One Step at a Time

I know you are all on the edge of your seats with my progress...

I have definitely gotten my eating back under control this week, Hallelujah!
I'm feeling much better.

The insomnia has returned, however. I was up until midnight last night, then bright-eyed and bushy-tailed at 3:30am this morning. So, I laid in bed cursing the clock instead of getting up and going for a run.

Tomorrow morning is my Friday (I took Friday off work, and Thursday is a holiday). I've decided that I will just get up and run tomorrow morning, come hell or high water. I'll only have to suffer through one day of complete exhaustion at work.

A friend at work loaned me a couple of "Core Rhythms" dvd's to get my opinion of them, so I will HAVE to do those over the next few days, also. She just got them- got suckered in by the infomercial. I love to dance, but I'm not the smoothest dancer so this should be interesting...

I'm planning a long (ish) run on Thursday as a positive start to my New Year.
Then, my first race of the year on Saturday.
My plan at this point: Faking it.
I really feel like curling up and not doing much of anything, but I have to get in gear.

I'm still mulling over my 2009 Goals, I'll have something posted later this week.

Perspective...

I was talking to the Maintenance Manager at work today. He and I work very closely together on several projects. I was talking about my lack of give-a-damn lately, and how my weight has ballooned out of control. (Obsessed, am I?)

He told me it sounded like I have a bad case of cabin fever and that I need to get out and DO something about it. Yup, he's right.

It's really tough when you've gotten to this place to drag yourself out of it. At least, for me it is.

I should be able to sleep well tonight, since I didn't sleep at all last night. Hopefully that will spur me on to "DO something about it".

It's not a great idea getting your days and nights turned around when you're off work and don't have to be anywhere at any particular time. It makes it that much tougher on Day 1 back to work.

Reformed Gym Rat No More

I’ve been somewhat MIA lately.

Nope, I haven’t been running. Not since the Jingle Bell Run.

I haven’t been working out much to speak of either.

First, the good. We had a fantastic Christmas. As always, I spent far too much on the kids, but they each got exactly what they wanted. My daughter got a touch-screen computer (and I inherited her year old laptop), Rock Band for Wii (the whole set), and some other various games, clothes, and a book from the fam and money from my parents.

My son got a new guitar and amp, a digital camcorder, a subscription to Xbox Live and the wireless adaptor for his Xbox to allow him to go online (we only have wireless internet at home), plus lots of band t-shirts from my fam and money from my parents.

I got some cool stuff, too from my fam. Some Pampered Chef stuff from my sis, Coca-Cola memorabilia from my bro and fam, a blender, talking Hoops and Yoyo calendar, and money from my parents (which bought me a Tomtom that I really wanted!).


Next the bad. I had an entire week off work and did absolutely nothing constructive with it. My big plan was to get my sleeping back on track and get back into the groove with running and lifting. I wound up staying up until 2 or 3 am every night, sleeping until 9 or 10am, then lounging around in sweats (or shorts) all day. The worst part, there were 3 days where the weather was so warm that I had the windows open in the house (65-70 degrees). Did I take advantage of the unseasonably warm weather? NOPE! I spent my time lounging about the house and eating junk food. Christmas was the worst. It was like I couldn’t stop myself.


And the ugly. I stepped on the scale on Christmas morning (I couldn’t help myself). It was bad. I stepped on the scale on Dec 26. It was 6 lbs higher. The day after Christmas, I weighed the same as I weighed the day that I brought my son home from the hospital 14+ years ago. I was mortified back then to be that huge. Bear in mind that I gained 50 lbs with each of my kids, they are only 12.5 months apart, so I didn’t lose all of the weight from #1 before getting pg with #2. I have never weighed this much before or since then… until now.

What to do about it? There’s not a lot I can do quickly at this point. I have gotten beyond the point where a few weeks is going to get me back to my fighting weight. This is going to take some serious work. And, the fact that I’m embarassed to go out in public makes it that much harder. I have a 5K scheduled for Sat, Jan 3 that I suppose I will run. I don’t want to, but that fact tells me that I definitely need to. I am going to work on putting together some short term and long term goals this week that will help me to get back to normal. I’m usually not much of a New Year’s Resolution type of person, but 2009 may be the year that I make some.

I have been doing a lot of reading this week, and one thing I read was in one of Jillian Michaels’ books. It said: “As you envision the changes in your future, you must begin to let go of your past… Forget about fat periods or skinny periods in your life.” A lot of my problems this year stem from the fact that I have never had a “real” problem with my weight. Before this year, I have never been “technically” overweight. I think I have let that fact affect me more than it should. I am so obsessed by it. I find myself talking about the “good old days” far too often. You know, the days when I spent half my free time at the gym, and had the body to show for it. That is not the case any more, and I need to get a handle on the present, and start looking toward the future.

OK. Enough about all that. Stay tuned, my goals for 2009 will be coming soon, and whatever goals I wind up with will be tracked through shorter-term goals.

Jingle Bell Run 5K - December 6

The Jingle Bell Run was scheduled to begin at 9am, or 8:45am, depending on which side of the race form you were looking at.

We hadn't agreed on a time to leave for the race prior to Saturday morning. Knowing that the race is about 30 minutes or so from my house, I got ready around 7-7:30am. Barbie called when she left her house. She said the roads were pretty bad, but she was on her way. Our first snow of the year came on Friday night.

We made it to the race at 8:30 ish and found that the race was going to have an even later start than planned. The race director was unable to be there, and the people who were taking over for her were out digging the mile markers out of the snow. It was only a couple of inches, it wasn't like it was a blizzard or something! Ah, well, that gave us more time to dread the race and try to talk each other out of running it.

Not wanting to stand around and wait, we went back to the car and started getting ready. You know, second-guessing what to wear for the weather, making sure Garmin has acquired the satellites, getting the ipod headphones untangled and ready to go. We figured we would see everybody come out of the building where the packet pick-up was taking place and meet up with them at the starting line.

BAD PLAN! The starting line was actually BEHIND the building, and everybody went out the back door when the race was getting ready to begin. All of a sudden, we looked up and saw a bunch of walkers moseying past the front of the car. What?? That CAN'T be the walkers for the RACE, can it?

Ummmm, yes, yes it can. We bolted out of the car and over to the race start. Luckily, this is a small town race, and we know the people taking care of timing. OK, so they will be taking 2:29 off our finish time. Off we go!

Let me just say, it's kind of fun to start a race late and chase everybody down. I was passing EVERYBODY! OK, so maybe most of them were walkers, but I'll take it! The course wasn't quite the same as last year. I thought there must be some shortcut at the end. Nope.
There was apparently some confusion over where the last turn should be.

Actual distance: 3.85 miles
My time (Garmin): 37:09 (9:39 pace)

We left before the race results, as we were not going to make a big deal about asking them to update our times. It was our own stupid fault that we missed the start! Barbie would have won the overall race if the times were adjusted. There was only one girl ahead of her, and not by 2 minutes. When the results are published, I'll know if the times were adjusted, but I'm happy to have gotten out there anyhow.

I didn't run all last week, as I was attempting to keep from getting a full-blown cold... my first in 3 YEARS!! UGH!!
I was out of commission for the most part on Sunday with the cold, but I'm feeling great today.

After the race, we went out for Mexican and wine (of course) and then headed home.

Later, I took the kids shopping again, and I've ALMOST finished my Christmas shopping. Of course, when the kids each want $500-$1,000 gifts, it doesn't take long to finish. One item for each kid and I'm DONE! Christmas morning isn't gonna be much of a surprise, but at least they'll have surprise gifts at my parents'.

Great River Road Race Report - or Happy Birthday to ME!!

Holy long title, Batman!

After totally blowing it on Thanksgiving, even though I had a plan to keep my eating in check... I proceeded to shop away the day AFTER Thanksgiving, getting a late start (thus avoiding the worst of the crowds) and getting a big chunk of my Christmas shopping done.

Saturday, 11/29 was my 35th birthday and the day of the Great River Road 10 mile race. The race was an out-and-back, right along the Mississippi River. I had signed up on Wednesday, along with a couple of friends. They tried (a little) to talk me out of it, but I figured I could at least have a healthy START to my day.

When Saturday arrived, I did NOT want to run 10 miles. Ugh! What was I thinking?? I tried to talk THEM out of it after we had already arrived at the race. But, alas, it was too late. We were doomed to run it.

I am SO glad that we did! At the start, it was about 40 degrees. This would normally be shorts weather for me. But, the race was right along the RIVER for crying out loud. And, I was COLD! So, I wore pants and a lightweight long sleeve shirt.

On the way out, it was SO HOT! I thought I had overdressed. I enjoyed the out-and-back, because we could see the frontrunners on their way back. Angie and I ran together, with Barbie taking off and beating us by almost 30 minutes. Gah!

At the turnaround, I was glad to be "overdressed". We ran the last 5 miles into a headwind. I wasn't there to "race". I hadn't ran since 11/16 (are you surprised?). Before that, I ran on 11/8 and 11/1. I was just there to run 10 miles. Or walk. Angie drug me through the last couple of miles, and we wound up running it in an 'official' time of 1:47:15. Not great, but I was fine with it.

Here are a couple of shots of Angie and I at the finish:

Afterward, we went out for Mexican (of course) and a couple of glasses of wine (of course).

4th Folder Tag

Since it seems that I have nothing to talk about lately, I'm copying some others and tagging myself...
Here's how it works:

1. Pick the 4th folder on your computer
2. Pick the 4th Picture
3. Explain the picture
4. Tag 4 more peeps. -- I'm not tagging anybody. Do it if you want!

I didn't pick the 4th of the 4th... I'm at work, you people do not want to stare at pictures of conveyor or rack! I picked the 4th folder of personal pics, 4th picture in that folder...




This is Barbie and I at a winery, after the Band on the Run race. Typical. I have no idea why I am sitting ramrod straight. I think I was trying to make my gut look flatter.

I do know that I got completely wasted that day. Angie accidentally deleted ALL of the pictures off Barbie's camera and was about to cry. I then took it upon myself to try and cheer her up by doing some sort of crazy, wacked-out dancing.

I then started drunk-dialing random friends and inviting them to drive Angie and I around to wineries later after Barbie went home. We had one friend take us up on the offer. She quickly realized how drunk we were and took us out to eat to try and sober us up.

We're all entitled to act crazy once in a while, right?


This weekend, I will have to skip the Turkey Trot on Saturday. My son's basketball team is playing in a tournament. They won on Tuesday, which puts their next game on Saturday morning instead of Friday night like I had thought. Ah well, there's always another race right around the corner.

Diet, Check!

Well, the good news is, I have my diet under control.

I've been eating very healthy this past two weeks. Lots of whole foods, very little junk food. I gave in to my candy corn craving the other day, but I was able to limit it and get the rest of the candy corn out of the house.

Great, right?

Well, almost.

Why is it that I can have one, or the other? I am not doing much running or anything else really. It's like I can eat right OR exercise. I can't seem to do both at the same time. Once I get that figured out, LOOK OUT! There will be no stopping me!

I went to bed last night early with the best intentions of getting up early this morning for a run. But then, the dog kept tossing and turning. Yes, I'm blaming my oversleeping this morning on the dog.
(But, he knows I can't stay mad at him).

I'm right on the cusp here. I swear, one of these days, you will come over to my blog expecting to read more excuses of why I didn't run today... and you will see me all fit and in the midst of my comeback.

Update...

I had a very good week last week. It all started with the return of my best friend.

Then, I went out for beer and burgers on Thursday night with a girlfriend. It was a date set-up gone awry. Why is it that people think when you are single that you should be set up with anybody else who happens to be single?

I have standards!

Saturday morning, I got up and ran 9 miles. It was a very exhilarating day for a run. It was cool, but not cold (40 degrees). The trees are beautiful with the changing leaves, and there was a slight breeze.

I got back from my run and went later to my company's Christmas party for the managers. Yes, we already had our Christmas party. The party was a lot of fun. Dinner, karaoke, and then 2 comedians had been hired as our entertainment. I hadn't laughed so hard in so long! They were fantastic. Even the people who weren't drinking thought so!

After that we dispersed and started the gambling. The party took place at the Casino Aztar hotel, adjacent to the casino boat. Not being much of a gambler (ever since my ex gambled away so many thousands), I gave away the $5 that we were given for gambling and went home.

Sunday, I took my daughter to get the other side of her lip pierced. I can't believe my daughter is one of *those* freaks who has 2 lip piercings. It really doesn't look so bad. I'll have to post a picture later. I figure, she gets good grades, she doesn't get in any trouble, she is very well behaved and always has been... if she wants to have a couple of piercings, I'm not going to make a big deal of it. She knows that when she gets older and wants to get a "real" job, she will want to let them grow back.

So, I'm back at it now. Of the 30 lbs that I had gained, I've now lost 6 of them. I may have dropped out of Viv's challenge, but I'm back stronger than ever now...

Tito is here!!

I managed to drag out of bed this morning at 5am and get in a quick 4.5 mile run.
Even more exciting than that... Tito is back!

One of my very good friends has had this dog for several years. Somewhere between 2001-2003, she lived in an apartment for a year that did not allow dogs. During that year, Tito lived with me. He is the absolute best dog ever, and I hated giving him back. But, I knew from the beginning that he was her dog, and I was also happy for him to see him go back home.

This year, my friend got married to a guy who has 2 large dogs and 2 cats. Tito and the other animals were not getting along, so she decided to do what was best for the dog, even though I'm sure it must be killing her.

I can barely contain myself, I'm so thrilled to have him back!

Tunnel Hill Run - My latest PW (personal worst)

On Saturday, I ran the Tunnel Hill 10 Mile Trail Run. The Tunnel Hill trail is located in Southern IL and is part of the federal Rails-to-Trails development program. The trail was created when an old railroad was removed from the area, thus the Tunnel and the various trestles that are a part of the trail. The entire trail is 43.1 miles long and is beautiful this time of the year with the changing leaves. This picture of the tunnel is from the Spring.

The race starts at Tunnel Hill and runs on the trail all the way to Vienna. Due to the logistics of running on the trail, the field is limited to 200 runners. I have run this race 7 times, every year except for one since I started running. It's one of my favorites; I look forward to it every year.

My best time on this run was 1:21. Not too shabby, but I probably could have run it better that year. I was young and just enjoying the day.

My worst time up until now, was last year at 1:34.
This year, I did enjoy the run in many ways - the weather was beautiful, the fall colors were beautiful. I hadn't run since Columbus, so it felt great to just get out there and run. About 1/4 mile into the race, we run through the tunnel. The tunnel is pretty long, and it gets DARK in there. All you can see is the shoes of the person in front of you. It's always neat to get in the tunnel with people who have never been there before. There were a lot of first timers around me this year.

As the race went on, my body started to say, HEY! You needed to train! Miles 5-8 were especially tough for me. At about the 8 mile mark, the song 'Teenagers' by My Chemical Romance came on my ipod and gave me the boost I needed to kick it back in gear. By that time, I had let too much time slip past me, so I was happy to just run out the last two miles and finish strong.

That is what I did. My official time was 1:44:15.
I was the only one in our group that rode down together to not get at least an age group award. I've only won one age group award there in all the years I've run it. And, that was not the year I PR'ed. I got lucky one year when nobody else my age ran.

Shanna won first place overall for Women in 1:09.
Garrett won third place for his age in 1:12
Barbie won 2nd place for her age in 1:20
Tim won third place for his age in 1:13.

Here are some after pictures. The first is me, Shanna and Barbie:

And, another one of me, Shanna and Garrett.

I will say that I enjoyed the day very much. It was great to get to a race and back in the groove of things. My least favorite part of the day was the Chub Rub. Ye-OUCH! I have never had this so bad before. It must be time to start working my thighs.

Bill and Trav's Bogus Journey

This is where I was last night. I took my daughter and two of her friends. One of her friends was in loooove with William. Bill is the lead singer for "The Academy Is" and Trav is the red-headed lead for "We the Kings". They were touring with two little-known bands, "Hey Monday" and "Carolina Liar".

"Hey Monday" opened it up and was very entertaining. The sound was reminiscent of "Paramore", with the female lead singer. You know you haven't made it big yet when the band members have to help out with the tear down and set up of their equipment, as the first two bands did.

But, then came "Carolina Liar". I LOVED this band. They were a little quirky in their performance and sounded much different from the others. Very 80's new wave type sound. I even bought their CD after the show.

The headline bands were great, of course. I even knew some of their music. Well, we also listened to some of it on the way over, so I cheated a little bit.

I didn't get home until around midnight, and managed to make it to work this morning. There was no school yesterday or today, so don't worry about the kids falling asleep at school!

Am I a cool mom or what?

Tomorrow- Tunnel Hill 10 Mile trail run. This should be interesting... I still haven't ran all week. I have decided that if I'm not feeling a bit more normal after the time change, I'm going to break down and go to the doctor.

Here we go Again...

I haven't ran since Columbus.

There it is.

Do I have a good reason? It depends on who you ask. If you ask me... No, not really.

I haven't slept more than a couple of hours a night in several days. One day last week, I slept for about 5 hours and woke up at 3:30am. That was the best. Last night was the worst. Could I really have gotten up at 5am this morning and ran? Yes. I would have been miserable and tired all day long, but I'm miserable and tired anyway.

I called in sick yesterday and slept sporadically throughout the day. That was nice, but not practical for every day. I'm hoping that I make up for some of it tonight with a solid night's sleep - drug induced sleep. Hopefully, I won't be feeling too foggy tomorrow morning to get up and run.

Thursday night, I'm taking my daughter and two of her friends to see 'The Academy Is' at Pops. I also plan to work on Friday. Since it's an All Ages concert, I'm hoping it doesn't go on too late. It should be pretty fun, even though I don't know very much of their music. I'm still planning to somehow run two days this week before the Tunnel Hill race on Saturday...

I'll definitely keep you posted if that happens!

7 of 9...

Or, where does your motivation come from?



If you've been following along for very long, you've seen my weight creep up over the past year to what amounts to the largest that I have ever been. Normally, I can see the big picture- In the grand scheme of things, I'm not that big. I can still run, and run well when I do the training. (Although, if I were doing the training, the weight wouldn't be an issue).



The real problem I have is getting my lazy butt out of bed to do my running in the mornings. After work isn't really an option for me, as I have found over the years. I can workout in the evenings for the short term, but this can't be a long term solution for me.


Now, to find some helpful motivation...



I've watched some Star Trek in my day, but it has certainly been a lot of years, and I never really got into the Voyager series much at all.


About a year ago, one of the maintenance techs at work told me that he thought I looked like "7 of 9" from the Voyager series of Star Trek. Yeah, right, whatever... But, I don't really know who this is.


He asked me a few times after that if I had a chance to google and find "7 of 9", so I knew exactly what he was telling me. Let me interject: this guy is known to not be a creep.


Last night, a conversation with a friend made me think of this and I got on Google and found this "7 of 9" character. She is played by the actress Jeri Ryan, and is on many websites as one of the "hottest women on Star Trek".


Hot women on Star Trek? Who knew?


Anyhow, here's the photos, her and me:

















Twins, no?

OK. I'm blonde and I have full lips. I'll give him that. But, I don't see me wearing that skin tight jumpsuit. Nope, not right now.

Believe it or not, this has helped me with my motivation.
I think,
"Wow! Somebody thinks I'm hot!"
"Wow! I could BE that hot!"


Let's hope it sticks this time. So far, in spite of an initially reported loss, I've gained it back and I'm at 0 pounds lost for Viv's Independence Day Weight Loss Challenge.


But, I'll get back there. My plan is not to post a gain for the next official WI.

Columbus Half Marathon Weekend

Ahhhh, where to begin...

We had a great weekend. I started off from my house at 6:30am Saturday morning and picked up the other 3 chics that were running.

It was Angie's first Half Marathon and Shanna was attempting her BQ. At 21 years old, she had to run a 3:40.

I had gotten the primo hotel at the Hilton, for only $100. Yup, I'm an expert at sniffing out the deal. We ate at the restaurant in the hotel. The food was yum, and there was no 2 hour wait like there normally is before a marathon in many cities. Afterwards, we all four sat in the hot tub on Saturday night in extra running clothes that we happened to bring along. Nobody brought a swimsuit.

Sunday morning, Angie was up and about at 3:30am and took a bath and put on her full make-up. It seems she couldn't sleep. *snort*

The rest of us got up between 4 and 4:30. We ate breakfast and dealt with getting dressed while trying to find a weather forecast on the local tv stations. No luck on the weather. We had to wing it from the weather forecast the night before. It was COLD! We left our hotel at 6:30am for the 7:30 start. Had no trouble parking the car and getting to the starting area, but then stood in line for the port-a-pots for 40 minutes or so. By the time we got out of there, there was no finding the pace team for Shanna. She had to run ahead and try to find them after the race started. She caught them by mile 6 (!!)

On to my race experience. It was so cold, I was glad to get started so I could warm up. At the start, it was in the mid-30's. I had worn my race ready shorts so I could stash my camera in the back pocket. Then, I proceeded to run the entire race without taking a single picture. Ugh!

When the race started, Garmin could not find the satellites. I didn't turn him on until I came out of the port a pottty, so it's partially my fault. The satellites weren't located until about 0.8 miles into the race. I did start the timer when I started and hit the lap button at the 1 mile mark, so I have all my split times, but I don't have the entire distance. Ah, well.

Angie and I had planned to run together, as long as she could get by without pain. We were together until around the 2 mile mark, then she told me to go on. At the next water stop, I caught up to her. She had somehow passed me! I went on ahead again, and caught her at the next water stop, again. So, I told her that we may as well just run together. She stopped at each water stop as she was still having pain and was trying to run through it. We were together at the 10K mark, and that was when her pain got to be too much. She walked in the rest of the race, and I went on ahead and finished.

I felt great the entire time. I think the cool weather was a big contributor to that. I wound up finishing in 2:16 and change. Not my best Half, not my worst. Considering the minimal training I'd done leading up to the race, I was very pleased with this time.

I waited nearby for Angie to finish. She wound up finishing in 2:48 and change. An automatic PR, since it was her first! We then sat in the sun for a bit before going to watch for the other two. Shanna finished the marathon in 3:40:48, a BQ!!! Barbie came in next in 3:52 and change, also a BQ for her, that's her second this year!

I used my camera to get a couple of "after" shots...

Here's me and Angie after our Half

And, Barbie and Shanna, the 2 BQ'ers!

Tag! I'm it!

I was tagged by Carly, which is good because otherwise I have NOTHING to talk about here. I have not gone for a run ALL WEEK.

My last run was the pitifully cut short 11 miler from Sunday. That's OK. One run a week is plenty, right? Ah well...

I'm running the Half in Columbus this Sunday, and I'm hoping I'll get it back in gear after that.

Six Random Facts about Me:

1- I am a musician. I LOVE music of all kinds. I started playing the flute when I was 9, and played all the way through school, including the marching band. I also was in the chorus throughout my school years and took piano lessons. I'm now a mediochre piano player, an excellent floutist, and a horrible singer.

2- I am a farmer's daughter. I was so embarassed about that when I was in high school. I don't know why- It's something I'm very proud of now. I always wanted to move to the city when I grew up. I haven't.

3- I enjoy silence. Maybe it's because I never actually get to be in silence. Maybe this will change after my kids are grown. I love music, and I indulge in some talk radio during long trips when I'm alone. But, sometimes, I'll just turn the radio off and listen to the silence. I did this during my last trip home from Chicago (a 4 hour drive).

4- I had my first boyfriend in Kindergarten. His name was Tony and we used to hide behind the seats on the school bus and kiss. I was devastated when my family moved at the end of my 1st grade year. My next boyfriend wasn't until I was in high school.

5- I am a freaky optimist. I almost always have a smile on my face. Only my close friends know that I'm not always blissfully happy. When I was laid off from my job in 2002, I took exactly one day to cry and feel sorry for myself. From then on, I knew that there was a reason for it. I was only mildly worried throughout the 9 jobless months that followed. And now, I recently celebrated my 5th anniversary at the best job ever. I was right!

6- I have my bellybutton pierced. I got it done when I was in my 20's and hawt, still after I had my kids. When I got mine done, it was not the norm around here like it is these days. I was cutting edge! I've often thought that a 34 year old woman with 2 teenagers at home shouldn't have her bellybutton pierced, but when I take it out my belly just looks plain. So, I've kept it. One day, when I get rid of this extra fat, it will actually look cute again.

Wow. I really had a hard time coming up with 6 things. I'm a dull person, huh? Who'da thunk it? I seem to entertain myself just fine!

Now, I tag all you peeps that seem to have abandoned your blogs recently: Kelly Donut, Ames, Jen-Elph, Delane, and DoriAnn.

I'm a Blog Slacker!

And a running slacker.

I didn't have any running to post about last week because, well, I didn't run enough to talk about it.

So, Angie and I made plans to run on Sunday- 11 miles.

Tomorrow is my son's birthday- he'll be 14. Saturday, we had the required cake and ice cream for the party. Then, I proceeded to pig out on chips, cookies and candy most of the evening whilst watching movies. I'm not really sleeping at night, so this seemed like a pretty good plan.

When the time came to get up for the 11 miler, I was laying there trying to think of ways to get out of it. I didn't come up with anything convincing.
Angie showed up at my house at 6:30am and we were off for our run. I felt pretty good, amazingly. We ran at a really good pace for the first 4-5 miles, like under 10:30/mile average. And, we walked a few times, mostly because Angie was having some minor pains.

After about the 5th mile, her knee really started hurting her. She asked me what she should do... run through it, walk, give up and let me go get my car and pick her up?
Fortunately, I've never been injured, so I had NO advice for her. I offered to go get my car and come back for her, and she said no- she wanted to get the miles.
At about mile 7.5, we gave up on running and walked the rest of the way back to my house. She felt great besides the leg, and was extremely frustrated.

Angie is planning to run her first Half Marathon with us next Sunday in Columbus, and now is getting understandably concerned. I told her that her best bet is to rest this week and see if she is up to the run on Sunday. I don't think she is going to listen. She is one of these crazy people and thinks she HAS to run if it says to run on the schedule.

Barbie's foot is bothering her pretty bad for the past couple of weeks.
Angie is having pain in her leg.
Shanna is planning to qualify for Boston, but just told us this week that she probably won't go to Boston even if she does qualify.

UGH! Why are we doing this, exactly??

Band on the Run 5K, 2008

Saturday morning, I ran a 5K to benefit a local High School marching band- the band that I was a part of, back in my Band Rat days...

This was the race's second year. Last year, it was H-O-T at the start of the race, and sunny. This year was much nicer, probably around 50 degrees. I felt strong throughout the race, the course is nice and flat, just around some neighborhoods near the new high school. I felt strong and passed several people in the last mile. The last half mile, there was a girl who I thought I could pass, but every time I got close she sped up too. I wound up finishing 10 seconds behind her, in 27:47.

Distance: 3.1 miles
Pace: 8:57 / mile
Avg HR: 168 bpm

Of course, she was in my age group. And, of course, she was 3rd place in our age group (10 year splits). Aargh!
I finished 4th out of 7 in our age group, and 30th out of 50 overall. *Sigh!*
Last year's time would have put me at 23, in the top half.

Ah, well, I was still happy with my time. I was almost exactly 1 minute slower than last year, BUT I'm also 20 lbs heavier this year. To me, that means I will be much faster after I drop this weight if I keep up with my training.

After the race, of course we visited a local winery. This week was my turn to get crazy out of control. I absolutely did NOT want to go home... I wanted to party all night. Apparently, I started randomly calling a couple of my friends to meet up (and drive Angie and I around). I did find a taker, but she just took us out to eat to sober us up. Thanks, Connie! :-)

We skipped our planned 11 mile run on Sunday. But, Angie did learn something about me. She called Sunday morning, and I told her I didn't feel like running. Neither one of us wound up running at all that day.

Later, I told her that I probably would have gone for the run if she had tried to talk me into it. Yes, I told her that for my own good. Next time, she won't let me off quite so easy. It may not have been pretty, but we should have ran those 11 miles anyhow.

TGIFFF!

I am so thankful that today is Friday.

I'm still struggling with getting up to run in the mornings. Yesterday, I slept too late, AGAIN, so I had to run my planned 7 miles last night after work and after walking the dog...

Distance: 7.0 miles
Pace: 10:34 min/mile
Average HR: 163 bpm

It's pretty clear, based on my elevated heart rate, that running in the evenings is tougher for me than morning runs. Now, if I could just get my night owl tendencies under control...

On top of everything else, now I'm stressed about my dog. I took him on Tuesday to get neutered, FINALLY (he's 4 years old). For whatever reason, he has started to get aggressive. I think it's excitement more than aggression, but it ended with him biting one of my son's friends in the driveway last night while they were playing basketball. Luckily, it's not a litigious family and it was more of a nip than a bite. Cocker Spaniel vs 15 year old neighbor boy - not a matchup I want to see again. My remedy to this- more walks and longer walks with the dog. Good for me, good for him.

On tap for the weekend-
Saturday: 5K race, followed by a trip to a winery (of course)
Sunday: 11 mile run with Angie.

Two Monday Week

The only thing that got me up and moving this morning is the fact that I have taken tomorrow off work.

I am going to enjoy every minute of no particular place to be at any particular time and get all of my errands done that I've been putting off.

My weekend was a lot of fun, but a bit expensive.
Today is my daughter's birthday, she's 15. How did I get old enough to have a 15 year old? Over the weekend, I had a houseful of 14 and 15 year old girls. It was a lot of fun, but my house is now a disaster zone. Ugh!

Saturday morning, Angie came by and we ran 10 miles. The run went very well, leaps and bounds ahead of the disaster that was last weekend's long run...

Distance: 10 miles
Pace: 10:56
Average HR: 154 bpm

I can not express what a relief it is for me to give up my plan for a full marathon this year. I've had such a stressful year at work, and have really been struggling with my weight which is new for me. I haven't had a problem with my weight for years, but the lack of regular running has brought it all back fresh and new - for several months now. Just making the decision to try and get back to "normal" before I start any marathon training has taken such a load off my mind. I'm hoping that I can get back into a normal routine by the end of the year and shoot for a spring marathon next year.

I will, however, be running the Half at Columbus. This will be my 5th half marathon this year, with very little running in between. Grrr...

Angie and I went to see "Nights in Rodanthe" last night, and out for wine and Mexican food later. The movie was very good, but was more of a tearjerker than I realized it would be. I needed the wine to drown my tears!

Why, oh why can't I get stranded at an Inn with a guy like Richard Gere?
If it were me, the guy would either be a weirdo, or an arrogant jerk.

Hump Day Blah's

Remember when I said that a friend from work was going to start calling me in the mornings to make sure we both got in a workout?

Yeah, well, she wimped out.

I had to recruit another friend. She is not a morning person, either- but she is one of those freaks that gets up when the alarm goes off no matter what. She said she doesn't want to talk in the mornings, but she has been texting me every morning to get up and at 'em.

Yesterday, I blew her off.

This morning, I managed to drag my tail out of bed and get out for a 4.5 mile run:

Distance: 4.51 miles
Pace: 10:19/mile
Average HR: 154 bpm

Yay!

I had ulterior motives- we had some important guests at work today, a couple of senior VP's. I did NOT want to be late this morning! And, I also did NOT want to still be coming out of my sleep stupor during the 8am meeting. So, a run was a nice way to get me up and wake me up.

In other news...
Tomorrow night is the last 7th grade football game of the year (short season, huh?). After that, maybe I'll learn that there's more to life than work and hauling kids to practices...

I'll keep you posted!

*YAWN!* Is It Monday?

Every Monday sucks.
Today is ever so much worse.

Angie texted me an early-wake up this morning so I would get up and out the door. I would have rather stuck needles in my eyes (to quote SKelly) than get up and run. But, I knew I would be asked about it later so I got out for a measly little 2 mile run. I put off going out the door for so long, that is all I had time for.

Yesterday, Angie came by and we ran 9 very slow miles. Ran is probably a bit of a stretch. I can't remember the last time I had such a horrible run. I felt TERRIBLE! Luckily, Angie said she didn't feel so good on the run either (that, or she was trying to make me feel better about being so lame). We walked SO much. I think it was a combination of all the junk food I ate all weekend, and the lack of running last week.

After we got back to my house, I looked at the stats in my Garmin. Our average mile was around 13:00, and my average Heartrate was 134. 134!? That's all? I expected it to be really high, based on how hard I felt like I was working. So, now, was I just being a big old sissy, or is there something else that made me feel so bad? Maybe the lack of sleep the night before? Maybe the extra pounds I'm carrying around this week?

Based on that run, I'm thinking of nixing my marathon plans for this fall and focusing on (1) supporting Barbie in Boston, (2) tackling marathon #3 next year, pending me getting my sh*t together between now and then.

10 Rainy Miles

This weekend was pretty tame, but it was the best weekend I've had in a while anyhow.

Saturday morning, I skipped out on a 5K that my friends were going to because of my son's football game that afternoon. I was going to have to leave early and knew that I wouldn't make it if I ran the race.

Saturday morning, too late for the race, the coach stopped by our house to let us know that the game was cancelled. AARGH!

Well, my friends had a pleasant day, involving shopping and wine swilling. I went to the library and grocery store with my daughter. Ah, well.
Later, my daughter and I went to see "Tyler Perry's The Family that Preys".
My friends had never heard of it, but I LOVE Tyler Perry movies.

Sunday morning, Angie and I had planned to run 10 miles, but it was drizzling a little bit of rain. We decided to go ahead and go for it anyway.

Miles 1 and 2 were nice, no rain to speak of and the time was passing quickly.

Mile 3- We picked up an extra dog. He decided we looked like a lot of fun and proceeded to follow us for the next 7 miles, even in the rain, all the way back to my house.

Mile 3.5-10 - This is about the time the rain started to pick up. By the end of the run, it was raining pretty hard and the wind had picked up. It was kind of nice to run in the rain, but we did a lot of walking after the rain started. I'm sure the people that were passing by us on their way to church thought we were a little crazy. They were probably right. I had to loan Angie a towel for the ride home, and dripped on the floor all the way through my house to get it.

I am glad we went ahead and went for it. If we hadn't done that, I would never have done the 10 miles and would have missed yet another planned run. So far, week 1 of my revised training plan is complete, and I did all of the runs that were planned for the week. Maybe the switch is finally flipped and I'm making my comeback. (I hope)

Sunday evening, Angie and I went to see "The Women"
It was a pretty good movie, but I think they could have made it better with the caliber of stars that were in it. What has Meg Ryan done to herself? She looked so much better before the lip injections, etc. Annette Bening was gorgeous!

Before the movie, we had a glass of wine at the local winery. After the movie, we went for Mexican food. All of those calories burned during that 10 mile rainy run, we ate and drank them away.

It was totally worth it.
Totally.

(I came home afterward and watched a couple of episodes of "I Love the 80's" on VH1.)

Football!

IS BACK!

Today, once again I put off my run for no reason besides laziness. I did manage a short run, but that was NOT my planned 13 miles. It's time to face facts. I am not at the level of training that I had planned. Obviously.

I just worked up a 13 week training plan that would still have me ready for Memphis. I'm giving myself a couple more weeks to snap out of this before I scrap my marathon plans for this year. I really don't know what is going on with me this year. I can remember when I used to be psychotic about running my miles- I've even gone so far as jumping on the treadmill at 11pm on a Sunday night to make sure I get those last 3 miles for the week...

I don't know what switch I need to magically switch in myself, but I sure hope I figure it out soon.

Tomorrow morning, I'm off to Chicago for 2 days of meetings. Changing my routine is usually a bad thing, but I'm hoping this time it will be enough to snap me out of this funk.

I did mention 7th grade football pictures a couple of weeks ago... After yesterday's game, my son's team is now 3-1. Woo! They won yesterday's game 24-8.

He's #76:

And, another shot- strutting back to the stands after a job well done. One day, I'll have to post a video of this. His post-game strut reminds me of John Travolta in Saturday Night Fever.

The Gauntlet

has been thrown...

Two friends from work and I are attempting to lose weight. Since we've been talking about it forever, we've decided on a friendly wager- pound for pound. I have the least to lose, but I'm not letting that stop me. I'm still going to win this challenge.

Besides, it's going to be getting cold soon, and I don't want to have to pour myself into Goretex to run this winter...

That dang running suit was far too expensive to not be used just because of excess blubber!

And, Barbie managed to find a candid shot of my daughter from Monday's race. She really enjoyed watching the finishers come across that finish line.

Labor Day 5K

I feel obligated to put a little somethin' here about yesterday's 5K.

The way I ran yesterday does not deserve to be put out here for everyone to read about. Which is exactly why I must say something about it.

Some of you may know that my BFF is the race director of this race. She puts on a great race, and it has a terrific turnout, considering the size of the town. There are a TON of fun-runners. This is probably because every kid gets a trophy.

I showed up at the race earlier than usual, since I had to get my daughter all set up to help. She was helping with the results- writing down the race numbers as people finished. I started my race day morning as always... Going back and forth to the bathroom.

Finally it's time to get this race over with. The first mile was in the shade, and there may have been a gentle breeze. I felt great, and finished that mile in under 9:00. Great, maybe I'm back to a halfway normal pace for me!

Nope. I slowed considerably once we got in the sun and never got the good feeling back until the race was over. I couldn't bring myself to drink anything yesterday morning, so I think I may have been a bit dehydrated, too. I wound up finishing in 29:24 (according to Garmin), and was greeted by my daughter at the end of the chute with a "You're slow, you need to run faster." Gee, thanks, but I already knew that. Ah well, it was good enough for 2nd place in my age group:

OK, you caught me. There were only 2 people in my age group. But, I'm claiming a 2nd place anyhow! I can't help it that the other 30-34 year old women were too lazy to get out there and run a race yesterday morning.

By the way, isn't my new skirt the best?

Now, I know what you are thinking... I have ran slower 5K's this summer. You are right- I have. But, I truly was not feeling it yesterday. I can't remember the last time I have felt that bad during a run. I didn't feel like I was pushing myself too much (ok, at all), but I just felt drained. For now I'm calling it "sugar overload", due to my horrendous eating all weekend, and moving on.

Accountability

Anyone who has been reading here at all must already know that I have a tough time making my running a priority. I have to try and get it done at the beginning of the day because my evenings are usually all filled up with hauling teenagers around and the like.

Yesterday, after our Manager's birthday lunch, a coworker and I agreed that we both have a problem getting in our needed activity (running for me, walking for her). After much complaining about it, we decided to actually DO something about it. Both of us come to work at 7am-ish. Her hubby actually has to be at work at 6am, so her alarm goes off every morning at 4:45am. She will start getting up with the first alarm and calling me to make sure I'm getting up. If I don't hear from her by 5-5:15am, I will call her and ask her why she isn't up. In addition to this, we are journaling what we are eating.

This all started today. My alarm went off at 4:45am. I turned it off and laid back down, hoping that she wouldn't follow through.

She did.

I continued to lay there for the next few minutes until I decided that I was being ridiculous and I needed to just get up and get out the door!

I did.

Yay! Then, I came home and packed a healthy lunch, with several snacks to last me all day.
This is the best idea, just one step away from an actual training partner.

Pictures from Saturday

Kirchenfest 5K picture:

Hidden Lake Winery:

Next week... 7th grade football pictures.

I know, you're on the edge of your seat for that.

Kirchenfest Strassenlauf 5K

This weekend was the annual Kirchenfest Strassenlauf in Highland. I celebrated with some friends by running their 5K race on Saturday morning. I knew I was in trouble when we got out of the car and jogged up to the church to pick up our race packets and was immediately drenched in sweat. Talk about your HUMID days!



The race started promptly at 8am, after the sun had already risen. The course is mostly through shaded streets in town, so it wasn't as bad as it could have been. The course had a couple of small hills, but nothing too bad. I felt good throughout the run, but my lack of training kept my heartrate higher than normal and left me with an "official" finishing time of 29:47. Good enough for 6th place out of 15 in my age group. Eh, I can deal with that.



After the race, there was a long time to wait. There was a 2K race that started at 9:30am. The awards ceremony wasn't until after the conclusion of the 2K race. We kept ourselves busy much of the time visiting with other runners and handing out flyers for Barbie's race next weekend.



And then, we happened upon the free beer.



After the awards finished up (Barbie won 3rd place), around 10:30am or so, we decided to stop by a winery on the way home and just do some tasting. Angie had heard a little bit about the place and wanted to check it out. Little did we know, they were having a wine festival with all kinds of vendors and live entertainment.



Ai-yi-yi.



Stay tuned - I'll have some race pictures later this week.

Catching Up...

Gah!

That's me, gasping for breath, now that I finally have a minute to myself.

I took my daughter to Chicago on Friday for a Tokio Hotel concert. I know what you're going to say next... Never heard of them, right? Don't feel bad, that's what everybody says. They are a young German band, that recently released their first album in English last year. My daughter has been following them since well before that, even though she couldn't understand the words.

The concert was at the House of Blues in downtown Chicago- the closest venue to us that they will hit during their North American tour. We drove up that afternoon, and stayed at a hotel within walking distance. It was CRAZY! Put a couple thousand screaming teenage girls in a small-ish bar, standing room only by the way, and imagine the fun. My ears are still ringing. It was good, though. If you know me, you know that I managed to elbow our way to the front, we could almost have reached out and touched those boys from where we stood.

Now that Tokio Hotel is becoming more mainstream, my girl is looking to other bands from Germany to follow... never one to follow along, and I'm glad.

Saturday, we drove back home, and off to a Miners baseball game. My son didn't go to that game. I managed to get him a ride to his football game that night with one of his coaches (they lost :-(.
The Miners won, in the bottom of the ninth, 8-6. Every professional baseball game I've gone to this year has ended up with my team winning in the bottom of the ninth! I should have gone to more Cardinals games this season, obviously...

Sunday morning, I got up and went for an 8 mile run with Angie. It was our first time running together, and it worked out really well. I was pleased that I've finally started to break out of my laziness rut and got out the door. Thanks to Angie (and Barbie who instigated the whole thing).

Today "officially" starts marathon training for the Memphis Marathon. I'm still thinking that I'll run Columbus, since it falls on the same weekend as my second 20 mile run. Maybe a miracle will happen, and I won't have to run Memphis at all! (not holding my breath)

So, I'm catching up on my running. I spent Sunday afternoon getting my house cleaned up enough to make it presentable (it's amazing how much stuff piles up when you're gone so much). And, I'm catching up on some of the things I've been procrastinating on at work.

Good times.

My Newly Adjusted Plan and Did I Really Let Her Do That?

I was talking to a friend of mine yesterday who I hadn't seen for a few weeks. He is a bike nut, but he's been a bit out of it lately. Sound familiar?


He asked me if I was still running a lot. (Yeah, right, he probably noticed how fat my ass has gotten and already knew the answer).


I told him I was "Re-Adjusting my Plan". Yup, that's got to be it. It couldn't possibly be that, "I was lazy and now I have to recant on my original goal".


Oh, I told him he could use that as his reason for getting lazy lately, also. It's a good time to re-adjust your goals!


My new goal race will be the Memphis Marathon. I'll likely still run Columbus as a training run. My Memphis marathon training will start next Monday, the 18th. This will allow one 20-miler before Columbus, and I can run Columbus as a training run if I decide to go along with the other girls. I'll then run Memphis as my goal race. This is assuming that I can get it together between now and next Monday. Ugh!


I don't know if it's lack of sleep, stress, or pure laziness; but I'm still having trouble getting out of bed in the mornings. I've got to get that under control.


So, now, Did I Really Let Her DO That??


Ummm, yes, yes I did. She's a good girl, gets good grades, doesn't get in trouble much, so I figure if she wants a piercing, what the hell!

She would kill me if she knew I was posting this picture... she had just gotten ready for bed and doesn't have on any makeup or her signature dark eyeliner. Plus, she has a sunburn from the previous weekend. But, check out that lip piercing! (barely noticeable, huh?)

Cobden Peachfest 5K

I may as well just admit it now.




I am a jinx to all of the area races this summer.

I've had a long weekend. It all started Friday evening- I left work early and took the kids to the 4pm show of the Dark Knight. Awesome. Movie.

Friday night at midnight, I took my daughter to get the book "Breaking Dawn". She HAD to have it for the weekend, since I was going to be out of town all weekend. So far, she's disappointed in the book- she doesn't like the way it's going.

Saturday morning, Barbie showed up just after 5am to head to the race. I had been up since 4am packing for the weekend. We went down and picked up her son and went off to the race.

It was SO hot and muggy. Luckily, they managed to find a less hilly road to have the race- it seems that entire area is super hilly, but the race course wasn't so bad. The race started at 7:30am and had water in 2 places. It was an out and back, so you technically could have gotten water 3 times (1 was at the turnaround). That was really nice after the Hoyleton race where they ran out of cups on the way back!

I felt pretty good during the entire race. Before I reached the turnaround, I saw Barbie's son in 1st place, and Barbie was the 1st female. They did wind up winning 1st overall Male and Female. Such a neat accomplishment! When I came up to the end, where the clock was set up, I noticed the clock was sitting at 0:00. Yup, they didn't have professionals, and they had messed up the clock. No "official" finish times- lucky for me, I had Garmin.

This was truly a small town race, complete with the popsickle stick method of results. In case you've never been to a race like this, they hand you a popsickle stick with a number on it, your finisher number (I was the 38th person to finish). You then go over to the race director, where they manually find your name on the paper and write down your finishing number. High tech.

I won my age group, yay!

Later, we got all cleaned up and went to the winery's grand opening. Barbie's son is working there (he's a college student). He's in the yellow, wishing his mom would quit taking pictures.

After a full day of drinking wine and going out for pizza with the boys after the winery closed, we woke up at 5am, later than we hoped for our long run. We slept on an air mattress on the floor of the spare bedroom at Barbie's son's house. Needless to say, my heart wasn't in the long run, and my planned 16 miler turned out to be a 10 miler. But, in my defense, those HILLS down there are killers! My legs feel like I ran 16 miles!

It was a great weekend, but I took a long, much-needed nap on Sunday, and I'm pumped for my 18 miler next week on my relatively flat course at home!

Missing: GAD, Please Return if Found

I've been debating even posting anything about my lack of running lately. I fear that those of you who know me only from blogland won't know that this slug-like behavior truly isn't normal for me. Lately, it seems that I keep posting over and over about how lazy I am. I'm NOT normally this lazy, I promise.

What happened to me?
A few weeks ago, I was firmly on the wagon and raring to go.

Lately, I can't seem to drag my ass out of bed to get to work, much less get a run in before work!

Now, I do have plenty of excuses for why I'm not running...

Excuse #1 - The project I am working on right now is requiring long hours during the week, and time on the weekends to check in on the contractors' progress.

Excuse #2 - Add to that, my son's football practice has started. I have to take him straight to practice when I get off work, no time in between to even sit down and open the mail. I realize that I could run WHILE he is practicing (I've done this in the past), but I also have my daughter who wants to spend that time hanging with mom. I'm taking it while I can get it- she's almost 15 and probably won't want to spend this much time with me for much longer.

Excuse #3 - I have to be at work at 10pm on Fridays to ensure that the contractors get off to a good start, and again by 10pm on Sunday night for turnover back for our startup. I feel like I'm on standby all weekend, and the entire time is spent dreading the Sunday night return.

Sidenote: I should be used to all of this by now! My life hasn't changed that drastically from the norm. I have projects similar to this every summer, but I've never struggled with it this much.

Excuse #4 - On top of all that, I'm still the biggest I've ever been. I've always been obsessed about my weight. I always thought I was getting "fat" anytime my BMI crept up between 24 and 25. Now, my BMI has actually managed to get into the "Overweight" category. This morning's weight has my BMI at 27.1, firmly in the "Overweight" zone. This really shouldn't be an excuse for not running, but I seem to use it as one anyway.

And, I can't seem to get my give-a-damn back to do something about it. I just want to sit around and eat pizza and Mexican food and not worry about it.

So far I've only missed 1 long run, but I've missed more than a few of my normal mid-week runs over the past few weeks. I think I still have time to get this under control before I destroy my marathon plans, but I've gotta get busy NOW!

If you happen to find my give-a-damn, please send it my way... Thanks!

Mud Mountain 5K

I've been looking forward to this race for so long. Everybody just kept going on and on about how much fun it was, and I had never run this one.

Friday night, I had to go in to work at 9:30pm to make sure my weekend contractors got started on the right foot. I was there until after 11pm, after which I went home and couldn't sleep. I finally went to sleep sometime after midnight.

I should have known then not to run a race for the first time when it was celebrating its 13th year...

Saturday morning, I woke up at 5:15am. I had to leave my house by 6am to meet up with Barbie and Shanna so we could ride to the race together. I did NOT want to get out of bed. Nope, sure didn't. But, I made it. We get to the race, and there are people everywhere.

First issue- not enough port-a-potties. In order to keep my bladder under control for a race, I pretty much have to go to the port-a-potty 3 or 4 times until my bladder is good and drained. This was not possible for this race. We were in line at the port-a-potty during the singing of the national anthem (!!), and there were people in line ahead of us that weren't even running the race! HELLO!! If you are there to observe, and the race is about to start, let the runners into the potty FIRST!! Especially when the race is not being chip timed.

We managed to get through the port-a-potty line and to the starting line before the race started, though. This was truly a cross country race, complete with the extremely wide starting line. We start off running across a grassy field, and narrow down to a trail through the woods. There were some brutal (brutal is an understatement) hills, uphill and downhill. I liked the downhills, but you had to be careful of your footing, since it was all grass and trail. Several areas were muddy and nasty, and me with my newest pair of running shoes.

OK, I'll give them this- it was kind of fun to run in a different type of race, but I'm truly NOT a cross country runner. But, the absolute worst part of the whole race was getting to the finishing chute, and there was a LINE there. You were trapped while waiting for them to tear the tabs off of race numbers (?) write down bib numbers (?) I truly don't know what the big hold-up was. Luckily, Barbie walked over with a fresh, cold bottle of water for me while I was standing there. That made it better.

My official finish time was 32:11. I was 4th in my age group (just out of the medals :-(

I was pretty pleased with the placement, though. There were 567 runners in all at this race, and to place in the top half of my age group made me happy.

We went out and ran a cool-down after the race, another 3 miles. This "cool-down" made me realize just how slow I am. The other two girls were taking it v-e-r-y easy, and I was struggling to keep up! I think I'll be running a 2nd marathon in December to try and get my qualifying time... I was so lazy after this race, I skipped my planned 15 mile run on Sunday morning. Gah!

The worst part- after the race, we were all standing around waiting and waiting for the results. They FINALLY started with the results, and got the top 3 women finishers WRONG. More waiting and waiting... They tried again- still WRONG. (We knew the overall winner, and they didn't have her results in there correctly). Finally, they went ahead with the men's results (the older men's results were questionable). More waiting and waiting...

Finally, they told us all to go ahead and leave (most people had already left). They posted the results on the website later and will be mailing out the medals for the women. I won't get one, barely (sob!).

This was their 13th year people! They have always been well organized and not had these issues (according to others who have ran it before).

I so don't want to post a picture from this race. My boobs look funny and lopsided... OK, I'll post it. I can't help myself- I love pictures on blogs... maybe you all won't notice my lopsided-ness!

Lesson Learned... Again!

My training has not been going as swimmingly as I would like...
Yesterday, I overslept for a morning run. I decided that I COULD NOT skip another run, so I ran in the evening- after work, but before my son's football practice. It was cooler yesterday than it had been for a while, so I figured I could manage.

I knew better than that.

I ran 7 miles, it was 84 degrees and sunny when I started - 86 degrees and sunny when I finished. I. Was. Miserable.

I have learned, yet again, that running in the heat of the day is not a viable option for me. I completely fell apart right after the 5 mile mark. I think I walked more of the 6th mile than I ran. That mile was an average of 13 min/mile, and I still finished up at a 10:35 pace. So, I'm not completely disappointed, but more interested in how I would have been earlier in the day.

So, what's on tap for today? Another 4-5 mile run in the heat! Yup. I had to be at work at 6am this morning, so no run again this morning. I hope I can gut out another mid-day run today, then I'll be getting an industrial strength alarm clock to rouse my lazy ass out of bed in the mornings!

Run for the Bagel 10K

This race was the small town race that thought it got too big...

Let me elaborate.

I have ran this race several times in the past. It's always been a well organized, well put-on event. This year, they decided to use chip timing. This is a race with between 350-400 participants between the 5K and 10K events.

I went there with 2 other friends, who had pre-registered. I, as usual, put it off until the last minute and didn't pre-register. Race start time was 7:30am. We arrived at 7:05am.

They told me that they weren't going to time me, since I wasn't there before 7am. O-K. So, I don't get a chip, but they time me by the clock, right?

NOPE! The results are on their website today, and I'm not even there! GRRR!!

Excuse me, but they should put that on the form. It said on the form that they would stop giving chips at 7am *sharp*. Well, a lot of races say stuff like that, but NEVER have I been told that I'm too late and they aren't going to time me, AT ALL! So, I bought a $25 t-shirt and ran with a bunch of people, basically.

I did enjoy the run. It was overcast, so the heat didn't get to me too bad. I felt good throughout the entire run and never really felt like I was pushing myself too hard. At the time, I held back a little bit because I thought I would be doing a long run Sunday morning, but I decided to flip flop next weekend's 6 with this weekend's 14. OK, so I decided that when I got up Sunday morning at 6:15am and the heat and humidity was already so oppressive that it took your breath away.

Luckily, I didn't place in my age group, so the timing was not really a huge deal. I know who finished right before and after me, what the clock said as I crossed the finish, and what Garmin said, so based on all of that, I'm calling my "official" time 59:58.

I went to the race with Barbie and Shanna- Barbie won her age group, and Shanna was the overall female winner! Yay! She ran the thing in 42:01. Can you believe it? That's a 6:47 pace! That girl can run!!

Here's a picture of us from the Hofbraufest run the week before:

My First Sunday Long Run

When we last left our heroine, she was contemplating whether or not she could complete her marathon training by running races on Saturdays and long runs on Sunday mornings. This week was her first attempt...

Sunday morning, I met up with my friend Carol and we ran 15 miles on the Tunnel Hill trail.

Well, RAN is a strong word. It wasn't pretty, but we got the miles in.

We chatted and enjoyed the scenery the entire time. Since Tunnel Hill is quite a distance from my house, we met up at 6:30am, about 30 miles south of home. By the time we got to Tunnel Hill, it was 7:30am. Luckily, it was much cooler on Sunday than it was on Saturday, and the trail is mostly shaded. It was a pleasant run; we chatted and had a good time. This is a good way to keep in touch with a friend that I normally wouldn't get a chance to spend much time with. By the time we had 13 miles, I was ready to be done. I gutted out the last 2 miles. I am really glad that we got together and ran the distance, though.

The verdict: Not so bad. I think training this way will be just fine...

Hofbraufest 5K

Well, this morning's race had some highs and lows...

The highs:
Everybody was there! There were about 300 runners, so I got a chance to see a lot of the runners that I don't normally see at races. There were a lot of runners from the St Louis area that I've met over the years but only see a couple of times a year.

The atmosphere was fantastic! This was the village's Sesquicentennial, so the festival was bigger this year than it has been in previous years. You could really tell that they had put a lot of effort into it.

Free beer.

The lows:
It was HOT! The race didn't start until 8am, and it was already over 80 degrees and humid.

The race was in the open, there was NO SHADE on the course at all.

I ran my slowest 5K time ever. Garmin said 31:14, but I haven't seen the official results yet. I did wake up this morning with some stomach issues, so I didn't eat or drink ANYthing before the race. No caffeine and no fuel. This contributed to my bad time. I didn't have anything to give after the first mile.


All in all, it was a good race. I had to leave before they gave the awards, but one of the girls that went to the Flying Pig with us won 2nd place overall and there was a cash prize!

On tap for tomorrow: Long run, somewhere between 13-15 miles...

Off to a Stellar Start

My marathon training, that is...

I ran v-e-r-y slowly on Monday morning, only 4 miles.
I had to travel to Boston for work on Tuesday morning. My flight was at 5:40am, so I had to get up at 2am to get to the airport early enough. My return flight from Chicago on Wednesday was delayed (big shock), and I didn't get home until 10pm. Thursday, I was still exhausted- no run. This morning, I was lazy and my AC is still acting up - no run.

Is it just me? I can NOT get out and run when it is hot inside and hotter outside. I've called a different repairman to come and look at it today, since the first guy couldn't find anything. Grrr!

Today, one of the managers at work brought me some pictures from our company wide Manager meeting/outing 2 years ago. I looked at the pictures and thought, "YUCK! I was fat!" So, I checked. At that time, I weighed about 10 lbs less than I weighed this morning. Yes, now you are all going to know how OCD I am about numbers... I have a spreadsheet that goes back through January of 06 with all of my weigh-ins. Before that, I was tracking it manually in my running logs. Ahhh, Excel, now I can graph it and look for trends.

I am truly sick.

I have a 5K tomorrow morning. Then, I will stop in to work and check on my project. Sunday, I plan a long run. Then, I will stop in to work and check on my project again. This entire project continues for 7 weeks before they finish up. I may go insane before it is over.

Fab 4th Weekend / Joker's Wild Half

My weekend started on Wednesday, since I took Thursday off as a vacation day.

Wednesday night: The kids and I went to the Cardinals game and saw the Cardinals beat the Mets, 8-7 with a walk-off homer in the bottom of the 9th.
GO CARDS!

Thursday: Such an exciting day off... I got up and went for a 7-mile run in the rain. It rained the e-n-t-i-r-e- time. It has been hot hot hot, so the rain actually felt pretty good.
In the afternoon, I took the boy (my son) to the dentist for his root canal and went to the eye dr for myself.

Friday (4th): The kids and I went to St Louis and checked into our hotel at Westport. We ate at Pujols restaurant in Westport Plaza and went for ice cream at Coldstone Creamery. Yum! We saw Carol, and we confirmed our plans to run together the next morning. Sweet!
Then, we rode the Metrolink over to Fair St Louis and saw Joss Stone performing and the beginning of the fireworks. My daughter was worried about the crowded Metro on the way back, so we watched the fireworks as we walked to the Metrolink station. Got back to our hotel around 11pm, and of course I couldn't sleep.

Saturday (race day): The race start time was 6am, so my alarm was set at 4:30am. I didn't want to get up, but felt ok once I got moving. I went to the race start around 5:30am and started my pre-race ritual of hitting the port-a-potty repeatedly. I saw Ed, who is also a local runner from our run club, and we chatted for a few minutes. I hadn't expected to see anyone I knew except for Carol. I never did see Carol on Saturday, and she didn't have any results posted today. I assume she must have gotten sick or something. This is a normal occurrence for Carol, backing out of races at the last moment.

I went ahead and lined up and the race started at 6:15am (yup, 15 minutes late). The course was 2 loops of the same 6.5 miles. There was also a "quarter marathon" that was one loop. The first loop went great, I finished the first 10K in 1:03. My goal for the race was to finish in under 2:20, so I knew I was well on my way. There were a couple of pretty good hills in there, one of the hills was very rough and killed me on the 2nd lap. I knew at mile 11 that I was going to make my 2:20 goal, even if I fell apart for the last 2 miles. My official finish time was 2:17:46. That's a 20 minute improvement over the Flying Pig 2 months ago, and I'm still not really training. It's embarassing how little I've been running this year! Aside from the 7 mile run in the rain on Thursday, the only running I've been doing for the past couple of months, is races!

After the race, I went back to the hotel and the kids were still sleeping! So, once we got cleaned up and checked out, the kids and I went to the zoo to see the penguins (the penguins are a fairly new addition to the zoo). Let me just say how much I love the St Louis Zoo. My favorite part: it's free!
Then, we went to the Hard Rock Cafe in Union Station for a late lunch/early dinner. I had a big, juicy cheeseburger. I deserved it! Then, we headed home and went to the movies to see 'Get Smart'.

Sunday: I enjoyed a day of rest. And, my air conditioner quit at some point yesterday. It was hot in the house when I went to bed, and it was almost 85 degrees in my bedroom when I woke up this morning. I did NOT get up and run. Grrr!

Tuesday and Wednesday, I will be in Boston for meetings. I'm hoping to get a run in on Wednesday morning. And, hoping to have my AC fixed by the time I get back!

Change in Plans

Okay, so we must all be open to change, right?

My ride to this Friday's 5K has an injury. I wasn't real excited about running this 5K anyhow, as there are no post-race wine-swilling activities planned. Meanwhile, I found out this week that there is a tiny 1/2 Marathon in St Louis on Saturday morning (race start time 6am- yikes!). Another running buddy is signed up for it, and we're running about the same pace these days. So, I decided to strike while the iron is hot and sign up before I had a chance to talk myself out of it.

I'm going to take the kids over for the Fair St Louis on the 4th, run the 1/2 on the 5th, and give myself ZERO excuses for not getting a long run over the weekend. So there!

Marathon Training is Underway!

OK, so today marks the "official" start of my marathon training. I'm pretty psyched about it! But, technically I did not run today.

I had to come in to work early today for a project. I can't actually trust contractors to have things ready for start-up when they were working on this stuff over the weekend. I've been burned one too many times with that!
That leads me to the question that begs to be asked... If I TELL a project manager to let me know if there are any problems, give him my cell # repeatedly, and then they have problems on Saturday afternoon, why doesn't he CALL??! I hate being surprised at start-up! Grrr!

~Vent Over~

Back to the subject at hand...
I'm pumped about this marathon training. This time, I intend to DO the training, not half-ass my way through it and skip half the long-runs and 75% of the weekday runs. I'm going to RUN, dammit! I'm going to see what I'm capable of. And, if I can drop 30 lbs or so, I'm going to qualify for Boston.
I realize that is what it will take. I've never ran well when I've put on weight.

I've ordered a fresh pair of running shoes, filled my kitchen with healthy stuff, and I'm rarin' to go!

Sesser Homecoming 5K

I can tell that everyone is on the edge of their seat with my indecision from last week. Unfortunately, I was having internet issues at home and couldn't post :-(

Of course, I chose the 5K race. It was Angie's birthday, there was celebrating to be done!

My 5K time was not as bad as it has been, but I've got some improving to do! I finished in 28:08.

It was hot, but the course was very nice, country roads with some rolling hills. This was the first year for this race, so they did have some issues... No water on the course, the miles weren't marked, the age groups were not standard (how can 35-50 be an age split?). All in all, it was a good race, though. I truly enjoyed the run, but I have to admit that I was mostly looking forward to checking out the winery down the road afterward, since I had never been there before.

The winery was nestled in the woods, and was very peaceful and made for an enjoyable time. What better way to celebrate Ang's birthday!?

"OFFICIAL" marathon training begins on Monday, June 30. I will probably be running the marathon in Columbus. We are now trying to get Angie (who has never run more than 5 miles) to try and complete the half. The more peeps on the road trip, the merrier, right?

Decisions, Decisions

Hmmm... Do I run a 5K race tomorrow morning, just down the road from a winery that I've heard positive reviews about... OR, do I run on my own at home and get in a longer run?

I'm leaning toward the 5K. And not because I love running 5K's.
They. are. torture.
Give me a Half Marathon any day. I was built for distance, not speed.

I have Monday and Tuesday scheduled off from work, so I can get some extra miles on those days. I have no plans for them at this point. I am sooooo looking forward to resting and cleaning my bedroom.

Perfect Weather and a Horrible Picture

Ah, I'm so witty in naming my posts these days, aren't I?

So, the weather outside is per-fect for running. It's been around 60-65 degrees when I wake up in the mornings, and the sun is just starting to rise.

Have I been running every day?

Absolutely not!

Ugh!

I will admit that I've been inconsistent, but I'm still running. I'm taking a few days off work sprinkled through the next 3 weeks. My plan is to use these days to get rested, get in a few extra miles, and kick-start my marathon training.

That, and there is NO WAY I will be able to take any days off in July, since I'll be neck-deep in a ginormous project at work. Blech! Seriously, what is the use in getting the extra week of vacation (my first year with the extra week) when you can't even schedule the time off?

Eh, I'd rather be busy than bored at work, I suppose... I just don't love the off-shift work during start-ups for these projects.

Here is a picture from Saturday's race. Very, very unflattering to me. I need to find some friends my size to be photographed next to... I think I outweigh these girls by at least 50 lbs!

And, ya gotta love that Barbie also ran the 15K and had time to change her clothes, but I just finished running...

Crossroads Dash 15K

This weekend's race was good and bad. I can't help but compare all of my races with previous experience. Last year's Crossroads Dash was a different picture than this year's. This 15K course is very hilly, and it doesn't start until 8am, which makes for a very hot race. I remembered that from last year as well.

Last year, I was no more consistent in my training than I have been this year. The difference last year is that I weighed about 25 lbs less than I did on Saturday. My time was almost 10 minutes slower! Proof positive (for me) that this extra weight is slowing me down! Grrrr!

On to the race report and off of the subject of weight (which is my obsession these days).

I picked Angie up on the way and we met at Barbie's house. We went from there to the race. There was also a 5K, which is the race Angie ran. It was only her 2nd 5K, and she managed a 31:30, awesome! Barbie did great as well, I think she ran a 1:14 for the 15K and won the master's division.

Even though I ran slower than I normally would, I was very pleased with my performance. I have been running my long runs extremely slowly lately and letting the heat get the best of me. For this run, I made myself run and not stop and walk every little hill. And, don't underestimate those hills. The hills in this race SUCK! And, there are far far too many of them. I did stop and walk at the water stations- I have a hard time drinking on the run, and needed the water! My time wound up being 1:36 (10:19 pace). Good enough for 2nd in my age division (gotta love these small-town races). Oh, and YES there were more than 2 runners my age!

After the race, we hung around until the Mexican joint opened and had our normal post-race Mexican food. Then, back to Barbie's house for some post-race wine. Yup, the run was worth it!