Training Week # 3

Let's check in!  How did training week #2 go??

I added 1.00 mile to my weekly total AND I cut my average pace/mile by over a minute!  I have to say... antibiotics for bronchitis made all the difference!

During the middle run for this week, I was able to run for 75% of the run, including the entire first 2 miles.  That was the first time I'd run 2 miles continuously without walking breaks.  It might not sound like a lot, but as a relatively new runner (ok, it's been almost a year, but a lot of this year has been trial and error) its huge.  I have no athletic base to build off of, and so I was literally starting from scratch.  Running 2 miles continuously as a 10 min pace is pretty good.

I also took a hot yoga class at Pure Yoga on Tuesday night.  The class itself was okay - it was a community class and my friend and I felt it was a very advanced class.  I'll write a full review this week... but it was not up to the usual Pure standards that we've seen in other classes.

What's coming up for this week:

I'm added 1 more mile to my weekly today during my long run.  I'm excited for this because I work 5.5 miles from home, so this means I can use my commute home as a run... I might have to overshoot home, but at least I'm saving some time.
The rest of the week is going to be tight - I have a very exciting and busy weekend coming up!  We are going to the sample presentation for the florist for our wedding and then on Sunday, we're going to see Book of Mormon with my family.  My sister-in-law's parents got us tickets for Christmas, and at the time, July 22 seemed ages away.  Now it's here.
Thursday I'm going to get my orthodontist in NJ to get my Invisalign taken off... I think.  Yes, I have Invisalign.  When I got my initial braces off when I was 14/15, my teeth were great.  I wore my retainers through my freshman year of college and then stopped.  My wisdom teeth came in/were impacted and pushed all of my teeth - particularly my bottom teeth - all out of sorts.  When it came time for the wedding, I decided to go for Invisalign because I didn't want pictures of my teeth to look terrible.  It's a little superficial, but there were always pictures of brides with their mouths open laughing or talking, and I just kept thinking, "oh gosh, these pictures are beautiful, my teeth are going to ruin these pictures of me!!"  However, I have noticed that as a result of the Invisalign, I have been much more meticulous brushing and caring for my teeth, and I have also found that my teeth are easier to brush and floss as a result of my teeth not being on top of each other.  It has definitely had it's benefits, but I am excited to get the little brackets (yes there are little brackets even though its Invisalign) taken off and to not have to wear them constantly!
To sum up, I have to run 3 out of my 4 available days, which isn't that big a deal, but it just shows how inflexible my schedule will be for the next few weeks.  I have time to fun, but I can't be lazy/procrastinate because I don't have time to make up that run if I decide not to go.




How are you doing making progress towards your goals? Do you have any exciting plans for the weekend? 

Training schedule: Week 1

OK, so here's the deal.  I am not a runner.  I am not fast, I'm not great at pacing myself, etc etc.  This morning, I'm running and I'm doing TERRIBLY.  And I'm re-thinking this idea of posting my training progress on my blog.  I've been running for almost a year and I have made a lot of progress, but I am still not "a runner".

And then I thought... I'm not trying to be a fitness expert.  I'm not trying to show people that I'm this amazing runner.  I am a normal person who decided to get off her ass and exercise.  My blog isn't about mechanics or what research is out there that proves this exercise is better than that exercise.  Nobody should expect me to run like the wind or bench press twice my weight.  And if they do, then they don't know me and don't know what my purpose is.  Which, fortunately for me, is not actually my problem.  

So, I'm just going to lay it out there.  I ran 4.00 miles in 51 minutes.  That's pretty slow.  My pace was 12.86/mile. I could prattle off a million excuses as to why I am so slow, but the fact of the matter is, I'm still getting used to running, especially sustaining my speed, and progress is slow but steady.  I did backslide a little the last couple of weeks because I was super lazy and had a cold, so I didn't exercise for like 10 days straight.  That's my own fault - I should have been exercising while sick, but I just felt frustrated. 

Tim made me a schedule, which starts next week... but I wanted to give myself a little bonus time, so I ran yesterday to test out my heel and then I ran again today for a "long" run.  

Here is next week's schedule:

Tim and I are huge excel dorks, so we have a nice google document that I created (and had to format in an aesthetically pleasing way) so he can see what I'm doing based on the schedule he created.  Every Sunday night, I'll post the next week's schedule along with the completed table of what I did the week before. 

Next Monday I'm going to go to the gym and cross train on a bicycle, then do some abs/arms.  Next Thursday, I'm going to go to the Bryant Part free Yoga class.   I'm not going to add the non-running to the spread sheet just because it adds a lot more clutter to it.

Reminder! Enter my CW-X discount giveaway before July 1st at midnight!!

New Goal

So since the PRoNE 5K run, I've been very... lazy.  I've been to the gym here and there and gone to a bunch of yoga classes, but really... I've been taking it easy.  This past week, I have had a cold, so I haven't exercised since Monday.  I also have been working very late hours which hasn't helped.

Well my friend Tim (the one who won the PRoNE 5K) emails me the other day asking if I want to run a "Half-Mary" which apparently is his auto-corrected way of asking me to run a half-marathon. I did a little research (check out http://www.halfmarathons.net/ for half marathons all over the country!) and found one in Jersey City, NJ.

The Newport Liberty Half Marathon

Here is the course map:

I want to do this one because it's in Jersey City.  Cameron and I are getting married in Jersey City on October 14, right in Liberty State Park.  The hotel we'll be staying at is by Newport and all the weekend events will be along this course route.  I get very tied to places (as you can tell by my love of Boston, and my last post professing my love of NYC) and think it would be really cool to do my first half-marathon in the city I will be getting married in just weeks later.

Also, JC is conveniently 2 PATH stops away from us.  And this will be a great opportunity for me to get to know the area a little bit before the wedding.  If I can run from the hotel to the venue, I should know how to direct a bus or a cab!

So... new goal... to run a half-marathon.  This is a serious one.  I need to train for it.  I emailed Tim, and he will be crafting me a training plan that I need to stick to.  To help me stick to that... I'm going to start post my training plan here when he and I make it, and then every week, I'll post what I should be doing and if I did what I was supposed to do the week before.

My plan is to exercise 5x/week - 3 runs, 1 cross training (most likely bike because I'm not a fan of the elliptical), and one class.  In addition to this...one of my runs will be... wait for it... A PRE-WORK RUN.  I'm a bad sleeper, so I don't want to start getting up super early every day of the week, but I also don't want to give up every single afternoon/evening of my week on those weeks where we go away for the weekend.  I'll compromise - I'll get up earlier once a week and run, so then I only have 4 days a week to exercise after work.

Do you think I'll be able to manage wedding planning and half-marathon training this summer?  What do you think of the course?  How do you stay on track to meet your goals?

Pugs and Mugs

A few months ago, I decided to look for a 5K to do in Boston, my old home, as my first 5K.  I figured that getting to go to Boston would be a good motivator for me since I love it there.
It was a choice between the PRoNE 5K or The Foxboro against Diabetes 5K, which were both this past Saturday, June 2.  I discussed with many of my college friends and we decided to do the PRoNE 5K because of its location; Castle Island.  The PRoNE 5K donates money to the Pug Rescue of New England, which helps rescue and support pugs in New England (if you can't figure that out from the title of the organization).

Race Map

It worked out great because the American Craft Beer Festival was also on June 2nd.  Cameron and I went to that 2 years ago with some friends and we all had a great time.  We were all very excited to spend the day together, running a 5K and then at the Beer Festival.  The name "Pugs and Mugs" was born during a conversation about getting tee-shirts made for the weekend.

Anyway, back to the 5K.  June 2 seems like a great day for a 5K, right? Especially in Boston where it cools down nicely.  Last time we went to the Beer Festival, I wore a strapless sundress and we spent all day outside beforehand.  So obviously, this time would be exactly the same... right?!

WRONG!

As you can see... Rain/Thunder = strapless sundress.  Crap.  My OCD self had picked out my Brooks Running shorts and my Sweat Pink tank top to run in.  I threw a pair of capris in my bag and figured I'd be fine in capris and the tank top - I run in tank tops as long as it is above 55/60.

Before the Race:
We all wake up on Saturday morning at 6:45 and its POURING rain.  Not only that, it's also like 53 degrees.  So Wendi, our very amazing hostess, gets out sweatshirts for all of us, including extra ones for after the race and we all get ready and head out.  We got to the event at 7:50ish, registered and got back in the car to wait.  It was freezing.  I committed to wearing Wendi's sweatshirt over my tanktop, which was a challenge itself because I'm very particular about what I work out in.

At 8:45, we climbed out of the cars and got ready for the race.  We took a couple pre-race pictures, but I look so horrifying, those will hopefully be deleted from Wendi's phone shortly. I put my arm band under the sweatshirt to keep my phone dry and set up my music.  We all lined up - my ex-roommate, Tim (ok, half of the people I ran with are ex-roommates, but he is the most recent one), started at the front and the rest of us gathered in the middle.

The Race:
At 9:05 we were off.  It was steadily raining and I had to dodge many people at the beginning.  Note to  anyone who participates in Run/Walks... try to position yourself appropriately.  I think I was positioned appropriately, but I had to run around people who were walking with 4-5 people in a row taking up the entire sidewalk.

About 7-8 minutes into the run, I was feeling pretty good and I hit a head wind.  The wind was literally pounding against me and I was just pushing through it.  I hit mile 1 running and was proud I'd made that with this wind against me.  If you look at the map, you can see that there is a little addition to the route outside of the circle to make it a 5K.  I ran down that and back up and then walked for about a minute, at which point one of my friends caught up to me and we talked about the ridiculous headwind.

We thought that was ridiculous... oh wait... it gets WORSE.

Between the mile 1 and mile 2 markers, the wind was brutal.  There was a causeway where the wind was completely against us BUT the rain, which was very hard, was coming directly from the right.  There were puddles (more like lakes) all over the route and my feet were soaking wet.  It literally felt like I was running through the Perfect Storm.  Except George Clooney was not there and it seemed like I would never make it to the mile 2 marker.

I ran the entire time over the cause way, although running might not be the most accurate word.  I did not walk.  I really wanted to, but I was trying to hard not to.  At one point, "I'm Not Afraid" by Eminem came on my music, which revived me.  I particularly like the lyric, "We'll walk this route together through the storm, whatever weather, cold or warm, just letting you know that you're not alone" as it made me think of all my friends running this with me and where they were at this point.  I pushed through and made it over the causeway.

I had been planning on walking after that, but I finally found the mile 2 marker and decided to keep running.  At this point, I'd probably been running for about 26 minutes.  Shortly after the mile 2 marker was the race photographer.  I remembered reading on someone else's blog to smile at the finish line so your picture is good, so I smiled the whole way to the race photographer.

Pretty good picture right?? You can see the causeway from hell directly behind me.

Not too soon after this picture was taken, a tail wind appeared!  Suddenly I was being pushed along, but because I was only 2.something miles into the race, I didn't want to expend all my energy and tried to run conservatively.  The rain had lightened up and there was a really cool military fort on one side of us.

I kept running and "Edge of Glory" came on.  As many people know, I strongly dislike Gaga, but I really love this song for some reason, and it's a great song to run to.

About a minute into "Edge of Glory", I turned a corner and could see all the tents and the finish line!  But I'd just passed mile 2!  How did I get to the end so quickly??  I passed the mile 3 marker and sped up to the finish line.

The official results:

I finished in 33:37.1. I had been hoping to break 30 minutes before the race started, but honestly, between the sciatica and the weather, I was just happy that it wasn't more than a minute above my best practice run (which was during ideal conditions).
I DID IT!  I finished my first 5K!

After the Race
Once we all finished, Tim had to collect his prize... because... oh wait... I forgot to mention... Tim WON! This is why he went to the front of the pack in the beginning.  He ran it in 18:08.  He got a heart rate monitor, which is cool.  We were all hoping for a pug, but nope.

Tim: the winner!!

There was lots of free baked goods - we took some brownies and bananas and headed out.  It's a shame we didn't stay for the rest of the race, but the weather was miserable. All of us were drenched.  Completely soaking wet.  One of my friends had to wring her sweater out.  I wanted to make sure to get a picture of myself in my SweatPink shirt with my race number, so I forced Wendi to take one while we were all dripping in the car.

We all showered and changed and then threw a load of our wet, gross clothes into the washing machine.  Thank goodness Wendi has a free washer/dryer!  To reward ourselves, we went to my favorite mall, the Natick Collection and shopped for a little bit.  I actually didn't buy anything, but I love the Natick Collection and was just happy to pay it a visit.

At 4:00, a bunch of us headed to the American Craft Beer Festival to wait in line.  We wanted to sit under cover and wait for the 6:00 start.  We had a great time at the Beer Festival - you get to try lots of different beers and we all just hung out for a very long time.   It was a very nice way to conclude the day and we had a very fun filled day!  Sorry, no pictures of the Beer Festival - with the rain, my hair was super frizzy and I didn't wear makeup.

Thoughts on the Race
When we got back to Wendi's, Cameron looked up to see if the mile markers were accurate.  We found that they weren't - the mile 2 marker was at least 1/3 of a mile too far.  That made sense because I was most frustrated during "mile 2".  Besides the giant storm over the causeway, I also thought I was running the slowest mile I've run in months, which really frustrated me.  I also was trying to conserve energy and actually pace myself because I thought that I was not even halfway through it.

I am very proud of all of my friends, because we all got up on our Saturday together and ran in the cold pouring rain and wind.

I want to work on finding a GPS for my phone that is more accurate than the ones I currently have.  My phone has perpetual problems finding signals, so a lot of times, I run and when I stop the timer, its like, "You have run 0.0 miles! You burned 0 calories!"  Annoying!  However, if I'd had the GPS working, it could have told me that I had gotten to mile 2 and my attitude might have been different.

I'll run another race and I loved going with everyone.  Mt. Washington was Summer 2011, PRoNE 5K was Summer 2012.  What does everyone want to do Summer 2013?!

Last note, we all put the pink SweatPink shoelaces in our shoes to run together.  It was GREAT!  It was so easy to find each other because we looked out for the shoelaces.  Love them!

Have you run a race in brutal weather?  Has it effected your time?  What should my friends and I try in the Summer of 2013?