marathon- complete!

I got a text on Saturday afternoon that I would not need to work on the response this weekend so I immediately threw some stuff in a bag and headed for New Orleans! 2.5hrs later, my buddy Matt met me at the expo and helped me find my bib # and packet. Funny story- when I signed up for the marathon, I must have forgotten that I was signing up for a marathon because I listed my anticipated finish time as 1:59:00... I was hoping I'd end up in the 1st corral, but they stuck me in #17. Just as well.

That night, we went out to an Italian place in Metairie, LA for dinner and I had a GREAT fettucini alfredo and fried chicken dish (gotta love the South). It was a nice opportunity to catch up with some friends and relax before the big run. At dinner, Chrisy informed me that two of our friends had gotten t-shirts made in memory of Thomas for our group of buddies to wear at the Rock 'n' Roll. Matt and I picked up our shirts (which were actually tank tops) and I thought it would be great motivation for me to wear during my marathon debut.

I didn't sleep much. Jimmy had scored us a room at the Ritz Carlton on Canal (there was a massive leak at the hotel he had actually booked) but I was so nervous and anxious (and sad) that I may not have slept at all...  a rough start! At 6:30 we left our hotel and walked to the start at Poydras and Camp St. I was worried at first that I wouldn't be able to navigate us there but there were TONS of people to follow!!! It was amazing. Even more amazing than the size of the crowd was that I ran into my favorite spin instructor amidst the chaos! It was nice to see a friendly face because, of course, I had already gotten lost and separated from my group. I felt nervous about not having pooped yet (I used to get the same way before rugby games) so I got in one of the incredibly long porta-potty lines and waited it out. The gun fired and there were still probably a dozen people ahead of me in line. You can imagine what it looked like when I finally made it to the throne. Why the fuck couldn't I have pooped at the Ritz Carlton?! Anyway, after that horrific ordeal, I hopped into one of the corrals and actually ran into ANOTHER person that I knew. Kay was shooting for a 4:30 finish and I told her I'd hang on for as long as I could. I stuck with her for maybe 2 miles. Haha.

Okay I could give you the turn-by-turn but I'm already bored with that idea.

I finished in 4:50:39, which is a pace of 11:06. I think I feel the right mix of happiness and... I don't know... hopefulness, with that being my first marathon. I'm happy that I was able to finish it and I know there are a handful of things I can do differently next time to improve myself. The first tweak I think I ought to make to my training is incorporating more strength work. My quads and glutes were tired pretty much the entire time, but I never found myself breathing hard. This tells me that it probably was not necessary for me to supplement my cardio work with spin classes as often as I did. I think I would have had a more comfortable marathon if my legs were stronger. The second tweak that I (hope I) will make is incorporating more long runs, even if it means starting my training a few weeks earlier. Having a 20-mile run under my belt was invaluable, but I think my body would have been happier if it was more used to the impact. Exhibit A is my left heel/ankle which I am currently treating with alternating hot/cold packs.

The best part about my run is that I never really found myself hitting a wall. My pace was pretty consistent and manageable and it helped that there were water stations every 1.5-2 miles because I allowed myself to walk for a few seconds at each of them. I expected my mental state to deteriorate at mile 18 or 19, but it never really did. When the miles started to feel longer and longer, I just thought about the tank top I was wearing and how important it was to honor Thomas' memory by finishing well. My pace picked up significantly when I saw all my friends cheering me on in the home stretch. I had taken so long (most of my friends ran the 1/2M and my friend who ran the full with me finished it in 3:20) that I halfway expected them to have already left for the bars. But they were there in their tank tops! I sprinted to the finish and got my medal and snacks and hugged my friends. Side note: I am so lucky to have such great people in my life.

Running my first marathon was a great experience. Here's hoping my second marathon will be even more awesome! Guess what I signed up for today...

October 28, 2012!

I wondered if it was a bad idea for me to sign up for the Marine Corps Marathon this afternoon, as I gingerly hobbled across my living room to retrieve my credit card. I think the timing will be good though. I will have wrapped up my last long bike ride 2 months prior to the MCM, so I should be in good shape and I'll probably be anxious to switch my focus from cycling to running. I think it'll work out well.

Anyway, that was my marathon experience! I was somewhat consistent with my training, dropped off the face of the running planet for most of the month of February, ate awful food, slept very little (taking three classes this semester was SOOOOO stupid), and I still survived it. Great success!

Great motivation.

lazy legs

This Monday was my first run since the 20-miler. So weird- I hadn't taken that long of a break from running since... idk, October? It was really nice though. Between work, school, and family time last week, the only workout I got to was Wednesday's spin class. The biggest time suck of last week though?- MGB. I spent the last four months planning a Mardi Gras Ball and now that it's over (it happened on Friday), I feel like I have so much more time on my hands! It turned out to be a great event. The DJ was great, the live bands were great, the food was AWESOME, the photo booth was super fun, the professional photographer seemed to be doing a good job (we'll see when I get my picture back!), and I think it was fun for everyone to get dressed up and celebrate. I'm happy that it went so well and that it is behind me.

Carolina John had suggested that I up the pace on my shorter runs. I think I'm going to focus on that this week. I'm not sure if that's a great idea so late in the game, but running faster gets it over with quicker 8)
Yesterday, I ran 6 miles at a 9:30 pace. I was so much faster earlier in my  marathon training... I'm looking at my training log and I did the same run in November at a 8:59 pace. I don't like that. Is it because I shifted my focus from speed to distance? Yes, my capacity for endurance has vastly increased since November, but why should that change how I perform in shorter runs? I've got another five or six mile run this afternoon before class. Hoping that my lazy legs will carry me to a < 9:30 pace!
Spin class yesterday was rough again. I don't know what it is...  I felt weak and kind of nauseous in the second half of class and almost thought about cutting out early. Is this my body punishing me for taking last week off? Okay body, I'm sorry!!! Now can we get our shit together and wrap up these last 2 1/2 weeks before the marathon??!

On a lighter note, my mom posted this on my Facebible wall yesterday:

Is she saying I ought to drink more? Thanks, Mom 8)

study break

It's been a crazy, crazy week. I cannot believe that it is already Wednesday. I drove back to Mobile this afternoon and I have this icky feeling in my stomach... I hate being here when my awesome family is hanging out with baby Lily without me. But I definitely had to come home. I had already missed three days of work and two classes and my cats were basically starving to death, so it's good that I'm back.

This is week one of my epic FOUR WEEK taper. It was supposed to be three weeks long, but I knew I wouldn't be able to get my 20-miler in this coming weekend so it was either four weeks of tapering or two weeks of tapering. Most people thought that I ought to train on the conservative side, this being my first jaunt into marathoning. This week is pretty shot for me, because of family time and Friday's Mardi Gras Ball and more family time, but I did manage a spin class tonight and I am planning a 10-mile run with Hans while he's here this weekend. I figure I kind of owe it to him, seeing as he was flying all this way to run a 1/2M in St. Pete. (We decided against making the trip so that we can spend time with my family. Priorities!)

Spin was kind of rough tonight. I don't know if I'm still fatigued from my run on Saturday, or just feeling shitty because of all the bad food I've eaten since this weekend (I was POOPED after being up all night at the hospital on Sunday and indulged in a Baconator on Monday... my first fast food of the new year!). After class, a bunch of people came up to me and asked how my marathon training was going. My first thought was, "Damn! I need to stop telling people about this! Now they all have expectations!" but really, it was kinda neat. Except for one of the guys I chatted with who is a very experienced long distance runner and cyclist and has run something like 30 marathons. He asked me how my 20-miler went and I have to say... I was pretty embarrassed to tell him. IT TOOK ME FIVE HOURS. He started doing the math out loud for what kind of pace I was running and I started making excuses "it was hilly, I had a cold/flu-thing, my legs were already tired, etc." All in all, not a very uplifting conversation. But he was nice about it and tried to be encouraging and I know it will motivate me to know that I have people that I am kind of sort of accountable to. I'm the kind of person who likes to keep goals a secret because I hate to let people down almost as badly as I hate to let myself down. Maybe it's time for me to nut up a bit.

Anyway, back to studying :-/

listening to my heart

I got my heart rate monitor in the mail earlier this week. The Omron HR-100C has a stopwatch, backlight, settable target zones, and a zone alarm and that's pretty much it! It cost me ~$35 on amazon.com and is probably one of the most basic models out there. I know some folks whose heart rate monitors save recorded values through entire workouts and can shoot out beautiful graphs and interesting data to be used for optimizing one's training routine or approach to a given workout. I could get really geeked out on something like that, but I chose to go simple. Mostly because I had just put a massive order in at nike.com and knew it would be unwise to spend another $569.95 on something really cool.

I wore my heart rate monitor to the gym on Wednesday. I ran 2 miles at right around an 8:30 min/mi pace (I don't have my workout calendar handy for the specifics) and I think my heart rate was up in the 170s. That sounds high to me, but I felt really good and could have definitely kept going if I wasn't already late for spin class. In spin, my heart rate stayed 130-150 and might have shot up a bit during sprints. I felt GREAT in that workout (the class I blogged about in the previous entry) and mostly breathed through my nose- a good indication that I wasn't working too terribly hard.

My friend Sam recommended that I use my heart rate monitor to measure my resting heart rate by wearing it to bed and taking a quick reading when I wake up in the morning. I tried to do that, but I'm a tosser and a turner and the thing was so darn uncomfortable, it would wake me up several times through the night. I would take a reading before I ditched it and went back to sleep. Having done that for a few nights, I think it's a safe bet to say that my resting heart rate is 55 bpm.

Maximum heart rate is a more finicky chicken to pluck. I used this MHR calculator to estimate that my maximum heart rate is 197bpm. There are a few age/gender based equations out there, but the gold standard, supposedly, is a clinical stress test. This Runner's World article describes a DIY method of calculating your max heart rate while running a track workout. I want to do this at some point because my estimated MHR seems kind of low to me... I will regularly end a tough treadmill workout at 185bpm (as measured by the sensors on the treadmill handle bars) and that would put me in the 90%-100% maximal zone which is potentially dangerous to heart health. Either my estimated MHR is off or I'm working way beyond what is safe for my poor ticker. Hmmm...

In other news, tomorrow is the BankTrust First Light Marathon and 1/2 Marathon. I will be running the 1/2M with some friends and then spending the rest of the day eating bagels and pizza to "restore my carb reserves". In the handful of races that I've done, I have always had two goals- one goal would be the one that I share with people who ask, the other goal would be my REAL goal which I would keep to myself. The goal that I share with people is a finishing time that I am positive I will make. The goal that I keep a secret is what I consider the ultimate, best-case scenario and it's so lofty that I am embarrassed to even speak it out loud to someone else. The lame thing about this blog is that no one reads it. The AWESOME thing about this blog is that... no one reads it. So here is my real, secret, lofty goal for the First Light 1/2M: I want to finish in under two hours.

So what do you think about that?

New Year, New Intentions

One of my resolutions for 2011 was to log all of my workouts. I decided to write them in a calendar in my living room so that I could easily see when I was having a good month or a lazy month. It ended up being really great motivation for me! 

My December 2011 workouts

Here is a breakdown of what I did in 2011:

45 Bikram Yoga workouts
25 spin classes (I thought this number would have been much higher!!! Maybe I wasn't as diligent as I thought)
665.5 miles biked
365.57 miles run (106 of which were in the month of December alone!)

As a side note, I also read 13 books in 2011. I logged all the books that I read on this calendar as well, and will probably keep that going in 2013. Yay!

I had some bad months... in May, I was in Yorktown and didn't bring my calendar so I didn't keep track of anything that I did (which probably wasn't much) and in September, the only thing I logged was a 9.3 mile run on the 7th, shortly before I came down with strep throat.

Anywho, I still need to buy a 2012 wall calendar but Hans and I already set some good fitness-related goals for the new year. My goals are to ride the Seattle to Portland Bicycle Classic and the Ride from Seattle to Vancouver (and Party), log 500 running miles and 1000 biking miles, run an ULTRAMARATHON (will more than likely go with a 50k), and do a pull-up.

I'm thinking that I will throttle back on my running after my marathon in March and focus on preparing for the long bike rides in the summer (the STP is 202 miles long and the RSVP is 188 miles long). Then I should have a solid three months to prepare for a 50k in the late fall...

Yeah I might be a little overly ambitious but it's the beginning of the NEW YEAR and I feel soooo great!