover on the downhill and glide into the next hill or the flat, but mostly holding back a little so that my breathing was accelerated but not labored. splits: 8:24, 8:17, 8:18, 8:03 (whoops), 8:08. i even looked around, enjoyed the scenery, beautiful bike path, smiled and waved to passers-by, and generally enjoyed myself. went through a short tunnel (made of cement) and garmin immediately lost signal but relocated me as soon as i emerged. changed gears as i hit the hill at 5.3 miles and shortened my stride a little in order to keep my turnover about the same. felt pretty good actually. ate some sport beans (mmmm, watermelon) after i crested the hill at 6 miles. had meant to take them at 5 mile mark but didn't think that hill climbing (heavy breathing) and chewing would be a good combo. mile 6: 8:49. miles 7-9 were on well known and practiced roads (college, corl, westerly, blue course) so i just enjoyed myself and monitored my energy/fatigue and maintained my moderate pace. 8:22, 8:41, 8:29. did away with my normal sprint to the finish (the short hill at mile 8.5 was enough of a test of my will) and then arriving home i plugged in my garmin and downloaded my data. what an awesome toy/tool!!!

went to paws and visited with many wonderful kitties and cats. my mom is gonna have great options when she comes to pick the newest member of her (our) family. didn't manage to eat anything substantial (just a protein shake when i got home) until around 4pm. that was a bad idea. feeling headachy now. fatigue and tightness setting in a little bit as well. time for a little vegging in front of the tv. am feeling hopeful about the half on december 6. add a mile a week and maintain a similar pace and i should be race ready.


9.2 miles 1:17:13 8:23/mile