14 Mile Hurt - Week 12

Yikes. So 14 some miles shouldn't feel all that bad at this point in the game, right? Well, it did. Ok, so maybe not TOO bad, but still bad enough. Left quad still not very happy after last week's 20. Both knees just felt like they've been pounding the pavement too much. And my right big toe area was getting sore. HOWEVER, I did manage to bring my pace down from the 9:07 ave I'd ran through 12 for the remaining 2.5 miles to 8:31, 8:17, and 8:19 considering that wind was in my face for the last 1/2 mile I think I did pretty good. Am I pushing too hard?

Ice bath for 5 mins, got out for 5 mins, then got back in for 2 mins. My feet just hurt too bad to stay in anylonger (must be the frostbite). Hot tub after of course, but not for as long and NO beer this time. Also did S-caps at 5, 10 and upon return home.

Weekly mileage: 44.1
Yearly mileage: 460.3

2 Hour Lunch and Shakedown

I ran the Grand Prix Shakedown; a 5 mile race that included part of the actual race course that the cars will be on over the weekend. I did pretty well, considering I arrived with not quite enough time to prepare; I handed my purse to one of the gals in our running group OIY, it was hot. There wasn't nearly enough water stops; one at 2, 3 1/2 and 4 something. My mouth felt like I had cotton balls stuffed in it.

Kim won overall female. It would have been nice if Katie were there to run against her. Actually it would have been interesting to see who would come out on top. Amber was first in her age group as were Ken and Matt. Dave was fifth... not quite earning him "also ran" status. Mark didn't place either, but ran a great race; that 40 year old male group is quite competitive.In the 40 year old women group first was Liz, then Kathy then me....

I started out WAY too fast clocking a 7:40 for the first mile! I slowed down to about an 8:15 then the heat and wind in my face took it's toll for 2-3 1/2 where my pace dropped to about 8:30. I managed to crank out a blistering 8:17 for the last full mile and a 7:50 for the last 160 feet (like that counts).
I think it was about 11pm when we finally left. I had a great time.

Corktown St Pat's Race - Week 10

Today was the 4 mile Corktown St. Pat's Race and I showed up wearing my green plastic hat with gold glitter shamrock and the red pig tails that I hot glued to it. I also wound up wearing the bright green shirt with the cotton home dyed shorts (I'm wearing the hat and the shirt in the photo). WOW, I ran really fast!! I ran it at a 7:45 pace! I even part walked my last water stop. I was one of the top 100 women finishers with a time of 31:01 which entitled me a cool green coffee thermos.

After we went to the "green dress hash". There weren't all that many people there for it which was kind of surprising and even worse was the lack of dresses. C'mon hashers, what the heck?! We still had fun and it was funny getting comments from people on the streets of hoity-toity Northville.

Half Way There! - Week 9

Well this is it, I've completed exactly 1/2 of this crazy marathon training. Mostly it's been good so far and I'm beginning to adapt to running so many days. This week was my first 18 miler, but I divided it in two; mostly because I had a baby shower to go to in the early afternoon and just didn't leave myself enough time to get in the whole run at once. Of course I went out way too fast for the first run of 10.4 miles. The wind was a pin, but not the direct in-your-face for very long. The second run was slower. When I got all done, I sat in the snow in the backyard and covered my legs in the cold white stuff and actually cried.... I don't know why exactly... just felt right I guess. Ironically enough the band Cold was playing "A different kind of pain" on my ipod as I sat there in the snow with tears streaking down my face. I guess 18 miles stirred up some different "feelings". (??)

Weekly mileage: 45.4
Yearly mileage: 339.3

I ran a 5K

Now ordinarily this is not exciting news except that over the last year I've had surgery on both knees for meniscus tears and tore my right hamstring in two places. I've barely returned to running and honestly I was just going to run the 5K as a bandit since I really wouldn't post that great of a time. After arriving at the "event" and discovering maybe not quite 50 people entered in the race and with 3 deep recognitions in a 10 year age group I figured what the heck and registered for $25 which included an interesting cotton running shirt with what is supposed to be a cartoonish ox on it; it's really more like a mutated ox and pig though. Certainly not worse that the Cheese Town race shirt with the smiling wedge of cheese with legs.

I had an awesome run! I felt good the whole way! At 2 miles my time was 16:16 and my overall time was 25:03. I took first place in my age division too! Sweet. Dave and Katie were first each in the mile which they used as a warm up (6:32 pace) Dave was first in his age group; Katie was overall first woman and of course first in her age group. We collected 5 medals between the 3 of us and there was a raffle afterward and I won a fold up chair and Dave got a $5 coupon for a fruit market.

We had a pretty good pancake breakfast with eggs, meat and hash browns too. I'm glad I ran it!