Going Goofy

Training week 14

2011-11-18T10:51:00.000-08:00

Monday, October 24

Rest. Of course.

Tuesday:

Ran 6 miles at lunch in 1 hour. Miracle. (Training schedule called for 8 miles with 5 sets of 600 at 5k pace, 7:26- not bloody likely).

Wednesday:

Ran 7 miles.

10:17/9:59/9:59/10:07/9:56/9:37/9:52

Thursday:

Ran 6 miles in 58:17 at lunch. It's hot again. 75 degrees, 80% humidity.

10:07/9:28/9:18/9:37/9:49/9:55

Friday:

Nothing.

Saturday:

Nothing.

Sunday:

16 miler scheduled.

Nothing. It's hard to run when you are wallowing in self pity. My mojo is nowhere to be found. I can only hope I can at least hold on to my fitness. Why has this happened?!

2011-11-17T11:48:00.001-08:00

Athens Half Marathon, October 23, 2011

OK. I decided to look at this as an opportunity. It's not so much that I totally slacked off the last three weeks for no reason; I was tapering. So there.

I wore shorts, a red shirt (in honor of UGA!), my black Zensah calf sleeves, black gloves, and black Adidas shorts. At the last minute I threw on a light windbreaker. I really didn't feel like being cold.

I joined a group of runners (or maybe zombies, it was dark), and walked to the start. We passed a tent for Occupy Athens- about two people in there. I tried to line up with a pace group- unfortunately, some of the pacers didn't show up, including the 1:50 guy. I had been hoping to go out with the 1:50 group. The race organizer asked the group around me if we wanted to carry the sign- we all declined. If I'd had more time to think, I might have volunteered to carry one of the signs for the slower people, but no way I was committing to 1:50!

A few days before the race, the organizers posted a message on facebook asking for someone to sing the National Anthem. To my surprise, a runner volunteered. The runner ended up doing a great job. I thought that was so cool- jump up there, sing the Anthem, hand off the mike, and start your Garmin...

The plan was to start slowly because I'd done absolutely zero speedwork. Yeah, the plan didn't entirely work.

Mile 1: 8:47

Kill me. I forgot my open finger gloves that convert to mittens, so I bought some cheap gloves. I can't use the screen on my iPhone, but these people behind me will run me over if I try to balance my phone and water bottle while taking off a glove. I finally pull over to a sidewalk. Stupid.

Mile 2: 8:03

I think it was here that we ran around the stadium. I'm not a football fan and don't feel strongly about UGA, but the stadium was cool.

Mile 3: 7:57

Uh, way downhill. This is the mile where I realized the hill was so steep my arm flailed out to catch my balance. By all means, blaze down it, cause I won't need to save any energy to get back up later. I am my own worst enemy.

Mile 4: 8:33

Was it around here that I saw a man sitting in a lawnchair in a full tuxedo with a glass of wine or was I already hallucinating?

Mile 5: 8:56
Mile 6: 8:27

Entering a dark, dark place. "Why am I doing this?" "How am I going to run a full in three weeks?!" I high five a little kid and feel so much better. (At the time I thought the kid brought up my spirits, and she probably helped, but looking back at the elevation chart, I'd been going uphill awhile.)

Mile 7: 8:35
Mile 8: 8:34
Mile 9: 8:44
Mile 10: 8:24
Mile 11: 8:27

Somewhere in that long stretch we entered the world's greatest neighborhood. Signs, cheering, banners- the works. One yard had at least 50 balloons filled with helium- awesome. It was almost to the level of the Gate River Run, but this was only it's second year. Cool people! I think a lot of them might have been drinking...

Mile 12: 8:23

One of the volunteers at a water stop yells something like "you need to get prepared for the last hill, pull yourselves together now and get ready." Far cry from the usual, "looking good" or the ubiquitous "you're almost there" lie. I hurried down a hill but tried to heed his warning and conserve some energy. (Turns out he was a coach).

Mile 13: 9:55

Really, Athens? What was that? Volunteer did not lie. There was a horrible hill at the end. Keep in mind that none of this course was flat, but that end was miserable. My knee was a bit achy and I was running as fast as people walking next to me, so I walked a bit. Oh, the horror. Pushed it up to a run for the finish.

Chip time: 1:53:16

AG: 15/126

I wandered back to the room and changed clothes. The race t-shirt was sort of ok, but not great. Good thing I'm not still hung up on bling, cause the medal left a lot to be desired.

Reflections:

I went into this race with unrealistic expectations. I was hoping to break 1:50, but the hills just never ended (so glad I didn't carry the 1:50 pace flag!) I tried to run cautiously (with the exception of the wildly flailing hill) out of fear of getting hurt right before my full. Having run absolutely no fast paces before the race, I was pleased I could maintain roughly an 8:30 the whole way.

I don't know if I could have run faster or not, which ruined any predictions for a relatively flat full... It was a fun race, but not one I need to do again- did I mention Athens is really, really far away? And in the future, I'd probably be better off running my last 20 miler three weeks from my goal marathon rather than a half.

Oh, and I hated wearing the windbreaker. I'll just be cold from now on.

Training week 13

2011-11-17T11:38:00.000-08:00

The rut continues.

Nothing Monday or Tuesday. Monday was a travel day, Tuesday was probably just blah.

Wednesday:

Ran 9.18 miles at lunch.

9:42/8:57/9:08/9:31/9:35/9:27/8:50/9:08

Friday:

Checked into the Holiday Inn in Athens. Nice fraternity party downstairs. Perhaps Miss Jennifer is too old for this nonsense. We have a "suite." It's a really old hotel, so the suite is a strange shape. I went to turn the heat on in the sort of sitting area and managed to set off the world's loudest fire alarm (which in turn set off the world's loudest children. Conveniently none of this could be heard over the world's loudest fraternity party.)

Saturday:

Drove around Athens with the peeps. We had to walk down an eternal hill to get to the Expo. Great. I was teased by two organizers for being from Waycross- "gonna be hillier here." Thanks, I hadn't noticed. Wheezed all the way back up the hill pushing the stroller- perfect.

Sunday:

The Athens Half Marathon... I'll save that for my next entry.

I'd like to take a moment to point out that I'd run 9 miles for the week prior to the Half. That's not really in any of the training schedules...

Training week 12

2011-11-17T11:24:00.000-08:00

Trying to get back on track...

Sunday, October 9:

Ran 14 miles in the afternoon in the rain. Found my friend, Mary, out running too. Stuck with her for two miles. I think she was taking pity on me, but I enjoyed having company. I was supposed to do 18, but started too late and lost daylight.

10:33/10:07/10:34/10:43/10:47/10:09/10:10/10:07/10:20/9:58/10:03/10:02/9:46/10:31

Monday: rest

Tuesday:

Ran 2.61 miles at 7 p.m. Granted it was getting dark, but less than 3 miles? I'm in deep trouble.

Wednesday:

Flying to DC. Ran 5.55 miles in the morning before our flight.

Thursday:

It took us all day and 3 airplanes to get to DC the day before. Ever been in an airplane that's been in the air for an hour only to have the pilot say "we're turning around because the door ajar light is on?" Ok, it wasn't exactly in those words, but that was the problem. Terrifying. And then had to spend all day in airports with a 3 year old and 5 year old. They held it together pretty well, but the potential for meltdown was high (from all of us, not just the little people).

Friday:

OK, it's cold outside and I've been to a real running store and have a cool new shirt! That should give me my mojo! I take off at 5:15 a.m. in Alexandria. I ran down King Street, Duke, Washington St. I called it quits at 7.15 miles. I never could find the Mount Vernon Trail, but I did have a fox cross my path. Odd that the closest encounter I've had with wildlife would be in Old Town!

Saturday:

I've seen the Mount Vernon Trail signs; I've seen people actually on it from the Metro. I will not be denied. I did 8 miles at 5:34 a.m. I was always near the trail as best I could tell, and sometimes on a random trail, but alas, the Mount Vernon Trail was elusive. I didn't see any people on the trail I did find- that was a little eerie. I turned around at Crystal City. Stupid trail! Anyway, that was 8 miles in 1:21:xx.

So, yet another week passes without a long run. I'm pleased I ran in DC at all, but freaked out that I've missed or shortened three long runs in a row. Oh, and I ate my weight in pumpkin ice cream and La Madeleine the whole trip- it's all going downhill now.

Training week 11

2011-11-17T10:48:00.000-08:00

Sunday, October 2

This was a hard one. We were at the hotel in Atlanta- the Taylor Swift concert was that night. I was scheduled to run 17 miles. There was a half marathon in Atlanta that morning. Part of me thought Emma wouldn't even be awake by the time I came back if I snuck off... The practical side of me worried that I'd get lost or I'd have some sort of medical emergency or the fire alarm would go off at the hotel or Emma would somehow get locked out of the room... I decided to harness my OCD and ignore my training schedule.

Instead of running, we went to the Target with the cart escalator (country bumpkins for sure, but really, there's an escalator for your cart! How cool is that?!) We went to Perimeter Mall too. It's strange how you can leave a city for ten years and your internal mall GPS can still kick in. We found a few things at J Crew, ate Chinese food at the food court (see Phipps?), and headed back to get ready for the concert.

Drumroll.... We head over to the CNN Center for the Phipps entrance. We're talking to a bunch of girls going on and on about their seats. Emma and I don't tell them where our seats are. Funny though, she didn't want to tell them because it would be mean, where I was afraid they might beat me up.

We make our way to our seats. Have I mentioned they were front row?? Oh yeah. We take a bunch of pictures of us in front of the stage and chat with our new best friends. My favorite BFFs were the couple behind us- Carla and her boyfriend. Hysterically funny, but not always intentionally. The boyfriend insists on calling me Miss Jennifer cause I'm apparently 110 years old. He did tell Emma to worship me for getting the best seats in the house, which I appreciated. Carla tried to give me her pina colada cause she said if she drank it all, she'd fall down. I'm afraid I declined, but good news! To the best of my knowledge, Carla stayed on her feet.

Here we are waiting for Needtobreathe- who were also good.

This is during Long Live at the end. I'd taken so many pictures I thought I might be crossing the line from "getting my money's worth, damn it" to creepy stalker. I did bond with the guy who was filming for the actual screens- we were tight.

The show was really, really good. I could babble forever, but I'll leave it at that. I will say I have completely peaked in my gift giving for Emma- I'm positive I can never top this one.

And back to reality:

Monday:

Rest (and 5 hour drive).

I don't know what happened to Tuesday and Wednesday...

Thursday:

Ran 5 miles in 50:40.

Friday:

Nothing. Wow. The Taylor Swift concert was costly in both money and runnning mojo.

Saturday:

Yep. Nothing.

Training week 10

2011-11-17T10:31:00.001-08:00

Ugh.. I lost my running mojo, and subsequently my blogging mojo. So, this is sort of going back in time. I'm making this shorter (much like my running).

Tuesday, Sept. 27

Ran 8 miles at 12:16 pm. in 85 degrees, 80% humidity. Took forever. (1:23:xx)

Wednesday:

Supposed to do 12, did 6 instead. Again, with the heat and humidity. Again slowww...

Thursday:

Ran 11.65 miles in 85 degrees but just 50% humidity. Slightly better (1:54:xx).

Friday:

PACKING!!!

Saturday:

Emma and I drove to Atlanta for the Taylor Swift concert that was re-scheduled in July. We went straight to Phipps Mall for a little shopping, thinking we'd eat at the food court. Hello, Phipps was always snooty, but they've done away with a food court. You know what else they've done away with? Shoppers. Go figure.

We ended up at the little restaurant inside Nordstroms. It's a bit of a hybrid- you order and then get seated. And by seated, I mean you shimmy into your two person booth and desperately try to pretend that there aren't total strangers in their own booths within your personal space. Emma and I were cracking up splitting a pizza as everyone around us ate their salads (and wine- lots of wine). Then they brought our deserts-- I meant to order one but somehow ended up with both a slice of chocolate cake and a bread pudding. The women next to us visibly recoiled at the sight of this caloric madness, which set me off into gales of laughter. RUN!! The chocolate cake might try to stick to your thighs!!! They did laugh when it was obvious I'd busted them and I went through the whole "I didn't really mean to order this" excuse. Crazy place.

So, because Phipps is beautiful but BORING, we headed over to Lenox. Ah... so that's where all the people were. Seriously, hordes of people with bursting shopping bags. Insanity. We bought a couple of things in Urban Outfitters and then fought our way out.

We drove over to the Omni Hotel around 5:00. I got to valet park my lovely 10 year old Sequioa- it's a classy vehicle, with the split leather seats and all. The whole area was swarmed with tweens and teens and moms. Luckily, I'd purchased some nosebleed seats for the concert. Our good seats were for the next night, but what else did we have to do?! Emma put on her homemade Taylor shirt and we hit the top row of Phillips Arena. The show was great as I expected. We spent most of the night poking each other and saying "look at how close she is to our seats for tomorrow!"

Oh, and of course there was no running that day.

Training week 9

2011-09-28T13:15:00.000-07:00

Monday, Sept 19

Ran 8 miles at 12:22 p.m. in 1:20:xx. 82 degrees, 65% humidity.

10:26/10:06/9:54/10:03/9:44/9:51/9:57/10:07

Tuesday, Sept. 20

Ran 8 miles at 11:27 a.m. in 1:20:xx. 91 degrees, 80% humidity.

10:13/10:05/9:57/10:02/9:50/10:08/9:38/10:12

Wednesday, Sept. 21

Ran 5 miles at 11:23 a.m., 81 degrees, 98% humidity. Sheer misery.

10:39/10:25/10:03/10:08/10:32

Thursday, Sept. 22

Rest. Planning on running 10k in St. Simons. Got an e-mail pre-race talking about shuttle buses for the start. Not thrilled with the idea of a first time race and shuttles.

Friday, Sept. 23

Rest. I started thinking I could drive to the shuttle bus parking, run 3 miles, run the 10k, run the 3 miles back... thus getting in a bit of a long run. And then I started thinking about how I was going to run with my packet and get more water... And then my family rioted and refused to go to St. Simons, which now added a further complication of driving over an hour each way. And I bailed on the race. Oh well.

Saturday, Sept. 24

Really irritated that I took an extra rest day for a race that didn't happen (for me). So, I ran 5.12 miles at 5:26 p.m. in 90 degrees with 60% humidity. Average pace 10:27 m/mi.

10:58/10:08/10:32/10:12/10:23

Sunday, Sept. 25

Decided I was going to make up for the skipped race by getting in a good long run. Had 14 scheduled, so I did 18 miles. Again, I find myself messing with my schedule. This can only lead to bad things, but I really want to lock in some of the longer runs because the next few weekends are jam packed.

So, 18 miles in 3:07:xx at 4:54 a.m. in 71 degrees and 100% humidity. I kid you not, 100% humidity. I almost turned around in the first couple of miles because I kept seeing the same tan truck circling me- I was getting really freaked out. And then he pulled up next to me. I was about 10 feet into someone's yard with my finger casually resting on my Mace trigger... The guy rolls down his window and says "I don't want to scare you, I'm delivering papers." Oh, I knew that. Ahem. I went over to the hilly neighborhood a little early to get out of that mess- and ran smack into the world's biggest possum. Technically, I didn't run into him (I would have died right there), but he was in someone's yard and scampered straight up a pine tree. At least thoughts of Macing newspaper guys and possums distracted me for awhile...

I took 2 Endurolytes before leaving the house and went through 2 frozen water bottles. I had one Hammer Gel before I left (no breakfast), and then 1 at mile 7 and 1 at mile 13. I switched to frozen Nuun around mile 15. Gels don't upset my stomach so I shouldn't complain, but I'm developing a major aversion to them. I'm sure I should take more Endurolytes too, but I can't bear to bring them with me. I've really got to work on a fueling plan!

11:55/11:18/10:48/10/39/10:28/gel 10:31/10:16/10:38/10:11/10:15/10:15/10:14/9:55/gel 10:18/10:01/10:00/9:44/10:03

Training week 8

2011-09-27T13:45:00.000-07:00

Monday, Sept 12:

Rest.

Tuesday, Sept 13:

Ran 8 miles at 4:44 a.m. in 1:26:xx. Ave. pace 10:49. Did ten sets of fast strides- roughly twenty seconds each. Highly technical stuff! Smoky again...

11:41/11:07/10:51/10:37/10:55/10:42/9:40/10:54

Wednesday,Sept 14:

Ran 10 miles at 4:30 a.m. in 1:43:xx. 70 degrees, 80% humidity. Ave. pace 10:20 m/mi. And yet more smoke...

11:34/10:44/10:23/10:02/10:12/10:22/10:08/10:03/10:00/9:46

Thursday, Sept 15:

Ran 4.25 miles in 51:24, ave. pace 12:10. Weird pain in right calf. Not constant, but just shooting pain when I least expected it. Made me very apprehensive.

12:50/11:42/11:47/12:17.

Friday, Sept. 16:

Miles 3rd birthday!! Rest day.

Saturday, Sept. 17

Long run. 15 miles at 4:46 a.m. for 2:27:xx in 66 degrees, 75% humidity. Weather better, no smoke, and best of all, no weird calf pain. Did a gel with a G2 Gatorade- bad idea. Thought I was going to be hit by the gingerbread man, but made it home!

11:40/10:26/9:58/9:54/9:49/9:47/9:26/gel 9:57/9:49/9:23/9:25/9:05/9:13/9:22/10:19

I'm entering in a few weeks all at once- I've been a little overwhelmed thinking that I have trained myself really well to run forever at a snail's pace. But now that I'm entering these manually, I'm realizing that even slight temperature/humidity changes make a huge difference. And of course, I knew that, but seeing it in front of me is reassuring...

Training week 7

2011-09-27T13:32:00.001-07:00

Monday, Labor Day

No running. Did ride my "vintage" mountain bike and play in the pool. Ate a lot of yobe yogurt too.

Tuesday, Sept. 6

Ran 5 miles in 47:20 in the afternoon. 84 degrees, 51% humidity. Ave pace 9:28.

9:38/8:39/9:43/9:31/9:42

Hey, that's kind of speedy! A random dog ran with me on a hilly route...

Wednesday, Sept. 7

Ran 10 miles at 4:30 a.m. in 1:36:xx in 60 degrees, 50% humidity. Sweet!!!

10:29/9:35/9:16/9:45/9:27/9:34/9:44/9:32/9:20/9:40

So excited about the first run, I ran a second that afternoon at 81 degrees, 44% humidity. Did 4 miles in 40:07.

10:24/9:40/9:51/10:09

Everything felt fine, but I'm guessing when I'm eventually injured I can trace the beginnings to this day...

Thursday, Sept. 8

Rest. (The madness of the previous day worried me!)

Friday, Sept. 9:

Ran 9.13 miles at noon, 81 degrees, 53% humidity, after bloodwork and waiting for the cable guy... ave. pace 10:11 m/mi

10:44/9:55/10:06/9:54/9:47/9:50/1-:18/10:04/10:08

Saturday, Sept. 10

Long run. Yes, it was supposed to be Sunday, but it worked better on Saturday.
Did 20 miles in 3:19:xx at 4:30 a.m. in 61 degrees, 93% humidity. Ave. pace 9:57 m/mi. Took a gel at 7 and 13, had water. Really, really smoky. Amazed that didn't come back to haunt me.

11:07/10:32/10:31/10:19/10:16/10:07/10:07/9:49/10:22/9:43/9:45/9:49/10:16/9:21/9:20/9:27/9:22/9:15/9:39/9:42

Sunday, Sept. 11

Rest.

Training week 6

2011-09-27T13:17:00.000-07:00

In the interest of not boring myself to death, I'm eliminating listing the scheduled workouts. I've re-done the schedule to accomodate various weekend activities-- always a good idea to mess with your schedule! (NOT). So anyway, here's week 6:

Monday:

Smoky. Ugh. Did 4 miles in 42:xx in 90 degrees, 60% humidity.

11:00/10:15/10:09/10:57

Tuesday:

Smokier. I refuse to run. (And Harry has an eye appointment).

Wednesday:

Ran 9 miles at 4:30 a.m. in 1:31:xx. 76 degrees, 95% humidity. Ave. pace 10:13 m/m

11:28/10:29/10:00/10:02/10:07/9:43/9:53/10:04

Thursday:

Ran 4 miles in afternoon in 40:30. 91 degrees, 50% humidity.

10:24/9:55/9:50/10:20

Friday:

Ran 9 miles at 4:30 a.m. in 1:28:xx. 66 degrees !!!!!, 95% humidity. Ave. pace 10:13 m/m

11:09/9:57/9:34/9:39/9:28/9:47/9:36/10:01

Saturday:

Rest! Played with kids in pool at SSI. The boys are insane in the pool.

Sunday:

Ran my long run at St. Simons. 12.33 miles in 2:08:xx. 5:30 a.m. I didn't write it down, but I'm going with 80 degrees and about 10000% humidity.

11:31/10:18/10:25/10:24/10:09/11:04/10:45/10:21/10:08/9:58/9:43/10:25

So my mom has been heckling me about running in the morning. I didn't really understand until I ran in St. Simons. It's hot, muggy, DARK, and stinky. The sidewalks wind around and are uneven, the sprinklers are going off everywhere (including across the sidewalks), branches are ridiculously low, the flashlight is necessary the whole time, everything stinks, and you spend most of your time wondering if a creature is going to pop out of the marsh and eat you. Not doing that again...

Training week 5

2011-09-01T08:06:00.000-07:00

Back from the brink...

Monday: rest

Doctor's appointment:

Got the dehydration lecture (perhaps valid), the "do you take any vitamins or anything?" talk, the scheduling of future blood work, and my favorite comment, "is this your normal weight, cause you're a runner, right?" I interpreted that as "seriously, you can't drop the extra 10-20 pounds running?" I recovered and actually liked the doctor, but still...

Tuesday: 7 miles scheduled.

Um, I did 2.11 very slowly. At least it was forward movement.

Wednesday: 12 miles scheduled.

Back to baby steps. I ran 7 miles at noon, ave. pace 10:15 min/mile. It was 95 degrees with 50% humidty.

Thursday: rest.

I've done enough resting, thank you very much. I ran 8 miles at 4:45 a.m. in 1:24:xx. It was 75 degrees, 95% humidity.

11:38/10:42/10:40/10:36/10:14/10:13/10:19/10:09

Friday: 10 miles scheduled.

I'm going back to the "rest" plan. I can pretend I flip-flopped Thursday and Friday.

Saturday: 5 miles recovery scheduled.

I ran 20 miles. Really.

Sunday was looking to be insanely busy, so I decided to do my long run on Saturday. Even though my long runs had been absolutely cursed and I should have dropped my mileage, I decided it was worth the injury risk to run the full 20 miles, just to restore faith in my marathon chances.

So, out the door at 5:15 a.m. (sleeping in!). It was 77 degrees with 85% humidity- wow, cool snap! And I ran, and ran, and ran. I had a frozen bottle of Gatorade from miles 1-8, water from 9-14, and Gatorade from 14-20. I took 2 endurolytes before the run, and 1 during. I had gels at miles 8 and 14. The gel at mile 8 did seem to give me more energy- and I had to keep telling myself that at mile 14 as I gagged down the second one. I left a cooler on my front porch with my frozen bottles and sunglasses- when I swapped out, I tossed my flashlight. I did feel like a hardcore runner! The thing about 20 miles isn't so much that it hurts (although it does, especially the last 2-3 miles), but it's so tedious. I threw in a bit of a fast-finish effort in some of the later miles- not so much for the training effects as to just make the run end faster. Twenty miles is like the world's worst road trip (and sometimes, briefly, it's the world's best road trip- go figure!)

11:37/10:39/10:14/10:05/10:17/10:08/10:04/10:25/9:52/9:46/10:04/9:20/9:31/9:35/9:19/9:08/9:35/10:08/10:07/10:45

So, the long run curse is officially broken!

Sunday: 20 miles scheduled.

Ha! Rest day. I was tired obviously, but not that sore. Plus, the soreness I was feeling was even- I only panic when one part of my body hurts more than another- that would be the sign of injury vs. soreness (learned that the hard way!)

Training week 4

2011-08-26T08:20:00.000-07:00

Not so good.

Monday: rest scheduled.

Late long run from week before, with the threat of escaped convicts.

Tuesday: 8 miles scheduled.

Ran 4 miles as recovery in 91 degrees, 49% humidity. My notes say "hard to stay slow." Classic foreshadowing.

Wednesday: 5 mile recovery scheduled.

(I flip flopped Tuesday and Wednesday, and then messed with them some more. Oh, hindsight.)

Ran 10 miles in 1:39:xx at 4:30 a.m. 72 degrees, 96% humidity.

10:57/9:49/9:40/9:44/9:26/9:17/9:41/9:43/9:43/10:10

Thursday: 11 mile long run scheduled.

Ran 5 mile recovery at 5:15 a.m. 71 degrees, 100% humidity.

12:01/11:10/10:42/10:30/10:30

Notes say "tired!" Oh, really?

Friday: Rest scheduled. (I planned on doing Thursday's 11 miles- so why did I run 5 on Thursday?)

Impossible to get up. Felt horrible. Perhaps the newly acquired fever (and accompanying heat rash) and stomach cramps are the trouble? Didn't do anything but wallow in self-pity.

Saturday: 7 miles scheduled.

Again, went the self-pity route. Still had a fever and what I thought was a touch of a stomach virus. I started thinking my fever was low enough to run, but the stomach cramping made me nervous.

Sunday: 18 mile long run scheduled.

The curse of the long run strikes again. Fever gone, but still had stomach issues. I spent the entire day wondering if I should just focus on the half distance. I briefly considering changing goal races to one in December, but that would mean more training weeks (and that is unthinkable at this point).

OK, so this is getting ahead, but by a freak coincidence, I had a check up with a new doctor on Monday. She's a runner too so yay! I told her my symptoms and about the whole running in the morning thing, and she said I was probably suffering from dehydration. Hello! That does make more sense than a mild stomach virus (cause who's ever even heard of a stomach virus being mild?) Even though I was drinking water and taking Endurolytes, I think the increased humidity in the mornings (plus the increased exhaustion factor) was doing me in. So, that's that. I bought some Gatorade and will look into buying some more Heed and stuff too- I really hate consuming extra calories while running, but keeling over isn't a better option.

And that's it for a very demoralizing week 4.

Training week 3

2011-08-17T11:35:00.000-07:00

Monday: rest.

Did 6 miles at recovery pace, 11:00 a.m., 91 degrees, 76% humidity. Have given up hope for my Garmin. Sad.

Tuesday: 9 miles with 5 at half pace.
Yeah, right. Half pace...

Did the 9 miles in 1:28:xx at 4:30 a.m. 78 degrees, 84% humidity. First mile feels fast, but never is. So they say heat is bad and humidity is bad, but together is more than a doubling effect (really, really bad). I think getting up at 4:00 a.m. and running 9 miles has the same impact...

11:07/9:52/9:31/9:48/9:25/9:23/9:11/9:34/9:42

Wednesday: 5 recovery miles.

Ran 4.81 at noon. 91 degrees, 58% humidity. OK, didn't have to get up at some insane time, but lots o'sun.

Thursday: 10 miles general aerobic pace.

Ran 10.05 miles in 1:40:xx at 4:30 a.m. 78 degrees, 84% humidity. Did a bunch of hills cause I was bored with my immediate neighborhood.

11:29/10:25/9:41/9:55/9:47/9:45/9:50/10:08/9:27/9:37

When debating what to do this weekend, we came up with the brilliant "let's trick the kids and go to Disney for Saturday" plan. Always fun, but not part of training schedule!

Friday: rest

Does driving 4.5 hours to Disney count as rest?

Saturday: 5 mile recovery.

Follow up question: does hitting the Magic Kingdom at 8:20 and finishing the night at Epcot count? What if you throw in dragging a 30 pound irrational kid?

Sunday: 16 mile long run with 10 miles at marathon pace.

Wow. Not realistic. I brought my stuff, but I didn't have the stamina to get up. Drove home in a bit of a panic. And seriously? marathon pace? I don't think so.

Monday: rest.

I included Monday in this week because my OCD kicked in and I had to do the missed long run. After dropping kids off and checking in at the office, I headed out at 9:45. Somewhere around mile 2 I was thinking about how I really need to stick to half marathons (or just stop this nonsense altogether). Somewhere around mile 7 I had a change in attitude and knew I would finish this run...

Mile 9.5? Sirens and blazing cops- I get stopped. Get this: "You need to get inside. There's an escaped convict in the neighborhood." I kid you not. So I raced back home in a frenzy... I went back to work, because what else could I do?

10:18/9:51/11:10/9:58/9:46/9:51/9:49/9:27/9:28 (and mad dash with Garmin turned off...) 81 degrees, 64% humidity.

Monday Long Run, part two:

The 9.5 miles is killing me. It's not long enough to be a long run and stopping was totally out of my control, but I'm freaked out about not hitting the total distance. There's no way I'm going to try to hit 16 all over again the next day...So, I hit the road again at 4:35 p.m. and finished for 15.5 miles. It still wasn't the full 16 miles, but I was pushing the carpooling envelope big time.

I know you aren't really supposed to break up a long run (certainly not by five hours or so) but when three cops stop you in about three blocks telling you to go home, you pretty much go home.

10:10/9:23/9:31/9:14/8:58. 90 degrees, 60% humidity.

Oh, and the escaped convict truly was in my neighborhood (he crashed a stolen car), but he was caught before I went back out in the afternoon.

Training week 2

2011-08-05T10:26:00.000-07:00

I could call this Pfitz week 14 but that just confuses me.

Monday: rest day.

Best.day.ever. Well, running wise. It was also the first day of school- middle school for Emma and kindergarten for Harry. The kids seemed better with it than me.

Tuesday: 8 miles with 10 X 100 strides.

Lunch time, 91 degrees, 71% humidity.

First four miles were great- worked the strides in at somewhere around a 7:00ish pace. And then the heat hit me. Stuck my head under a faucet in a park. That helped for the next mile. Ran home, reloaded on water, stuck my head in the kitchen sink, and went back out for another grueling 3 miles to finish my 8 total. In retrospect, probably should have just called it a day when I was trying to crawl inside the kitchen sink.

Wednesday: 5 miles recovery.

Lunch time, 90 degrees, 70% humidity.

Still hot, but not nearly as bad thanks to a frozen water bottle and a slower pace. Hard to stay slow.

Thursday: 10 miles general aerobic.

4:30 a.m., 78 degrees, 91% humidity.

I couldn't bear the thought of a repeat of Tuesday (sure no strides, but an EXTRA two miles?!) so I decided I'd get up early. So there I was, out the door at 4:30 a.m. I had my runner's Mace attached to my hand, my water bottle, my iPhone, and a flashlight. Nothing like traveling light! Running in the dark wasn't that eventful- most of the streets were lit enough to leave the flashlight off, the sun wasn't wilting me (obviously), and there was no real traffic. There were two horrible Chihauhaus by the stadium and a little old lady moving her trashcan at 4:45 almost did me in, but I finished my 10 miles. And as a bonus, I got the kids to school on time with lunch boxes.

Friday: rest.

Noon, 90 degrees, 70% humidity.

To heck with rest. I did 4 miles at a recovery pace today to free up Saturday!

Sunday: scheduled 15 miles.

4:37 a.m., 78 degrees, 94% humidity.

Again, with the early stuff. 4:37 a.m. out the door with all my junk. The two Chihauhaus by the stadium have friends- another little one and a big boxer looking monster. The big one charged me (with his little friends following)- I yelled "NO" and kept backing out of the way. They charged a few times- never closer than 15 feet but close enough. Note to self: practice using Mace. I had my finger on the spray thing, but realized I didn't know the range. Second note to self: surrender stadium route.

So at least I was awake. Nothing else exciting happened except my Garmin died at 8 miles. I pushed on for a little over an hour. I had told Ted I'd be home around 6:45, so I called it quits. I think I got in about 14 miles. My Garmin was fully charged, but it's almost 5 years old. Next time I'll take Ted's...

That last missed mile made me a little crazy, but I've worked through it and think I can call this week a success (minus one mile... d'oh!)

PFITZ 18/55

2011-08-02T06:20:00.001-07:00

Yeah, so I've been a little negligent. I found myself in a bit of a rut last spring. I can't even remember where I left off, but I did four halfs (halves?) in four months. Let's see- Jacksonville Marine Corps Half, Soldier Half, Jacksonville Bank Half, and finally the Ocala Half. They all went reasonably well. I finished between 1:53 and 1:56 in all of them. I can't even remember my finishing time in Ocala, but I ended up first in my age group and scored a cool horse statue! That, my friends, was a hard race. Never-ending hills. Ouch.

In March, I finished the Gate River Run in Jax and found myself with a Top Ten Percent hat. Awesome! My scorching 8:30ish pace worked for the top ten women, but they weren't giving the hats to the guys around me. Ha. So in the future, 8:30 for women may get you a hat, probably not for guys. (I very rarely wear my hat cause I feel silly, but I still wanted one!)

The spring came- I finally can recognize a pattern to my running. Even though the summer and fall are horrible temperature wise, the rest of my life is more under control (no holidays and the kids' school stuff isn't in full swing)- my running seems better. In the spring, I'm pretty fit, but tired... and then the pollen kicks in. February is not a good month for me. I hung on this year and survived the Gate River Run (although I couldn't talk after the race). March through May is a disaster of school stuff- can you say field trips? And then it's hot again.

I like to gauge my summer fitness by the Fourth of July Sunshine Festival run. It was maybe a little hotter this year and I was ridiculously tired, but all excuses aside, it kind of sucked. I finished in something like 24:3x. It wasn't bad by any means, but was a full minute off last year's time and made it obvious that I'd been slacking. Oh, and gained a few pounds...

SO... I've decided to change things up a bit this year. First, I've accepted that summer through fall is my best training time. As much fun as it was to run the four halfs in four months, I think I'm going to focus on one or two races. Last year's training consisted of running races (the halfs) with a few weekend long runs (maybe 10 miles each) and about 4 weekly runs of 6-7 miles each with an average pace of 9:30 or so. I didn't follow a training plan for the halfs, and it showed. I was consistent, but I wasn't really improving. And I was always a little tired and on the edge of injury (weird tendon/foot swelling thing).

Drum Roll-- I just finished the first week of Pfitzinger's 18/55 plan. (Ok, actually it was more like the 3rd week but I had to jump in there and I'd already built up my base after the humiliation of the Fourth of July race).

I'm signing up for the Soldier Marathon. That's right-- the FULL. I might do a half as a training run along the way, but come November, I'll be running my first real Full (I don't count the Goofy because it was it's own crazy thing.)

So last week looked like this:

PFITZ: 15 weeks before the race:

Monday: rest (not a problem).

Tuesday: 10 miles at average 9:55 pace in the rain. I thought I looked like pretty hard core running in the rain until a little old lady tried to force me on her porch...

Wednesday: 4 miles at recovery pace (10:00ish). Again with the rain. Ugh. Had to avoid old lady's house.

Thursday: scheduled 8 miles with 4 at half pace. Only had time for 7 at lunch:
Mile 1: 9:38
Mile 2: 8:18
Mile 3: 8:26
Mile 4: 8:55
Mile 5: 8:57
Mile 6: 9:40
Mile 7: 9:53
I was supposed to hit a pace around 8:09-8:30 for the fast stuff. Obviously, I didn't. It was 86 degrees with 65% humidity and a dew point of 74 degrees-- I'm hoping these numbers will creep back down when (if??) the weather gets better. It certainly felt like a hard effort.

Friday: rest. Sweet!

Saturday: 4 recovery miles (ave. pace 10:05). This time the dewpoint was 77 degrees. Pleasant. And actually, I mean it. Sure the weather was horrendous, but slowing down the pace made it bearable. I had to keep changing to mellow music to slow myself down.

Sunday: Scheduled 14 miles at 9:06-10:06 pace. This one was rather daunting. I got up early (like dark early!) and ate some Greek yogurt and had a Diet Dr. Pepper. Out the door at 5:30 a.m. with a water bottle filled with Heed, my phone, shiny clothing, and a flash light. The temperature was 81, humidity 83%, and dewpoint 76 degrees. Ran by the stadium where two chihuahuas charged me (WTH?!) Waved to some cops. Really weird to run in the dark. Didn't need my flashlight so I tossed it in a friend's yard. Did the fourteen miles in 2:16:xx. Times were 10:59/10:11/9:58/9:47/9:39/9:23/9:33/9:31/9:17/9:18/9:49/9:30/9:44/9:56. This was a hard run but mostly because I was so worried about the dark that I didn't prepare to run 14 miles. By about mile 10 I was hating the now hot Heed- got a bit of a sidestitch going downhill- only made better by going uphill (but that hurt everything else!). Should have probably had a few more carbs before I left, should have at least brought a gel just in case, and really need to freeze my water ahead of time. I made it home well before 8:00 a.m. to find the boys watching TV and playing on Harry's DS- perfectly happy.

Thoughts on the week: two firsts-- I've never run any major distance in the rain and never in the dark (except at the start of a Disney race!). I found my paces based on times plugged into the McMillan calculator. I can already tell a difference in how I feel- I didn't realize how important it is to really slow down for the recovery runs. I put in a lot of miles this week (39) including my longest run in forever and only had minor soreness on Monday- I recognize it's silly to judge a plan by one week of runs, but I'm feeling optimistic.

Jacksonville Bank Half 2010

2010-12-20T10:28:00.000-08:00

Last race of my thirties...

Well, my very first half was the Jacksonville Bank Half in 2007. I hated everything about it. It was hot and steamy (pouring down rain about an hour before), it was boring, etc. Now, with the benefit of time and experience, I can say that I was a bit too harsh.

Here's what really happened-- I had been relying on my Nike+ system for my times. According to my Nike+, I was blazing fast! The speed shown on my iPod usually was within a few seconds on my 5k times, so I decided I didn't need to calibrate it (as if I was going to find a track here!)

A few days before the half, I decided I was a bigshot runner now, and I needed a Garmin. I proudly marched outside ready to record my super speedy training runs (even at a relaxed pace, I was clocking 8:00 minute miles on my Nike+). I quickly learned that the Garmin, with it's constant communication with three satellites, was totally wrong! Or perhaps, my $25.00 Nike+ plug in thing wasn't entirely accurate. And by not entirely accurate, I mean it was off my pace by about 2-3 minutes per mile. (It's still a mystery why it was correct when I was running in races). Yeah, my little world was shattered.

I went into the Jacksonville Bank Half fully convinced that my Garmin was wrong. After a totally sleepless night, I took off from the start at 8:00 minute miles- cause I was capable of that pace... Bad idea. Sure I was capable of 8:00 minute miles, but only for about 3 miles. The other 10 proved to be a problem. Somewhere around the turn around at mile 7, I started walking. Waves of people passed me. It was beyond dreadful. I dragged in, but I was not happy.(And that's when I learned you should always be signed up for another race in the future so that you can get past the gut reaction of "I will never, ever run again!") Did I mention that my horrible PF first made itself known around mile 7?! No exaggeration, it took me almost 20 minutes to walk into the hotel from the bus stop. I was so naive, I just assumed that I should hurt after running (sort of) 13.1 miles. That ultimately led to the pain and suffering for 26.2 miles during the Goofy, but that's a whole other story.

So I pretty much told everyone who would listen (mostly my running friend, Becky) that I hated the Jacksonville Half.

Now of course, I know that was horribly unfair.

Skip to 2010. This was my third race in three months, and would qualify me to join the Half Fanatics group.

I got up early the morning of the race and drove down to Jacksonville (while listening to a talk radio show where the guest was describing his past life as a horse). Packet pickup was easy. I parked in one of the neighborhoods, but noted the directions on my iPhone. It was yet another cold day. I went with black shorts, a long sleeve bright red shirt, an old jacket, and a Santa Hat (over my running hat). I'm getting dangerously close to the category of "costumed runners"- this frightens me (and my 11 year old).

The starting area is nice- over by the Bolles School. Lots of real bathrooms, which ranks high on my list of good things. Cute shirt too- bonus! I unfortunately listened to a couple of runners in the bathroom line who decided to wear jackets. I knew it was right on the line, but decided to keep mine- until I started getting really hot around mile 3. I left my favorite jacket (truth be told, it should have been retired long ago) and never saw it again...

You run on some busy streets (lane blocked off) and then in and out of neighborhoods. I recognized some spots from my first race, which I thought was funny because I can never remember the route. "Oh look, there's where I started the death walk..."

I kind of think of this race as an insanely long 5k. It was mostly flat or even a little downhill- that was nice. It's a little boring, but good for a fast race. I ended up finishing in 1:54:xx (chip time was in the 1:53s). The medal was much better than in 2007, and the shirt really is cute. I made it back in my car and home by 11:00 a.m.

If I try to run a full next year, this would be a good choice, but only if I spend a lot of time on my playlist...

(I learned how to change the posted dates on these entries- this is more than a little late!)

Reindeer Run

2010-12-14T15:03:00.000-08:00

And the annual Reindeer Run is upon us...

I didn't really want to run the 5k because the Jacksonville Bank Half was the next weekend. But, Harry wanted to do the one mile and the shirts are usually cute (although you have to wear them quickly because the reindeer feels silly after December). At least four people asked me if I was going to be running the race in the week leading up to it. I found that highly entertaining.

Harry and I arrived pretty early- it was cold and sort of wet. In four years of running, i've only run in the rain once (and after the initial novelty wore off, it just annoyed me, especially when the water kicked off the back of my shoe onto my leg). Lucky for us, the rain slowed to just a bit of a drizzle. I still worried that with Harry's history of falling, he was doomed to go down...

We lined up at the track with a few kids and some walkers. The race director got the kids to do a few stretches and jumps. Funny stuff. So the race started- I knew we were in trouble within one lap. Harry was whining up a storm. We had to keep passing a gazebo area where the 5k runners were waiting. Harry started jumping in puddles. I yelled at him to get out of the puddles, but then the audience of bored 5k runners started laughing and cheering, and there was no stopping the puddle jumping. So on we went, round and round, with Harry playing it up for his public each lap. By lap three, I was encouraging Harry to jump in the puddles- anything to maintain our forward momentum. We chatted a bit about Universal Studios purely as a distraction technique. A lifetime later, we finished. Someone's got to finish last, right? Harry got a water bottle for his prize. I was concerned he'd freak out over the lack of medals, but he took it well. Maybe he was just grateful to be done too.

We decided we'd use my new camera and take pictures of the 5k. We took a few pictures of Santa Moi (lead bike, in full Tri Santa suit) and then drove over to the hospital. I parked and rolled down my window for the pictures. That whole not getting out of the car thing might explain why some of my pictures were blurred, but it's not like I was being paid! Harry hung out the window and yelled things like "I think you can do it!" Inspirational, no?! I felt a little silly, but it was fun. Not surprisingly, the back of the packers looked like they were having the most fun.

We waited until we saw the police car go behind the last runner. Harry recognized the cop driving- he was excited that he knew him. I realized later that this was the first time Harry didn't fall down in a race- nice! But based on his general attitude during the race, Mr. Harry may be on a bit of a hiatus for awhile... I'm sure his public will be disappointed.

Soldier Half Marathon, Columbus, GA

2010-11-16T12:41:00.000-08:00

This was a pretty sweet race. I signed up at the last minute and then called for a hotel (probably should reverse that plan in the future). I finally found a room with a king size bed. Since my mom, Emma, Miles and I were going to be sharing this room, I was a little concerned. Well, the lady in reservations said she didn't care how many people I had in the room as long as I could live with it. Perfect. Hello, air mattress!

The race organizers were very clever- they posted constant news and weather updates on facebook, which made out of town simpletons like me quite happy. They included a medal hint- I'm thinking dog tags! Oh, and I'm thinking I'm going to be cold...

The usual drill: running late for the expo and packet pickup, refusing to make any stops, a few wrong turns, running into the building dragging my crew, blazing up to the table to get my bib... The packet pickup was in the Infantry Museum- totally surprised by how nice it was. Volunteers were great- got all my stuff and we headed to our hotel. The reviews said the hotel was really nice but in a really rough area. Yep. We couldn't find any decent food, so I grabbed a pizza at Little Caesars. The pizza was fine, but again, the area freaked me out. (We did attempt to go to a restaurant by the mall, but went the wrong way for a very long time. I'd write more about that, but it would be in violation of my "never speak of this again" declaration.)

After modeling several outfits for my own Stacy and Clinton, I blew up the mattress and curled up with baby Milo. After all, my mom and Emma had a big day of shopping planned and needed to be in the real bed. I could just shake out the little aches and pains over the course of 13 miles.

And now moving on to race day!

I got up, put on shorts, my running girl Brooks tshirt, hat, my sweet plaid arm warmers, my Zensah compression calf sleeves, a light vest, and my Newtons. I threw on a cheap sweatshirt- both for the warmth and to look slightly less ridiculous. Out the door and into the car... And put the heat on full blast cause I'm going to turn into a Popsicle any minute!

After an uneventful drive I left my toasty warm sanctuary and dragged my shivering, teeth chattering self into the museum. Now that's an advantage to this race! Huge heated building, lots of chairs, and a really clean bathroom with at least 20 stalls. (I'm thinking they have the stalls because they have receptions here- seemed excessive, but it was a beautiful sight. I almost took a picture, but didn't want to look completely crazy). I popped a gel on one of my last bathroom trips.

The plan: take one gel before the start, start slow, rely on water stops, take one gel at mile 7 or 8. Try for a steady 8:30ish pace.

And we start (after they had to turn all the runners around because we were facing the wrong way- are we runners or sheep!?) In the first couple of blocks, we make a u-turn- aha! That must be why we were all turned around! We go up a bit of an incline. I'm still cold. Oh, I am loving my favorite new race attire- little convertible glove/mitten things!

This is a different sort of race for me. We were on the base for awhile and then on a bike path (think paved small road in the woods). Don't get me wrong, it was a great course, I just didn't clearly notice the different miles.

Here are my splits:

Mile 1: 9:08
Mile 2: 8:38
Mile 3: 8:35
Mile 4: 8:37
Mile 5: 8:37
Mile 6: 8:25
Mile 7: 8:46
Mile 8: 8:29
Mile 9: 9:05
Mile 10: 8:43
Mile 11: 8:51
Mile 12: 8:53
Mile 13: 8:48

Some of my memories:

First, the course was advertised as flat with a rolling hill at mile 2. Most people would probably agree with that assessment. Not me. I saw hills everywhere, and I'd call the hill at mile 2 a bit more than rolling. I guess I'm a true flatlander. I kind of liked the variety, but it did hurt.

Second, running in an army race was way cool. A lot of soldiers were running the full in camo and boots. Wow. Soldiers were everywhere on the course cheering, including a high ranking General. You finish the race running through a long line of flags with soldiers lined up.

The water stops were great, but I was so distracted looking around the base that I missed the first one. My first water was at mile 4- entirely my own fault, but not a good thing.

The bike trail part of the course was beautiful- lots of changing leaves and views of a river.

I forgot to check the map to see where the turn was for the half marathoners. I asked a woman around mile 8- she was older than me but had sweet pink compression socks and a long ponytail swinging away. She didn't know because she was running the full... And then she passed me. Show off. Or maybe my hero. Or both. Obviously I found the turn around (at the bottom of a hill, naturally!)

Mile 11 was lonely. I think I saw one other runner on my side (some walkers were on the other side). It was bleak and if it wasn't really uphill, it was in my mind. Note to self: long training runs need to be longer or all mile 11s (and 12s and 13s) will continue to be more miserable than necessary.

The finish: great medal (yep, dog tags). Grabbed a drink and wandered back in the museum looking for coffee. None to be had. Dragged myself back to my car (never stop moving until you make it to the car!) and went back to the hotel. Spent the next eight hours or so shopping with my fashionistas. Little bit of PF, but not too bad. Demanded a trip to the army surplus store for some Harry presents... And off to home.

Oh, final time a somewhat disappointing 1:56:xx. Not rational to be disappointed, but there you have it. And it took me at least three days to get warm!

Race for the Pinks 5k

2010-10-23T06:25:00.000-07:00

I signed up for this 5k mostly because it was a few blocks from my house. Can't beat the transportation! The 5k was starting at 8:00 and the fun run at 9:00. I drove to the race (which felt really, really lazy) because Harry wanted to do the fun run and I was a little worried about getting him there in time.

Anyway, I put on my running skirt I bought for last year's Princess Half. I'm really not the running skirt type, but I thought it would be appropriate to look girly for the Race for the Pinks. Unfortunately, I'd never worn it before and it was both short and big. The little bit of coverage provided felt like it might slip down- that was distracting!

I talked to my friend Michelle before the race who just wanted to finish. I wanted to have a new time to plug into the race calculators so I lined up behind the always present half-naked, trash-talking high school boys. My friends Cheryl and Mary were next to me. They were doing this race the weekend before the Marine Corps Marathon in DC. Hard core. Cheryl tapped me on the arm and asked how old I was. I told her I'm 39. Her response was something like "oh, I thought you were older!" And now I know I'm a runner, because instead of thinking that I can't get to Botox soon enough, I recognized that she just wanted to know if she had to worry about me in the Master's division. Cracked me up.

The race started. First couple of blocks is downhill. Cheryl and Mary are in front of me. I find this unacceptable since I'm sure they're holding back a bit for their full next weekend. So I trot on past them. And found myself next to Allison. She's a triathlete type and she's running insanely fast. I keep up with her the first mile and a half- we're pushing 7:20s. The course is hitting all the hills. Using Cheryl's logic, it suddenly hit me that Allison is younger than me. Bye Bye.

The rest of the race was uneventful. I finished in something like 23:5x. I was hoping to be faster, but I was in the same order with the locals so I guess the hills took a toll on everyone (except Allison- note to self: don't try to keep up next time!)

Time to go get Harry. Pity I can't get out of the parking lot without going across the race course. Hmmmm.... I grabbed Harry's bib and just started trotting back to my house. I loaded Harry up in the stroller, knowing that he wouldn't want to go one step farther than a mile. I'm sure we were quite the sight- I'm hot, sweaty, wheezing, limping, pushing the ginormous Harry. (At least my skirt stopped threatening to fall off once I got hot). The race monitors laughed at me. Harry and I made it to the parking lot and put the stroller in the car.

We lined up. I was bragging about how Harry maintains a nice steady pace. Yeah, he immediately took off... and in half a block was walking. I remember him trying to walk on a curb and falling (good to get the prerequisite race fall out of the way early). He'd run, he'd kick pinecones, he'd walk, he'd wave at other people, he'd break into a limp and start rubbing his leg- very busy mile! It was definitely fun, but it took a long time to finish (I think 14:xx minutes). Harry did sprint in the last block or so. To his utter dismay, they'd run out of medals. I knew I'd won my age group, so I told him to stick around and that I'd give him mine. Unfortunately, I forgot that instead of medals, I'd be getting a little towel. Harry was less than impressed. Such is life in the back of the pack.

The teenage age boys were from a cross country team in Douglas- they finished 1st through 5th. Cheryl won the Master's division, but she was behind me. So did I really beat her or did she just play it safe and ignore me since I wasn't in her division?? My vet was at the finish line holding a random puppy. Turns out he'd seen it at his office the day before- it was chasing people on the course so he grabbed it and was going to walk it home. Small town!

I did decide I might have a new policy regarding 5ks. I couldn't run this 5k with my newbie friend because I needed enough time to pick up Harry, but I think in the future I may try to help pace some of my friends. I had an okay race time, but I was really crippled for a full week afterwards. I had to skip a lot of training including two weekend long runs- not smart. I'm not really sure why I can't seem to get rid of lingering injuries (apparently if you have some sort of PF in your left foot, you can overcompensate with your right and then end up with both legs crippled...) but stupid me shouldn't have been so competitive.

Worldwide Festival of Races

2010-10-11T11:01:00.000-07:00

This is a hard one to describe without totally admitting what a dork I am.

When I first started running way back in 2006, there was this newfangled invention- an iPod. And on that shockingly little Walkman, you could put something called a podcast. I don't know how it happened, but at some point I started listening to this guy, Steve Runner, who does a show called Phedippidations. Half the time I didn't understand what he was talking about, but I liked listening to him telling running stories and sharing information. And, let's face it, it was free and you can only take so much of the Black Eyed Peas on the treadmill.

One day, my new running friend, Steve, announced he was going to start a virtual race called the Worldwide Festival of Races. The timing of the race fell into my Goofy training. All I had to do was sign up online and print out a bib they generated, run a half marathon over a certain weekend, and post my results. I signed up and that Saturday, I went outside and I ran and ran and ran... and walked some... and ran some... it was my longest run ever. When I finished, I hopped in the bathtub fully dressed like the other hard core runners and took an ice bath. Alright, I'm not that hardcore- I took a luke cold bath, but still. I remember calling my mom and saying "I just ran a half-marathon!" So there it was- my first half marathon finish. I was very pleased with myself, but officially terrified of the Goofy.

Fast forward: I ran the Goofy, and had a baby, and signed up for the 10k the next year. I vaguely remember finishing that one. I think I might have done one other, but it really is a blur.

Fast forward again: When Steve started talking about the Worldwide Festival of Races this year, I was a little perturbed because it fell the weekend AFTER my half-marathon in Jacksonville. Technically I could have counted the Jax half as my virtual half, since I'm the one who reports my results, but it didn't feel authentic. And then I realized Ted was going out of town the weekend of the virtual half- ah, not meant to be.

But wait! Friday night was Parents' Night Out! And now Ted would be out of town and the kids had somewhere to be for a three hour block of time- and the Worldwide Festival was back on! I signed up again...

I scrambled around Friday getting the kids ready for Parents' Night Out (crazy hair night requires significant prep time). After dropping them off, I headed to the Y for a treadmill because I didn't want to run in the dark.

I hopped on the treadmill. Before pushing the start button, I stood there a minute and debated whether or not to pull my scrunched down compression socks up to my knees. Finally I decided that it wouldn't really add that much to the weird runner vibe I was already giving off- bright pink shoes, two water bottles, gels, visor, iPhone... so I yanked the compression socks up and pushed start.

Mile 1: yeah, not feeling it. Surely it will get better.
Mile 2: hey, this still sucks.
Mile 3: I'm cool with the old guy changing the channel, but seriously, the Weather Channel??
Mile 4: oh crap. I forgot to eat dinner.
Mile 5: oh look, I can have a gel for dinner. Yum.
Mile 6: shouldn't this be sucking less by now?
Mile 7: I'm all alone in the gym... kind of creepy.
Mile 8: I am so getting a biscuit at KFC when this is over!
Mile 9: stupid virtual race! have to start the treadmill over cause I'm almost out of time...
Mile 10: soul crushing to see the miles start over.
Mile 11: maybe I should slow down?? (but then this horror will never end!)
Mile 12: I'm so hungry...
Mile 13: that's it! I am NOT doing the last .1 miles!
0.1 mile: oh fine!!- I'll finish this stinking race!

And that's it. 13.1 miles at 9:50/mile. I took a quick shower, changed, and headed straight to KFC for my biscuit (or two). For once the kids were all organized and by the door so picking them up wasn't the usual challenge.

And that's my virtual race report on my virtual race!

Jacksonville Marine Corps Half 2010

2010-10-04T06:24:00.000-07:00

Background:

I signed up for this race primarily as a means to keep myself training during the summer. If I don't have a race looming over me, I will stop running. It's that simple.

Week before the race: shoe catastrophy.

Long story, but basically I had one pair of pink Newton shoes that were a little snug and I had a pair of yellow Newtons with 500+ miles (yes, I finished out the 500 miles). I had a pair of Sauconys that seemed fast but were completely untested. I also had a pair floating in the mail (thank you, Road Runner Sports, for sending me the men's version of my favorite yellow shoes and then taking forever to correct it- oh, except wait, it wasn't corrected- I got a duplicate pair of the tight pink shoes that I now need to send back... and there was the long story. D'Oh).

All of that was just a set up to explain why I ran two miles in the week before the race. Yep, TWO. My PF was flaring up and all of my shoes freaked me out in their own special ways. I took the extra time to print out pace charts. As the week grew longer, I started tossing those charts- 1:46? Ha! 1:47? Not likely. Finally, I decided I'd just wing it with my Garmin- if I could hit steady 8:30ish miles, I'd be happy.

Day of the race:

I was on the road by 4:00 a.m. I think it's actually easier to drive at that hour than try to pack all of my running stuff and all of the kids' stuff and get ready in a hotel... Of course, after you've run Disney, hitting the road in pitch black darkness still feels like sleeping in!

Yeah, forgot two important things: there's no traffic on the back roads in South Georgia at 4:00 a.m. and the Marines were in charge of the race. I was parked and ready at 5:30 a.m. and packet pickup took about 30 seconds. Oh well- gave me time to stress out over the three pairs of shoes I dragged along! Did I mention the race started at 7:00 a.m.? I watched them make some last minute adjustments to the balloons at the start line- not everyone can say that!

I perused some sort of Florida running magazine, decided on my old tested yellow Newtons, popped a gel and 2 endurolytes, and just people-watched from my car. Finally I made my way to the port-a-potty lines. While in the line, I chatted with a father and daughter running together (he'd done 3 Goofys, this was her first half). He warned me about the "corkscrew"- I wasn't really clear on what it was, but it involved a bridge and a horrible descent around mile 11... Oh good.

We lined up. There were no corrals or even signs. That didn't make me very happy. The Marines band played the National Anthem- really good.

And the start:

Ugh. Too crowded. Lots of weaving. I'm good with walkers even with their Camelbacks- what do I know, they may be testing their equipment for an Ultra- but must they get right in front of me??

Mile 1- 8:49

And there's the first bridge. It wasn't too bad...

Mile 2- 8:17
Mile 3- 8:51

Somewhere in here was the second bridge. It was really bad.

Mile 4- 8:18

I was delusional. I actually thought I could recover from the bridges and get back to an 8:07 pace.

Mile 5- 8:30

Lucky break: found an older hard-core looking guy in a bright green shirt. Decided he would be my pacer.

Mile 6- 8:25

Kept following the old guy. I liked the auto-pilot. Somewhere around here I actually noticed some of the cool stuff we were passing- trendy restaurant/shopping area, neighborhoods...

Mile 7- 8:33

I was feeling pretty good, although every now and then just out of nowhere I'd get hit by a massive urge to start walking. I usually gave myself a mental slap and changed my music...

Mile 8- 9:04

Dude, the old guy was so slick- I didn't even know he had a gel until I saw him toss it. I got mine out of my pocket (not easy carrying my iPhone and water bottle too). It wouldn't tear. Damn. I stopped running and finally tore it- I ate maybe half. In all my fumbling, I lost my old guy pacer.

Mile 9- 8:23

I could see the bright green shirt on the horizon, but I couldn't catch the old guy. I threw out my water bottle.

Mile 10- 8:51

I was still sad about losing my pacer, but I distracted myself wondering just exactly what the "corkscrew" was and how close we were...

Mile 11- 8:47

We were on sidewalks along the river now. It was nice because of the view, but it was kind of tight and my 500 mile Newtons weren't so cushy on the concrete.

Mile 12- 9:31

And around here, I learned what the "corkscrew" was. First, there was a pedestrian bridge- you went up about three squares of sidewalk, then leveled out about two, then repeated. And again... I made it to the top without walking, but then had a weird sort of out of body, knees buckling sensation. It was disturbing, but I was pretty sure no one around me was in good enough shape to rescue me, so I pressed on... to the corkscrew. It was a square ramp thing that just went down and down and down... I guess it was designed to avoid stairs, which I would have appreciated had I been pushing a stroller, but the sharp turns were really painful. I finally made it down. The one part of the corkscrew that I did like?? I saw a little bright green shirt way down below me. It was my old guy pacer! I couldn't catch him, but he hadn't gained a bunch of time on me since my unfortunate gel incident...

Mile 13- 8:57

We were in the Jacksonville Landing area now- lots of random people staring at us. I was desperately looking for the stadium... People who still had a little kick started passing me. Bastards.

Oh look, a photographer. At mile 13. After three bridges. Lovely.

.1- 1:02

And the finish. 1:54:26.

We ran under some sort of artillery Marine tank things. Pretty cool. A Marine put my medal around my neck- it's actually a nice substantial medal. For the price, I didn't expect much. (Now that I think about it, the shirt was really nice too. This race was quite the deal for your money!)

Another Marine handed me a pint glass. It's all trendy now to grab a beer at the finish- Budweiser was a sponsor. While fun in theory, I passed on the Budweiser before 9:00 a.m. I did however score a Moe's breakfast burrito. Normally I would scorn a breakfast burrito (not because I'm so pious, but because the thought of eggs in a burrito isn't appealing). I ate this one in the car (that I found after the traditional wrong turn in the parking lot). Best part of the race.

Ah, burrito...

Donned the sweet compression socks, pulled over to change my wet shirt, and made it home by 11:00 a.m. Not bad!

The best part of the race (besides the breakfast burrito?): I didn't finish and immediately freak out about how I was never running again!

Harvest Run 2010

2010-09-10T13:13:00.000-07:00

Over the years, I've developed some running fears. There are two main categories: elements outside of your control and then those involving internal control.

All right, elements outside your control are obvious- dogs are number one, then maybe traffic, then weather. Oh, and Thursdays are trash days- which is worse, the closed trashcan still full of trash or the recently emptied one with the lid flopped open?! (Trick question- the worst is to get behind the TWO trucks that are in my neighborhood- took me a long time to realize there wasn't just one truck sadistically following me on my rambling route!)

The internal control issues are related mostly to coordination- you know- fall off a curb, twist your ankle, knock out your front teeth, etc.

Some fears even combine the two: twist your ankle while screaming and running from a pack of chihuahuas or have a driver see you conducting your music because the heat exhaustion finally made you snap. Not that I have any experience in either of those fears. Ahem.

That brings me to the Harvest Run 1 mile Fun Run. Coach Harry wanted to run this one with me. It was the same day as the duathlon so I was looking for a really good reason to not run the 5k- perfect!

Harry and I lined up towards the back. He'd been talking trash in the car- he's going to run the whole way, there's no walking in running, and I better try to keep up. Yeah, ok. He was wearing an armful of Superman silly bands... The race started. We took off!

Within maybe five feet I realized that I was pushing the baby, but I didn't see Harry. Huh..seemed really quick to lose him. I looked behind me- nothing. Then I looked down. And there was Harry- looking like he decided to stop and make some snow angels on the asphalt. Well that was unexpected. And in my next surreal moment, a man behind us (who I'm sure had kids of his own cause only a parent would do this) just hoisted him back to his feet and put him next to me.

So both Harry and I had a shared out of body experience and found a new running fear- falling flat out backwards! There was nothing to do, so we just started running.

Harry did well the first quarter of a mile or so. He complained a bit about his feet. Personally, I would have gone with the "I just landed flat on the street" excuse, but whatever.

Around the halfway point, we found a friend from swimming lessons. He started chatting with Harry. Then he said the greatest thing ever: "I'm going to win, you're going to lose." Now this kid was faster and older and thinner, so he was probably right. But, he didn't count on how competitive Harry is. Suddenly the feet felt fine and we were booking it(comparatively speaking).

Harry's friend is all over the place- he's behind us, he's in front of us- just chatting with people. I think he literally ran circles around us. The kid really is oblivious just talking to people and having fun, but Harry is getting all worked up. With about two blocks left, I spotted the kid sitting on a curb with a friend. Yes, sitting.

I whispered to Harry, "Your buddy isn't paying attention... if you just keep on running, we're going to win..." He nodded at me conspiratorily, and we kept on moving. Finally, the last turn- out of nowhere, Harry threw in a sprint finish (again, comparatively speaking). I had no idea he'd saved a little kick! We finished in 12:20. Not the fastest mile ever, but we were pleased. (And yes, we totally took the distracted friend!)

After the race, we decided to watch the 5k. Harry and his friend hung out together raiding the food goodies, poking at ants, cheering, and just doing other boyish things. I think they were both pleased with the race- Harry was quietly glowing over his victory and the other kid probably knew it was a "fun" run and that he could have taken us at any point. I let the baby out of the stroller (who never said a peep during the race) so he could hang with the big boys.

And that's pretty much it. Harry has another sweet medal and I have a new running fear. Oh, and after much discussion, Harry and I came to the conclusion that the fall was caused by a silly band flying off his arm at the start- we think he tried to catch it and lost his footing. We're both fuzzy on the details...

Heels to Wheels Duathlon

2010-08-30T08:17:00.001-07:00

I signed up for this one in some euphoria induced haze from surviving the Turtle Crawl Tri- What?! No swim?! I'm in!

And then I started running more miles. And running more miles. And my bike sat in my garage... And I learned something about myself: I'm just a runner. I can dabble in the whole bike/swim thing when I'm hurt and I can't run, but if given a choice of the three, I'll be running... and sitting on my couch, but mostly running.

That's my whole justification for why I hadn't been on my bike in three months. I bought a new pump, pumped the tires, took the sticker from the tri off, and rode around the block. Most people do brick workouts for preparation- ride the bike for say 30 minutes, run for 15 minutes. Nope, not me.

Saturday morning rolls around. After about a month of never waking up late or resetting my alarm for the kids' schools, I woke up late. Not just a little late, but supposed to be in transition 15 miles away 15 minutes ago. Hmmm... At least I didn't have to think about options- throw on the clothes, grab the transition bag, throw the bike in Ted's truck, and on the way! The race was going to start at 7:30 a.m. I arrived at the park at 7:20 a.m. I ran up to the registration area, started filling out the waiver, had to leave my bike and run back for my ID- tedious. Finally got marked and dropped off the bike. My entire transition space consisted of a towel, my helmet, and a water bottle. I had to stash my goody bag behind the bike because I didn't have time to go back to the truck again.

Saw a few friends. Chatted a bit, but still frazzled by my crazy morning. The thought of racing 43 minutes after waking up is a bit daunting. The thought of having part of that race be on my bike was too much to bear.

They gave us our instructions and we all lined up in the grass. It turns out they wanted us to run along the grass for maybe 1/10 of a mile and then turn onto the street. Race starts. No big deal, but I was a little wobbly in the new Newtons with the funny lugs on the grass. We hit the street- lots of little long hills. You go up, you go down, then you do it again cause it's an out and back course. I think I'm second or third girl, so I'm pretty happy. My pace was in the neighborhood of 7:20 miles.

And now I'm in transition- I grab my helmet and bike and walk to the mounting area (it's a crack in the asphalt that I guess looks like a line). I get on and realize my glasses are totally foggy. Oh good. I still can't get my water bottle while riding and there's no way I can get to my glasses and clean them. And for that matter, what would I clean them on? As I'm pondering all of this, my head is slightly forward and the breeze hits my glasses- problem solved!

I head out on the roads. OK, not only did I not ride my bike ahead of time, I didn't check my gears. Yes, I checked the basic "don't leave it in too hard a gear" thing because apparently people get on and then fall off, but I forgot to make sure it wasn't in too easy a gear. You know the big gear thingy? It was in the small ring, so I couldn't generate much speed. I tried pushing down the button a bunch, but it wouldn't shift. As all of this is going on and I'm practically hyperventilating, everyone I just passed is passing me. "On your left!" Oh, really? All of you are on my left! The people with the fancy tires are killing me- "wait, you're passing me on my left? I thought that was the lifeflight people coming to get me!" Seriously, they make this crazy whooshing noise... Everyone had on their fancy bike shoes too. Oh, and my bike was making this horrible noise like a sticker was hitting the tire over and over. I decided to think of it as a metronome so I didn't completely lose my mind. (Turns out it was part of the cadence thing for my Garmin that I've never been able to work- that was money well spent).

OK, had to pull it together. Hit the turnaround....s l o w l y... told the volunteer I probably needed to learn to turn. Chatted with a nice guy who had a bike like mine. Took off again. I mashed that stupid button again out of pure frustration, and lo and behold, my gear shifted! Now I could push a little more. So I keep on pedaling and chatting with people passing me. At least being passed helped kill the time! Oh look, another embarassing turnaround. Seriously should have at least taken a couple of spin classes cause this bike thing is starting to hurt.

Finally, finally off the bike. So happy. Grabbed my water bottle with Heed. Did I mention I can't drink on the bike? Waycross Bank and Trust had signs every few miles with giant letters: HYDRATE. Mocking me.

Grabbed my hat and hit the grassy path again. Now the problem isn't so much my shoes as it is my legs. I heard someone say they had dead legs. When I heard that in the past, I assumed it meant your legs were exhausted. Yeah, that's not exactly it. They are exhausted, but the problem is more that they don't know how to move properly and for at least a half of a mile, you can't convince them that running is a natural thing. If I were ever so reckless as to eat right after getting a filling, I assume it would be the same way- having to teach yourself how to chew. I felt like I was teaching myself how to not move in such a jerky way.

We ran down the same course, so more hills. The really fast people are headed towards us. Everyone yelled encouragement to each other, which I thought was very fun. That was highly unusual- most races I've done people are either extremely quiet and listening to iPods or they are all out crazy like Disney. One of the really fast guys reached out to high five me- don't know how fast he was moving, but that hurt! My first mile was 8:15, the last one 7:52. I was pretty proud to pull off an under 8 minute mile at the end! As I was headed towards the line, I could see the clock at 1:19:xx. Having no clue of a goal time, I decided I'd be good with under 1:20. Final time: 1:19:33.

My time was good enough for 5th overall girl, and 1st in my age group (40-44, excuse me!?) I was pleased with the race, but I think duathlons may have just landed in the BTDT category for me...

So now, my been there, done that category consists of: bridge runs, triathlons, and duathlons. I thought I'd like it better because of the whole "no swim" thing, and I am certainly grateful there wasn't a swim, but I just am not that good on my bike. And really, I don't want to take the time to get better on my bike. I still like it, but it's not really my thing right now. I'm scared of riding on the roads, I'm scared of the fancy pedals, I'm scared of why I would need a helmet. I may very well want to ride more in the spring when I'm tired of running or have met my goals or most likely, am totally injured...

Oh, and my Newtons were a huge hit. Several people asked about them, and one older guy said "I remember you. Those pink shoes blazed past me and I never caught them again." Can you say race highlight!?

New Newtons!

2010-08-27T08:41:00.000-07:00

So, I just retired my yellow Newtons with approximately 490 miles on them.

They cost about $150.00/pair. What's that make their per mile running cost? I'm going with about 30 cents per mile.

The Asics I bought from the running store?

They cost about $80.00. A bargain, right? Well, I demoted them to walking only status at 6 miles cause they almost crippled me. So what's their per mile running cost? Oh, about $13.33 per mile.

And people look at me funny for buying Newtons and think they're too expensive? Sure, if they don't work for you, that's one thing, but I didn't even think mine needed retiring until I realized how close I was to 500 miles. (Speaking of which, I'm going to have to run the last ten miles in the old yellow ones just for closure).

Anyway, I now have a new pair of pink Newtons for people to either covet or mock. With any luck, they'll be blazing past the mockers.

Harry's Munchkin Super Kidz Tri

2010-08-25T13:55:00.000-07:00

Race Report: Super Kidz Tri!!!

Harry did his first tri this weekend at the ripe age of 4. I was worried about everything- he'd think people were laughing at him, he'd freak out in the pool since he'd only had 2 weeks of lessons, he had a new bike, etc.

Race morning: Got the baby to the sitter and packed up Harry and all of his stuff. He got to use all my tri gear (fancy water bottle, goggles, helmet, etc). We made it to the Y and set up his transition area. We picked up his swag bag and he got body marked. Oddly, he was mostly interested in the ruler in the bag...

Transition.

We went to the pool early just so he could check it out again. When anyone asked if he was ready, he said "oh, I'm ready!" He put on his required swim vest. We waited in the bleachers for Ted and Emma to show up. (And when they did, I laughed at the look of panic on Ted's face when he suddenly thought he'd forgotten to bring the baby.)

Harry lined up. They had all the 4 year olds go out together after explaining that this race was about completion and that they should take their time and be safe and have fun. Harry's lane was by the wall. The race starts. The boy sprints down the handicapped ramp in the water and does a giant leap. He comes up sputtering, but starts swimming. We're following along the side of the pool as everyone is cheering. The kids are all pretty close. Turns out Harry is better in the water than his mother. He makes it to the end with no problems. Ted hauls him out, and we're off to transition.

We throw on a shirt and shoes and head down the stairs to the track. (They call it a track, but it's really just a vaguely oval shaped asphalt path). I put on Harry's helmet and helped him on his bike. He hasn't done much riding since it seems to rain every afternoon, but he gets it moving. The four year olds are required to have training wheels. I keep my hand on his back and we go around the first lap. And then, as everyone from my track club is cheering at the end of the first lap, we have our first mishap. I don't understand how it could happen with training wheels, but Harry goes down hard sideways and drags the bike with him. I tossed him off the bike, picked it up, put him on, and we took off again. I would have been freaked out by such a truly spectacular fall, but all he said was "you know, that kind of hurt..."

So for the second lap, I ran holding Harry's handlebars. Ted ran over to record him, and Harry just yelled "meet me at the finish line, Dad!" Emma was cheering, which we could just hear over all the commotion. And we are back in transition- yes, off the bike and I can stand upright!

Helmet off, and we're running. It's one lap around for the run. Harry goes out at a good clip, but not a sprint. He's able to maintain his speed all the way around and doesn't walk. The last few yards Emma joins us. I let her run him in.

And now Harry has his medal (which he put with my medals- how cute is that?) He's got big plans for future races. There's a 1 mile fun run this Saturday that he really wants to do.

The thing I liked best about Harry's race was that even though he wasn't the fastest, he was just thrilled the whole time. And I learned something about my racing- worried about people laughing at him? worried about the swim and the new bike? Those fears didn't apply to Harry at all- they're my usual race day fears that I was putting on to his race... weird, huh?

So, this weekend I have the following races lined up:
1) Saturday: Duathlon- 2 mile run, 14? mile bike, 2 mile run. I haven't been on my bike in forever but I wanted to do this race to encourage local events... it's going to hurt!
2) Saturday: 1 mile fun run with Harry and maybe Emma;
3) Saturday: may run a 5k with a friend who's a newbie runner- not sure yet.
Crazy.

Future plans

2010-08-18T11:49:00.000-07:00

I've been putting in some big miles so far this month, so provided I don't end up injured (which is a bigger "provided" than I care to acknowledge), I've got to find some race goals.

Known upcoming races:

1) Heels to Wheels Duathlon, Aug. 28. Yeah, guess I better peel off the race sticker on my bike from the Turtle Crawl tri. What? It was only 3 months ago... The duathlon is run 2 miles, bike 14, run 2. I'm thinking it won't be that hard, except for that chunk of 14 miles in the middle. And I need a new pump. Cause you know, the only thing harder than riding a bike for 14 miles is riding one with flat tires. So apparently my new bike euphoria a year ago was extremely short lived.

2) Jacksonville Marine Corps Half, October. In theory, this is the one I'm training for, but I can't seem to push the send button on active.com.

3) Peachtree City 25k, Darkside Running Club, November. Dual purpose- visit Ted's brother's family and do a race. I love when I can merge things like that- then it's not all about me! The race looks interesting. There's a 50k at the same time, so there should be a lot of people way weirder than me which will be refreshing. It's a 5 mile loop on golf cart trails with "rolling hills." I'm a little concerned about the possible disparity between my definition of rolling hills and the locals. Still, there should be lots of people moving sort of slowly (cause they've got 30+ miles altogether to go!) I wonder if they'll laugh at my Garmin and Newtons? Probably not my Garmin, definitely the Newtons. I've filled out the form but haven't taken it off my desk.

4) Jax Bank Half Marathon... or Full? In theory, this could be a good year to run a Full. I'd love to break 4 hours, and horror of horrors, a Boston Qualifying time for me would be 3:50. Ugh. The running calculators predict I could do under 3:50, but that's if I can stay injury free with perfect training and have a perfect day. I don't know if I want that kind of pressure. I could do the half- did I mention my main goal is last minute Christmas shopping in Jax and a last race before I turn 40?

5) Princess Half, Feb. 27. I'm sure I'll do it, but I need to work on my outfit.

Optionals:

Tallahassee Half or Full? Breast Cancer 26.2 with Donna Half or Full?

Gate River Run, March something. I don't really like this run (hello, bridge at end!), but if you are in the top 10% you get a cool hat. Granted I'll never wear the hat because I'll feel like a pretentious runner, but it's kind of tempting. Emma can't believe I'd run 9+ miles as fast as possible "uh, just for a hat?!" And then when I told her I probably wouldn't wear the hat, she laughed... a lot.

Ready Set Glow 5k

2010-08-17T07:18:00.000-07:00

Ah... a midnight 5k with glowsticks! Does that sound cool or what?!

Yes, it sounded totally cool... a month before. Slightly less cool a week before... and then it just made me feel really, really old as I contemplated actually putting on my running clothes at 11:30 at night.

No, no... I'm young, I'm hip, I'm doing a 5k at midnight.

So, Ted's passed out (you know, he's a year older than me). The boys are passed out. Emma's wide awake. So I give her the remote and her phone and tell her to have a big time. It's the Friday night before school starts- I know, I know, I'm an incredibly responsible mom.

After killing a few hours that would have been better spent sleeping (and by sleeping I mean watching Chelsea Handler while eating Ritz crackers and peanut butter), I drove over to the Y. It's all of a mile away from my house.

Guess what? It's still incredibly hot. Heat index 103 hot. Great.

I pick up my packet. The t-shirt is sort of cute, but not run at midnight cute. The glowstick is a nice touch- it's a bracelet. Instead of bibs they wrote your number on your hand. I probably should tell them to go the tri route next time and do the arm. My bulging tendons made it hard for the director to write my number on my hand- note to self "hands are looking old." Nice confidence booster.

So I walk to my car with my goody bag. I just got a haircut, so I decided to leave the hat behind (and sunglasses- d'oh! this feels weird!) I try jogging a bit and realize that even with drinking water and sitting around during the day, I'm still really tired. I'm feeling more uncoordinated than usual- think it's because my body wants to be asleep.

OH, and there were tons of people with little kids in the park- so weird! There were a lot of people at the race- I guess they all liked the novelty too. I'm rather smug about the fact that I don't have my children playing on swings at midnight until I remember I left my 10 year old in charge of her two brothers. (Hey, she knew she could wake up Ted if she needed him!)

Race starts. I'm exhausted, but I charge up the big hill by the hospital- good plan! Yeah, so that hurt. I'm wheezing and I can't see my Garmin. I downloaded a new playlist for the race- yeah, Bare Naked Ladies "Who Needs Sleep?" not nearly as clever at midnight. The race was supposed to be lit. Well, you could see in the sense that you probably weren't going to trip, but the disembodied barking of invisible dogs was extremely disturbing. I assumed any dog that loud must be behind a fence or it would have already eaten someone in front of me, but I didn't like not being able to see them coming.

Mile two. Still haven't recovered from the crazy fast first mile, or the exhaustion, or the humidity. I hang on by following a guy in front of me. He doesn't know it but he's dragging me in. We pass a few people on a bit of a downhill.

I see a group of men in front of me. I pass a couple of them and then realize one in front is Ron. Ron and I always finish near each other, trading the lead. I really wanted to pass him just so I could say "hi" and annoy him, but the more I thought about it, it sounded like a whole lot of trouble- have to turn the music off, have to take the headphones out, have to run a lot faster. He could have this one. (I was also distracted by my sudden hatred of James Brown and his mocking tone- NO, I do not feel good!)

And the finish. Down a long hill. It's 26:00. I was surprised because the effort seemed the same as a faster race, but there were so many horrible variables that it was okay. Finishing sort of near Ron made me think it was a pretty good race. And I was too tired to really care. I think my card said 30th finisher. There were about 135 people in the race.

This lovely picture kind of sums up the finish.

I stuck around for the age group awards because I thought I was the 4th or 5th girl across. Hello, should always read the fine print on the registration. Awards were by DECADE and only for first. C'est la vie.

In the meantime, the humidity increased to the point that there was tons of thunder and some lightning. Emma started texting me like crazy- "I hear thunder. R U OK?" and my favorite- "baby awake! Hurry!" followed by "baby being good. ok." I gave her my shirt for being my race support.

So, that's it. I'm going to put midnight races in the same category as bridge runs or those dreadful tour things. Novelty runs that I don't really have to do again. Nothing against the race- it was well organized and attended and generally a good race, but it was at frigging midnight. Enough said.

July 3rd, Sunshine Festival

2010-08-16T12:50:00.001-07:00

So a month later...

This race and I have a history.

It was my first real 5k in 2007. I did it in 29:59 and was thrilled. And horrified. I'd signed up for the Goofy- 39.3 miles in one weekend. That was suddenly seeming a lot harder...

In 2008, my mom and I "ran" it when I was 7 or 8 months pregnant. It marked pretty much the end of my running until the baby was born in September. It wasn't really the running that was a problem. It was the heat and the look of concern on the volunteers' faces- "Is she going to have that baby right here? I'm just handing out water and pointing the right way- I did not sign up for baby duty!" We finished in something like 43 minutes.

In 2009, I ran it in about 25:16. I had higher expectations and it basically left me utterly deflated for the rest of the summer. I didn't run again until realizing I could sign up for a tri for our Labor Day Disney trip.

So, that's the Sunshine Festival 5k- I always think I'm going to like it, but it's usually a morale-crushing, willpower-destroying disaster. I don't know why I forget that every year.

Anyway...

July 3rd comes along- my mom kindly picked up my packet the night before. I got all my stuff together that night and prepared to get up early. Worked out fine. Made it to the course with plenty of time to spare. Ran slowly a bit and did a few strides. Talked to some people I knew, and tried to ignore the creeping heat/humidity and my sudden revelation that I hate this race.

And we start- this year I lined up closer to the front. Not right by the teenage boys and the hard-core old guys without shirts, but not next to the guys in the khaki shorts. As usual, I found myself next to a stinky guy. What's up with that?! It's early in the morning and you're going to get sweaty, so I understand not taking a shower before, but if you are that stinky before the race, cut the crowd some slack. Way too early for that kind of sensory overload...

It's a flat course around parks and neighborhoods. I never can remember the course, which is crazy since I run there a lot, but I'm just following people. I go out with my new strategy of starting as fast as I can and trying to hold on. It's not sophisticated or particularly smart, but it is easy to remember. Mile 1 is under 8 minutes, mile 2 about the same. By mile 3 I'm questioning why I keep running 5ks, but I know if I blow this I'll have a complete meltdown- so I push through. Final time: 23:3x. I can't remember exactly, but it was my second fastest 5k and much hotter than the one I set my PR in. So I'm reasonably pleased. My mom met me at the finish. She said I looked pretty good and wasn't as stinky as usual. (Uh, thanks? So like, I wonder if pre-race stinky guy had peaked in his stinkiness or if he got worse?! I left him in my tracks at the start- no way I was sticking around to see what happened on the stinky scale of 1-10. Looking back on Mr. Stinky, I'm wondering if I should have told him to get to a doctor. I mean, I'm a runner who's been in a lot of stinky races and I have three children so I am no stranger to stink, but I'm still gagging a little just thinking about him. As a matter of fact, I have to end this topic now. Right now.)

We went back to get the rest of the peeps back for the awards ceremony. Not surprisingly, there wasn't a lot of action at home in terms of dressing/waking/etc. We finally headed down long after the ceremony. People were cleaning up. I found someone in charge and claimed my age group prize-- 3rd out of 39! It was a nice ocean scene print- kind of fun.

So that was it. Another year, another Sunshine Festival.

Running store!

2010-06-28T13:56:00.000-07:00

At long last, I went to a real running store. I live well over an hour away from any "real" running stores. (Being the running snob that I am, I don't consider the mall stores "real.")

I had to pick up Emma at camp about a zillion miles away. On the way up, I took Emma and the baby through Columbus, Georgia (curse you Columbus with your "one wrong turn and you're in Alabama" lack of signs!) We went on a bit of a side trip to Calloway Gardens. Unfortunately, I only remembered how boring it is when we got there. (Okay, it may be lovely when it's not 100 degrees). We then went on a side trip to the Wild Animal Safari Park. Hello, surreal! We bought some food and hopped on the zebra bus with no windows. You hand food to the animals, unless they have "horse-like" mouths in which case they may grab a finger, so you throw it.

I'm totally digressing.

My mother and the baby and I went back a couple of weeks later to get Emma. I had a gift card from the Turtle Crawl Tri (or as I think of it, the ocean horror) for Big Peach Running Store. So, off we went. After a few map reading glitches, we found ourselves at a little store in some Atlanta suburb. Small, but packed full of tasty treats! The guy helping me was about 18 and had a very "hands off" approach. Really nice, but I almost felt like I needed to ask if I could you know, buy something. And this after I mentioned we were on a pilgrimage! Strange. He put me on a treadmill and some funny scale type thing (I don't think it weighed me- wouldn't have agreed to get on that!) Turns out I have high-normal arches and should run in a neutral shoe. He said I had a great steady gait, which was odd since all I could see in the replay of the video was my duck landing. When I pointed it out, he said something to the effect of I land like a very steady duck with very little deviation. Uh, okay. Trust me, I still look stupid.

So I tried on a bunch of shoes- I ended up with some Asics and some superfeet liners... and a new sportsbra... and some socks... and gels. I asked about Newtons, but they were a bit dismissive in a "I don't really know much about them" kind of way. And then we had to leave- my mom was growing a bit impatient (even after the high of finding new people to tell she ran a half-marathon) and the baby was starting to sprint on the little fake track they had for shoe testing.

And that was it.

Oh, and I've run twice in my Asics with the green superfeet. Did three miles on each run and was absolutely crippled. Thanks, trained shoe fitter guy! HA! It worked out in the end because they are really comfortable for walking and seem to help with my PF, but still...

Liking the sportsbra and the socks as well, and haven't run enough to try the variety of Hammer Gels I picked up. Probably should check the expiration dates. You know, now that I think about it, I'm not really sure why I'm left with such a good impression of the whole running store experience. Weird.

5k benefit for Emmanuel school

2010-06-04T06:58:00.000-07:00

So I don't even remember the name of this race, which is CRAZY, cause I won it.

You read that right.

I was overall top female... WTH??

OK, there were a lot of beginners there and the usual fast people were obviously not there. I decided to take this race more seriously and ran a real warm up. I started out in the direction of the one mile fun run. A friend's 5 year old, Patrick, was running the one mile. His grandfather was far behind him and his older brother predictably dumped him. I decided Patrick would be a good running buddy so I joined the one mile fun run. He actually was perfect- we'd sprint at a 7 minute per mile pace, and then walk at a 22 minute pace (he also caught a ride on a golf cart for the one big hill- smart kid!) It was a really good warm up- note to self: bring Patrick to every race!

The 5k started. All I really wanted to do was get past the clump of little kids who always start in front of me. I pushed hard and saw I was at a 7:30 pace, which was ridiculous. I held on though because those little kids are fast little sprinters and I couldn't see them (or hear them because I was listening to Queen's "Don't Stop Me Now" on some sort of horrible loop). At about 1.5 miles I caught a teenaged girl- I told her we were halfway there, and she stopped pretty much instantaneously. So then I felt like crap- I thought I was encouraging her, not taking away her will to live! Regardless, I was pretty certain I was now the first girl, so you know, to heck with her- she's young, they'll be other races... I passed a water stop- a small dog tried to get me. Hello, who brings an unleashed dog to a water stop? Oh well. And now I'm going uphill. It's feeling hard, but not impossible. Now my Garmin may be hurting my pace- I see I'm still in the 7:30s. I felt like I could go faster, but I was worried I'd literally fall down. Hmmm... oh, and I'd never moved that fast, so my actual coordination felt off, as in I wasn't sure I was swinging my arms fast enough. I distracted myself by listening to yet another round of "Don't Stop Me Now." It was making me absolutely crazy, but it worked that far and I couldn't possible jinx myself by changing it.

Finally, the finish. A guy in a tri shirt passes me with a "good race" comment. It doesn't bother me one bit because he was young and fit and he should have been in front of me way before then. I push through, hearing "first girl." Crazy. My time was 23:09. My long standing 5k PR was 24:42 so I'm pretty surprised.

I picked up my medal and went on home trying to figure out when I became a "real" runner. And then I entered my 5k results in the McMillan Running Calculator, and see a prediction for around 3:40 for a full marathon. I know it's probably optimistic and reflects proper marathon training, but I need a 3:50 to qualify for the Boston marathon... oh, the torment. Curse you, Boston dream!

Swamp Run 10k

2010-06-04T06:45:00.000-07:00

Haven't really posted lately (that's how all my posts start). As the title says, I ran the Swamp Run 10k a couple of months ago. I really didn't even want to go, but my husband was already committed to watching the kids. Seriously, who would pass up that opportunity on a Saturday morning?!

I drove out to the Swamp Park, hopped out of the car, and realized it was freezing! I had on shorts and a light t-shirt. D'Oh. Either I didn't notice the temperature in my frenzy to get out of the house or it dropped 20 degrees in about 10 miles. Either way, I was not really happy.

I grabbed my bag, threw on the long sleeve race shirt, and wandered around doing that pre-race thing- go to the car, get the Garmin, drink water, lock car, put key in shoe pocket, freak out thinking I need something else, get key out, open car, repeat.

Finally I decided I was just going to have to be cold and left the race t-shirt behind. I was concerned that wearing the t-shirt before the race would guarantee a twisted ankle.

The race starts. I have no expectations. I started out at what felt like a slow pace. The first mile is on the road. Somewhere around mile 2 you head into the trails. (Trails are really just narrow grassy paths). It was hard to pass on the trails, and I was actually feeling like moving fast now. Got to another open road and started passing people. It felt a little risky to pass people around mile 3 and 4, but I was feeling strong. I even passed a girl who totally killed me at the Gate River Run last year (I expected her to get me back, but she didn't. Sweet!)

There's a turn-around on the roads, which was a nice distraction. There weren't that many people in front of me. Since it's an out and back course, I tried to push it some to avoid any log jams on the trail. I saw my friend Mary. She yelled some encouragement, as always. (Mary is in her late 50s, but crazy fast!) I pushed past her and headed home.

I saw two men ahead of me the last half mile. I passed both, expecting they'd catch me in the end. I never really have a final sprint. They didn't catch me! Shocking. Final time: 52:10. A new PR and good enough for 2nd in my age group and a little trophy.

I hung around with the old runner guys after the race who let me in on their trash talking- that was hilarious. Me and the 60 year old guys. They had a big pancake breakfast too. Usually I skip it, but this time I thought "hello, pancakes!"

All in all, pretty fun. Oh, and when I looked in the race results later, the two guys I passed were like 67 and 14. Yeah, I felt a little bad about that...

2010-05-17T12:22:00.000-07:00

Well, kids, I survived!

Turtle Crawl Sprint Triathlon:

First, I had to get up at 3:30 a.m. to pick up a friend and drive an hour to Jekyll Island. Very Disneyish, except I had to be reasonably alert since I couldn't hop on a bus!

Uneventful drive. We found the place with no problems (probably because for once I was really early!) Picked up our race stuff and handled transition relatively well. I would much rather do it the day before, but I still managed to get all my stickers and numbers in the right places. They had a tri-tat system- you put temporary tattoos on for your numbers. Great in theory, but took too long. Being the needy type that I am, I grabbed a volunteer to help me with mine. We both messed up, so I had tattoos and regular Sharpie markings. Tons of people reversed their numbers, scratched them out, and wrote them in marker, which I found amusing.

What I did not find amusing?? They had already lengthened the bike to 14.4 miles because of construction, and then they added 50 yards to the swim for 650 total. (Thankfully, I wasn't doing the Olympic!)

The swim:

So you might have gathered that I was nervous about the swim... we walked for an eternity down the beach. A bunch of people from our class were together, sharing the apprehension. Our coach told us to get in the water. It was really windy and there was a strong current. He said it would be hard to get to the first buoy, but then the current would drag us in to the finish. (You went out to a buoy, hung a left and went straight until turning for the finish). It was a timed start. We entered in pairs within a couple of seconds of other people.

Getting to the first buoy was sooo hard. I heard some people screaming for help behind me. I was conveniently breast stroking (also known as treading water) because I'd swallowed a ton of salt water already, so I could see the lifeguard on her surfboard- she was paddling over and yelling something like "I can't get there yet." This did not encourage me... The current kept shifting- I didn't know that at the time, I just knew that my coach was a big liar! I did a lot of freestyle once I calmed down and changed up my stroke to deal with the fact that I was breathing on the side with the waves. It still took forever to reach the buoys. I was swum over a couple of times and a guy knocked one side of my goggles- nothing like some salt in the contacts! Anyway, after about 30 minutes of sheer terror, I was finally out of the water. (Our coach later said it was the most challenging open water swim he'd done in 15 years).

The bike:

It's a long way to transition, up a boardwalk and through sand. I was fine with that, cause I was out of the water! I put on my shoes without socks, grabbed my helmet, and headed to the mounting area. I got going without any real problems. Now here's the thing with my bike- I've ridden a lot on a trainer, and I've ridden a lot slowly outside. So I had no idea how fast I should be going. I was averaging about 17-19 mph (I did take my Garmin). I passed a bunch of people (cause if I didn't make it clear, after the swim, pretty much everyone was in front of me). I realized I was at about mile 4 and about to pass a guy with 20 on his leg. And I thought to myself, perhaps I'm not much stronger than a 20 year old boy and I should stick with him... So that's what I did. (I eventually passed the 20 year old at the end of the run, which really pleased me. ) The bike was great, except for the last 3 miles in a headwind. But again, I wasn't in the ocean, so I was happy.

The run:

Dumped the bike and helmet. Grabbed the hat and race belt. Drank some water, since I'm still too nervous to grab my bottle on the bike. Couldn't think of anything else to do, so I started the run. Here was my happiest moment- even though I only did one brick in training, the run felt fine. Legs weren't heavy (so should I have pushed more on the bike after all?) The course was a mess because of more construction. It was an out and back, so I saw some people from my class both ways which was a nice distraction. My Garmin said the course was a little short and that I averaged about an 8:17 (hard to tell since I was not the best at turning it on/off at just the right spots). I was extremely pleased that I wasn't running much slower than just a regular 5k without all that near drowning and biking stuff first! I saw our coach before the finish- he yelled about a final kick. Miracle of miracles, I was able to pull out a little sprint to the finish. I never can do that! The run ended up being a 24:42, so maybe I started my Garmin early? Hey- tied my 5k PR with all that drowning/biking before it!

So that was it. They had lots of food and goodies afterwards. We sat around a bit and cheered for people and talked about the race (mostly sharing swim horror stories). Got a sweet albeit ridiculously bright t-shirt. The official results have me at 1:51:xx and 4th in my AG. I'm dying to see the splits so I can tell just how horrible I am at swimming!

There's another sprint tri in October at the same place. The swim is only 400 yards. I'm torn between never, ever wanting to see the ocean again and wanting to redeem myself. In the meantime, there may be a local duathlon in August- now that I can work with!

OK- final results. For my age group: 10/16 in the swim, 7/16 on the bike, 1/16 on the run. I guess I know where I'm most comfortable!

Here I am with my friend at the finish. I'm the Goofy one in the pink hat.

Tour de Torture

2010-04-09T12:57:00.000-07:00

As always, I'm posting late.

Anyway, Tour de Torture-- 3 runs, 1 weekend.

The first run is a Friday at 6:00 p.m. It's four miles through my neighborhood. Now I know these hills, and I'm not overly pleased. Still, I think I may be able to use some strategy based on knowledge of the course. Yeah, so I go out too fast. I'm cocky, I'm ready to go. I run up the horrible street with the horrible hills too fast. I can usually maintain about a 9 minute pace if I'm pushing it on this street- so I go for about an 8 minute pace. Predictably, I'm not just wheezing, I almost sound like I'm crying. So I chat with the older, wiser runners who pass me and just try to get moving again. I really don't like night runs. Too many chances to ruin yourself during the day! I finished somewhere around 34 minutes and then went home to say bye to Ted who was leaving for 3 days... as in leaving me alone in charge of 3 kids... with two races to go.

Saturday morning is a 5k. With the exception of having my babysitter show up at 7:59 for a race starting at 8:00, it went well. (They started a bit late, but I was hustling up to the start strapping on my race belt as the horn blew!) I forgot my Garmin, which may have helped. Same basic route, but cut out some of the hills. I don't know if it was because it was morning so I hadn't sabotaged myself yet or because I didn't have the Garmin pressure, but I felt better. The clock said 26:xx but someone told me he thought the course was long. Again, Garminless, so no clue.

Saturday afternoon was a 1 mile run. Never done a 1 mile run. Not worth the effort in my opinion. You go out blazing, can barely breathe, never get time to settle down, and then it's over and you have the whole "do I really have to take another shower?" thing going through your head. The clock said 8 something, but my Garmin said 7:5x. Whatever. The whole Tour de Torture concept was getting a bit, shall we say, tortorous...

It took awhile for them to tally the results. I played with my phone.

Best part of all?!

Check it out:

Harry always wants to know if I "won" my race. He totally doesn't get the concept of everyone winning for finishing the distance. Finally, I was able to announce that "YES! I WON." My mom was in town watching the kids for me, so it was fun to show off my medal.

I should add that this was a perfect storm- I ran reasonably fast, but tons of the usual runners who could run circles around me weren't at all the races due to a bike race on Saturday morning. Still...

Oh, and Harry promptly knocked the head off the running girl, but I was able to wedge it back on. Typical.

Spring

2010-03-10T10:25:00.001-08:00

Finally, we have decent weather.

I decided I'd do a slow recovery run today at lunch. I started at a good pace, but then found my time creeping faster. To keep myself slow, I started taking pictures on the run. I finished with a little over 5 miles... with no sign of my usual post half-marathon injuries. Let me praise the Newtons again!

Slowed down my pace nicely.

You can see I don't have a whole lot of traffic concerns on my routes. Is the second street not a beautiful sight? It was just re-paved a couple of weeks ago- tedious at the time, but really nice now.

I'm actually more afraid of one of these than cars.

Princess Half Marathon 2010

2010-03-08T10:01:00.000-08:00

The Princess Half Marathon was yesterday! I can't believe I'm updating so quickly...

GOAL

Try to finish the half with a decent time. Finished in 2:21:xx last year. Think I can beat it.

SUPER SECRET AND QUITE POSSIBLY TOTALLY UNREALISTIC GOAL

Hmmm... Try to break 2 hours based on results from Dolphin Days run.

Positives: My time at the Dolphin Days was reasonably fast, I'm not injured.

Negatives: Everything else.

More specifically: longest long run was 10 miles, wearing 2 week old shoes that require different running style (Newtons), wearing new clothes, trying to set a PR at Disney after a day at the parks, potentially eating tons of bad food at the parks, the picture taking temptation on the course, the time... as in have to get there by about 4 a.m.

Friday: THE EXPO

We check in at the hotel and then Emma, Milo and I drive to the Expo. I remembered the stroller this year, but you have to leave it outside the building. Really dumb. I get that it's crowded, but there are tons of moms dragging children... if you're dragging children, you're not dragging merchandise and you're on the verge of giving up and getting out of the building as quickly as you can. Case in point: I looked at the stuff for sale and left with a pin and a keychain. And the only reason that even happened was that there wasn't a line at the checkout.

I printed my waiver ahead of time and found my number was 14. I thought that was pretty funny until I went to get my packet and saw "Elite" on the bib corner. Tempting, but who wants to be humiliated that quickly in a race? I had to drag the baby over to Runner Relations, and then drag him back to another window to get my proper bib. Then it was back the other way to pick up the t-shirts/goody bag. The t-shirts were mis-labeled, so we had to guess on the sizes. Tedious. I had a really nice volunteer but the baby was getting very, very heavy.

I can't believe I was so frazzled that I didn't have Emma take a picture of me with an elite bib.

SATURDAY: the Parks

Same routine as always. Hit the Magic Kingdom bright and early.

We ride Peter Pan, Snow White, Pooh, Buzz, the race cars, the people mover thingy, etc. Emma and Ted went on Space Mountain while Harry, Miles and I shared ice cream sundaes (which we never confessed).

Harry driving!

Everybody liked the rides including the baby. A bird stole a piece of popcorn right out of Milo's hand. He offered it more. Clueless! Harry found the birds disturbing, and rightly so.

We grabbed lunch at our usual Pecos Bills. It's never as good as we think it will be, but it's reasonably easy and part of our traditions now.

Harry, Emma and Ted got in line for Splash Mountain, but of course, it went down for repairs. Probably for the best. It was about noon, and the wait was 5 minutes. I'm guessing people were getting wet and really cold.

Harry wanted to hit Buzz again, so back we went. Ted wanted to do the Carousel of Progress, but all I see in that ride is a confined space for an eternity with no easy opportunity to get out with an angry baby. The baby and I passed. We wandered towards the Castle and discovered the High School Musical parade was meandering around. We danced for a bit to Metro Station's "Shake Shake Shake" which had been edited considerably (which I know because it's on my running playlist- the humiliation!)

Walkie-talkie fun!

We decided since we only had the one day at the parks, we'd head to Epcot and hope the boys could make it without a nap. Yeah, good plan.

All was well at Epcot in the beginning. Harry was big on the Nemo ride- here I'm taking a picture of Ted taking a flip video of Harry- no wonder he thinks he's a rock star.

The boys were starting to fray at the edges a bit...

Self-explanatory.

It was the Flower and Garden Festival. I barely noticed this year, but probably because of the distractions provided by my peeps.

Then it got cold, people got sort of hungry in a "I've snacked all day but not had a real meal" kind of way. Irritation set in. It was still fun because I demand fun at Disney, but Epcot with two irrational creatures is not the best (and then there were the boys to consider. LOL)

A happy moment.

The boys did fall asleep briefly, but it didn't help much. Back to the hotel...

Really, back to the hotel worked for me. It was 8:00 p.m. and I had to get up at 3:00 a.m. I still hadn't organized my pile of stuff, and I was worried about the weather.

SUNDAY: The Race!!!

My iPhone alarm goes off. Wow. No matter how organized you get the night before, it's still hard to get ready that early. I drank a Diet Dr. Pepper, put on all my layers, grabbed a bag full of extra water/gels/towel/etc. to toss at the start and hit the road. Oddly, as I was leaving the hotel at 3:45 a.m., pizza guys were making a delivery. I get on I-4 and head towards Epcot. As usual, I keep an eye on the signs but basically follow the cars in front of me. I'm pretty sure the SUVs, minivans, and cabs out and about at this hour are chock full of princesses.

I'm parked by 4:10 a.m. Now that was too easy. We're supposed to be in the corrals at 5:30 a.m. What to do in the meantime? I fiddle with my stuff in the car- take some stuff out of my bag and pretty much put it all back in. I start walking to the staging area (where they herd everyone before they open the corrals). I turn around after about 100 yards to retrieve any clothing I have in the car. The pink jacket I decided I wanted to leave in the car so I didn't end up donating it? Yep, it can go to charity. I now have on a short sleeve shirt, arm warmers, a lightweight vest, my running skirt, baggy maroon pants, my hat, my Newtons, a running jacket and a purple sweatshirt, and my race belt. I'm like a giant fluffy plum. I'm carrying my crown in my bag cause I want to preserve some dignity.

I walk to the staging area. There's the pre-requisite DJ playing 80s music. Then he launches into the "Cupid Shuffle" and before my eyes something like 200 women start line dancing. It was at exactly that moment that I decided I was excited to be there. Just surreal.

I hit the port-a-potty lines, and start the long walk to the corrals. There are two women from Michigan near me- they're in t-shirts and shorts. They said they were cold. You think?! It was in the low 40s. I had draped my Ariel towel over my neck- I took pity on them and handed it over. They said it was an answer to a prayer- I was hoping the running gods would approve. A lot of people were really not dressed for the weather- what was up with that?!

I get in Corral A. Yep, A, as in right behind the Elites.

I'm by the stage with the announcers. They have a camera crew that keeps interviewing people around me. Very strange to watch the interview next to me and hear it slightly delayed on the video screens! With about a half hour to go, I pop a gel and drink some water. I'm still killing time. Damn if more people aren't line dancing- Cupid Shuffle again, YMCA, etc.

I decide it's time to break out the crown... hello, wardrobe malfunction! My gloves stick to the velcro holding my crown together and the velcro tears out of the crown. Luckily I had taped my pace chart on my phone with duct tape- I ripped some off and did a hasty repair. Who knew?! And now I think that the running gods must be with me- crown repairs at the start line. Throw whatever you want at me, Princess Half, I'm ready!

Ten minutes to the start: I take off the pants. Not easy with shoes, and I had a sudden irrational fear that I'd be naked from the waist down, but it worked. Then the sweatshirt. It is the coldest of colds.

The Fairy Godmother appears. She cracks some princess jokes and then does a little jig to the Cotton Eyed Joe.

As Harry would say, I didn't see that one coming!

The countdown from 5.... fireworks this year! And we are off.

Mile 1: 9:27

Crowded. Cold. That's about it.

Mile 2: 8:42

Trying to make up time. Still cold.

Mile 3: 9:05

First character picture opportunity. It's the Princes/Heroes. I give the guy my camera, but something to do with the darkness outside and the brightness of the float pushed my camera over the edge. After ages of messing with it, the guy takes a video of me.

Mile 4: 8:53

Little panicky about time goal. Dump the jacket. Pass the Ticket and Transportation Center somewhere around here. Lots of spectators giving high fives. I go out of my way to high five everyone. For some reason, this is crazy fun. A spectator yells that he likes my outfit and another tells me to just keep smiling. What nice spectators to be out in this freezing cold humoring a bunch of runners!

Mile 5: 8:43

Getting back on track. I can't remember if Contemporary Hill was here or later- oh well. I wrap my headphones around my iPhone- don't need music in the upcoming Magic Kingdom!

Mile 6: 9:56

Uh oh. Magic Kingdom. I'm doing great, blazing down Main Street. I'm taking blurry pictures and moving on... and then Pluto is by Tomorrowland and there's only one person in line.

And then we head past the Pooh Ride and Dumbo... then right by the Carousel, I spot a line of Princesses and other random characters. Such a short line, how can I not stop?

Oh, jeez, this is ridiculous, but it's Mickey and Minnie!

And the trumpet guys...

And then it's through the Castle. Got to position yourself just right in hopes of getting a photo. And then just in case, have to pose for one in front of the Castle!

OK, I'm moving again. Time to get under control. I'm thinking about how Becky should be there to reign me in!

Mile 7: 9:21

Frontierland- almost out of the blackhole that is the Magic Kingdom. And there's Jessie. Oh... Harry loves Jessie (who he also calls Annie). I've got to stop.

Ok, now cross the railroad tracks and take the obligatory blurry photo of the train. Seriously, why don't I ever take the 2 seconds to stop for the train picture?!

Now we're in the float area backstage. Time to get serious. There's a long line for Peter Pan- I don't stop. I'm so proud I barely notice stopping for the Genie picture. Damn! And it's a waterstop and now I'm moving.

Mile 8: 8:42

OK, I printed a pace chart for 1:55. I'm a little over 5 minutes off. I still have a shot at breaking 2 hours. I'm pretty sure it will hurt. We're in the tedious area where they squeeze everyone into one tiny lane of traffic. It's hard to weave in and out. I read a few of the inspirational signs; they just irritate me. I'm pretty sure I'm not smiling as much.

Mile 9: 8:51

I'm feeling the fade. I'm starting to panic about the fact that I've never worn Newton shoes more than 6 miles; I didn't run more than 10 in training; and I'm just growing weary. I decide I'm taking a gel at the next water stop. It may be too late to do me much good, but it will at least be something different to do. I get it out and start squeezing it so it won't be frozen.

Captain Jack was somewhere out in this great wasteland that is the area between the Magic Kingdom and Epcot. As a sign of my dedication (desperation?), I don't stop for him.

Mile 10: 9:25

I take the Chocolate Hammer Gel and drink some water. Really wasn't as exciting as I'd hoped, but the novelty of not moving was nice.

Mile 11: 9:00

Getting ugly. I'm looking at the mile marker clocks- it's going to be ridiculously close.

Mile 12: 9:15

So I forgot how bad the overpasses were. First there's this long winding overpass- the kind that makes you joke about g-forces when you're driving. Just keeps going up. Then you go down... great. Then you go up another one. I can see Epcot in the distance. Normally this would be a welcome sight. Not with a time goal.

Mile 13: 8:53

Killer. I tried to up the pace. And I'm proud to say, I did up it. But, alas, not quite enough. We cross through Epcot towards the finish line. The Gospel choir was there (on the left) this year. That was nice. I see the time- 2:00:10. It's not going to happen. I think about stopping right there, but then I thought maybe my chip time would be better and I didn't want to be crushed steps away from the finish. I push through...

FINAL CHIP TIME: 1:59:72.

(Ok, 2:00:12.)

I got my medal and asked the volunteer to take my picture. She had to give my camera to someone else because she couldn't get her glasses on with all the medals around her neck. Then, I remembered I needed a picture for my iPhone. I went up to another volunteer and she couldn't get her glasses on either! What are the odds? I got my picture and staggered off.

I went through the buffet line at the end- bananas, bagels, oranges, raisins, Luna bar samples, pineapple cups, Diet Cokes... grabbed a bag full of stuff. I hope they didn't run out of the Luna bars- the women in front of me were stocking up with huge handfuls. What was that all about? I grabbed a massage for $10.00, rolled off the table and out of the building, and went to the concessions stand to see if the shirts were more appealing without the baby. The shirts were easier to look at, but I was shivering like crazy. I considered buying a jacket, but the $49+ tag seemed silly, so I just headed to the parking lot. For once, I found my car on the first try.

Trouble back at the hotel...

LAST THOUGHTS:

Well, the 12 seconds make me laugh. Do I regret taking pictures? Not really. Taking pictures gave me a few breaks. Who's to say I wouldn't have crumbled around mile 12 had I not taken some extra time? (And yes, the photographers took pictures too, but not with the characters. And no, I don't know what I'm going to do with these pictures since it's just me and the characters, but that's not the point). In theory I can always try to run for time in a more traditional and boring setting, although running as fast as possible in a boring setting is not sounding all that appealing.

There was a guy running with us carrying a tripod. He gets my vote for best support crew EVER. He put together a youtube video that can be found under Princess Half Marathon (make sure it's 2010)- he's friendofvic. First he caught me posing with the Princes/Heroes and then waving after the Magic Kingdom. That's some funny stuff.

And, I'm embarassed to add, I just downloaded the Cupid Shuffle so I'll be ready next year. I'm busting through 2 hours next year... and I'm taking pictures, so I've got a lot of work to do!

Super Dolphin Days 10k

2010-03-01T11:40:00.001-08:00

So, it's been awhile.

I took January off for several reasons: recurring PF, novelty of new bike, refusal to face cold temperatures, etc. I bought a new trainer for my bike and moved it into my bedroom. I downloaded two movies for my iPhone from "Sufferfest." It's actual footage from rides/races from either the handlebars or helmet. It's really fun in a horrible kind of way. Somehow not running worked for me- I ended up losing 10 pounds since Christmas, so that made me love my bike. Bikes are still kind of high maintenance for me, but Harry and I did go through the process of taking the front tire on and off and playing with the tube, so I'm feeling a little better about my mechanical skills.

Then someone asked me if I was doing the Princess Half- no, I said, it's too expensive and it won't work in my schedule. Got the idea in my head... yep, I signed up. I then had to deal with the concept of a rapidly approaching half with a base of maybe 4 mile runs. Over three weeks, I did a 6 mile, 9 mile, and 10 mile long run. All went well, even though I completely violated the 10% rule. (When you go from running say 4 miles a week to 25 miles, you're living on the edge).

I also freaked out and bought some Newton shoes. They are supposed to help you land more in your forefoot or midfoot or somewhere... I don't get the technology, but if it will keep me from hurting my heel, I'm all for it. And I got them in pink, cause you know, the Princess is approaching. You're supposed to break them in slowly, or I guess really break yourself into the right way of running in them. I vetoed that idea.

So, not having a clue about my pace strategy for the Princess, I signed up for the Dolphin Days 10k. I really wasn't that worried about the race, but somehow I managed to wake up over and over thinking that either I was late or I'd shown up wearing jeans. Tedious.

I go to the start in a short sleeve shirt, shorts, a light running jacket, and my super sweet pink Newtons (with the bright yellow laces). It's about 39 degrees outside, but I'm not too cold. Apparently it's very trendy to roll out of bed, throw on any old clothes, and stagger to the start. I'm not saying I was looking fabulous, but I felt a little silly in my pink shoes.

The race starts-

Mile 1: I start too far back and have to weave through people. I'm a little worried about going out too fast, but I don't want to get stuck in a pack. I finish the mile in 8:27. That seems a bit too fast, but I'm not hurting.

Mile 2: D'oh! The waterstop isn't manned yet. I don't want the water, but it bothers me. I run on. I'm passing people like crazy- usually this comes back to haunt me. Mile 2 is finished in 8:15.

Mile 3: I'm playing the same songs over and over on my iPhone because I've developed a sudden superstition that they are keeping me fast. I'm still passing people... what's up with that? Mile 3 is 8:15.

Mile 4: I remember reading that if you drink in the last 20 minutes of a 10k, it won't have time to help you. Last year I fell apart after treating the waterstop like a rest area, so I run on through. Mile 4 is 8:19.

Mile 5: How is it possible that I am still passing people? I look up and realize I only see men in front of me. I'm pretty sure I can actually feel these guys I'm passing losing the will to live- the pink shoes could only be worse if I had a running stroller too... Oddly, I still feel good. I keep telling myself to keep landing with my feet under my body to protect my heels and to keep my turn over quick. Emma texts me- "where r u?" Seriously? This mile is 8:30.

Mile 6: Somewhere around here there's another waterstop. Nope, not me. I'm moving on. For the first time since the beginning, I get passed. First there's a rail-thin woman who looks so smooth she should be on the cover of Runners World- I let her go. Then an older guy in running tights- he looks hard core- I let him go too. Finally in the last 1/2 mile, a guy in bright red shoes takes me. I'm ok with it though because I like his shoes (we bright people should stick together) and I suspect I was in high school when he was born. Mile 6 is finished in 8:27.

I finish in a shocking 52:31. I actually don't feel bad. Is it the cross-training? the weight loss? the Newtons? Don't know, but worked for me. I took 6 minutes off last year. Got a little hardware too, and by hardware I mean a little cheapo medal. Second in my age group; 40th out of 130; 7th woman across.

Before I sound too cocky, I have to add that I look dreadful in the pictures. Here I thought my pink shoes were causing the runners I passed to fall apart; but I think it may have been seeing someone as goofy as me pass them. How fast must I go before I can look like a real runner instead of a fast shuffler?!

So, now to decide on pacing for the Princess. If I plug my numbers into running calculators, I could maybe pull off a 1:56:xx half. But, I don't know if I have put in enough long runs. I'd hate to run as fast as I could and blow off the whole Disney experience only to have to walk in the last few miles. I'm thinking of a compromise position-- I'll aim for breaking 2 hours, but I'm going to take a few pictures at the Castle. Unless of course I wake up exhausted from the Disney parks the day before- then I may just take my sweet time.

And of course, I'm wearing my "you really need to take some time to get used to them" Newtons. I haven't gone over 6 miles in them. I'll bring some older shoes too in case I actually come to my senses in time to change my plans, but it's not likely. If I go down, I go down and will have no one but me to blame. I can live with that.

A Tale of Two Races

2009-10-19T14:02:00.000-07:00

Harvest Run 5k, Sept. 2009

This race has tormented me in the past.

2007? I fail to notice the "p.m." following the 7:00. I show up in the morning complaining about how crazy early this race was... to find absolutely no one there. Apparently, I was crazy early by about 12 hours. We had plans to go out of town, so no race for me.

2008? The baby was due something like 3 days after the race. I wanted to waddle through it, but I couldn't convince anyone to go with me and was afraid the race organizers would call the paramedics if they saw me alone.

2009? Oh yeah, this is going to be my year! I'd been focusing a little too much on cross-training (as in dropped my run mileage to maybe 10 miles per week), I'd cleaned the whole house all day in anticipation of my mother coming over, and I'd had pizza for dinner. What could go wrong??

So, my entire family abandoned me. Harry, the trash talking three year old who claimed to be prepared to win the 1 mile, fell asleep. Ted and Emma used the babysitting excuse, and my mom said it was going to get dark and she had to hit the road. Not a problem. I drove downtown, found my Garmin which luckily was charged, and got my shirt.

I laughed at my friend Dan who's seven year old totally took him. (If the kid beats you by a few feet, maybe you let him win... if he beats you by a block or two, he just took you. Just saying.) A little girl won the one mile by a landslide- in a pink dress and Crocs. Classic.

I ran my race. Nothing too exciting. The pizza was only mildly threatening, the humidity was horrible, the course was boring,... same drill as always. I finished in 26:06. Not my best, but not bad considering how slack I'd been. I won an age group trophy- too funny!

I talked to my friend Mary after the race. She recommended a good bike shop nearby. I was very proud of how mature I was being in our chat- Mary totally took me (I share your pain, Dan). I was on her heels for about 2 miles but just couldn't hang on. Mary is 20 years older than me, was wearing a knee brace, and had just won her age group in a sprint tri that morning...

Fast Forward two weeks:

Brunswick Stewbilee 5k:

Now here's the problem with signing up ahead of time. I really lost interest in doing this one after my new best friend Fred sold me a bike. That's right-- I've got a BIKE! Anyway, I strapped all the bikes onto my new rack (nightmare!!) and trucked on over to St. Simons. I hadn't run since the last 5k- because I'm fickle, and I'm all about the BIKE.

I head over to the race. Not many people there- it's the same weekend as a tri in St. Simons. The race is for the Boys and Girls Club- they made really cute bibs with colored in numbers. Unfortunately they were on paper- not bib type paper, but real copy machine type paper. Hard to pin on and pretty much disintegrated during the run. Points for cuteness though.

The race started- same boring course they usually do in Brunswick. Nothing too exciting. I finished in 25:59. I was pleased because it was 77 degrees and 100% humidity at the start(yet oddly not raining... hmmm...) Oh, and it was windy. I kept longing for my bike.

OH, how could I forget?! The Frederica Academy cross country team had a big group of kids in the race. Some of them were really fast, but I passed at least 5 kids. Let me repeat, I passed cross country kids. Now I don't know if their coach told them to treat this as the slowest run ever or what, but the ones I passed looked tired. Maybe they were really new to running, but shouldn't a 15 year old cross country kid be able to run circles around me?! Weird.

I skipped the awards. I'd spent a lot of time at the start subtly checking out the ages on the bibs, pre-disintegration. Lots of perky 38 and 39 year old women. I was a little disturbed to see my Garmin showed the course was short- like 2.99 overall. Oh well. I was ready to stop. Oh, and the T-shirt, while cool, was not race-specific. It was a basic Stewbilee shirt- not a bad shirt, but instead of saying "that's right, I ran a 5k this morning" it made me think "let me point you to parking."

I went back and got everyone dressed to hit the Stewbilee. Picture 60 vendors with Brunswick stew and cornbread to sample. Now that's my kind of post-race activity. Burn 50 calories, consume 1000.

Anyway, everyone's in the car... we're maybe two blocks away... and Harry said his "neck hurt." I'm thinking it's nothing. So, without going into too much detail, it was actually something. Nothing like a 3 year old hurling in your car while trapped in one lane of traffic with nowhere to pull over! Obviously, we did not make it to the Stewbilee this year. (Harry was fine within a few hours, but the rest of us were traumatized).

And that's the end of the Tale of Two Races. I think I'm going to continue to cross-train more than just pure running. I may not have actually improved my 5k times, but I seem to have sort of maintained my running fitness. I'm not sure how much further I could go though... I think I've changed my winter run goal from full marathon to half marathon and I've pushed it back to after Christmas. I may just procrastinate away the whole season!

Triathlon? Sure, why not?!

2009-09-09T07:49:00.001-07:00

OK, it's been awhile... like 6 months. So, I've been running. I snagged a trophy for 3rd in my age group at the Swamp River Run- Harry was very impressed! I'm thinking there weren't many people in my age group, but I can't be bothered with the details.

I trained like crazy for a 5k this summer- the Fourth of July Sunshine Festival Run. I ran something like 130 miles in June alone. That was pretty horrible. I did ok- a 25:16. It wasn't a PR, but my old PR was set in the winter, pre-baby, during Goofy training, etc. Whatever, I was a little depressed.

Then we decided to go to Disney for Labor Day weekend. I was playing around on the Disney endurance site, and I found a race at our hotel! Obviously, meant to be. One catch- it's a triathlon, so there's a little swimming and biking involved. Hmmm... of course, I signed up.

So I had about five weeks to train- hadn't swum in years (and never really well), and hadn't been on a bike in forever. Oh, and don't own a bike. I managed to overlook the problems I was facing with two-thirds of the race. It's the Trek Womens Triathlon- 1/2 mile swim, 12 mile bike, 5k run.

Looking at other sprints, I became really annoyed with the swim length- 1/2 mile is 18 laps (36 lengths) in the Y pool. I could do the distance when I started, but only by resting a lot on the sides and changing strokes constantly. I was a little concerned that there would be no sides for resting in a lake.

Anyway, I did a lot of swimming and started taking spin classes. I was going to use my daughter's bike, but luckily more experienced triathletes steered me away from that idea (nice bike, but a wee bit small!) I rented a hybrid bike instead and tried not to worry about the fact that I wouldn't get a chance to really ride it until the race.

So, we go to Disney on Friday. We do MK Saturday morning. I go to the Expo to get my stuff. There are some seriously intimidating people around me. I'm waiting in line to get my rental bike, and the bike guys are fixing tires/gears/etc on these fancy bikes. I start talking to some of the women around me (to keep from having a complete freak-out!) and they're all really cool. I feel better. I get my bike, and feel even better. It's a Trek 7100- that meant nothing to me, but basically it's shaped like a lighter weight mountain bike with medium tires. It's faster than Emma's bike, but doesn't have drop down handlebars like the cool kids. I putt around, and go put it in my transition area (basically put it on a rack).

The Expo is fun- I got some free moisturizer type stuff and bought one of those Bondi Bands for my hair. I listened to the organizer, Sally Edwards- she was really funny. She made everyone stand up and shout "I am a strong swimmer" while pantomining doing the freestyle, then "I am a strong biker" while pretending to bike, and then the same for the run. Then we had to yell "Yahoo!" while doing a finish line pose. She recommended some goggles that they were selling- being so easy to manipulate, I immediately bought a pair....

Then, off to Epcot with the family- until dark. I end the night spending an hour or so packing and re-packing my stuff. This tri thing is so high maintenance! Did I mention my PF is flaring up from too much walking lugging around my 25 pound baby?? Nice to continue my Disney tradition of starting a race exhausted and limping!:laughing:

THE RACE, finally...

After much drama with Coke machines, I score a Diet Coke and hop on the bus with some other racers. It's about 6:20- my wave was starting at 7:17. I'm so grateful it's not 3 a.m! We head to the transition area. I put my towel down and line up my running shoes and socks, race belt, helmet, and sunglasses. That's basically it. Weird. I put my water bottle in my bike cage. I then face the horror of taking off my t-shirt and facing the world in a lot of lycra. I pop down a quick gel (with my Diet Coke chaser- I'm sure I was getting some looks!) I tuck my swim cap in my shirt like the other cool triathletes (peer pressure!), take my goggles, and head towards the water. (And return to leave my flip flops- d'Oh!) It's really strange walking around barefoot.

I get body marked. They put your number on your arm and thigh and then your age on your calf (but your age at the end of the year-- so I was a year older-- not cool!) I'm officially feeling pretty tough now, with my markings and my skin tight clothes! We head down to the beach. I'm in the sixth wave. I watch the earlier racers. Sally Edwards is there to give everyone a high five. Each wave gets it's own word- when we line up, we find out our word is "Gorgeous." Cracks me up. We go through the "I am a gorgeous swimmer! I am a gorgeous biker! I am a gorgeous runner!" routine. I get my high five, and off I go.

I wade along- the bottom of the lake is sand with a few weeds. The water is nice and warm- I'm incredibly surprised to find that being in a lake doesn't scare me. Maybe the 12 year old in me who swam in lakes at camp came out?! Everyone tells you to start in the back and to the side if you aren't comfortable. I've swum a ton at the Y over the five weeks, but I decided to be conservative and stay far back. Big mistake. Yes, I wasn't trampled, which was good; but, there were so many people in front of me doing crazy things. Within 100 yards people were not just doing backstroke, but doing it so that they cut directly in front of you (as in sideways!) It was an absolute madhouse. You would get past one person, and then there'd be another doing something bizarre in front of you (probably in reaction to someone in front of them!) Then, if that weren't frustrating enough, my very fine goggles with the great peripheral vision started leaking. I was really mad at myself for wearing something brand new- how could I be so stupid!?! Then I decided I'd better just laugh about it...

Finally, the swim came to an end. On the bright side, I wasn't tired- I'd barely been treading water for long sections just watching the chaos! I hopped out and ran over the mat- I'm hoping that picture isn't too horrible, but expecting the worst. I ran all the way to transition- most people were walking, which gave me some confidence since I felt fine.

I did the clothing change and grabbed one swig of water. It took awhile to get out of the transition area- finally we were moving, but slowly in a big crowd. OK, I'm ready for the bike, people!

We take off- the route is somewhere outside the parks- we have to go between traffic cones. I'm hanging to the right while people on fancy bikes are passing me. When the road opens up more, I get up the nerve and start passing people. You yell "On your left!" and blow by. Passing is really fun. Getting passed? Not so fun. The overpasses kind of stunk, but not as much as running them! The worst part- you had to turn around at the base of one of the overpasses, and then haul it up!

I was really, really jealous of the people on the "road bikes" with the skinny tires, drop down handlebars, and clip pedals. I decided not to be annoyed with them passing me- I focused on not being passed by people on bikes like mine who were wearing running shoes instead of biking shoes. I kept up a fairly steady pace until the last mile (I think- why are there no mile markers on the bike part?!) The last mile was on sidewalks and windy paths through the Fort Wilderness resort. I got passed a couple of times on the sidewalk- scary! I got stuck behind a slower woman when we reached the spectators- her family was cheering for her. I decided there was no way I was passing her while they were yelling "Go Mom!" I have my standards.

I hopped off the bike with no trouble, and ran it to the transition area. I was sort of perplexed in the second transition- I took off my helmet, put on my visor and race belt, and grabbed a sip of water. That was all I had to do- I kind of wanted to procrastinate a bit!

I'm realizing as I start running that I'm going into this dehydrated. I was way too scared to drink water on my bike, so I'd basically had maybe 2 ounces of water this whole time. D'Oh! Oh well. I'm also sad that I don't have my iPod. On the bright side, I'm not moving that fast, but I don't feel bad. It's a really boring hot, humid course with two out and backs, but I'm so happy to be on the ground on my own feet. And now, because I'm a much better runner than a swimmer or biker, I'm passing people. That's working for me. I see the finish- I get a high five from Sally, and the next thing I know, I have a medal. (It's not the greatest looking medal- a little subtle for me, but I'm all about giant Disney characters...)

I grab some free SportBeans for the kids and turn in my bike. Back for a shower, and then a full day at Epcot. Anytime anyone says anything about being hot or tired, I immediately say something like "yeah, I can see where you're getting a little tired... you didn't by any chance do a TRIATHLON this morning, did you?!" This cracks me up. I also suffered from a bad case of "race thinking"- at one point I freaked out thinking I'd lost my 3 year old. Ted pointed out that he was actually sitting in the stroller... that I was pushing.

Anyway, it was great fun. I learned a lot and really enjoyed the training. I will definitely keep up the swimming and spin classes. And I want a bike to ride with the kids- so I'll probably get an entry-level road bike just in case another tri just happens to pop up...

Gate River Run 15k

2009-03-30T10:10:00.000-07:00

This one caught me by surprise. The week before the Princess Half, Ted tells me his friend Andrew thought it would be fun if we met them in Jacksonville since his wife Melissa was running a race. I actually thought I was agreeing to a little 10k until I looked at the dates and started cursing. I was already facing a half I wouldn't be trained for; now I had a 9 miler the next week. On the positive side, the half would serve as a good long training run for the 15k!

So, we pack up our stuff and head to Jacksonville. On the way, Harry has a cookie fit. He wants the "chocolate cookies you have in the car!!" He's almost at meltdown level before I interpret correctly- "you want thin mints?" "YES!" Yeah, those cookies were in the car a month ago- they've long since been eaten. I break it to him that he's going to have to settle for something else since I can't produce Girl Scout cookies on demand. We stop at a convenience store before we hit I95. Ted goes in to get some drinks and some sort of cookies. On his way out, he spots of all things, a Girl Scout cookie stand. So Harry got his Thin Mints. And I suppose he learned that if he was loud enough and irrational enough, we'd do whatever necessary to meet his demands. That will probably come back to haunt us, but it totally worked in the short run and sometimes that's okay.

We made it over to the Expo. It's at the stadium, and it's really tedious to park my ginormous car. Of course, dragging all of us in is also tedious, but I expected that. We actually ran into Melissa on the way in. Our plan was to have dinner together, but I was getting anxious about dealing with my 3 and Melissa's baby. OK, actually I was only worried about Captain Harry, but that was a pretty big worry especially since he'd just scarved down a ton of Thin Mints. When you're trying to find the stadium and park, you just keep passing the cookies back...

We finally coordinated with our friends and ended up at their hotel. We walked across the street to a very nice restaurant. When I say nice, I mean no kid's menus, no high chairs, etc. I'm realizing that in the frenzy to get to the Expo, I forgot about the whole re-applying lipstick, brushing hair thing. Yep, I'm dragging in a horde of children looking like crap. Nice. Surprisingly, Harry and the babies were well behaved at dinner. Food was good, and it was fun to talk to Andrew and Melissa.

We headed over to our hotel by the Town Center. The hotel is in a huge outside mall type place. We had a suite, and were upgraded so that we were in basically a two bedroom apartment. I was sad we weren't staying all weekend!

So, it's the usual race day prep stuff. I put on the running skort I wore last weekend. Loved it last weekend, but it drove me crazy all day- who would have guessed? I drove over to the stadium. I ended up in a parking lot that charged $5. That irritated me but I didn't want to try circling the stadium. I did take a couple of pictures of where I was parked so I could find my car. I only took my iPhone this time, with headphones.

Everyone is just milling about by the start. I don't see anyone in costumes, and everyone pretty much looks like they just staggered out of bed and headed to the race. Not to complain, I'm not dressed up either, but it was a funny contrast to the Princess where everyone seemed dressed for the theme. I had on my fancy "Run Like a Princess" hat I bought at the Princess Expo. That was a lucky accident- I added it to my pile of stuff I was buying. I was so distracted holding the baby that I didn't notice it was $30 until I got to the hotel. I was a little irritated by it's price, but it turned out to be a fabulous hat.

So there I am, just standing in a sea of I think 15,000 people. I'm texting my mom because I'm so bored, and I'm listening to the always present 80s music. People aren't really chatting because they all have on their iPods.

Finally, the start! There's a cannon blast and the theme to Rocky. We head off through downtown. We pass the Maxwell House coffee place- it totally smells delicious. We're on a wide street but there are people all the way across. It's really packed. I was a little disoriented seeing Forest Gump blaze by in his short shorts with his box of chocolates. Bands were playing at almost every mile- I turned my music all the way down and tried to wave.

Then there's the Main Street bridge (I think- it's blue). It's not that bad, but I'm so over bridges. It has that grating that always makes me think I'm going to fall through or at the very least trip. We head through a trendy shopping area on San Marco and then we are on River Street. It's a really nice neighborhood- people are sitting in lawnchairs watching. There's a guy in a kayak watching us from the river- that would be cool. One yard had a "mimosa stand" which I thought was great. Some kids had sliced oranges they were handing out, and a runners club had those popsicle-like things without the sticks. It was a veritable buffet.

The spectators were funny in Jacksonville. They were out there and they were clapping, but it wasn't nearly as over the top as Disney. I think maybe that's because the spectators at Disney either are cast members or have a personal connection to one of the runners. I felt more like the Jacksonville spectators were out there to watch the race cause it was in their neighborhood- which is cool, but I felt weird, like we were on exhibit. It added to my feeling of isolation within the herd. I think that goes back to the iPod thing. Was no one talking because everyone was listening or was everyone listening because no one was talking?! Anyway, except for the couple of times some crazed dad pushing a stroller pushed through the crowd, I didn't hear much. Maybe Becky and I just talk too much and I've grown accustomed to chatting on the courses. Or maybe I was just way too tired.

The last mile was the bridge they call the "Green Monster." Much as I expected, it sucked. Although it did not suck as much as the bridge in Savannah, and the bridge in Savannah did not suck as much as the bridge in Brunswick. See? I have way too much bridge knowledge for someone who hates hills.

You go straight down the bridge and to the stadium for the finish. It was a little longer than I anticipated, but really was downhill. I cruised through and then ran smack into a horrible traffic jam. A mass of runners was slowly making their way to the medals and then to the Expo. It took me at least 15 minutes just to get free. I decided there was no way I was going into the Expo mess and broke out of the crowd as soon as I could. At this point, I was realizing my car was possibly on the other side of the hordes of runners coming off the bridge. As I got closer, I decided that my car was actually under the ramp the runners were coming down, so all was well. Turns out the $5 fee was totally worth it, since the man running the lot had to talk me through backing out. Again, the curse of the ginormous vehicle.

I drove back some ridiculous way to avoid the race route. I still made it back in time to shower and pack before check-out time at noon. I grabbed a quick bagel while holding Milo. I was telling Ted something about the race when I realized Milo had stolen my bagel and was gumming away! So, fully packed and checked out, we hit the stores and then drove on home.

Would I do it again? Yeah, sure, but it's not a big goal. If it works out in my schedule next year, great. I am glad I did it, but I'd really like to stay away from bridges...

The Princess Half

2009-03-25T11:41:00.000-07:00

I tried to exercise some self-control and not sign up for this race. I really, really tried. I told myself that I'd run the same course in January; that Disney races are expensive; that I don't even like princesses... And then I argued back: I could go faster on a course where I knew what to expect; the whole family likes Disney and Harry would only be under 3 and free for another month; and some princesses are pretty tough. Thinking about the new medal finally did me in. I don't know why I bother trying to be good.

I sort of trained for this one after the half in January. My longest run still never made it past the Dolphin Days 10k, but I ran more consistently. My Disney running partner, Becky, recently hit a new PR of 2:23. I printed out a pace chart and taped it to my phone with a goal of 2:21. In theory I could run 3-6 miles at a faster pace than that goal, but not having run long distances in awhile I wasn't sure how long I could maintain a faster pace.

We drove down on Friday planning to hit the Expo that night. I dropped Ted and Harry off at the hotel, and Emma and Miles and I drove over to the Expo. Slight complication: the stroller was at the hotel and there was a Braves game at the Wide World of Sports. We parked the car and began the long trek to the Expo, carrying the baby. That might have been more tiring than the actual race...

We bought a bit of stuff at the Expo. Why does Disney insist on making ugly shirts?! Seriously, I could make a better shirt in like 30 seconds. One shirt said something like "Who's the fastest one of all" with an apple- cute idea, but on ugly gray. Another shirt said something about my other slipper being a running shoe, but on shockingly bright turquoise. They had potential, but missed the mark. Which is not to say I didn't buy them. Ahem. As I was debating the ugly shirts, Miles (who I was still holding after the eternal trek) was making a spectacle of himself. I didn't really think about the atmosphere at a women's only race- he had to smile at everyone and they all had to respond. I wonder if he could have crowd-surfed to the exit? Hmmm....

We made it to the room, and hit Epcot. After wandering the countries aimlessly, we drove back to our room at the All Star suites, and amused ourselves with all the pull out beds. (Three in one room- the couch, a big chair, and the ottoman! The coolest part- pillow storage was built into the beds. I wonder if most people are smart enough to see the pillows on the first try? I had a complete fit until I re-folded the bed and found them- then I was quite captivated, but I'm easily entertained).

Saturday morning, we did the Magic Kingdom thing. Emma got to ride just about everything, so she was happy. Harry rode Splash Mountain twice. You know where the boat starts doing that jumpy uphill thing for the last fall? That would be where Harry turned to me and said "I don't want to be on this ride!" Too late. He laughed at the end and proclaimed it his favorite, but declined to go a third time. ("It's scary and you get wet.") Good thing he declined, cause we weren't standing in line again!

Milo and I entertained ourselves while waiting. See? It takes so little to entertain me now.

And, it was off to Epcot. We got a Kim Possible phone thingy. You go on missions to the various countries. It's very cool- you follow the clues and strange things happen. For instance, in Norway, smoke comes out of a chimney. In China, a creepy door opens and then slams shut. It's all done in a way that no one around you really notices what's happening- it was a huge hit with us. It also stopped the drama between Ted and Emma- one wants to ride Test Track, while the other wants to partake of food and beverages... We actually had to turn in our Kim Possible Kimmunicator because Epcot was closing. Note to self: get to the Kim Possible station earlier next time.

Finally, the morning of the race. Hello, daylight savings. The race started at 7:00, which of course, felt like 6:00- that hurt. My phone managed to vibrate the alarm- like that could get me up! Fortunately Milo is an alarm all to himself so I wasn't too late. I got dressed and drove to Becky's hotel. We'd decided against wearing the WISH shirts, only because they are too hard to make "Princessy." Becky had on pink, and I had my "Princess" tiara. (Becky also had on not one, but two, knee brace contraptions. I'm thinking a good friend probably shouldn't have encouraged her to run, especially not for a PR. Of course, a good friend wouldn't run with a 10k with someone who'd had a baby 3 weeks before-- Becky and I are such bad influences on each other!)

We drove to Epcot and parked the car (which we later found again with only a little drama). Being old hands at this by now, we didn't even go to the herding area and just started walking to the corrals. It was really cold and dark. I had a little water and ate a Snickers marathon bar. I had to mess with my tiara until it felt right- it's a little too far back to be perfect in the pictures, but it didn't bother me. I was very amused with it, although a little insecure not having a hat.

I'm such a slacker now. I call Becky Kim Possible because she has all sorts of stuff in her belt (and her gloves pinned on it!). I had my phone in my pocket, my camera in my hand, and my key in a shoe wallet. That's it. I hadn't even had water that morning- just a Diet Dr. Pepper. For my first long race, the Minnie 15k, I had a water belt fully loaded with bottles of water and Powerade. In the bag part, I had bandaids, tylenol, extra contacts, sport beans, money, etc. I even had a bandana tied around the belt for some inexplicable reason. I probably need to find a place somewhere between being too prepared and just showing up...

OK, so we are in Corral A, which is pretty sweet. We're with the fast people. We're not completely delusional and don't go to the very front, but in theory, we could see the elites. (The closest I've ever seen the elites at Disney is when they are either warming up along the road outside of the corrals, or when the leaders pass us on their way back from MK). We can see the starting line banner, and can sort of see the presenters. Now that I look back on it, this may have been the first time I wasn't basically inside a speaker, so it wasn't completely deafening. A random man found his peeps in front of us. He was passing out lemon drops. Concerns of choking brushed aside, we accepted. I finally finished that lemon drop after a couple of miles. I kind of liked it.

The Fairy Godmother came out and rambled for awhile. I was pre-occupied with my lemon drop, the cold, and the sudden realization that I was about to run 13.1 miles horribly undertrained, but I'm sure she said something sort of encouraging. The wheelchairs took off amidst some colored smoke effects. I thought they might be waiting for the "big" start for the fireworks, but alas, no fireworks. Really, fireworks are fun, but over-rated. I always think they are going to be cool, and then end up hacking over the start line.

Becky and I take off. For once, I set my Garmin at the right time. The first mile is uneventful. It's a little crowded, but not anything like the January weekend. Costume watching is fun. Allthe guys started in Corral B and back, so a few passed us early. One was in a full Snow White outfit, wig and all.

The next three miles are all a blur. Lots of costumes to check out. Some entertainment- they had a few bands, string quartets (I think- all I remember is they were dressed formally), and a little group playing guitars. I tried to take pictures of the mile markers, but they all blur or delay too much because of the dark. The signs had different princess scenes. Apparently there were hidden Mickeys in the signs- I must be the world's worst hidden Mickey finder. I didn't even think to look. Of course, looking would have required slowing down. Didn't really think it through, but everyone there was in pink, white, or black (or full costume). I would never have found Becky again if I slowed too much!

It's getting a little lighter as we blaze down Contemporary Hill and blaze back up (and by blaze I mean we didn't walk at all).

Going into the Magic Kingdom was exciting as always.

I was a little disappointed to not see Chip and Dale in Tomorrowland cause that's usually where my picture madness peaks. We raced over to a bathroom by Ariel's Grotto and then got a picture taken outside the Castle. We took another one with Snow White by the Castle. Then we stopped for the posed photo in front of the Castle. It turns out I could start picture madness without Chip and Dale! Luckily, Becky reigned me in and we got back to trying to keep moving reasonably fast. There were a bunch of picture opportunities behind Splash Mountain, but we didn't want to slow down.

Silly me, at about mile 7, I looked down at the pace chart on my phone and told Becky we were right on pace. Yep, she really wanted that PR. That was when I started to realize that long runs in training are a good thing...

So, off through the boring stretch. There were princesses along the way, and more photo ops than at the regular half. The lines weren't long, but we both decided it would hurt too much to stop (well, hurt too much to start again). I thought the fairies at the bottom of the last overpass were in a really odd spot. It would have been so painful to tackle the overpass after a stop there.

We dragged on up the overpass with Epcot in sight. I say "in sight"- try blinding. The sun was up and I was wishing I had my hat. (My anti-fog glasses were not living up to their promise).

We really tried to dig in the last mile or two. All my pictures were of people's feet and the roads- it was so hard. We were pretty much at the grunt, point, and groan stage.

The finish- I look up and see we're headed for a 2:21 finish. Sweet! I'm so tired, I let Becky take off on the last few feet. I'd suddenly realized we were running for her PR, and I didn't have to hurry anymore... We got back together at the finish, got our fabulous medals, and praised our time.

And then it was back to the hotel for a quick shower, packing, and a trip back home. I think that the Princess was my favorite half- I love the traditional Donald, but there were a lot of advantages to the Princess. This one's going on my list of races I want to run again (ok, all Disney races are on that list, but this one is slightly higher than others).

Super Dolphin Day 10k

2009-02-23T10:33:00.001-08:00

My 10k report from the Super Dolphin Days 10k:

So, thankfully, my Warrior peeps had me dressed appropriately for 30 degree weather! I was in a thick turtleneck, pants, gloves, hat, and vest. I was much more comfortable than I expected (in normal life I would have waited until later in the day to run, since it reached 65 by mid-day!)

We picked up my packet Friday night at an elementary school. I picked it up early to get it over with, only to find out you had to get the chip the morning of the race. I thought that was weird. Turns out it took all of 20 seconds to get my chip that morning, so no big deal. Anyway, they said get there 30 minutes early to get your chip, so I had roughly 29 minutes to kill.;) I took some pictures on my phone. As usual, I was the only doofus taking pictures...

So, I'm studying the map, thinking this is farther than I really wanted to go, when a random woman starts talking to me. She's asking if the course is well-marked. I have no clue, but we kind of chat a bit. She's wearing a big coat and sweatpants; she's older, and kind of has that perfect older lady hair. I think she's either a leisurely walker or a spectator...

We all wander down towards the start. Hard to find- this is it:

People are standing around chatting. I'm texting and checking my facebook. Again, doofus. The race starts with a quick airhorn blast. I see it coming, yet I jump. So embarassing to be so twitchy!

This was my plan: start the first two miles at about 9:45, then try to creep towards 9:30 for the middle, then push for 9:00s for the last two miles. I really just wanted to break an hour. (Previous 10k best was 1:08 but I haven't run one in a long time without the complications of pregnancy or a friggin' bridge).

I start running, and find myself behind an older steady guy. My first mile is 9:02. The second was 9:07. I knew I couldn't keep that pace, but I was in that delusional stage of racing... Third mile, 9:11. I decide to let the old guy go!

I walked a bit through a waterstop. Might have been a mistake...
Fourth mile was 9:35; fifth mile was about the same. By mile 5, I was sending my mom text messages about my distance so she could find me (she had the kids). I tried to text her "kill me" but accidentally sent through "kills" which I thought was actually more appropriate.

Mile 5, guess who's cheering and yelling that the finish is around the corner? My friend who looked like a spectator! She took first in the 50-54 category with 47 minutes- D'Oh! I loved that- so fun when someone totally surprises you!

Mile 6, there are some kids cheering. I manage to smile a bit, but nothing like my usual, friendly racing self. Then I look up and see the boys in the stroller with my mom and Emma jumping up and down. That did make me happy, although not faster... The last little bit is up a curved drive- the only hill has to be there? It's in the same 9:30 range.

So, I finished with a 58:38. I felt good about my effort level, but I need to do some more training. And drop some pounds. That would help. I taped a pace chart to my phone and checked it each mile- that was really good. I spent all of mile 4 wondering where I could add the extra seconds I gained by not running at an average pace of 9:27 per my chart. Stupid, but distracting, and sometimes distracting is all you've got.

We wandered down to the coffee shop and then watched the 5k. The Coast Guard was running. Some were really fast, but then a big group was running in a sort of chain following the flag. Very cool.

I made everyone linger for the results. According to my calculations based on last year's results, I had a chance for a medal. The fastest people in my group last year moved up to another age group. Yeah, I was 11th out of my group!! What was that all about?! I'm so taking those people next year...

And that's pretty much it.

Jen in GA

Disney Half Marathon 2009

2009-02-23T10:28:00.000-08:00

It's finally here. The Disney Half.

So, my mom and I decided to do the half after I ran the Goofy last year. We did two long runs of 8 miles each together. They weren't particularly fast, but they beat the sweeper time. Still, we were horribly undertrained.

My mom picked up my packet for me. That's always highly stressful- you have to get your packet by Friday night at 8:00. We usually leave around 1:00 and it's about a four hour drive. I was able to actually let people get out of the car for a bathroom break once I knew my packet was accounted for!

After doing all the night before prep, and then helping my mom with hers (which throwaway clothing did she want to bring, which shorts would she wear for the race, etc), we went to bed. I dumped the baby by Ted at around 3 a.m. and went outside my mom's door. We joined forces, and headed for the bus (after a quick bathroom break- never, ever give up the last opportunity for a real bathroom!) I was dragging all of our stuff since I was to be our sherpa.

We wander past the red carpet and over near the WISH people. As much as I like them, I can't really face talking to anyone at 4 a.m. We kill time looking at the band, the merchandise tent, etc. Did I mention it was freezing cold?! We both had on sweatshirts and gloves and sat on a Princess blanket that Emma decided was too "baby" to keep.

On a quick port-a-potty trip, we bonded with a woman who'd flown in from Maine. She had done a half at home but was 30 minutes over the sweep time for Disney. I told her to get near the front of her corral and look for the bikes. I liked her, and hoped she'd make it.

Finally, we headed to our corral. Silly me, I put my mom's time down as whatever the fastest time is that doesn't need proof. Had we been properly trained, it would have been a reasonable time, so I don't feel bad about being too far up. It bought us a little wiggle room. We abandoned our blanket, though I felt kind of attached to it.

The fireworks start, and we are off! We're doing somewhere in the neighborhood of 12-13 minute miles, so not bad at all. My mom is alternating between euphoria, panic, and general grumpiness. I'm just babbling cause there's nothing better than a Disney race!

We took pictures of the mile markers, even though they weren't new. I was disappointed to not see the "Choose your Groove" sign, but they had the music playing, so we went disco. Finally, we hit the Magic Kingdom. The spectators are crazy as always. I had to take a picture with Chip and Dale in Tomorrowland, then we found Alice and Piglet. We took pictures in front of the castle- good thing since the photographer missed us completely! (Somehow in our training, I didn't emphasize the need to anticipate the photographers and position yourself well- major oversight).

We'd been very strong through the Magic Kingdom. Unfortunately, our lack of long runs caught up to us- not so much from an endurance perspective, but from a wardrobe perspective. My mom had to stop to adjust her shoe/sock at least once per mile from Tomorrowland on. She'd have known that those socks sucked had we run longer in them, but such is life.

Hmmm... so miles 7-11 are a blur of photos (Mary Poppins), a stop at the port-a-potties, yelling for random WISHers, giving strangers Tylenol and bandaids(remember, sherpas are prepared for all emergencies). Because we lost a lot of time with shoe/sock stops, we gradually got in with a much slower crowd. I was very proud that I could stay focused- we said we were doing the race to finish and we were not going to worry about our finish time. I almost lost my focus once, when the old guy with the jazzed up walker passed us, but once we got past him, we were ok.

Mile 11 or so is an awful ramp/bridge with the sun beating down on you, but you can see Epcot. It's up towards the countries and then back down past the Epcot ball... then through the really long stretch of parking lot to the finish line. I made my mom do the cheesy holding hands up in the air across the finish thing, cause as Harry would say "I had to." We got our medals! (Time was somewhere around 3:23, but at least 20-30 minutes of that was lost to the shoe/sock crisis, bathroom breaks, pictures, etc).

We didn't wear our medals in the parks because the ribbon is scratchy but did wear our t-shirts. We hit MK and Epcot and chatted with anyone who made the mistake of asking about the race. It was great fun. My mom totally gets it now- you can be thoroughly miserable by mile 11, limping and exhausted all afternoon, and trying to pick your next race at dinner.

Oh, and the woman from Maine in the port-a-potty line? Would you believe we walked out of the massage tent, looked up, and there she was? She had a big smile and her medal. That's one of my all time favorite Disney race memories.

Reindeer Run 2008

2009-01-06T08:05:00.000-08:00

Last year I set a PR at the Reindeer Run 5k. The course starts at the YMCA, goes straight uphill to the hospital (convenient, no?) and then goes in a big square back. I ran it in 24:42. It was a beautiful thing, and I'll probably never come close to beating it. And it probably set me up for the leg pain I had during the full marathon, but whatever...

I was a little worried about running it this year. Obviously I wouldn't get close to my PR, which I can accept, but still... Then I decided to pressure my mom into running with me since she had only done one 5k before. Even though this is a low key race (as in no race numbers and you have to remember your time), any race experience is good for preparing for the half.

So, we ran uphill and in a big square. My mom hit the BMZ (Bite Me Zone) around mile 1, then got a little better around 2, and fluctuated until the end... We stuck around for the awards. Turns out even with a 38:xx minute run, we won age group awards! So, while my time was a little different, another age group ornament from the Reindeer Run.

Most importantly, we ran the entire 5k well within sweeping time of the Half!

Savannah Bridge Run

2009-01-06T07:37:00.000-08:00

Why do I keep signing up for Bridge Runs? Seriously, I train on flat ground and I'm scared of bridges...

Ted kept saying we needed to visit some relatives in Savannah, which I thought was a good idea. Being completely compulsive, I did a little race research for Savannah. Lo and behold, we just happened to decide to visit on the weekend of the Savannah Enmark Bridge Run. There was a 5k or 10k- you could do both for a 15k, called the double pump. I decided to go with the double pump because I can't help myself (and I found it very amusing what with my new pumping lifestyle).

After driving miles and miles looking for the damn bridge, we checked into the Westin by the start line. There are actually so many of us now that I brought an air mattress. There's a good look!

I got up early and got dressed. The temperature was 40 degrees, which caused me some concern since I'm a cold-weather weenie. I went with shorts, t-shirt, vest, and gloves. I'm never going anywhere without gloves again!

I walked to the start at the base of the bridge. Ironic that we'd been circling for at least an hour trying to find the bridge the night before, and I was going to be crossing it three times. I people watched for awhile. They made an announcement that a bus was running late, so I drifted up to the start just to have something to do (and to see if there were more people dressed as Santas, elves, pirates, etc). I thought I'd take a picture of the start. A random spectator saw me, grabbed my camera, and insisted I stand at the start for a picture. Can you say mortifying?!

So, here's my official picture. I'm glad he did it, because when you wear a black vest with black gloves, you look like you don't have hands in the official race pictures.

The 5k was hard, the 10k harder. It was a whole lot of bridge, so a whole lot of up. I don't remember my times, but for the double pump I was in front of maybe 12 people out of 300 something. I fell somewhere in the middle of the pack for the 5k but they didn't report my times as just a 5k runner (somewhere around 35 minutes).

This sign made me laugh. Crap. You can't see the sign. Technical difficulties.

You got a t-shirt, towel, and special plastic glass for the double pump. My towel looks stupid on my medal rod. It was a really inexpensive race, but I would have gladly paid another $10 for a medal.

I might consider this race in the future, but the bridge thing is really getting old. How about a nice flat race?! Plus, Ted's relatives all saw my times listed in the paper with a 77 year old man beating me soundly. I'd explain that only the truly insane and not recently pregnant did the double pump, but that's kind of pathetic...

I was also the only person with a camera. What's up with that?!

The Great Ear Piercing

2008-11-26T09:56:00.000-08:00

Emma wanted nothing more in life than to have pierced ears, for all the accessory options, don't ya know. We originally told her she could have it done at 10. But then I started thinking about how we just made up the age restriction and how desperately she wanted them...

Of course, we caved. I told Emma she could have the official piercing done for her ninth birthday. Unfortunately, her ninth birthday falls on Thanksgiving. Obviously nothing would be open on Thursday and Friday would be crazy at the mall. I convinced Ted we should take her on the Friday before. We told her we needed to pick up some photos at Sears, which was true, but we really didn't all need to go. Silly Emma never noticed that we went all the way through Sears and halfway through the mall before we hit Claires. The salesperson asked me what I needed and I told her- Emma almost fell on the floor! So there she is in the chair, clinging to Ted, while Harry watches suspiciously and Miles decides I should feed him while taking pictures. We were quite the spectacle!

Here's the basic idea in pictures:

"Like, right now, really?!"

The finished look

Predictably, Emma was thrilled with the outcome and is totally OCD about the alcohol/turning routine. Equally predictable, Harry made a run for it when Emma was finished- no way he was going to let that lady touch his ears!

Official Half training begins

2008-11-24T12:35:00.000-08:00

Sure, I was supposed to begin training a few weeks ago, but I was trying to balance that out with the whole wait six weeks after delivery thing (never mind the inconsistency with running in the Race for the Taste at three weeks post delivery)...

Regardless, the training has commenced.

Sort of.

I was all ready to go Sunday morning at St. Simons, but it was 37 degrees outside when I woke up. I don't run if it's below 45. Or maybe 50. Originally Ted said he'd watch the kids so I didn't have to worry about freezing them, but he was reluctant to get up. I decided it was kind of a moot point since I wasn't going outside with or without the wee ones...

So, mid-day arrives and with it, the temperature gets up to about 59 degrees. Harry was taking a nap, Ted was reading, Emma was watching TV. Here was my opportunity! I threw Miles in the ginormous double stroller and picked up my mom at her house. After rejecting the running jackets I brought for her and taking my running vest literally off my back (and glasses off my head), my mother pronounced herself ready. Oh wait- I forgot. First we split some sort of macadamia nut brownie/cookie. Apparently I get my Stomach O'Steel from her!

We headed out. My mother had just had a private lesson with a ChiRunning Coach (really), so she tried to implement her "lean" and I just plodded along pushing the baby and babbling. We took one of the routes that I always took during Goofy training- boring, but reassuring in its familiarity.

We ran approximately six miles. As usual, I turned off my Garmin at one point and forgot to re-start it so I had to estimate about a half of a mile, but I've become fairly good at estimates so I think I'm within reason to call it six miles. Besides, I'm the Coach, so if I say it was six, who's going to argue?! It wasn't the fastest pace, but our goal is to get across the line together and be at a non-sweepable pace of at least 14 minutes per mile (allowing time for pictures and potential bathroom breaks). Our pace was well within non-sweepable time, so all was good.

The baby was perfectly content, and my mother has proclaimed herself a RUNNER. I just know in a couple of months she'll be looking up past results for 5ks to see if she can win her age group!

Race for the Taste

2008-11-20T10:19:00.000-08:00

OK, it's been about 6 weeks since the Race for the Taste, but I've had some time issues...

We went down to Disney on a Thursday for Emma's fall break. Her break just happened to fall on the same weekend as the Race for the Taste, which is how I ended up running in a 10k three weeks after having a baby.

Surprisingly, it wasn't that hard to deal with being at Disney. The first day I used the ginormous double stroller, but after an unpleasant run-in with a bus driver, I switched to the sling. Generally, Ted took Emma on the big rides while I took Harry to the stuff he could do. The baby pretty much slept in his sling and I tried not to accidentally run him into anything! One of my favorite memories is on an English woman in the line to the Playhouse Disney show suddenly exclaiming "have you got a baby in there?" and when I said yes, she couldn't stop chatting about how she "saw a hand popping out." It was so funny.

We stayed at the Fort Wilderness cabins. For the most part, I hated the cabins- I'm more of an "explore the lobby and gift shop" kind of girl. But, and this is a big but, you didn't have to worry about bothering other people with your noise, you had a kitchen, and you parked right by your room. So this will probably be our resort for awhile...

Here we are heading out from the cabins on our first morning. I already look tired and Harry is rolling his eyes...

Did I mention Harry spent the entire trip as "Captain Harry" the pirate?

And this is how poor Miles spent most of his time:

So let me fast forward to the actual race...

First, after playing at the parks for two days, I realize I have to pick up my packet. We've gone back to the cabins, so Miles and I hop in the car and head to the Wide World of Sports. Being the brilliant person I am, I go towards Epcot (thinking it has to be near since the race starts at the WWoS and ends at Epcot). Yeah, so that doesn't work. I have to pull a U-turn at the entrance to Epcot and head towards MGM (excuse me, Hollywood Studios). This seems like a reasonable mistake, but it feels way too familiar- yep, did it for last race too. I'm sure I'll do it for the next race as well.

Miles and I park and head off to find the elusive packet. I go in the entrance to the "Milk House" that I've always used expecting to see signs and t-shirts to buy. No, I see men playing hockey. There's a full sized ice rink where the expo should be. So that's a little disconcerting. I go back outside and look for other runners- sure enough I find them at a back entrance. Then everyone refuses to give me my packet until they've seen inside my sling. People are fascinated that I have a sleeping munchkin strapped to my body! They all praise me for running so soon, so I leave tired but feeling appreciated.

Sunday morning, 5 a.m. So, like I'm already up! I'm exhausted from having already spent time at Disney and the whole sleep deprivation thing. But, sleep deprivation is nothing new... I get dressed while watching the Top 7 things to do at Disney on it's perpetual loop. I've never been so slack about a race- it's impressive that I have my chip on my shoe and my bib is sort of even. I head out the door and drive over to Epcot. I jump on a freezing cold bus and we drive over to the start. A bunch of us start laughing because we can't remember where we parked (luckily, it was the same place as all the other races so I can follow my autopilot to find my car at the end). I'm feeling a little self-conscious in my glowing WISH shirt.

I wander around a bit and end up in the port-a-potty line. There's a pleasant man in front of me talking to some girls. He's far too coordinated for me to handle- his hat matches his entire outfit and has a pocket for his iPod. So, there he is with his iPod sticking up like an antenna on the back of his head, and he messes with it, and suddenly I'm reading the screen to his iPod and seeing "ABBA" and I want to die laughing... then I'm distracted by the crazy guy who always shows up in basically underwear and a cape- what is that all about?! Hey, my glowing WISH shirt doesn't seem so crazy compared to an antenna iPod and naked guy! But me standing there laughing to myself- that might look a little crazy...

I drift over to the start with absolutely no clue how I'm going to do. I find Becky, my running buddy. A couple of weeks before the race, I told her to go her own pace this time since I had no clue if I could even finish. Becky asks me if I'm going to run or walk- I tell her I don't know. She says she has no plans for getting a PR and will go my speed. I'm nervous I'll make her too slow, but really glad she decided to join me.

The race starts- it was totally anticlimatic. I wasn't at my best, but I was able to run all of it. (I don't count walking the water stops as stopping running). Becky and I chatted and ran at a pretty steady pace. By the time we reached the Beach Club, I could tell I hadn't run that far in a very long time, but I was still ok. We cruised through the countries and headed to the finish line. We made it in about 1:11, so that was pretty good. If Becky hadn't been with me, I'm sure I would have been miserable!

We found another WISHer, Leigh, at the finish and took our pictures (as usual, my eyes were closed- would it kill them to take another shot?!) We then went to find our food samples. The gimmick with Race for the Taste is that you get food samples from the Food and Wine Festival. Becky and Leigh seemed to find it difficult to deal with strawberry shortcake, pasta, quiche, and a diet coke- in that order- in the morning. I must say, I have what has to be the greatest stomach of all time. Sure, I may have a jelly belly, but on the inside? Stomach o'steel. I can hold anything down at anytime with no bad consequences. Perhaps this isn't a good thing...

So, Becky and I realized that we'd seen each other for at least seven Disney races and run together for two- how funny is that? It made me sad to part, but we'll be together in January. She's already volunteered to drag either my mom or Betsy so that will be a help! In turn, I agreed to provide candy somewhere along the course of the full since Becky is going goofy again (and yes, I've gone from being completely fine with my wise decision to only do the half this year to being a bit jealous).

I high tailed it back to the cabins (after taking Leigh back to her hotel- silly girl didn't think about bringing her pass with her when she decided she could walk back to her Epcot resort-- yep, I've done that too in the past). Emma was showered, but the little boys were basically naked, and Ted hadn't showered- but he had made pancakes, so that was good.

I scarfed down a heap of pancakes and after everyone was made reasonably presentable, we hit the Animal Kingdom. When it got too miserably hot, we went back to the cabin to rest. Our plan was to hit Epcot that night for the Food and Wine Festival... but, living on the edge, I convinced Ted to sacrifice the Food and Wine Festival. We got in the car and drove to the Magic Kingdom without telling the kids. Emma was totally excited since we hadn't spent much time there. Harry would have been excited, had he been awake. He was quite pleased if a bit confused when he woke up by Space Mountain.

We rode a bunch of rides, and then I ran with the baby in the sling all the way through the MK fighting the Spectromagic crowd. Why? Well, to get the monorail to get to the Transportation Center to get to our car and finally, to get the sacred bottle that had been left behind! Mission accomplished, thank you.

Here's the kids on our last night with their ice cream.

Did I say "their ice cream?" Harry is pleased with himself because he stole mine.

And just in case you wondered what a person would look like after running 6 miles, visiting two parks, carrying a big ol' baby in a sling all day, and on no sleep?

And that pretty much wraps it up.

And just in case anyone thinks I'm exaggerating... allow me to present Naked Guy!

Shortest maternity leave ever.

2008-10-23T11:55:00.000-07:00

I'm discharged from the hospital on Thursday at about 10:30 a.m. Since this is the arrival of a third child, Ted stays at work and my mom picks me up. We make a quick stop by DeeDee's for homemade doughnuts.

I leave the baby at home with his Mimi after lunch and head up to the office to verify that the crap I left on my desk on Tuesday was still there. (Good news! Crap had not magically taken care of itself.)

And that was it. So my maternity leave was officially three hours long. I was back in my chair within 48 hours of leaving it. I kept saying during my pregnancy that I was going to give birth in my chair. I came about as close as possible, although without the mess.

(FYI GoofyBaby is chilling with me even now as I'm typing with one hand... I'm in the office, just procrastinating).

Introducing GoofyBaby!

2008-09-23T09:00:00.000-07:00

Well, it's been awhile since I posted since I was kind of busy, but the title says it all. I really don't want to relive the details and thanks to the kind nurse who put something in my IV find the details a little fuzzy, but here are the highlights.

My mom came three weeks before I was due based on dates of other two kids, so of course he hung in until his due date allowing me even more time to get enormous and grumpy;
We ate every doughnut we could get our hands on;
We accompanied the doughnuts with various coffee drinks;
We got bad manicures;
We bought a ridiculous number of towels over several visits to Walmart and had them monogrammed (really);
We bought bedroom furniture for Emma- try testing out a mattress 10 months pregnant;
Finally, my water broke about 10 minutes before we were supposed to drive 20 miles to get Emma for dance- my mom called and told the school to put her on the bus;
We hid from the yardman who was ringing the doorbell since we really didn't have time to chat;
We went to the doctor's office where they said go to the hospital- that was a wasted step in the process;
My mom took me to the hospital and fenagled a wheelchair for me;
Good thing, since I thought I might actually have the baby on the giant helicopter "H" before we made it in the building;
We got in a room and the nurse broke it to me that I was again not having an epidural;
I went through the "woe is me... I'm not an earth mother type" stage;
We told Ted to meet Emma's bus and take her to dance;
The nurse put something in my drip;
Ted called and said one of Emma's friends was unexpectedly with her- we told him to take them to dance and come to the hospital;
I closed my eyes for everything else (and highly recommend this approach);
My mom was asking the nurses what to do if the doctor didn't get there- I think they told her to go sit in the corner but that may be a Stadol-laced memory;
My mom realized things were moving too fast- she called Ted and made him turn around with the dancing girls;
The doctor arrived- not that I really cared;
Ted came blazing in;
I realized Emma and her friend were in the waiting room in their dance leotards- oddly enough, that was a real event not a Stadol hallucination;
Had 8 pound baby. Don't really remember seeing him.

That's about it. I got to the hospital around 3:00 and had him at 4:15. All of that was in the p.m.

So, we named him Edward Miles. He's going by Miles, until he gets older and decides its too dorky. It's a family name on Ted's side, and the obvious choice for GoofyBaby (thus dorky). Harry calls him Milo because of an enunciation issue... He looks just like his siblings.

Emma and FFA

2008-08-01T12:18:00.000-07:00

Emma, Ted, and I went out to lunch for the last weekday of the summer. We're talking about if there are any changes in the third grade. We decide classes are harder, but they don't join any clubs until fourth grade (spelling bee, math club, etc).

Ted asks Emma if she wants to join FFA later on. She immediately says "oh, yeah!" I'm trying not to snicker at my redneck child. So Ted says "Future Farmers of America?" and Emma says "uh... Favorite Fall Activities?" And I almost do a spit-take, cause that's the Emma I know, not the future goat herder.

The Name Game

2008-07-18T11:45:00.000-07:00

So I'm thinking this new baby can't go through life named GoofyBaby. We've come up with a few ideas, but nothing perfect. I guess we can just look at him and "know" his name, but that seems a bit too last minute, even for the girl who still hasn't pre-registered at the hospital.

I've polled my WISH friends- they like Miles and Max (son of Goofy). Miles is my front runner for a middle name. It's in Ted's family tree, and it seems very appropriate for a GoofyBaby. I like the name Max for other people's babies, not mine. I don't know why, but there you have it.

I also asked Emma and Harry. Emma and I have more fun picking names that won't work for whatever reason- our current favorite is Joshua. Try saying Josh Smith fast. For that matter, try saying it slow. It never fails to crack us up (but so does I Survived a Japanese Gameshow, so we are obviously simpletons.) Still, as we like to say, that is not focusing on the task at hand.

I asked Harry for his thoughts last night. Shockingly enough, he seemed to get the question and immediately blurted out an answer- "WallyMe." Uh, okay... He was still insistent on WallyMe this morning. Tracy (his teacher) thought maybe he was talking about the movie, but he hasn't seen it and isn't particularly interested in the commercials. In a funny twist, Wally kind of goes with my Disney running inspired theme- kind of feels like Walt, doesn't it?

That's about it for that topic.

I haven't completely neglected my running. I am wearing my sweet new shoes right now. They are Pearl Izumis, so I can run like an animal. We at WISH were pretty peeved at their ad campaign (essentially mocking joggers as being weenie runners), but I'm a sucker for a good sale. I can still tie them too! And they're a very serious reflective silver/orange, so on the off chance that a driver can't spot me by the giant gut and unruly hair, they'll totally see my feet. (As I walk through the parking lot at Walmart, because again, not doing so much running).

I've also spent a great deal of time (ok, wasted a great deal of time) coming up with potential races in the future. I've found a bunch of prospects. Now we just need to decide how to work them into our schedules based on the following factors:

1) Location and weather;
2) Time of year and time of start;
3) T-shirt appearance;
4) Is there a medal? And if so, is it worth the trouble?
5) Past results- can I maybe get an age group award?
6) Scary- but stroller friendly?
7) Race atmosphere.

I like my rewards, so if it's got a good medal and a cute t-shirt, I'll probably be willing to drive a little farther. And if it just looks like fun (think Christmas races), I might be more eager to sign up.

Oh, and of course, will it fit in both my life schedule and our training schedules? For instance, a 10k run on a weekend we are scheduled for a long run from 5-7 miles would be perfect. I need to go get some calendars while the school planners are on sale-- time to start penciling in our running schedules! I loved that part last year, especially when I could look at a 20 mile run around Christmas and fall over laughing. (More grim than funny when you are actually in the middle of that 20 miler, but still really fun to put on the calendar). I'm assuming we won't do anything over 9-10 miles for the half, so my calendar will be slightly less daunting (until you remember GoofyBaby and his imminent arrival).

The Glucose Horror

2008-07-16T13:00:00.001-07:00

I head over to my doctor's office to do my glucose test for gestational diabetes/regular check up a couple of weeks ago. Lovely crowd. The girl next to me was having a conversation with her toothless mother that centered around the baby's name: "well, if it's Dakota's, we're thinking Chloe; if it's Justin's, we're thinking Victoria." Hello. The most shocking part? Her name choices weren't bad... Another woman and her charming family were screaming that it was going to be $270.00 that day instead of $150.00 and "she was going to kick some ass." Yay! Future playmates for GoofyBaby!

They finally call me back. I've gained one pound in a month, which is surprising because I'm feeling very, very big. The nurse looks a bit wide-eyed when she tests my blood pressure. I have to say "it's usually low" before she lets out a "oh good, it's 90 over 60." Whatever.

That's pretty much it, except they tell me I have to do the glucose test at the lab, and it's closed for lunch. Good, I wasn't in the mood for needles anyway.

Two days later, I suck it up and go for my test. I chug the nasty drink-- Powerade on crack-- all the while telling myself that if I could drink a nasty Powerade dixie cup at almost every mile for 39.3 miles in January, I can handle this. And I'm pleased with myself because I managed to have a Goofy flashback in a totally random moment!

I go sit in the lobby and watch infomercials and read a book. I feel fine, if horribly bored, for about 30 minutes. Then it happens. I'm sitting there minding my own business watching an infomercial for a Shark cordless vacuum, when I feel a bit dizzy. I try to focus on the vacuum- it can pick up wet rice and nails and get under your furniture!- when I decide maybe lying down on the loveseat would be a really good idea. (You know, if you're going to keel over, might as well get in position early...)I'm clammy, I'm queasy, I'm just utterly miserable. I feel so bad I don't even want to get the nurse (and I'm afraid she'll make me do it again another day).

Finally the nurse comes for me. I get it together enough to make it down the hall and into her little chair o' blood letting. "Success!" I think. She looks at me and says "are you alright?" I think I answer positively, but she starts freaking out. She says I'm really pale and basically look like crap. Hello, I'm upright and that's an accomplishment. Don't bring me down, lady! She draws my blood, mutters about how I obviously don't need to take this test, and runs off to get me a Coke out of their private stash (unheard of!). The Coke, which is actually a nasty Cherry Coke, perks me up enough that I consider re-joining the world of the living.

So, now two weeks later, I've had a couple more sinking spells from eating sugar. Is that cruel or what?! I asked the PA what my level was. You have to be below 130 on the test or you go to the second stage of testing for gestational diabetes. I was at 90. I asked her if that was low enough to make me feel bad- she said it was just really healthy. Call me crazy, but "really healthy" levels shouldn't require lying down in public wondering if you need to call 911.

This baby is starting to irritate me. I know I still need to pre-register at the hospital, and that either GoofyBaby or as Emma says "the baby to be named later" are not appropriate name choices, but I need my space back.

I did try to cheer myself up by buying new running shoes and a new running outfit for post-arrival. Hopefully they'll get here soon- I'll have to put the outfit away for awhile, but I can wear the shoes now. I'm proud to say as of two days ago, I could still tie my shoes by myself. Not to imply that I am actually running anywhere...

Sunshine Festival 5k

2008-07-08T07:57:00.000-07:00

Well, several months ago we said we'd do this race. Heck, several weeks ago we said we'd do it. Then it got hotter, I got bigger, and the doubts kicked in...

So, my mom told her friend and fellow Disney half-runner Betsy as of the night before, we weren't going! Well, I told myself I'd wait until morning to decide...

I didn't set my alarm thinking that if I overslept, it wasn't meant to be. I woke up to a lot of light in the room and thought "huh, guess I'm too late." Then I looked at my phone and it was 6:20 a.m. Plenty of time to get to the park and register before 7:30! Before I got too over-eager, I put on my clothes. I couldn't find any BodyGlide, which was disturbing indeed, but my shirt fit! So, after deciding I was not going to have a wardrobe malfunction and nothing really hurt, I called my mother, who groaned, and left the kids with Ted, who groaned.

I walked down to my mom's house, hurried her up, and we headed to the park. We got in the line to register. My mom was laughing at the "goobers" in their running clothes, but then started laughing at herself in her WISH shirt (mine stopped fitting after the Minnie). We registered and got our T-shirts. OK, dilemma. What to do with the shirts?! So, we walked over to the Village Inn and Pub. The clerk was fine with us leaving the shirts there. I captured this shot of my mother putting on her bib in their mirror...

We used their bathroom and headed back to the race, after a quick check in the mirror. I'm having doubts about how my mother will handle sitting in a parking lot before dawn and using a portapotty!

We stand around "stretching" and meet a nice girl from Gainesville. We talk kids, running, strollers, etc. I told my mom later that she was wearing a fairly subtle Boston shirt. I can't wait to see how she placed- she looked like she was going to be fast!

So we line up in back and entertain ourselves by scoping out our fellow runners. There's a fun game you can play- "who's going to take me?" and it's variation "who can I take?" (There's always someone who will surprise you!) I'm hoping we took the random people in jeans and khaki shorts...

The race started, after a really nice performance of the National Anthem. We hadn't really discussed race strategy, so at the last minute I said "let's start out running and see what happens" or something like that. It's a nice course- all neighborhoods, all flat. Several families came out on the course to cheer decked out in their Fourth finery- very nice touch. They also wrote in chalk on the streets- "RUN RUN RUN." Cute.

Guess how far we made it before we stopped to walk?! The first mile marker!! Seriously, if you haven't run a 5k, getting to that first mile marker is hard. We did it in around 13 minutes. We walked some, ran some the next couple of miles. We entertained ourselves by talking to every volunteer on the course- and there were a lot! My mom took to pointing to me and yelling "pregnant" and pointing to herself and yelling "old!" Yep, we were making a spectacle of ourselves. I think the WISH shirt brings out the crazy in wearers...

Here I am in all my glory with GoofyBaby. (We took this picture close to the end, but before the people at the finish could see us walking).

We blazed in somewhere around 43 minutes. As usual, I filled out the card thingy, got some water, looked around, and then remembered to stop my Garmin. The stupid part is that I thought of it about 10 feet before the finish line, but didn't want to hit it crossing the line. Oh yeah, because I'd hate to ruin the official photographer's picture-- as if! We ate some well deserved Oreos (well, generic Oreos), said bye to our super speedy friend, and retrieved our shirts.

Then we headed on back to home wearing our bibs, and strutting the walk of the pious 5k racer. (The walk is even better when you have a big medal!)

That night we did the fireworks thing with some friends. Harry and Emma were hanging with their buddy, Jessica. Emma wanted to do her hair; Harry wanted her popcorn. Harry was a little concerned about the fireworks, but got into the spirit of things pretty quickly.

Finally, the next morning we hit the beach. What you don't see in this picture is me being pummelled by waves trying to keep my camera dry (and reasonably non-gritty).

So, as far as I can tell, that ends my official running career until post-GoofyBaby. Sure, I may waddle around the block a few more times, but the next 5ks I can find that are nearby are in September. I'm completely convinced GoofyBaby will arrive on Labor Day, so that makes the September races difficult at best. Luckily, I have my coaching job to distract me! I'm already looking up 5ks (and maybe a few longer distances) to work into my mom and Betsy's training. As soon as I get them copies of Bingham's Marathoning for Mortals and make them a calendar, I'll be ready to coach... I wonder if I need a whistle?

A Comment

2008-07-02T08:35:00.000-07:00

This is Jen's daugter and I would like to say that I am offended!

Princess Emma and her supporters demand a retraction

2008-07-02T06:10:00.001-07:00

Certain fussy members of my family have declared the pictures of Emma in the pool to be less than flattering. I'd like to point out that no one looks good in the bright South Georgia sun in a baby pool, especially when distracted from posing by trying to protect themselves from Harry's flailing, but whatever. So, here are some additional pictures of Emma...

This one is at Mullet Bay. Food's ok, but the butcher paper is brilliant. Even Harry behaved himself (except for one incident where he felt the need to chat with the people in the booth behind us, but that was entirely their fault for making eye contact.)

In case you were curious, here is what you might look like after going on a beach walk in about 95 degree weather, having a complete hissy fit because it's hot and your children are whiny, and demanding to get out of the sun and eat immediately. It's a vision!

(Note that I have a death grip with one hand, and a cracker to shove at Harry in the other- is that multitasking or what?)

This one is at the park down the street. What's up with the trend in bumpy slides now?! Hello, who wants to go down that?! Thank goodness Emma will do it with Harry so I don't have to squeeze in.

So there are my updated pictures.

The Great Potato Harvest

2008-06-30T07:16:00.000-07:00

Farmer Ted planted potatoes in his raised bed in the backyard a couple of months ago. After much consideration, he pronounced them ready to harvest! Ted says we can't use shovels because we could hurt the potatoes. I get the logic, but I don't really want to dig with my bare hands. Unfortunately, Harry is only interested in moving handfuls of dirt out of the raised bed and Emma wandered off to find her hula hoop. Great. Pregnant girl has to take one for the team and start digging.

I squat down and start rooting around, so to speak. Ted is pulling up potatoes (which Harry is puting in baskets along with dirt). I keep digging, but don't find anything. I can't see what I am touching, but determined to be a good sport, I keep digging. Success! I touch something that feels vaguely potato-ish... then my finger pushes through whatever it is and it frigging explodes. Some sort of warm goo is all over my hand, which is still trapped in the dirt. As I pull up my hand, the smell of rot is overwhelming. So now I'm covered in sticky, stinky goo and screaming while everyone else is laughing hysterically. I run in the house and scrub my hand over and over, but could still smell the funk.

So what was the stinky, sticky goo? Well, contrary to the images that popped into my head courtesy of Stephen King and Dean Koontz, we're thinking it was a very, very rotten potato. So much for me playing farmer! Ted told me I was a bad homesteader. No argument here!

Here's a slightly staged photo showing children who look cooperative...

I did manage to get over my alien pod explosion images enough to eat the mashed potatoes Ted made. Pretty tasty! There's now a basket full of dirty potatoes sitting on my dining room table...

I did use the shovel and pitchfork to look for any left over potatoes after the initial extraction. I had no idea you used your core to shovel- that was a little awkward since my core has gone into hiding. Still, that was exercise, right?!

That blue thing in the background of the picture? Why, it's our lovely pool! Here's some pictures of Emma and Harry in it when it's full. I think these capture their personalities fairly well.

Unfortunately, we didn't empty out the water for like... a week. Yeah, pretty slimy. Let's have a moment of silence for the pool. RIP, slimy blue pool.

Well, I think I ran twice in June...

2008-06-27T10:30:00.000-07:00

The first run in June:

Emma was at a friend's house swimming and Harry was at home with Ted napping. It's just far enough to my friend's house that I didn't want to send Emma on her bike alone, so I put on my new maternity running skirt and "ran" over with her. I took the long way, so we made it about a half-mile. I decided rather than stick around, I'd try to keep going (I know, nice friend to dump your kid off and literally run...)

I ran about 3 more miles with a couple of walking breaks. It was in the 90s, which I found irritating. Luckily I was in my neighborhood, and while I still don't know street names all that well, I do know the shadiest, flattest, least doggy populated streets. I poured cold water all over my marathon hat- it's not the best look, but it works. I actually felt pretty good, and when I made it back to my friend's house, everyone thought I was a total bad-ass. Sweet! We all know the real motivation for that run, right?! The maternity running skirt was brand new...

The second run in June:

I took Harry out on a Saturday morning after our customary Walmart trip. It was about 9:30 a.m. when we started. (You have to get Harry to Walmart early because he likes to "march" through the store. Marching is easier without a crowd).

I discovered where my sciatic nerve is the night before. Hello! It didn't hurt that morning, so I thought maybe exercising would help. (Yes, why rest a potential injury when you can make it worse by running?) I ran about a block before I realized my sciatic nerve was still having issues. I thought I could just slow down and work through it, but then I got a weird pain in my side. I couldn't decide if it was a regular side pain or not, because as you may realize, my side is a lot bigger now. And I was getting hot. And Harry took possession of our one water bottle... I decided running wasn't working, so I walked the rest of the way. I made the mistake of pointing out a bunny to Harry (we have lots of wild rabbits in our neighborhood now). He missed it, and then insisted for a good two miles that the "bunny hide" and he "want to see bunny!" Alas, no other bunny sightings.

I'm used to our Goofy training when Harry was still too little to do much talking. He's not going to be making any speeches anytime soon, but it's still entertaining to have him try to carry on a conversation in his stroller. (Although the bunny talk/"more cracker" demands did get a little old...)

Oh, and now my only size appropriate running shirt is getting a wee bit snug around the gut.

Future plans:

Hmmm... there is a 5k in St. Simons on the Fourth of July. I did it last year- it was my first 5k where I broke 30 minutes (29:59 to be exact). I'd kind of like to do it, but I'm not so sure.

The pros: it's a short walk from our place, there are walkers so I probably won't be DLF, it's flatter than you can imagine, I probably weigh about the same now as when I did it last year (really!), and it's another chance to wear my super cool maternity running skirt.

The cons: it's going to be hot, I haven't attempted to run in awhile, they don't allow strollers so I'd have to carry my water bottle instead of having a convenient tray, I'm going to be even bigger than I am now, and my only enormous wicking shirt may not be able to hold me in.

The biggest pro of all? Well, my very first 5k I was DLF. For the last mile or so I was running next to a woman who knew the cop bringing up the back in his squad car. He was literally yelling at us through his loudspeaker! He was teasing/encouraging, but I've never been yelled at through a cop's loudspeaker (or had the sirens flick on right behind me- he did that too)... it was really bizarre. I'm thinking I show up this time with my big ol' belly, and I might get an ambulance escort! Or maybe even a fire truck! That might be worth it (although Harry would be devastated if I get a fire truck escort and he's not with me...)

I haven't completely lost my mind though. There is a 5k in a little town about 20 miles away this weekend starting at 8:00 a.m. Call me not tempted! I'm very proud of that bit of self-control...

Introducing my Medal Rod

2008-05-28T07:13:00.000-07:00

A little over a year ago, Wendy from WISH posted a picture of her medal display in response to the "so what do you do with all these medals?" question. It was a curtain rod covered in medals. I almost died of envy when I saw it. Seriously, it was beautiful. I wanted one so badly, but with one medal I thought my rod might look a little... needy.

Well, look what I have now!

Before you make fun of the spackle, I have to add that my helpers were 2 and 8. Harry kept demanding to "help, momma!" I put him in charge of the stud finder. He was very pleased with himself. Emma was less enthusiastic, but did at least eyeball the rod to see if it was reasonably level (and then she mocked me for putting them in chronological order). Can I talk about my hatred of plaster walls? Thus the spackle...

You might be able to see a common theme with the medals. Yep, with the exception of the one Jacksonville half medal with the tacky ribbon, they're all Disney. (OK, I've added another one I found from the Bridge Run, but still). Oh, and only the first three are pre-GoofyBaby.

I haven't done much running lately. The combination of heat and just feeling yuck is a problem. I felt truly awful yesterday afternoon at work. I think my blood pressure dropped some- I don't have a scientific basis for that idea, but I felt really light-headed and queasy and had some Braxton Hicks action. (It's also possible I was hungry). The feeling eventually passed. I had Ted take my blood pressure about an hour later- it was 100/60 with a pulse of 57. That's not that low for me, but I'm wondering if it was lower when I felt so bad. Anyway, running was out of the question.

On the bright side, I haven't really gained much weight. I'm eating plenty, so I assume GoofyBaby is doing just fine. The way I see it, every pound I don't gain is a pound I don't have to worry about later! Of course, I know it's entirely possible to gain eight pounds next month- I think I gained eight pounds with Emma every month.

I've been looking into training post-delivery. I'm sure I'll leave GoofyBaby at home some, but I'd like to be able to drag him along on some of the short runs. Most double jogging strollers require the baby to be at least 6 months old. That so puts me outside my training window for the January half. There's one I found that you can buy an attachment for in order to hook a carseat on! Picture me with Harry in one seat and GoofyBaby in a carseat on the other side (and Emma on her bike)! And yes, I realize that's the height of madness. It's all that's keeping me happy right now, so I'm just going to keep my little delusion that I'll be perky and ready to run and that both boys will be cooperative...

Return of runner girl... sort of

2008-05-23T06:13:00.000-07:00

So yesterday was a stressful day to put it mildly.

I took Emma to her eternal dance rehearsal (THREE PLUS HOURS). When I went back home, I looked at Harry and thought, "oh why not?" Coach Harry went in the stroller. He's so funny- I told him we were going running, and he gathered up my iPod and Garmin and brought them to me.

I really felt kind of yuck, but decided I didn't care what speed I ran- I knew just trying to get out and move would help. I ran almost 2.5 miles. My goal was 3 miles, but I didn't worry about it because I had to cut it short to get a quick shower and grab Emma.

It turns out my average pace was around 13 min/mile. In the old days I would have been finished with my 3 miles easily before I finished yesterday's run. But that's okay.

Harry and I had fun. Harry stole my water bottle (which is really his SpongeBob bottle) and perfected his spit-take. It was very impressive. I chatted with Harry, gave him his supplies (baggy of goodies and Paci depending on his mood), conducted music with one hand, and text-messaged a friend, all while looking for cars and avoiding melt-down inducing views of the park. My multi-tasking may have contributed to my time...

It was nice to see I can still run, even if it's almost a walking pace. It was also 82 degrees and 61% humidity, even at 7:00 p.m. when we finished- can you say hot!?

But that's all my news. The actual dance performance is this weekend. I don't even want to think of the implications of a three hour rehearsal...

Slacker

2008-05-22T11:30:00.000-07:00

All right, just so no one has the wrong impression and thinks I'm Serious Runner Girl, I have to say after my reasonably triumphant 5k finish at the Race for the Pinks, I haven't done much. Actually, I haven't done anything. And it's been a week... or two...

I have my reasons:

First, I caught a cold. So that entailed much self-pity and sniffing and general wallowing.

I'm better now, but there is a bigger problem lurking. I'm the type who needs a race in the future to motivate (scare) me into training. I've discovered that's how I always am, regardless of GoofyBaby. There's a 5k in July, but I doubt I'll want to run at that point. I might walk/waddle it, but I might not. I am considering breaking out some cowbells and lining up along the course to cheer, but it may seem really early in the morning. The half is in January, post-GoofyBaby, and that's just way too far away to think about. GoofyBaby needs a real name before I even start worrying about the half!

Never say never... I'm not saying I've stopped running completely until GoofyBaby's arrival. I sort of thought about it last night, but we were under a severe thunderstorm warning until 10 p.m. and the pine trees are really, really tall on my route. But at least I did seriously consider going.

Having said that, I've accepted that if I don't run again until after GoofyBaby appears, I still managed to keep it up for a pretty long time.

In the meantime, I think it's time to make my curtain rod medal display. If I'm really good, I might even consider working on my running scrapbook. Right... I'm just going to focus on the curtain rod thing.

So here's something entertaining:

Minnie Marathon 15k, 2007, first long distance run, time approx. 1:54

Minnie Marathon 15k, 2008, 20 weeks pregnant, time approx. 1:48

The first picture explains why I'm so anxious to not completely fall apart... oh, and obviously, I got a better hat after seeing exactly why layers and visors don't mix well.

Race for the Pinks 5k

2008-05-21T12:53:00.000-07:00

So, I said I was going to slow down, but when I came home from the Minnie weekend, I was feeling good and decided that was an arbitrary decision...

The Race for the Pinks was the weekend after Minnie. The race was organized by a service league in town. I'm embarassed to admit I dropped out of the league this year. Nice people, but too much drama.

So, I had mixed emotions on this race. On the one hand, there was a possibility there would be a good turnout so I wouldn't be dead last and it was for a good cause; on the other hand, it felt slightly tacky to go to the race after dropping out of the group. Ultimately, I decided it didn't matter.

My plan was to wake up Saturday and decide if I wanted to go or not. I woke up, decided I had nothing better to do, and then for the first time ever, loaded up the stroller and took Harry to the race. It's always bothered me that Harry experiences the boring training runs, but never the races, and they didn't list any stroller restrictions.

Harry and I registered with about ten minutes to spare. Being no fool, I took off his shoes and socks. He protested, so I explained that I didn't want him to throw them off while I was running. He looked shocked, and demanded "I wanna run!" I had to move quickly to distract him! We lined up in the very back and waited for the start.

I forgot to mention there were pink balloons everywhere and blaring music. Why is it always blaring 80s music at races?!

We took off through downtown. Harry crossed his arms behind his head and just kicked back. Cops were there blocking the roads, so there was tons of room for us even with the stroller. I fell back to about an 11 minute pace. As usual, by about the two mile mark, I finally warmed up enough that I wasn't miserable. I gave Harry a cup of water from one of the stops (I had my own- beauty of taking a stroller!). He poured it all over himself.

The last mile, I began passing some people. I felt a little guilty- who wants to be passed by a stroller?! At least I didn't look too obviously pregnant, I think. I had on my WISH shirt, so I could inspire as I was passing...

It was a perfectly marked race until the last couple of blocks. There was a turn that was missing a sign. That's the beauty of not being in the lead. I saw people headed back in my direction and knew something was up. (Some of the really fast runners were mad about it, which I understand since it threw off their times, but it was a shame it had to happen in an otherwise great race).

Finally reached the finish. Our time was 32:xx. Considering I was responsible for 3 people if you include Harry and GoofyBaby, not a bad time. We went to grab some water and a banana. They had turned on the sprinklers in the park by the finish. Good idea in theory, but when you went to get your water, your shoes and shorts got soaked (not to mention poor Harry in the stroller!) Harry of course took the banana.

We stood around the finish clapping for people. Okay, I was clapping and Harry was eating his banana. In my experience, no one cheers unless you are at Disney. What is up with that?!

Oh, and Harry really wanted to run the 1 mile fun run. Can a 2 year old run or walk 1 mile?! I can't imagine he could last that long, and I'd hate to have to carry him. I think I may try taking him on a few walks to see just how far he can go. I'm guessing my boy's more of a sprinter, but how long remains to be seen...

Sunday, Minnie 15k

2008-05-21T11:32:00.000-07:00

This Minnie, oddly enough, is not on the race course, but it is one of my favorite sights from the Flower and Garden Festival.

Now, on to the race:

I was insanely tired Saturday night, but what's new at Disney? Becky and I made plans to have me pick her up at her hotel at 4:30 a.m. Her hotel was maybe 10 minutes away and it would probably take close to 10 minutes to get from my room to my car. So I decided to get up at 4:00 a.m. Yeah, that was kind of cutting it close.

I jumped out of bed, turned off the cell alarm that I didn't need, and did the whole shower routine. This time since I decided to get up as late as possible, I ate my bagel in the shower. Oh yeah, that's a time saver! I managed to get dressed and out the door.

I scurried down to the car, didn't glare at the insanely chipper woman in the lobby with a race bib, and went to pick up Becky. Of course my contact started doing weird things to my eye when I reached the car. It was now about 4:25 a.m. and I was a little worried that my organized friend would be tapping her shoes waiting for me. But no! She must have been tired from the day before too- she called me saying she was running late. Whew! Oh, and I saw the mile markers along the road on the way to pick her up- yep, they were in the middle of nowhere. Now I was officially thinking this might have been too ambitious, but so was the Goofy, and I survived that. My power of positive thinking was being tested.

I found Becky easily and we made it to Epcot. We parked the car and hopped on a bus where we found more WISHers. We were at the Animal Kingdom in no time. A big group of WISHers had assembled. We chatted some and sat around- I was having a second breakfast of Goldfish and a Diet Dr. Pepper. Oddly enough, no one else wanted any Goldfish! It seemed like a good salt replacement strategy to me.

We got up and spent some time wandering around looking for some Bio-Freeze for Becky's knee. We decided they didn't think anyone would hurt at the start, so no Bio-Freeze! Generally speaking, it's not a good thing to start a race hurt. Hmmm...

Finally, we got in a porta-potty line. You have to time it just right: too early and you'll start to panic thinking you have to go again; too late and you're worried about the race start. I've now officially experienced the too late thing! I think we made it out of the line maybe 2 minutes before the start. We took off across the parking lot grumbling about how the race hadn't started and we were already running. There was no way to make it into the proper corral to start, so we just headed for the very back as the fireworks started.

The view from the very back.

We spent the first couple of miles weaving around walkers. Things were pretty congested. I vaguely remember miles 3, 4, and 5. They were a horrible flashback to the full. People say they like to run the Minnie to see what the last bit of the full was like because they were so out of it. Well, trust me, it comes back to you. Asphalt, asphalt, asphalt, overpass, repeat. Poor Becky was still looking for a medical tent, and I was fussing about how they only had 5 water stops for 9 miles (I had my own water bottle, but still...) There's a turn around along the way. As much as it sucks to know you have to go back on that same road, it is fun to wave to people as you go (although more fun to wave to those behind you than in front!)

It felt like a fast pace to me, but we were usually somewhere in the 11-12 minute range. I guess that's what adding 10+ pounds and a stowaway can do to you! It's a good thing I had Becky to kind of pull me along! I was surprised to find it so much of an effort. True, my training had been somewhat shaky, but I was hoping the Goofy would carry me through.

Somewhere around mile 5 we found the medical tent and Becky got her Bio-Freeze. It didn't help right away, but she'd been on a mission for it, so that was good. Bio-Freeze basically numbs the area where you apply it. Unfortunately, the "applied area" during a race is your hand, a trickle in the right spot, and your shoes/socks. Becky was laughing about her cold hand.

Finally, finally, we hit the backside of Hollywood Studios. We both laughed about wanting the candy bar table they had from the full! We ran through the really dark tunnel and I managed to take a picture of the costumes from High School Musical 2 for Emma- I was proud I remembered!

Another runner yelled "it's just another 5k, ladies!" which I know she meant as encouragement, but wasn't so helpful.

Then we hit the Hat and found a few characters- of course, we took pictures. Pictures are fun to have and they require stopping!

After the hat, we focused on attempting to look reasonably cute for the official photographers. "Keep smiling, keep smiling!"

We left Hollywood Studios, and ran to the Boardwalk. Stupid death march strikes again!

I'm always surprised that the little hill by the Swan/Dolphin is more daunting that you expect. We ran past the Beach Club. Becky took a phone call from her husband without stopping! I'm telling you, the girl was on a mission! She had looked for her family to be on the balcony when we ran by her hotel, but they weren't there. We'd joked that we were too fast for them- turns out we were right!

We hit the countries and met up with Tricia from WISH- hey girl! We ran together for awhile but again, Becky was on a mission, so we drifted apart. Last year I walked the countries and took pictures of almost every one because of the Flower and Garden Festival. This time I barely even looked up (mostly because when I did look up I'd think "are you kidding me? we're just by Japan- will this never end!?") I love the countries at Epcot, and it feels sacrilegious to say it, but I'm getting a little tired of that route...

The last Epcot stretch-- Woo hoo- Spaceship Earth, parking lot, sad to see no choir... WISHers cheering. Can't slow down when WISHers are cheering! And we blazed through the finish somewhere around 1:48, which was considerably faster than last year. We took pictures, joined WISHers for cheering, and generally just enjoyed not running. Becky laughed at me because I freaked out over having fine grit all over my body. It was salt! In all my running, I've never experienced that one. I didn't take any gels or anything with me. I drank a little bit of PowerAde at the water stops, but it was nothing like the PowerAde I drank at every stop for the half. Maybe that made the difference?

I have never been able to stick around for the end of the race. I loved seeing the last finishers. Sure, the runners at the front of the pack are impressive, but the last people- now that's some true determination and courage! It was really getting hot so they had to be suffering.

Final thoughts: it was a great race. Having Becky with me helped tremendously. She was going fast, but it wasn't a bad pace. I told my doctor I'd make sure I could still talk while running, and we did chat during the race. Her knee bothered her throughout the race- she was pretty tough! I enjoyed teasing her about the pace, but I know she would have slowed down the second I asked. It was really crazy fun!

I hate that they are getting rid of the Minnie- it's such a great distance. I've already signed up for the half in January, and I don't know if I'll be able to convince my family to head back in March for the new half. And, if I'm reading the information correctly, the course looks too similar to the Minnie. If you're going to do a half, you need to go through Magic Kingdom!

Very tricky, Disney... Minnie had left before we finished the race and never came back. Princesses, on the other hand, were everywhere.

Every time I finish a race, I always get hit with that "why do we do this to ourselves voluntarily?" feeling, but I get over it pretty quickly. I am going to probably focus on trying to increase my walking speed (I am the slowest walker ever) until this baby is born. I really wanted to kind of slow down on my own terms, and I think having a Minnie medal is a great way to do it!

So that pretty much wraps it up. I dropped Becky off, went back to the hotel, showered, packed, etc. And, in memory of last year's cinammon roll after the Minnie, I split a waffle with Harry, who insisted on wearing my medal.

Saturday, Minnie Marathon Weekend

2008-05-15T11:02:00.000-07:00

The Go Red for Women 5k

Disney has this early morning thing going on with races. This race started at 7 a.m. from the parking lot in Epcot, which meant in theory you should be there no later than 6 a.m. You could say it's because of the heat; or you could say it's because the last 5k racer should be finishing before Epcot opens. Whatever. Either way, with the exception of horrible flights and the SATs, I've never had to get moving so early as I do at Disney (and this was actually a late starting race in Disney terms!)

But, on the bright side, I can never sleep before a big race anyway. As usual, I stared at the ceiling for probably two hours before finally giving up and getting in the shower at 5 a.m. I got dressed and woke up a fairly perky Emma. I realized this was going to be a very slow race when she made me pull her shirt over her head carefully so her pre-pinned bib wouldn't get wrinkled.

We drove over to Epcot with no problems. We wandered over to a bright group of WISHers. Everyone was totally cool and chatted with Emma who I think felt pretty important. We lined up with Becky (Lexxiefern) in the 13-15 minute category. Emma stole my favorite hat because her Minnie headband was too tight. I don't think she has any clue how nice that was of me. That's my marathon hat, girl!

The race started, and we were off through the parking lot of Epcot. I'm not sure Disney races should start in parking lots-- woo hoo, nothing but asphalt! Not all that inspiring. Regardless, Becky took off running, and Emma and I set off at what I called a "walking" pace and she called "sprinting." Ahem. I was a little nervous about her attitude, and rather pleased that Becky left us- I didn't want any witnesses to potential meltdowns.

Did you know the extra booths for the Food and Wine Festival are stored out in the open on the edge of the parking lot? Somehow the little thatched cottage for Ireland isn't as cute crammed off to the side. I tried to point the booths out to Emma, but she wasn't that interested. Here's a picture anyway.

We could finally see Epcot (Test Track) off in the distance. Emma's mood improved dramatically. At this point, I decided to go with the flow. There was no way we could maintain a "beat the sweepers" pace. They were allegedly going to enforce a 15 minute/mile pace. I had visions of having to toss Emma to the nearest WISHer while throwing my body in front of a sweeper bus... with this big belly, I'd be pretty good at passive resistance. Then I started to worry that I'd be officially banned from the races... yes, I really thought all of that through. There were tons of people ahead of us, but a not insubstantial group following. I kept my eye on the people behind us the rest of the way, just in case I saw them suddenly escorted to a golf cart or some other sneaky sweeper transportation.

The mile 1 marker was right outside Epcot. Then there was a water stop, and we were able to check out the backside of Test Track and some other rides. I finally threw away our water bottles that I'd been lugging around. Here's a sign of how fuzzy my brain is on Disney morning time- it never crossed my mind to pour out the water in our bottles when their weight was driving me crazy. (It's hard to carry two water bottles in one hand while holding an 8 year old's hand with the other- especially when "holding" is more like "dragging.")

We entered from sort of behind Spaceship Earth and then headed towards the long bridge to the countries. You'd think after this many visits I'd know it's name- International Gateway perhaps?

We saw some really fast people headed back the other way who'd already circled the countries. I'm proud to report there were WISHers in there! Emma usually spotted them before I did (remember I kept turning around to look for sweepers vehicles!) She'd scream "GO WISH!" like a wild banshee. Now that was some funny stuff!

Once we were in the countries in Epcot, life was better. There was music blaring and Minnie would shout out encouragement over the loud speakers- that was a nice touch. Living on the sweeper edge, I took a picture of Emma in each country. I'm pretty sure that was her favorite part- my girl loves to pose! Here's a sampling of the country pics:

Check out the two women who passed us at mile 2- one of them has a friggin' boot on! More power to her, but does that give you any indication of our pace?!

Here's the best part about races at Disney- no crowds in the parks!

Finally we were headed on back down that Gateway thingy. We left Epcot through the same spot where the choir was at the marathon. We stopped for yet another picture at the mile 3 marker. The volunteer there had a technical difficulty (stopwatch not working? I can't remember specifics) so she appointed herself photographer. At that point, I was much happier to find a photographer than to know our time!

We crossed the finish line and got our medals.

Feel free to mock our PowerAdes. I would.

Oh, and how could I forget?! The WISHers cheering were wonderful!

We stuck around for awhile, but Emma wanted to hit the Magic Kingdom early, so we headed back to the AKL. We changed clothes and were on a bus for MK by 8:45- not bad! The fact that we strolled through the race helped tremendously. I didn't even have to take a shower! Emma was acting like the race was no big deal, but she wore her medal all day.

So, off to Magic Kingdom. Harry was a little befuddled in the beginning.

We headed straight to Splash Mountain, Pirates, etc.

Alas, the crowds were building. Emma was obsessed with riding the RockNRoller Coaster at MGM, so we headed over by way of ferry/bus. Harry loved the ferry and bus!

Unfortunately, the ride had an 80 minute wait, so Ted and Emma went on Tower of Terror first. I wanted to take Harry to see some little kid stuff, but he passed out. I ended up buying some water and sitting in the hottest sun imaginable for about an hour waiting for them. I pretended sitting on a curb in blazing heat was good for me because it was sort of providing rest for the Minnie. Which was strange, since I didn't feel any more rested hopping off that curb. D'Oh!

We hightailed it out of MGM (or Hollywood Studios now), and headed to Epcot. I was weary, and the death march from MGM to Epcot made me nervous for the next day. It's ironic that I've always called that stretch of sidewalk from MGM to Epcot the "death march." My title was more appropriate than I realized- that's the last couple of miles of the Minnie 15k and the full. It makes me twitch.

We entered by the backside of England. As we were walking up the ramp, Chip (or perhaps Dale) spent some quality time admiring Emma's medal. That made me happy. No one else commented on it all day. I think the problem is that no one realizes a race took place, and lots of kids are wearing lanyards for pin trading that look a lot like the medals.

That's about as close as Harry will get to a character. Chip got down lower to chat and Harry wigged out. Maybe next year.

We ate a bunch of junk. See?

We wandered the countries... again and again. Emma and I'd just done the same route at 7:30 that morning. And I was going to have to face them after 8 miles at about the same time of day the next morning. Ouch. We ate more food, walked more, shopped some, got rained on- typical day at Epcot. I was getting crazy tired, and Ted kept asking if I'd "be okay to do the race." It sounded like a trick question- yes, if we could get out of Epcot, I'd be fine for the race. But, if I said I was so tired we had to leave, that might imply I was not okay for the race... So I just dragged along, because really who wants to ever leave the parks early anyway?

Here's my last shot of Epcot. That's not an illusion that it's getting dark- that's how long we stayed.

We went back to our hotel. So, it's about 8 p.m. I have to get up in roughly eight hours; I've been on my feet since 5 a.m.; we've been to 3 parks after walking a 5k; I'm bound to be dehydrated; my race stuff isn't ready; and I'm 20 weeks pregnant. Good thing I like a challenge.

Friday, Minnie Marathon 2008 weekend

2008-05-14T15:29:00.000-07:00

Well, I'm back from Minnie weekend and of course, it was fabulous!

The week before the Minnie, Emma had a slight fever. I didn't think much of it since I had one too and it cleared up quickly. It was one of those better in the morning, peak at night around 100 degrees type fevers.

She insisted on going to Field Day at school on Friday. She didn't have a fever and I didn't want to go through the stress of getting a doctor's note for an excused absence (how stupid is that!?), so I sent her.

I drove out early to watch a little of the Field Day activities. So, three legged race, Emma was dead last. Long run, yep, dead last, although not by a humiliating margin, so better than last year. But, apparently I missed her triumphant moment! She and her best friend were the last two standing in the elementary hula hoop competition. The referee (bored highschooler) ended up calling it a tie, because neither would stop... after seventy minutes. Really. Seventy minutes. Who does that?!

I'm pretty sure I have a good hit on Emma's athletic type. I think she's going to be a fabulous middle of the pack endurance athlete. She's perfect for long distance races, where stubbornness and determination go a long way towards making up for traditional physical talent. I thought I was stubborn, but I don't think I would ever have done something that crazy (although the Goofy might have been close). Of course, we'll never know since I can't hula hoop for 7 seconds much less 70 minutes.

Oh, and it turns out she did have a fever that day. So my insanely determined child hula hooped for over an hour with a fever (that turned out to be tonsilitis and an ear infection- bad mother missed it and exposed the entire second grade! D'Oh!)

We spent Sunday night at the ER getting meds for the above-mentioned infections for a little shy of $400.00. That was nice- I was hoping I could give them $400.00 and they could take away three hours of my life... After much drama and ear goo that I will not discuss in detail, Emma was reasonably cured by Thursday. Good timing since we were headed to Disney in less than 24 hours!

Packing was difficult. Did I mention that Emma and I were doing the 5k on Saturday morning and I was doing the 15k on Sunday? Between the races, the parks, the pool, etc. it was a lot of packing stress...

Friday afternoon we drove straight to the Expo. It's a much easier Expo to deal with than marathon weekend! Packet pickup was confusing because I had to pick up three different packets- two 5ks, one 15k. And then I had ordered all different size t-shirts... Still, it was pretty smooth.

We made it to our hotel, the Animal Kingdom Lodge, with no problems. I'm directionally challenged, so this was a positive sign. Our room was a pool-side view (call me cheap) with a queen and bunk beds. Harry and Emma dug the bunk beds. Ted packed enough food for an army, since after all, we were staying two whole nights... the kids did like eating their sandwiches in bed while partaking in the grand Disney tradition of watching the Seven Must See things at Disney on TV.

We spent the night exploring the hotel and checking out the animals.

Emma must have asked twenty times when we were going to the pool- I finally couldn't take it anymore, so we headed to the room to change. Harry was horrible about wearing his swimvest until he saw other kids playing in the pool. Only then, with a visible shudder, did he say "okayyy" to the "are you going to put on your vest" question. Dreadful. The pool is nice, but the outside air was cold, so we didn't last long. It was hardly worth the fight over the vest. We meandered over to the arcade, where everyone played a few games. Finally, it was back to the room to organize our race chips, bibs, wardrobe, etc. for the 5k.

2008-05-06T13:00:00.000-07:00

So, this is just pathetic. I haven't written anything new since February?! Well, I've got an excuse-- I had a major distraction. Turns out I've got a GoofyBaby on the way. Why do I call him GoofyBaby? Yep, ran the Goofy with me. Who knew? Looking back on it, perhaps that's why I developed such a strong hatred for my water belt in the half...

Anyway, I've done a couple of 5ks since finding out. I was a little worried about the whole heart rate thing. Apparently it's no longer that you have to stay below 140 when pregnant, it's that you have to be able to maintain a "conversation pace" or something like that. That's all fine and good when you have someone to talk to, but when everyone has an iPod in a race, there's not much chance to test your conversational skills.

The Sidney Lanier Bridge Run:

This 5k was sometime in February. The Bridge Run goes up forever, then down, and then back up, and finally, you guessed it, down. I did this race last year with Emma. She was great going up, whiny going down, and unspeakably horrible going back. I was dragging her the whole way back up while she complained about our speed-- "if we're not going to win, why do we have to hurry?" "Oh, I don't know, maybe because our car is on the other side of this bridge and we don't want them to open it to traffic before we get back!?" Yeah, it was ugly for both of us. Needless to say, I left her behind this year.

So this time, I started out reasonably strong going up, but never having trained on big horrible hills, I panicked about my speed. No conversation opportunities around me (unless you count sharing an "ewww" with a girl next to me when we had to jump over a puddle o' puke- someone obviously was going too fast ahead of us!) I walked a bit of the up, then ran pretty fast down. Before the race I worried about tripping over my own feet and rolling down the bridge. Turns out that worry was all for nothing- gravity really wasn't that helpful. And I probably would have been grateful if I could have rolled a bit.

At the turnaround I saw a couple of friends. I was wearing my WISH shirt and felt the need to scream their names and wave like crazy. Then I felt really silly, because it was the quietest group of runners ever. But, it gave me something to do, and reassured me that while I wasn't sure I could maintain a conversation, I could handle a loud scream.

I met up with my friend's husband somewhere around the top of the bridge. We ran down together. They are a little newer to running, and still gungho, so I let him pull ahead of me the last few feet. I didn't want him to have to be beat by a girl, especially since I hadn't told anyone about GoofyBaby... didn't want the thought of being beaten by a preggo girl to push him over the edge! We finished a little over 32 minutes, which I thought was pretty good since it was a frigging bridge! I really did the race for the medal, but it wasn't all that great...

Gray Ribbon Run 5k:

This one was in April in Blackshear. The friends I mentioned in the Bridge Run actually organized the run as a fundraiser for a friend with cancer. At the very last minute I drove over to Blackshear and entered. It was a great race with a ton of people and good support.

I watched the end of the 1 mile run. It was really cool- lots of fast little kids, people warming up for the 5k, and little old grandmothers in jeans pushing kids in strollers. I liked the diversity. Usually everyone is crazy fast in the local races. At my current pace, I could have been DLF easily in a typical local race(Dead Last Finish).

The 5k started a little late because the cops had to get gas! Seriously. It was scheduled for 9 a.m. and already a little warm. We finally started. I really questioned my sanity during the first mile, especially when the runner with the Jack Russell on a leash passed me. I could hear his little toenails clicking along, mocking me (the dog, not the runner). I considered stopping and doing a quick walk of shame back to my car, but alas, I hadn't paid attention to our route and was lost. I did test my conversation pace when I saw the mile 1 marker- I pointed it out to another runner and didn't keel over. So, on we pressed. Mile 2 was long and dull, and involved an out and back. Again, geek that I am, I clapped and cheered for the first few runners headed towards us, but it was a lonely endeavor. Why are all these runners so serious?

At the mile 2 turnaround, I realized someone who kind of annoys me was pretty close behind. I wasn't going to let this person pass me- it became my mission. So, GoofyBaby and I had a discussion. I told him that we had to buckle down for the last mile. I didn't get any objections, so I bumped up the pace a bit. And right there, my friends, is where running the Goofy makes all the difference in the world. I think running Goofy (albeit slowly for the full) gave me a bit more mental toughness than I had before. I mean, if I can run 26.2 miles with my knee hurting, I know I can suck it up and put in a fast last mile. So that's what I did. I started passing people even going up an evil hill. I saw the church where the finish was, and blazed on in (relatively speaking). I finished in 29:07.

Turns out my finish wasn't really 29:07. Well, technically it was, but they didn't put the cones in the right place at the turnaround, so it was a little shy of 5k. But, that doesn't count, because I didn't know it until after the race...

And the person GoofyBaby and I were trying to beat? Oh yeah. We did it. But the Jack Russell still took us. That dog is mine next year!

Wasn't the marathon last weekend?

2008-02-08T08:09:00.000-08:00

Well, it's been a month since the marathon. Whatever, I'm going to keep saying "last weekend, when I was running the marathon..." I spent my junior year of college in England. My roommate and I were always cracking ourselves up talking about "last year in England." Yeah, it only took about 5 years for us to stop.

So I haven't been doing much running lately. Cause you know, I ran a marathon last weekend. Ahem. Anyway, here's a sort of sporty thing in my life. Emma, my 8 year old, loves gymnastics. She decided this year she wanted to attend the "cheerleading camp" at school. It's a Saturday morning practice with the varsity cheerleaders. I didn't let her do it last year because I was afraid she'd be humiliated. She'd been taking gymnastics over a year and still didn't have her cartwheel. Seriously- the end of the year performance was excrutiating. I felt horrible not letting her go last year, but I thought she could be potentially humiliated in front of her peers. I won't always be able to save her from humiliation, but that was such an obvious possibility that I just couldn't let her take the chance.

So this year, she's done maybe two million cartwheels. And yes, she "has" her cartwheel. Off we go to cheerleading camp. She's there about 3 hours (which was one less hour than Harry and I had to drive taking her back and forth...)

Harry and I went to pick her up. She's in the auditorium with a bunch of other little kids and some really self-absorbed teenagers. The teenagers lead them through their dance and cheer routine and then do these lift thingies. The cheerleaders are all talking amongst themselves and basically lifting the little kids when the coach says something. Emma is in line for at least 10 minutes. She comes running over after they finally lifted her. I thought she'd be annoyed at how long they took, but no, she's thrilled.

She eventually performed her routine with the other kids at both a pep rally and a basketball game. She loved every minute. How is it possible this is our child?! She was actually pretty good. Not the best by any means, and not a "flyer" (the kids who get thrown in the air), but still she was good. She was telling me that it was "the best day ever!" and it made me laugh, because I got it.

Emma told me later that she "really wasn't the best, but it didn't matter, because it was so much fun!" Then she said I wouldn't understand. I stared at her awhile and said "Hello, Goofy?!" and she laughed and said "oh yeah, you ran a marathon, you do understand!" Sweet.

Oh, and she actually didn't need to have her cartwheel to perform. Who knew? But I still think doing those millions of cartwheels in anticipation was like me running mile after boring mile in training. Could I have done the Goofy with less training? Probably. And she could have done the cheerleading without her cartwheel, but how nice to have a reward at the end of all that work!

Don't get me started on how much Harry liked watching the end of cheerleading camp...

Post Marathon

2008-01-17T13:19:00.000-08:00

I just went to look in my spam folder and there were all sort of encouraging messages from my college friends! Viagra ads and get rich quick schemes can get through my filter, but not my friends?! Anyway, thank you!

Some of you wanted to know about WISH since I ramble about it so much. It's an on-line training group with a common goal of running Disney races. It's part of disboards.com. It's a really nice group- some people are super fast, some are slower walkers; everyone is encouraging. I don't know why, but if you tell a group of internet strangers that you are running a certain number of miles at your next workout, you tend to do it. At the same time, if you are freaking out because LTO or WTO (life takes over or work takes over) or you have a cold, there is someone out there to tell you it's ok.

WISH stands for "We're Inspired to Stay Healthy." The WISH slogan is DLF>DNF>DNS. It means "dead last finish" is better than "did not finish" which greatly trumps "did not start." Something like that is on the back of our shirts. I actually hear people reading the shirts and saying "yeah, that's right, girl!" to their friends in races. It cracks me up everytime. Right after I started reading the WISH boards, I ran my first 5k at home. These people are ridiculously fast. I finished right at 30 minutes and was dead last finish. I really think if I hadn't found my WISHers, I would have given up right then utterly humiliated. Instead, I laughed it off and just said better than not finishing or starting!

So that's the story of how I've joined a Disney running cult. LOL

I'm thinking ahead to my next races because I've got a bit of the post-marathon blues. I'm leaning towards running the Disney half and cheering for the full. My mother is thinking about joining me. Any others out there? Seriously, it's not that bad to train and you get to eat more!

Later kids.

2008-01-15T16:22:00.000-08:00

The full marathon! Part two of Goofy--

The wake up call comes at 3:00 a.m. Are you kidding me? I'm so tired I just beat on whatever it is making that horrible noise. Then the realization hits me- time to get ready to run a marathon. What was I thinking?!

Same basic routine as the day before. My eyes are beady and bloodshot, even after a shower. I eat a PB and honey sandwich. I get most of it down, but let's just say, it doesn't stay down. Great. So my nutrition plan is not going well.

I gather my ridiculous amount of stuff and go find a bus. Hmmm... there are two different types of people on the bus: those who can't stop the nervous chatter, and those silently glaring at the chatty ones. I'm pretty sure I know which group is doing the Goofy! One woman gets on the bus and starts yelling at the driver as she's boarding that "a lot of us are nauseous and we need air conditioning!" I find this incredibly irritating- who is she to be yelling at my driver, who is up for a second day in a row (I know because he drove me both days)?! And how dare she speak for all of us?! Uh oh, I think I'm approaching the BMZ (Bite Me Zone) and I'm not even running yet.

I get to the staging area after the long deja vu hike from the bus. It's hot and it's HUMID. Perfect. I find out later it's 100% humidity. I can't find WISHers- since when have all these other people started wearing shirts in our color? That's totally unacceptable. Hmmm... me thinks it's time to stop everything and buy my now customary 4 a.m. Diet Coke. Then I can begin a proper WISH search, preferably far away from the blaring 80s videos.

I find one WISHer- ok, that's better. Another leads us to the rest of our clan. Ah, security at last. The Goofy people are looking pretty strong. Tired, a bit sore, but basically ok. My friend Helen is eating her cereal again- who has the presence of mind to pack cereal, milk, a plastic bowl, and a spoon? She did it two days in a row- I'm so impressed. I drink my Diet Coke.

All is well for about ten minutes- then the Disney people open up a path to the corrals. Great, we're sitting in the path. We all scatter. I walk with Lily towards the corrals. As we chat, I'm feeling better. A woman is walking with us talking about how she wants to move from Corral B to Corral A with the fast people. Of course I hate her. It's not a rational thought, I'm just in that kind of mood. Lily on the other hand is totally patient and chats with her. By the end, I kind of like the woman- she's just nervous like the rest of us. So thank you Lily for humanizing the speedy woman!

I'm sitting there watching the TV screens and trying to understand what force in the universe always leads me to a blaring speaker, when my friend Becky appears. Oh good! Becky is another Goofy WISHer. She and I have seen each other at the Minnie and Tower of Terror races. We laugh because she can't sit- she's wearing her running skirt and doesn't want it to snag. I take off my throw away sweats and we sit on them and wait... for about 1 minute before we are forced to move. I dump the sweats and we stand together waiting.

Becky, you owe me, because this is cute of you and not of me.

The announcer counts down from 15 instead of 10 (in honor of the 15th anniversary), the National Anthem is sung, there's fireworks, yada yada. I'm really tired. We finally meander across the start line. Becky thinks I'm going to be fast so she sends me off. Ironic since I really am not in a running mood. I remember asking her if my left leg should already hurt...

I weave through people for the first mile. Same mile marker as yesterday. Miles 2 and 3 are just more weaving. It's so humid. Yesterday was much better. My left IT band is officially hurting. I ran with a hurt IT band once in training- within 2 miles it went from a dull pain to absolute daggers. I'm a little concerned that I have something like a million miles to go.

So, here's a picture of mile 1. Yep, looks just like mile 1 from yesterday. So do the people I'm weaving through. I'm a wee bit bored. The novelty is gone.

We're heading towards Epcot. Hey- I pass some WISHers! Sometimes I remember to take pictures, sometimes I don't. I try to wave to all of them.

Here's Wendy, our WISHer who seems to be racing at least 2 days out of every week. Seriously, the woman never stops moving! She posted that she drank a Diet Coke while on the course. My hero.

And here's Helen, our Australian cereal-eating WISHer.

Look- the flamingos are back. Deja vu! They're looking a little rough too. One guy seems to have lost some feathers...

Here comes Epcot.

We're in Epcot, heading towards China. Somehow I've missed the first three water stops. Yesterday I had a Powerade and water at almost every water stop so I'm panicking that my hydration strategy is going downhill (along with my time). Oh, and would you believe I'm getting hungry?

I stop and take a picture with Mulan. I'm wearing my fancy new hat I bought in Germany (in Epcot).

I'm still hot, my leg still hurts, and now I'm hungry and thirsty. I'm having an attitudinal problem. Then it happens- spectators! Look at the bright WISHer. Now I'm feeling better! I wave like crazy.

An overpass- people to watch! I'm looking over the bridge for WISHers! Things are perking up.

It's blurry, but look at how reflective we runners are.

Now we are where the runners go under the overpass. I'm studying the bridge like crazy. Yes! I see a WISHer! We wave and take pictures. (Why didn't I stop to focus my camera?!)

Here's right past a water stop. Check out all the cups everywhere.

Oh look, here comes Magic Kingdom. Guess what, not really. I'm not amused. I did this yesterday, thank you very much, so I know the Magic Kingdom is really not that close. I hear two girls from Team in Training talking about beating Katie Holmes' time. Seeing that I've just passed them and I'm moving incredibly slow, I'm thinking it's not going to happen for them today. I keep it to myself- if delusions of beating Katie get them to the finish line, more power to them.

Somewhere in this horrible leg-hurting stretch I meet Cecilia. She's another WISHer, but she's running as a mentor for Team in Training. She sees my shirt and we start talking. She has two girls with her. They both have on leg straps. Are these girls tough or what?! I only realized I was injured when I started the race; these girls knew they were hurt before they started and did it anway. Serious guts!

Here's a funny fact about Cecilia. We made tentative plans over the internet to run the half together. We both thought we needed someone to make sure we kept a slow pace and didn't get hurt. We were planning on finishing in about 2:30. In all the chaos, we didn't find each other. Turns out we both finished at 2:13, although she beat me by a few seconds. Obviously we needed each other since neither of us was capable of sticking to our 2:30 plan alone!

I run a little further and meet Bree. She's a WISHer too. I'm glad I have on my shirt- she isn't wearing a WISH shirt, so she finds me first. We chat awhile. She's thinking this is not going to be one of her better days. She wants to walk a bit outside the Magic Kingdom because her stomach is churning. I think it's the best idea I've heard yet! We walk, we run, we chat. Somewhere by the Transportation Center a WISHer hands me a Twizzler. I'm still hungry, so this makes me really happy. Bree and I pick up the pace as we enter the backstage of Magic Kingdom.

Whoo hoo! It's Main Street. It can't compare to yesterday, but it's still fabulous. (Wait- that's not fair to Main Street. It's not Main Street that can't compare to yesterday; it's me that can't compare.)

Heading towards the Castle.

And now Tomorrowland.

I see Chip and Dale. Bree keeps going while I stop for a picture. Cecilia and her crew line up behind me. We hang together through the Castle and Frontierland.

Cecilia stops at the medical tent. Brilliant idea! I get some Biofreeze squeezed into my hand. I try to put it on my leg, but it all just slides down. Nasty! Oh well, maybe it will numb the pain a bit. Poor Cecilia is trying to keep an eye on all three of her injured chicks now! My leg hurts, but I'm really just scared it's going to hurt more; Cecilia's crew looks like they've already reached that point.

We reach mile 12. It's finally starting to be a bit different. Somewhere in this vicinity, Bree finds me at a water stop. Obviously it's meant to be. We stick together the rest of the race.

Check out this running club. I think this was the fourth time I'd seen them dancing around in two days. I love them! Bree and I talk about how much fun it would be if the WISH team could have a spot where we could do the same thing next year.

Mile 13. I amuse myself by thinking I'm not halfway through the Mickey, I'm two-thirds through the Goofy. Still seems kind of, you know, far...

We head towards the Animal Kingdom. I take a picture of the Disney nursery for Ted, our family horticulturalist. I'm pleased that I still have enough wits about me that I can remember to take this picture, even though it doesn't show anything interesting (I want Disney topiaries, people!)

Oh look, we're near the Animal Kingdom. Here's some furry animal.

Here's a less furry animal. I pass on getting in that picture.

I make Bree get in the picture with the parrot. As we wait, the parrot says "Hello." Being polite people, we both answer "Hello." We don't talk about it afterwards. How did it not strike us as strange that we just had a conversation with a bird?! Things are getting a little fuzzy.

I get more Biofreeze at a medical tent- this time it doesn't just run down my leg, it lands on my shoe in a big glob. I hope my shoe is happy now because my leg still hurts. Bree gives me an Advil. I take it. Dry. Bree's stomach and hip flexors are bothering her. We're quite the pair! Surprisingly we are fairly upbeat, considering that we are having some physical issues.

Back to people watching. These girls look cute. Hot, but cute.

Animal Kingdom- there's Expedition Everest!

And that was it for the Animal Kingdom. But here's Minnie Mouse!

I don't know where they got their energy, but the Incredibles came out of nowhere- this is a picture of them blazing away. (Bree said something like, "oh look, it's the Incredibles" but being somewhat slow, I almost missed them. I think I was looking for characters, not runners.)

Mile 18. How far can you run on sheer stubbornness? I think I'm about to find out. Just when it feels like it will never end, I look up and see WISHers! I see Becky's sister, Jen, waving and screaming. We go a little further and Bree's family is waiting. Her little boy is with her husband and mom- too cute.

We take a picture with Mickey. We're starting to pay a high price for these pictures. Starting back up is a killer. Still, have to take the Mickey picture.

Oh look. Miles of asphalt. Pocahantas and John Smith are standing on the side of the road. Yet another picture.

Mile 19. They're all blurring together. We've had so much Powerade and water. There's a lot of sloshing going on now. We are both wishing we could find a Diet Coke soon. In theory Diet Coke would slosh too, but it still sounds good.

Peter Pan and Wendy are standing by an RV. Peter is talking about making wishes. I want to slap him. How about a little pixie dust, Peter? Cause guess what- I'm not flying!

WISHers with wet washclothes. Best idea ever.

Mile 21. Whatever.

Finally we head to MGM. Bree tells me they used to put out a red carpet, but it's not there this year. But around the corner are Butterfingers. I grab one. Poor Bree can't eat anything. I'm probably totally grossing her out. What can I say- I have an iron stomach! The only thing better than my washcloth is my Butterfinger.

There's the Tower of Terror.

What the heck, another picture.

Mile 23. Can we just get there already?

Kim Possible. Look at Bree being all sassy and posing while I'm clueless.

We deem the Queen not worthy of the horrible pain of starting to run again from a stop. Later! We see WISHer Martha running. We ask her how she's doing- she says not good. This bothers me a lot. Martha trained so well for this one- I don't think she missed any runs. I find out a few days later that she was having IT band pain in both legs. Ow! She pushed through it- you go, girl!

We leave MGM and head down the path to the Boardwalk. More WISHers! Hey, another Twizzler! Bree doesn't seem to want one. She missed out!

We're almost at the Beach Club. For the last 6 miles, I've been talking about how my family and WISHers are going to be there. I see my family, I get all excited, and I take a blurry picture. I can't stop because of that whole leg thing, but I do get to high five Emma.

WISHers- even in my delirious state, I hear the cowbells!

Is it possible we are back at Epcot?!

Mile 25. Bree and I talk about how we've done this loop tons of times with our families (or maybe I say it to myself). We push through. Bree starts twitching around Germany because of the bratwurst smell wafting our way. We press on. I see a kid wearing what looks like a giant lanyard. I don't think much about it, but then I see a man clapping and he has the same giant lanyard. Ah ha! It's the medal- and it's pretty sweet!

Push past Spaceship Earth. There's the choir again.

It's the finish line! Bree tells me to run on ahead. As if. I high five Chip or Dale- I don't have time to look at the nose to tell the difference. We run across the finish.

We get our chips cut off, and I grab a Mylar blanket that immediately sticks to me. Then it's off to the Mickey Medal. Now this would be a fun volunteer job.

Here's Bree getting her medal. It's her fourth full at Disney!

Bree takes a picture of me getting my Goofy medal. We get separated to take our official pictures- I have to be in a different Goofy line. I take my picture and go pick up my bag. I turn around to find Bree, and she's gone! Quite possibly she turned around to see me and I had disappeared into the checked bag area. How funny is that?! It shows how delirious you are at the end of the race!

I call my mom and Ted, chat very briefly with some gathered WISHers- I hope I didn't seem rude, but I couldn't stop moving for fear I'd never start again.

I start on the eternal trek back through Epcot to our hotel. Along the way, I get to cheer on runners. I fully intended to cheer in front of the Beach Club with the WISHers who so kindly cheered for me, but again, I was scared to stop. I did get a few pictures of WISHers both on the course and scream teaming along the way.

Right before the hotel I saw the last finishers. There was a man with a woman in a Team in Training shirt. There were a bunch of the bike medics right behind them. I cheered for them, and then went up the truly dreadful hill to the hotel. Did I say "up" the dreadful hill? Down the hill was worse. I finally made it to the room and took this lovely picture.

That's it. We went out to Epcot that afternoon with Harry. I was limping everywhere. I exchanged a few knowing smiles and words with my fellow limping marathoners. I did have a Napoleon in honor of our WISH teammates who were not able to be at Disney in person, but were with us in spirit.

I also had a beer, for those teammates who aren't big fans of sugar. I know... it was a sacrifice.

Nothing says classy like pushing the stroller with your sleeping baby through the rain with a beer!

Finally a picture with Goofy!

We ran into Cecilia in Epcot. She said her girls made it. She looked great. I was a little jealous that she was walking like a normal human being!

My mother called me- she and her friend Betsy took Emma to the Magic Kingdom. They ended up touring the parks with a man and his two kids. One of his children was too small to go on the bigger rides and my mother doesn't like fast rides, so they teamed up. He had some sort of super-secret fastpass that let them on every ride. They rode everything over and over and had a fabulous time. I was so grateful not to be there... I'd already been to the Magic Kingdom twice in one weekend anyway.

Last but not least, our time was 5:42:xx. Not speedy, but considering the heat, humidity, and that whole Goofy madness, I was happy. Besides, I had a ton of fun. If I want to run a fast marathon, I'll do it somewhere boring where all I want to do is get to the end fast! (Did I mention I dragged my iPod with me for two days and never once turned it on?!)

Special shout out to WISH spectators, WISH runners, Becky, Cecilia, my family, all the other friendly runners/spectators along the way, and of course, my running buddy, Bree!

By the way, in case you're curious, I'm still limping... on Wednesday.

2008-01-14T15:35:00.000-08:00

Finally, the Half Marathon starts (really!)

Anthem sung, fireworks off, we're headed to the start! I'm not that nervous. Anything is better than waiting around.

Remember it's 6:10 or so. It's dark outside. We're running down closed roads. There is enough light to see, but it's still strange. There are people everywhere. Some people are going slower off to the right; some are slowing down on the far left; and there's a lot of weaving in the middle. Oh, and a lot of weaving in the grass on either side. Some people do a run/walk plan- they run for say 4 minutes and walk for about 1 minute. Not a problem- probably a good idea really- but they seem to want to start the walking portion directly in front of me. What's up with that?! Didn't really matter; I just didn't want to plow into someone. If I wanted to run fast, I wouldn't be at Disney and I certainly wouldn't be going Goofy!

I have my iPod strapped on my arm, but never put in the headphones. (I just let them dangle so they could get trapped under my bib when I least expected it- annoying!) There are bands or DJs or whatever all over the place; there's a guy playing air guitar; there's a running club that is dancing around with loud music and some sort of penguin theme. There is so much to see.

Here's the first mile marker-

That's pretty much what they all look like. Well, they're all a little different. One's the Screamer, one's American Gothic, etc. Hello- I just realized they were playing the moon landing tapes at mile 1- see the sign? D'Oh!

Here's the Screamer.

Here's a section where you got to decide on your music.

I went disco, of course.

I see the entrance to the Magic Kingdom and get all excited. Psyche! We're running down a different way. I never drive at Disney and I really don't pay attention on the buses, so I'm kind of clueless as to what's happening. Whatever, I can sense the Magic Kingdom coming up! Wait- here's the Ticket and Transportation Center- spectators everywhere! It's total sensory overload- people are screaming, waving signs, ringing cowbells. My bib has my first name on it, so some sharp-eyed spectators are screaming my name. And, I see WISHers! I'm screaming now too and waving like an idiot! Seriously, this is ridiculously cool. I can feel a huge cheesy grin on my face- there's a hill somewhere along the way, but I don't care, because I'm running at Disney and I don't want it to ever end.

Here's a fuzzy spectator picture (and they were more excited than they look here!)

I look up and realize we've entered a backstage area. (Talk about non-magical- the backside of these wonderful buildings are warehouses.) There's an open gate... there's lights... there's Disney people with big Mickey gloves... tons of screaming and spectators... MAIN STREET, BABY! As if the Ticket and Transportation Center wasn't crazy enough, Main Street is loaded with screaming people including WISHers. My running is effortless now. It's absolutely overwhelming.

We turn towards Tomorrowland. I come to a screetching halt- Chip and Dale are here! I have to jump in line to get a picture.

I take off again, big cheesy grin permanently affixed. We pass the TeaCups, which are spinning, and there's Alice and friends. D'Oh! Stop again- who cares about setting a personal record!? I'm in the Magic Kingdom!

Now this is just getting out of control- Piglet!

The Carousel is spinning, Dumbos are flying...

Now I'm headed to the Castle. Ariel, Prince Eric, the Fairy Godmother, and two trumpeteers are on the balcony. I'm about 20 feet away when the trumpets start blaring above us- runners are cheering!

We head through the castle- photographers are on the down ramp. Some doofus cuts me off. Oh well, there's other photographers- maybe there's a decent picture out there. We run all the way down the ramp and go towards Liberty Square and Frontierland.

Ever seen where the parade starts by Splash Mountain? We go into the backstage area through the parade entrance. Whoa- back up, need a picture of the train for Harry, Mr. Choo Choo.

I don't see the floats like people have talked about in the past. But, there's a big ship full of pirates. I wait in a pretty long line. Who cares?!

There's another water stop before we leave the Magic Kingdom and then it's back to roads. Kind of a boring stretch, and a tight squeeze. There are some signs that are clever. Can I remember any of them? Nope. Wait, here's one- "clones are people too." Hey penguins! (from Mary Poppins- that took me awhile!)

Hmmm... a litle boring now, let's turn to runner watching. These guys do not disappoint- Tinkerbell, Peter Pan, and Captain Hook. The man facing them was just asking Tinkerbell how he got the short end of the deal!

We run towards Epcot. There are more spectators and WISHers to help break up this stretch. I can see Spaceship Earth in the distance. We run into Epcot, head towards the World Showcase, and then turn back towards Spaceship Earth. Spectators are out again- love these people! We head through a cast entrance.

Hey- there's the gospel choir. Very cool.

I'm running past the choir and can hear cheering- there's the finish line! I high five Chip (or maybe it was Dale). I cross the finish- I forget to hold my arms up in the air- maybe the photographer got me with Chip (or Dale, whatever).

I stagger over to the volunteer taking off chips, get my medal, get a blueberry muffin, and head to the Goofy tent. My orange arm band is changed for a blue one showing I completed the half. On a whim, I get a massage. Hurts so good! I chat with a few WISHers, ask my friend Angie to point me towards Epcot and my hotel, and start the long walk back dragging my bag of useless stuff. I'm wearing my medal, of course. People are congratulating me as I'm walking. How fun.

I look at my phone messages- my chip time was 2:13:xx. I forgot to look at the clock when I crossed the line. That's much faster than I intended to go, and may hurt me for the full marathon, but oh well- it was sooo fun.

After cheering some along the way through Epcot, I make it to the room and take a short ice bath. My mother and her friend took Emma to MGM (Hollywood Studios!) that morning, so she's having fun on the rides. Ted and I walk around the World Showcase a few times with Harry. I'm really happy about the Donald, but worried about the next day. I get another pizza that night. At about 8 p.m., I get in bed. The getting ready routine doesn't take as long, since I did the same thing the night before. I'm a little sore, but nothing too bad. On the positive side, as opposed to getting no sleep before the half, I pass out that night.

Here we are with Donald.

Regrets: very few. I didn't use anything in my checked bag, and it was really heavy to drag back. I hated my water belt- the water stops were very organized- Powerade in blue cups in the first tables, water in white cups towards the back.

Here's my last picture. This would be the view of someone almost passed out on a ledge below Spaceship Earth while waiting for their family to get off the ride...just saying.

Tomorrow the full!

2008-01-14T14:42:00.000-08:00

Waiting for the Half Marathon start

Good news! I really didn't have to worry about over-sleeping. I wake up so pleased with my internal clock- it's 2:45 a.m. Perfect! Then I blink a few times and see the 1 in front of the 2. Great, it's just after midnight. I've been asleep maybe two hours. I doze on and off for the next hour. I spend my waking moments staring at the glowing lights in the room- thermostat, smoke detector, and my favorite, powerstrip under the desk. I give up at 2:30 a.m. and take a shower. Could my eyes be more bloodshot?! The first bus is at 3:00- maybe I can nap in the parking lot.

I get dressed, put on all my accessories (Garmin watch, iPod holder, stupid water belt thingy, etc). I add my "throw away" sweats in case it's cold outside. I grab my plastic "post-half" bag, my water belt, my extra bottle of water, the towel I'm going to sit on, and a sandwich. Why yes, I do travel light.

I go downstairs to the lobby. The only people I see are by a bus outside. I guess that must be for us and hop on. The driver takes maybe 8 of us straight to the parking lot. We get off the bus, and walk pretty much forever to get to the staging area. It's basically empty. Trying to adjust to actually being early to something in my life, I wander over to the concessions stand. I grab a Diet Coke. I have to say, as people start arriving, I notice that not many other people found it appropriate to drink a Diet Coke at 4 a.m. Alright, actually no one else is drinking a Diet Coke. Did I mention I'm drinking my Diet Coke in front of a big screen TV thing and there is a DJ playing Duran Duran, Van Halen and Aha videos? No napping in this parking lot, just vague memories of junior high.

I'm getting a little anxious now. I'm annoyed that I have all this stuff with me, and people are starting to gather in little groups. Keeping with the junior high feel, there are people sitting in circles. Very lunchroom. I wander through the baggage check-in area, and find a whole other section, blissfully less loud than the 80s revival in the front. And look! There in day glow yellow is my WISH team! So, I get to join a circle too- I feel much more secure. We all chat a bit and I drop off my bag. I feel a bit silly in my sweats, but at least the asphalt isn't bothering me. I eventually drift off from the WISHers to go into a portapotty line. When I return, I realize that my corral is heading out. I join the herd. They put you in corrals based on your estimated finishing time. I go find Corral C and sit down again. Man, I can't find any WISHers! Oh well, I kill some time dumping my sweats and towel in the big box that Disney gives to charity. Then I wait some more.

Oh, and some flamingos provide some distraction, as you might imagine.

Mickey, Minnie and Donald come out (I can see them on the screens, not in real life). Someone sings the National Anthem, the fireworks go off, and we're running. OK, walking slowly towards the Start sign...

2008-01-14T14:08:00.000-08:00

Friday of Disney Marathon Weekend

We make it to the Expo on Friday afternoon to pick up my stuff. Because I'm doing Goofy, I get to go to the front of the line. Getting to go past the ginormous line might be worth doing Goofy. (For reference, there were over 12,000 people in the half; 18,000 people in the full- only 3,000 in the Goofy, so I just walked right up to the Goofy tables).

I get my packets and go downstairs to pick up my "free" T-shirts. Exactly why did Disney think grey was a good color? The actual design is very cute, but the grey is kind of dingy. Oh well, there's plenty of other stuff to buy! I drop the family off at the Sharpie stand to make a poster. In a burst of power shopping, I pick up 2 t-shirts, a frame, a pin, a Goofy stuffed animal, and a keychain in about 5 minutes. Really. I'm that good. I find my peeps and we head to the hotel.

My mother wanted to come to the Marathon as well- she said she wanted to see me run a marathon, and I told her this could be her only chance! So she and a friend, Betsy, stayed in another room in our hotel. Ted and Emma go out for a sushi dinner date. Emma, my mom, Betsy, and Harry and I wander down to the Boardwalk. I know I can't deal with Harry in a restaurant (especially after a 4 hour drive). I'm a bit neurotic because you are supposed to eat something you are used to before you run- as in make no changes. We end up with a plain cheese pizza that we eat at a table outside. Have I ever run the day after eating pizza?! Well, no, but I have eaten a lot of pizza in my life so I feel reasonably safe.

We go to our respective rooms. I spend at least an hour compulsively organizing my stuff. I have to pin my race number on, put my chip on my shoe, pack my bag I'd pick up after the race, and just generally pace around, all while watching What Not to Wear. Finally, around 10:30 p.m., after setting my phone alarm and a wake up call, I drift off with the knowledge that there's going to be a lot of beeping in my room at 3:05 a.m...

This crazy marathon thing

2008-01-10T08:11:00.000-08:00

Well, kids, here it is- Disney Marathon Weekend! Around February of 2007 I randomly decided I wanted to run the marathon at DisneyWorld. I'd never run more than 4 miles at a time, but so what!?

Decisions, decisions:

Here's the deal- Disney has a half marathon on Saturday (13.1 miles) and a full on Sunday (26.2).

When you finish the half, you get a Donald medal. When I was a tweener, my family took a trip to Disney. My step-father bought us all Donald t-shirts and gave our name as "Duck" at the podium at Chef Mickeys. (Yep, humiliating.) As a result, I have some attachment to Donald.

But, when you finish the full, you get a Mickey medal. This year is the 15th anniversary so there is a super-secret medal they won’t let anyone see. Hello, dilemma! I want the super-secret medal too!

Guess what? You can get both medals. It’s called the Goofy Challenge- and yes, you get a Goofy medal too. Two days, three medals! I don’t even like Goofy particularly, but I do like bling so there you have it—

I’M GOING GOOFY!

That all sounded great around February… now, it’s sounding a bit, you know, long.

Training:

You look at books on training like Marathoning for Mortals, and you think, "eh, I can handle this." And you can, but it takes more time and effort than you can possibly imagine. You start off by running 3-5 miles 3-4 times a week, and add a LR (long run, don't you know) over the weekend. In theory I started off doing two LRs on the weekend to get a feel for back-to-back runs in preparation for Goofy. And yes, I got a feel for the back-to-backs. They hurt. I dropped the shorter LR on Saturday.

Did I mention you build up to 18-20 mile LRs? Did I mention the LRs all fell right around Thanksgiving and Christmas?! That was really convenient, because you know, you've got nothing better to do between Thanksgiving and Christmas than spend all your time running and running and running...

Coach Harry has been on every LR with me in his stroller. The baby who can't even handle sitting still for a meal at Chick-fil-A can sit in a stroller for 4 hours with a bag of Skittles. It's an enigma, but whatever. I finally learned to put him in footy pj's if it was cold out- otherwise he keeps taking off his shoes, and little old ladies glare at me. Recently, Emma tossed aside her training wheels and has accompanied me on her bike. Good thing we live in a small town because with a somewhat steering-challenged bike rider and me and Harry, we take up the whole road.

Would you believe I've run over 500 miles in preparation for this weekend? That's not really hard-core, lots of people do more, but I'm still pretty amazed I stuck with it so long. I'm in "taper" mode now- you slow down considerably, so that you can go into the race fresh. As a side effect, you become convinced you can't even run a mile...

We are all making the journey to Disney. The races start around 6 a.m. "What?!" you say, "there's no way you're getting up that early!" And you're right-- I have to be on a bus both days around 3:30 a.m!! Two good points- 1.) I can't possibly be nervous that early in the morning; 2). I may very well be back to the hotel before my peeps have finished breakfast! Hold up- that second point only applies to the half!

In case you're worried, I did run a half marathon last month in preparation. It was a nice course in Jacksonville. I was soooo bored. But, there were no Disney Parks to run through, and no characters to take pictures with, etc. Yep, bringing my camera, because nothing says pretty like a running picture!

Emma and I did a "run" together in October at Disney. Emma's idea of running is walking, so it was pretty sweet! They had a race that was twice as long at the same time- that's why there are people who you can tell are really running in the background! They've covered a lot more distance than us.

I found a group of fellow minded Disney runners on the internet. I know, I know... internet friends. But really, I wouldn't have made it this far without their encouragement, so I have to give credit to my WISHers. Go WISH team!!

If you have any interest in tracking me,

Half: http://disneyworldsports.disney.go.com/dwws/en_US/marathon/events/detail?name=Marathon2008HalfMarathonLiveResultsDetailPage

Full: http://disneyworldsports.disney.go.com/dwws/en_US/marathon/events/detail?name=MarathonResultsDetailPage

Plug in my name. Don't be concerned if I suddenly stop moving. I'm probably taking pictures. Oh, and on the day of the full, I may very well stop for a ride at one of the parks or maybe lunch... you never know.

OK, I'm going back to obsessing over packing details now...