Posts tagged Half Marathon

I was hoping to get on here earlier this week but it just did not happen. 

First I will talk about my Half Marathon on March 16th (I think that was the date) It was the Get Lucky Half Marathon. It was a cold and icy race. I believe that it had sleeted the night before. In fact I almost got hit by a car trying to get to the race who had hit the ice. Anyway, it made for rough race conditions. But this half marathon was my slowest one yet :( I finished in 2:29. But I did not train nearly as well as I should have. I was just not very motivated to train. But the good news is it has lit a fire underneath my running butt and I am kicking my training into high gear by working on my speed. 

Over the course of running training/running my marathon. I ended up gaining 10-15 lbs. I just figured I could eat whatever I wanted because I was running a marathon. This is not the case. So in January I joined the Biggest Loser Competition at work. I lost 8% of my body weight and 15lbs. I won the competition and $160!! It is a nice feeling to be back where my body is the happiest :)

But the thing that has thrown the most crazy into my life is we SOLD our house!!! :-) We sold it around the last weekend in March. So we had a couple of weeks that we were crazy busy trying to find a new house. It was stressful waiting to see whether or not we were going to get the house we wanted. But we did. There were a couple of offers but they chose ours. So now comes the work of moving, painting and updating the new house to what we like. Needless to say I have become even more addicted to Pinterest.

The weekend we are closing on our house I am running Minneapolis Marathon Relay. So that will be a crazy weekend but I am looking forward to a new running adventure with friends! 

I will keep you update on how that goes and hopefully I will be on here more but I will not make any promises especially not until we move.

I have the Polar Dash Half Marathon on Tuesday. It is supposed to super cold. I am kind of nervous about that. But I have a Sports Authority Gift Card which I plan on using to pick up some gear :)

That is if I am able to run it. I was having some pretty bad knee pain yesterday. It is better now but I every time I would bend my knee I would hear a popping sound and the back of my knee would hurt really bad. I plan on going out for a short run tomorrow and if it is really bad I will not run the race. I will keep you post!

I have decided I that I am going to join the boot camp that my gym puts on. I have gained 5-10 lbs lately and I would like to get in under control. What worked in the past is no longer working so I am hoping this will jumpstart it for me and I will get some good advice. This will start next week. I am will looking forward to being challenged in a new way.

Hi There Blog World!

I am still here just kicking/running along. I just have been really busy. I have been working overtime, we are trying to sell our house and when you add working out into the mix. I do not have much time. That means something gets the shaft sadly that means blogging. :(

I am really hoping we can sell our house soon and not have to prepare for a showing for every weekend! It is hard to keep everything clean all the time. Until then I will do my best to keep up with everything.

Yesterday, I went into the city to pick up my packet/gear for this years half marathons. I got my stuff for the Polar Dash (January 1st) and Get Lucky (March 17) I am glad to get that out of the way and not have to worry about it. I got some amazing gear to get me through the winter

I also got 8.25 miles in yesterday! I ran it in 1 hour and 27 minutes. Hopefully I will be ready for the Polar Dash! The idea of what the weather could be on that day is pretty scary. But I am planning breaking in the New Year with a run and just enjoying the day/race. 

Hopefully I will be able to be around more often!

• I got my all my workouts in for the week!
• Right now, that does not even really matter to me. My sister’s father in law and close family died on Friday. Unexpectedly from a blood clot.
• He was 68 and from every accounts seemed to be a healthy man!
• It are moments like this that make me realize how important it is to enjoy every moment with my friends and family. You just never know when that moment will be your last.
• On a light note I am looking forward to the three day week and being able to spend some quality time with my family!
• I also registered for four half marathons in 2013.
• I will be running the Polar dash on January 1st, Get Lucky on March 16th, Women Rock on all women race on August 31st and Monster Dash the last weekend in October. Looking forward to all these races! 

Here is to a great week and a great Thanksgiving!! Enjoy every minute of it :)

I am back post marathon. I took the last two weeks off to figure out where to go next. I had spent so much of the last year or two focusing on finishing the marathon. I had finished it and I really did not know what the next step was.

I always said I was only going to run one marathon and be done. I just wanted to call myself a marathoner :) It is just so hard because I want a post 5 hour marathon! But training for a marathon is hard and takes a toll on your body. So I have decided to take 2013 to concentrate on Half Marathons and cross training maybe lose the last bit of weight. Then depending how the next year goes give the marathon another attempt in 2014 either at Fargo or the Twin Cities Marathon.

My first Half Marathon of the year will be on January 1st the Polar Dash. It seems like a great way to start the year off. Although I think I just may freeze my butt off! I plan on not racing for a PR but just enjoying the whole race experience. So this week I start training for the another half marathon. :) I am looking forward to another race and having direction in my running life again.

So this week should look like:

Monday: Run 3 miles

Tuesday: Voting 

Wednesday: Strength Training

Thursday: 3 miles

Friday: Rest Day

Saturday: Local Turkey Trot 5k and some strength training

Sunday: Elliptical

I am going to leave you with a picture of my parents and I before the marathon. I really love this picture of us :)

Like I said before this race kinda snuck up on me. But the race came and I felt like I was ready for race day. The weather was all around terrible. I tried to prepare the best I could but I was not expecting that kind of weather at the end of April. It was 35 degrees windy, rainy and we even experienced some ice pellets. So this is went I went with.

I think this worked really well for the conditions until I stopped moving. Before the race I met up with my friend Courtenay from www.autopilotlegs.com (who is going to rock the Fargo Half in three weeks :) She ran the 10k.

After trying to stay warm for an hour it was time to get moving. Thank Goodness! For the first three miles the Halfers and 10kers ran together. This is the 15th largest race in America and I could tell. It was so packed! I did the best I could with the circumstances and ran for three minutes and walked for one. 

During the race never really bothered me until we hit mile 7 when we hit this open area in course. It was at this time I became aware of the fact I was running against the wind and rain. Once we hit the turnaround it got better. I am very proud to say that I managed to keep my ratios. I was not able to keep this up for my first half. I did learn that I cannot drink Gatorade from a cup while running. I took a bath in it. Good thing it was raining. 

After much hard work I finished it. With an official time of 2.17.08. No PR for me :[ I was hoping for more but it was not in the cards. Maybe another day. According to my Garmin it was 13.25 miles in 2.17.10. So according to my Garmin it was a better pace than my first Half. I will take that and run with it :] My splits, 10.12, 10.24, 10.06, 10.28, 9.58, 10.08, 10.28, 9.56, 10.35, 10.18, 10.47, 10.48, 10.48 and 9.02. 

I was actually pretty stable during the race. Then when I crossed the finish line I saw someone crying. Then it hit me I have accomplished so much and have lots to be proud of. Then I started to cry. Sometimes I running gets to be so routine for me that I do not realize how much I have really accomplished. 

Then I realized I was cold and wet. I started shivering and I do not think I stopped for three hours. Either way I learned so much about myself through this race. So proud of myself for chugging along and never giving up through terrible conditions!

Sorry for the lack of posting. This week are just crazy. I was at my parents this past weekend and tomorrow at noon I leave to go for training over night in a town five hours away. Then on Saturday is my Half Marathon. So I do not know if I will have much time to blog later this week. So I thought I would try to get this done tonight. Onto my goals..

This is my second marathon. My first Half Marathon I finished in 2.16.11 in October. It was an absolutely magical time. 

So my number one goal is the same for every race I run.

1. To finish and to enjoy the experience.

My other goals.

2. To finish under 2:20

3. To PR.

I would be lying if I said I did not want to finish right around or under 2:10. But I am not going to put too much pressure on myself. I really just want appreciate the experience and how far I have come. 

The weather forecast for the day.

Lets hope it says this way. This would be pretty much perfect in my book!

I would be lying if I said I did not struggle with this past week. But I kept on going and I believe that is what is important. So here it is…

Monday: I did 30 Day Shred

Tuesday: I ran for three miles and did a session of the 30 Day Shred. I had a really good run. My average pace was 9:24 which is super fast for me. I was pretty proud of this run

Wednesday: I did another session of the 30 Day Shred

Thursday: I ran three miles and then did another session of the 30 Day Shred. I had another pretty good run with an average pace of 9:33.

I took Friday off. It was planned because I knew my body needed and because it was a crazy busy day full of work and travel. My Body was thankful.

Saturday: We were up North and I was planning on running. I was looking forward to this run all week. Last week I had an awesome 10 miles so I thought these four miles would be great.

I was sadly mistaken. It was just a struggle. I am not sure exactly what happened. The run started up a hill and I started off way too fast. I looked down at my Garmin and it said 7:00 for a pace. I never run that fast even on flatland! It was also super windy. Ugh It was just bad.

Either way I ran 3.1 miles with an average pace of 10;19. I am glad I am done with that run. I am looking forward to much better runs this week. I come from the school of thought that you have to have bad runs in order to have amazing runs :]

Sunday: I took another rest day. I enjoyed Easter to the fullest. I went to church, spent some quality time with my family and had an amazing meal.

This week is my last big week before I start to taper for the Half Marathon. Super excited :]

Sorry I have not been posting much. I have been distracted with reading the Hunger Games. I read the first two books and saw the movie this past week. Good stuff :] Now I am onto the last book but I am going to give my brain a rest for at least a week. :]

Onto the week…

Monday was good. I got a quick three miles in after work. It was a nice run. I took it slow just because I had been pushing myself the days prior and I just wanted to take it easy so I did.

Tuesday. I went to BodyPump and then I did 5 miles on the elliptical in 30 minutes.

Wednesday I took am rest day and decided to double up on Thursday.

Thursday I went for a quick three miles. I ran it in 29 minutes. So my pace was 9:36. Then I went to BodyPump. I could definitely tell that I burnt more calories in BodyPump. My heart was beating much faster then normal. 

Friday. I took another rest day in preparation for my long run on Saturday.

Saturday was my long run day. I went out for eight miles. It defintely was not wasy I had moments where I wanted to stop. I took a Gu at mile 5. Can I just say I do not like those things. They do not sit well in my stomach but it was the only race fuel that I had :[ I ran 8 miles in 1:18:20 with an average pace of 9:47. I would be absolutely elated if I could run that for my half marathon!

After the run I went to Body Flow. I was a sweaty mess. It had been a long time since I sweated that bad. I am sure they all appreciated it ;o I also needed some other kind of fuel but all that I had was Pretzel M & Ms. So I ate them while waiting for class to start :]

Afterwards I stopped at the local Grocer for lunch. It was Yummo! :]

All in all a good week. :] I am hoping to hit up a lake this next week to get ten miles in! 

It was a fairly good training week. There was some good and bad training in there but  I did what I set out to do and that is what counts.

Monday: It started with BodyPump. It was the first time I had been back there in a couple of weeks. It felt really good to be back and lift some weights. My Body could tell that it had been a while and was tired.

Tuesday: I was supposed to run 3 miles. But there was a lot of drama in my 11 hour work day. I was drained. So I skipped it and relaxed at home. It was much needed. 

Wednesday: I ran my three miles that I was supposed to run on Tuesday. It was hard. My legs were still feeling Monday nights BodyPump Session. But I stuck to it. I finished 3 miles with a 9.43 Pace. After that I went to BodyFlow. It was a nice class and a stretch that my body fully enjoyed. :]

Thursday: I ran three miles with a pace of 9.41. The pace was not much faster than the day before but I felt so much better. I felt if I needed to I could run on and on. I love those runs!

Friday: A Rest Day!

Saturday: My long run day. The whole week I was planning on doing 10 miles on the treadmill while watching the Biggest Loser. Then came the problem we were up north and the gyms up there do not have Wifi so I could not do that. I do not think  I could run on the treadmill with out watching tv on the good ole iPad. So It was about 45 degrees and sunny out. So I thought I would take it outside.

It had been a long time since I had run outside for that long. There is a lovely lake around there that is 9 miles around which in my mind is close to 10. So I went with it. Of course 10 seconds into the run my Garmin decided to go to Pot. So I whipped out the trusty ole Cell Phone and used the stop watch to make sure I stay with my ratios. I went slower than I usually do but I enjoyed the run so much! It was nice to enjoy the wild life and country air. Sometimes I really miss that. I ran the nine miles in about 1hr and 45 minutes. Pretty close to where I should be for long run pace.

I am so proud of myself for running that thing. I remember when I was in High School we had a bikeathon around the lake. I barely made it a mile or 2 without catching a ride. Now I am running it. :]

Sunday: Candlelight Yoga. My body needed a really good stretch and that is what it got.

I have some really cool things coming up this week. On Wednesday, I am meeting a running friend for supper. I cant wait to talk running and life with her. I am planning to attempt my first Spin class on Thursday night. Then on Saturday I am meeting more running friends and running the Get Lucky 7k (4.3 Miles) I am thrilled to be entering running season again!