Baby girl!

I meant to write about a few things over the weekend. Let me just breeze through the highlights so I can cut to the awesome part :)

1) Finished my final long training run for the marathon! I ran 20 miles from Daphne, through Montrose and Fairhope, to Point Clear, and then back to Fairhope. I wanted to show a map of this run because I'm pretty proud of it, but I'm blogging from my phone and that might be a bit much for this ol' iPhone to handle. The run was TOUGH. Much harder than my previous long runs and I think that was partially due to the awesome hills of the Eastern Shore and maybe the 16 mi run that I did less than a week before this one. My friend Sam ran the last half of the run with me and thank goodness, because I really needed the company! Now I just have to heal up and maintain my fitness for the marathon on March 4th!

2) I ate a lot of amazing food this weekend. Xiaobin and Melissa came to Mobile and we hit up this incredible jazz brunch on Sunday morning. Here is a list of things that I ate: eggs Benedict, bananas foster French toast, lasagna (such an amazing breakfast item), king cake pastries (almost choked on one of the babies), scrambled eggs, bacon, and a waffle. If you think this is stupid excessive, allow me to offer an excuse. I was pretty nauseous and icky all day Saturday (after my run) so this was the first real meal I had in 24hrs. I enjoyed the hell out of it.

3) I watched the Super Bowl last night (duh) and came home and chatted with my Hans about our plans for St. Pete next weekend. We were really looking forward to running the 1/2M but not sure what to do because my sister was looking like she might be ready to go into labor sometime soon. Seconds after I got off the phone with Hans, Joann called me and told me that her water broke! I threw some stuff in a backpack and arrived in Slidell, LA at around 2am. I was really scared of what it would be like in the deliery room and what my sister would be like but the atmosphere was not chaotic at all; it was very quiet and focused. It was such a blessing to see my sister and brother in law work as a team to deliver our baby girl. I was floored by how strong and serene my beautiful sister was through her labor and how nurturing and encouraging Ben was to Joey. I wanted to step in and hold Joann's hand and help her push an be part of the action, but it was Ben and Joann's show and all they needed was each other. Lily McCrae was born at 6:05am today. She is such a precious thing! She's goofy like her daddy and sweet and good-natured like her mommy. She's nursing beautifully and great at napping. I don't have a lot of experience with babies, but Lily seems like an awesome one :)

I'm an aunt!

17 miles in the Eastern Shore

Yesterday, I met up with my friend Sam at the public library in Daphne for the LONGEST RUN OF MY LIFE (seems like I'm doing that every week, these days) - 17 miles. It was in the low 40s and I felt extremely underdressed, but I figured I'd get warm in the first few miles and that it would heat up towards the end of our run. We set off to run along the Eastern Shore Trail from Daphne to Fairhope. 

32 paved miles from Battleship Park to the Weeks Bay Reserve. Awesome!

This was the first run I've done with another person, while training for the marathon- and it was an absolutely critical one to have company. And to make it even cooler, Sam is the only woman I know to have completed a full IronMan! In short, she kicks a lot of ass. 


We talked a lot about her IronMan preparation and she told me that the most crucial thing she learned was heart rate training. She explained that most people struggle with their training because they don't know how to properly pace themselves and will tend to swim/bike/run much faster than they ought to. This is the wrong way to train because it causes your body to operate at heart rate outside of the fat burning zone. Basically, your body stops burning fat because your workout requires something with a higher caloric value so it ends up burning muscle instead. This opens you up to more injury risks and causes you to feel burned out and exhausted by the end of your workout. Training in the appropriate heart rate zone forces people to move slower than they would, but it allows your body to operate in the aerobic zone which is where your body most efficiently burns fat. Sam said that if you do it right, you should feel refreshed by the end of a long workout. I can't say I've felt that way after my long runs!


Before I knew it, we had run 8.5 miles and it was time to turn around! I couldn't believe what a difference it made to run with someone else, especially someone as interesting and experienced as Sam. It was a gorgeous run and I was really enjoying myself... until right around mile 15. Sam has ITBS and it really started to bother her towards the end of our run. My aches and pains were isolated in the arches of my feet, which was annoying but still MUCH better than what I had experienced in my other long runs. Then, we both started to feel nauseous which Sam said was a symptom of dehydration. At mile 16.3 (estimation), we saw an oasis in the desert...

We crawled in and said "we don't have any money, but if you give us some lemonade we'll love you forever and come back from lunch!" and they said "Alright, ya'll!" 

We sipped our half lemonade/half water beverages and they were sooo incredibly refreshing! I felt much better and extremely grateful to the kind folks at East Shore Cafe. Thanks to them, Sam and I were able to safely make it back to the library where our cars were parked. We had to walk a little because our legs had stiffened up from our break at the Cafe, but we survived and I'm still counting it as 17 miles completed!

Today, I'm feeling a little tightness in my calves but other than that, I'm just fine. Might do a spin class with Hans this afternoon to loosen everything up. Might also invest in a heart rate monitor ;)