One last schweaty run?!

Okay, so maybe the title is pure wishing, but it was so cool this morning, the roomie and I opened up the doors, aired out the house, and didn't end up with a humidity and heat induced glow! This all blew in last night, about the time Mom and I left the house to go pick up Chinese for dinner :)

Sooo maybe I run because I eat that, but it was a super special Mom weekend! Anyway, when we left, the rental car told us it was 81*. By the time I'd gotten totally lost talking to the cashier when she told me my frequent user card was only for Chinese people, gotten my food and re-started the car, it was 74. But...Um... I know a couple of Japanese people at work, but no authentic Chinese people, so how did I end up with this?! She told me it was only for students, so I explained I used to be a student at State, I just tend to lose and find these cards! It might have been the one KR gave me :P We swap fro-yo rewards cards for Chinese, win win!

 Okay, so yeah, it was typical warm and humid yesterday morning! The sun didn't come out til that last mile when we were on a tree-lined trail, and for that, I was truly thankful! We did a nice as-flat-as-Raleigh-has-to-offer 6 miles on mostly tree-lined greenways around a lake, behind/between housing and apartment complexes, and chatted about all sorts of things. For example, the main person I run with from my group is probably old enough to be my mom and she recommended Hope Springs, the Meryl Streep movie. A new person dropped down to our pace group and she's about my age, and she had good things to say about it. What?! Urgh...fine. Sooo that's what my mom and I ended up seeing yesterday, and she was thankful I would go see it with her, sparing her the humiliation of being that middle-aged woman sitting alone in a clearly-aimed-at-her movie.

 We'd been warned about this beforehand, but we saw something similar to this:

 Okay minus the striking, fake screaming or water balloon. More like this:

 Thankfully one of the faster pace groups saw a guy like this just getting warm (or cool?!) on the trail and while the participants just stopped and backed off, a fellow mentor SPRINTED back with a pep in her step saying "Copperhead COPPERHEAD in the trail!" I stopped our group there, turned around to pass on the message. I was ready to strangle a couple of runners that were like "oh, COOL!" until I realized they weren't from our training group, so if they wanted to tangle with this venomous {see, Huck! I listen} creature, more power to them- and no legal obligation to our training group!

He eventually slithered off, and you could still see the majority of his body continuing to go into the grass by the time we passed. Shudder! Totally gave our group an adrenaline rush and I'm pretty sure we dropped average pace by a few seconds even with our 30 second pause!

The group is experimenting with in-run nutrition and I'm realizing that running for 70 minutes means I need to eat twice. That last mile, I could feel my brain start to shut down, I talked even less clearly than normal (which if you know me says a LOT!) and had to seriously focus on getting through. I had a chocolate outrage Gu that had caffeine, and I really liked it. The consistency and taste were definitely chocolate icing and I wouldn't want to down one of those without water to wash it down, just to get the super intense sweetness out of my mouth. Sorry if this is TMI, but coffee makes me have to pee, so for long runs, the last thing you want to do is need to pee when you're 3 miles from the closest bathrooms, so I liked that this flavor had caffeine built in. Morning runs demand caffeine! I definitely stayed up til past midnight on that shot and a 20 minute nap!

I'm super-nerding it up this week, determined to take advantage of these cool mornings, so I have not just my work outfits laid out but my running outfits! Sports bras and non-cotton socks included :) My legs are getting tired and my right knee bugs me after long runs, so I'm taking the advice of the other mentor for my pace group and going to keep running on tired legs to build up the endurance. I'm going to use shorter runs to get my mileage, even though it might mean a 3 miler before work and another couple after. Tuesday's cross training will be some elliptical, too- "mileage" without the impact.

Off to get in some upper body strength :) What good are awesome legs if you have pudge arms?!

Here's to the next tv timeout!

-Syd

Run more, blog less?

Scatterbrained...

• I am now a mentor for... a HALF-MARATHON training program! Its actually amazing and wonderful because my mantra used to be "I don't run when it's above 70*" and I think out of the 8 runs I've done in the past 3 weeks, only one has been under 70. It sucks, I "glisten" by mile 1 and then sweat like a dog the rest of the way, I chug water like a pro from my new hydration backpack, and when its all over, I stretch until I'm putty, including the pesky upper leg muscles that aren't helped by sitting at work all day, and then drink some aaaaamazing protein recovery drink.
• I am stupidly happy when I run. Like, that and a good cup of coffee and I might be dancing all day at work. 
• My job? Amazing! I have lots of fun, its challenging but not so much that I run screaming because I have no clue what's going on, but I know there's lots to learn and the support I have around and above me is top notch. 
• Other super cool thing about my job?  My boss runs! He goes out during the day, even when its 11:30, sunny, 90*, 80% humidity... I ran with him and this other guy that is in a related division last week. I'm still acclimating to running and I knew that I would be slow, but the men were running my spring pace and I'm in out of shape summer pace :/ We'll see how I do when I keep training and it flippin' cooooools down!
• Final "yay!" thing about my work- the shower is amazing! Like... better than Huck's house! Might have to utilize that more this winter, run when its still light outside from work, shower, and hopefully rush hour traffic will have somewhat cleared by then. Oh my plots!
• Speaking of plots, talking to my mom tonight, I said "have I told you about my evil plot?" I'm sort of worried because her reply was "which evil plot?" I swear it was running related, but I'll tell you when I put where my money where my mouth is :)
• Back to mentoring- I LOVE the other woman mentoring the pace group with me since she's chill, laid back, total opposite of me, but when we get to rough parts, we're both offering up the "head up, shoulders back, hands loose" etc form cues. The people in the group are also neat- upbeat, thankful to be there, determined, and a lot of fun to talk to :)

So... I stink. The roomie tried to wash the shower curtains today (thanks!) but it failed, so she was out stimulating the economy when I got home and now that I'm thoroughly ripe, its time to shower :) 

Here's to the next TV timeout :)

-Syd

EEP!

I was supposed to be in bed 45 minutes ago BUT I need to say...

I RAN TODAY!

Well, sorta. I think elliptical machines are cheating, but my work gym has ONE treadmill and I got in at the same time as a lady who was FOCUSED and knew what she was doing, so she beat me to it :/

So glad we had 2 ellipticals to fall back on... Little does Huck know, I'm stealing his resistance bands and doing something p90x tomorrow so I can get in some soul-crushing weights :D BUT! I did 3.1 miles, the first mile in 9:04, the second in 10min and the third was just zoning out a lot. Total, it took me a little over 30 minutes, but like I said, the third was me looking at a lot of birds outside. I've been around this guy too long:

Like I said, ellipticals are "cheating", so I might as well go faster on them!

Off to bed (should've been there almost an hour ago!)... EEP!

Here's to the next TV timeout! (or fun gym workout or P90x shred or...)

-Syd

And such

First off, I need to be more aware of the weather. When it was triple digits for so long, I just gave up on it ever being less than 80 outside and it was 60-something last night. WHY DIDN'T I GO FOR A RUN THEN?! Well, a kitten with a broken jaw that I was feeding through a tube for one reason. Anyway, I'm going to check the weather every couple days, see if I can't catch some 70's weather. I might be getting up at 5am on Saturday to get a couple jogging miles in.

So here's my other random fitness stuff, out of my brain, onto the blog. Be afeared! :) <-- I've lived in the South too long... w/e. Embrace it, like barbecue, sweetea and y'all!

1- http://hellogiggles.com/10-reasons-running-doesnt-suck-as-much-as-you-think  Love this!

2- Pullup work continues! I can now do very slow, controlled negatives on the pullup bar. I can even hang with my chin up for a couple seconds :)

3- I had fun this week TAKING in some of my jeans :)

Before:

Jeans that fit that I used as my template:

After:

For the record, these are all Old Navy 10's. The template pair is a few years old and you can tell a huge difference in the denim. The old pair is very sturdy, feels like you could wear it for years, not wear a hold anywhere. New pairs? Ripped when I took out some overzealous seams!

I also took in the tech shirt I got for running my half marathon. I was super bummed when I got it and realized it was just too big. I gave it to Huck for a while, but darnit, I earned it! So I took it back, told him he could have my 10k shirt, and used a shirt I'd gotten from my training 8k group to know where to sew new seams for the half shirt. So far, so good :)

4- Its been over a month since Huck's been on the Paleo diet. He cheat a LOT thanks to the yummy summer drinks out like Lime-a-Ritas (not high class, but YUMMY!), but between the diet and pretty regular p90x, he's had to add another notch to his belt and I can tell he's lost the beer gut he gained after ending Insanity but before we got back into p90x and he went Paleo. Foods he used to take or leave have become treats, like almonds and other nuts.

As he's gotten more familiar with what is and isn't in the plan, the meals he cooks have become more varied and he can even find paleo meals at restaurants. Last night, he made these amazing eggplant lasagna stacks using fresh eggplants a coworker gave him. When he went to Cracker Barrel at lunch, instead of his usual chicken and dumplings, he got a Cobb salad, brushing off the bread crumbs and getting a vinaigrette dressing, which seems like a totally normal meal, but not only was it Paleo, it was SUPER YUMMY!  No longer is it steamed veggies and a hunk of meat, but its spaghetti squash with standard marinara, veggie stir fries, roasted any veggie, lots of summer meats like sausage and brats, lettuce wrap fajitas and typical meals, just making the rice or pasta sides for the non Paleo people like kids or girlfriends (:D) that might be eating. I don't know if I'm ready to go Paleo, but I do find myself eating less bread, just because I don't buy it as much and rely on the few English muffins or tortillas I might have in the house, and keep an eye on potential Paleo meals or ingredients to pass on to Huck.

5- For more info about the kitty with the broken jaw: http://dearwiley.blogspot.com/2012/07/more-adventures.html

Here's to the next TV timeout!

-Syd

PS- get access to a gym next week... might we see a return of a running Sydney?!?!

StronGrrrr

So since we're still in my summer running motto phase (I don't run when its above 70* outside) thanks to the fourth day in a week of triple digit heat in NC, I decided to set an attainable INDOOR fitness goal. Doing p90x with Huck, I've had to do more pushups, squats, pot stirrers and the grandaddy exercise of pullups than ever before.

Trust me... there are days where the things I CAN do- squats, all 50 million variations, bicep curls, evil pushup variations, and still be waddling like a penguin, so the days where my friend Tony gives us 10 different variations of pullups to do?! Yeah... when you can't even do one normal easy (whatever works for you) pullup, doing the scarecrow variations (go up, tilt right, tilt left, go back, then down)?! Make me laugh with the "yeah, right!" giggles and give me a break while I watch Huck get all buff.

Until.... Well, there are girls on the show that use resistance bands or utilize a chair to help them cheat, and I want to be them. They "bring it", don't wuss out, and look AMAZING as a result. That, plus lots of brown rice, chicken and steamed broccoli meals or lives as professional dancers. Whatever. So... in my self-imposed "man up! don't wuss out!" mantra, I've decided my goal by July 31 is to be able to do at LEAST 1 unassisted pullup.

To start off, my world of Googling told me to try with negatives. I jump up to the top, arms contracted, and lower myself down, hopefully slowly and controlled. So far, I'm using Huck's knee to jump up. Yes, ladies, I've figured out how to get a man down on one knee :) What, does that mean something to ladies in a committed dating relationship?!

Enough razzing the so-not-there-yet bf... more about progress! I remembered to do it on Monday, got in 1 solid one, and 2 semi-solid ones, then we did tris and shoulders, so that the next day I was still sore on the bottom half thanks to Saturday's legs and back workout, and then any arm movement made you aware of the muscles to twist or turn :) I did a happy circuit of pushups, squats, calf raises, Russian twists and jumping jacks (and other random bodyweight exercises) Wednesday morning when I could finally move with minimal pain, and before fireworks commenced, tried to get more negatives in to keep the progress. Now that I'm trying to remember how many I did, I totally can't remember. I did try to get above the bar on my own but having a pullup bar in a hallway just lets you Spidey up the wall :/

So that's my story :) Can't run?! Do pullups! Adapt or wither... and don't be a wuss!

Here's to the next TV timeout!
-Syd

So many things

1- I SURVIVED (barely) Illinois' toughest 15k. I have the medal to prove it:

The medal is hanging around my nec.k... don't know how I have enough energy to smile

2- It was h-e-double-hockey-sticks! I don't run when its above 70 outside by choice. It was 70 at the starting line, before I had to go up this evil hill twice! I killed that hill the first time, was doing well despite an absent water stop pre-hill, even when I got lapped by...well... a lot of people! But... somewhere around that first loop near the zoo, even after going past one of my best friends who was doing a lock-in (Zoo Znooze) , the leg that pressed on the gas pedal for 13 hours a couple days before cramped up, the heat exhausted me, and the impending meet up with my dad started to suck the happy go-go-GO right outta me. I got down the happy little hill, had a spectator tell me my braid looked cute and whimpered at the sight of the hill again with no water break until I was up it and started to walk like a pro. My chest exploded and hamstring cramped up like never before as the heat and panic rushed over me to have me bawling right before mile 7. I thought about this picture:

And kept going. I knew that right after mile 7, it was down one hill, 2 miles of straight and flat at the end with my momma and sister waiting to cheer me in after they'd done the 4 mile race.

Oof.

3- I didn't run much after that. Serious amounts of pain. I even put this Biofreeze gel on my leg to try to numb it, and omg it got numbed and I smelled like mint and couldn't feel my leg the rest of the day.

4- The next time I ran? I was in Savannah, GA at a $42/night hotel with one of my best friends from high school, on the treadmill in the gym. I turned on tv, enjoyed The Mentalist, checked out my form while I ran, and tried to get in some speed work. I'd only waited about 20 minutes after eating this AMAZING $7.50 low country boil so when I was upping the speed (to 7.0 mph!! and BEYOND) I slowed down when I started tasting the shrimp, crab, sausage, corn and 'taters again. Had a GREAT time doing the HIIT though!

5- I've decided my goal for the month of July while it decides to stay in the triple digits outside in the BLAZING humidity is to do at least 1 unassisted pullup by the time August comes around. Huck has a pullup bar in the hall of his kitchen/living room, so I have a plan... if I can't run outside, I shall become a beast!

6- For the awesome new job (yes yes, official job offer paperwork came in a couple weeks ago! WOOO), I had to get a physical. The doctor told me that people like me keep him from being busy. I compared the results of my cholesterol from 3 years ago, when I would go to work, sit down, come home, sit down, go to sleep, repeat. My total cholesterol has gone down by 1 point, but the triglycerides, HDL and LDL all tell the story of a much healthier and active person :) As a scientist, its nice to see proof in fancy numbers like that.

7- Other proof that I'm doing something right? When I went home, my mom had tons of my high school stuff for me to go through, since she would be putting the house up for sale a couple days after I left (it sold in 40 hours, no joke). Out of curiosity, I tried on my junior year prom dress. At 25, the dress that 17 year old me wore doesn't fit... because its too loose! My senior year prom dress?! Even worse! At least the junior year one has just an inch or 2 of fabric that you can grab here and there. Because of the cut of the senior year one, it just doesn't fit at all! It doesn't help that I don't gain fat in the most...um.. desirable?! places for a girl, but even the back is loose enough to hold a 6 pack :)

Ok... I promise more updates! Life should settle down here shortly and you'll get to hear about pullup progress :)

Here's to the Next TV timeout!

-Syd

X Training

Hey,

I realize I might only run once or twice a week now days (yayyy 90*+ weather :/ ) but I'm actually working my butt out more because I don't have to think about saving energy for the tempo/long/fartlek run, I can do what I do now barefoot (less socks for laundry!) and pretty much anywhere with minimal planning.

Huck has p90x, and I'll do that with him a few afternoons a week when he comes home from work. There's some of the workouts I'm just not strong enough to do, like the chest and backs, mainly because that's almost exclusively pushup and pullup variations. When I did it last week, I got through the first half, then went to do something else. Huck pushed me this week to at least get to the next water break after the halfway point. I'm never going to build up the muscles to do a pullup if I don't keep trying, right?

Tony Horton's plyometrics X is KILLER! Lots of sweating and trying to land softly and quietly...like a CAT :) The first time I did this, you could hear the thunks from outside. This week, I got a fist bump and "nice!" from Huck :) We needed to get some other stuff done that night, so we cut it short, but I still smoked his butt for some of it.

I went to KR's house on Wednesday for girl time, which included getting my hair blonded up! While driving to her place, I got the call that I get to start my REAL JOB in July! There's so many other awesomely happy things about this, but when they said "July" I did the math and decided to follow in KR's footsteps and add some bright (bubble gum, to be precise) pink to my hair. That, and making dinner and a celebration red velvet cake, took so long KR and I did the Insanity Upper Body Strength DVD Thursday morning.

I'd made Huck promise to kick my butt on hills at Fleet Feet's social run on Thursday night, so within 12 hours of Insanity working my arms, I was pounding the pavement. Huck had done a 45 minute p90x in 30 minutes so we could be on time, and it cleeearly killed him. Don't get me wrong, it was still warm, and our 1 mile warmup and then killing Mount Leonard 4 times was... ouch. He would sprint up the hills way faster than me and I'd have to gasp out "keep moving" to him, but we were both just ready to collapse after that 4th time. We tried to catch a group of ladies who had run a 3 mile route but to no avail :/

So that's my story :) I'm officially signed up for Illinois' Toughest 15k next Saturday and I'm trying to gain 5 lbs any way possible to compete in the Athena category but this darn cardio mixup is thwarting my plans. I've never wanted to gain weight more in my life!

Here's to the next TV timeout!
-Sydney

Sweet and Sour

Why yes, I had Chinese for dinner, why do you ask?!

This is the story of a "sweet" run and a very "sour" run! My sour run was Tuesday morning with KR. The tl;dr story? Flippin' heat. Almost 2 miles in, when we stopped to talk to the scandalous roomie, my head tried to explode, which my brain and ears didn't appreciate. I at least got up the major part of the hill, after I didn't start attacking it until 1.3 miles into the run, so yay for small victories.


\ <-- sorry about that! to hear from the culprit, go here : http://bit.ly/K5aYcj

Okay, so, on to my "sweet" run...a friend from my gladiator training days posted on facebook yesterday, asking if anyone would go do a 3 mile run with her on Saturday morning. I know her pace, and I can go that speed talking all day now. Serious signs of improvement for me, considering 11:30 pace used to mean concentrating :)

Heather told me it might end up only being 2, not 3, and considering the Roomie and I are doing a hilly 10k tomorrow morning, I was totally okay with that. I figured this run would just be a good "hey, legs, remember what its like to run? ok, then great, we have to do more of this tomorrow!" loosening up.

As we got to running, my running buddy explained her feet have been going numb around the 2 mile mark of her runs, no matter the shoes she wears and no, her laces aren't tight, tyvm. We talked the entire time, and it was weird being the fast one! If I talked, we sped up. If she talked, we slowed down. The first 2.38 miles, we did an 11:30 pace, but we stopped to let her feet get un-numb.

After the remnants of the tropical depression and other high/low pressure system mixtures hit NC, we've gotten lots of rain, which means lots of puddles on greenways. There was one that is obviously a continual problem, because off to the side, someone had placed 2 planks of wood for a makeshift bridge over a washed out creekbed next to a long puddle on the asphalt. This very high tech bad@$$ guy came and splashed in the puddle, couldn't get over it. I backed up a couple steps, hit the last high point on the puddle's edge, and made it across, no big :) Heather saw it and just laughed. You know how you race against people on the treadmills in the gym? I puddle jump competitively, apparently ;)

I've been trying to keep up the general fitness with the help of Beachbody :) Huck has p90x and I did a few workouts with him, and I wake up at 5am now to do TurboFire by myself. Its not as intense- its as intense as you make it, all body weight cardio stuff so far- but the cardio gets your heart rate up and turns you into a sweaty mess. INSIDE! Totally better than running when its 70, or 80 or even the 90 it likes hitting now!

We'll see how well the crosstraining is working after the 10k tomorrow. Recap and pictures tomorrow :)

Here's to the next TV timeout
-Syd

1,2,3

Theres been lots of reasons why I've been failing at updating. First. I havent been running as much. The heat is truly kicking my butt. My 3 miles this morning ended up being 2, a hilly 2, but the humidity made it impossible for me to catch my breath. The hill I've become so accustomed to destroying? Yeah that was 1.5 into my route this morning and I was thankful to get 75% of the way through it, took a detour to walk and then ran down. 

What I found on my detour- a Rose Garden! I stopped, smelled the air, and took pictures :)

I also had a "so bad I don't want to blog about it" run last Tuesday. We had 50 minutes and KR and Huck convinced me we could do the 4.5 mile route...and the the people talked for 5 minutes and the pressure was on to do 10 minute miles. Have I ever explained how badly I fail at running under pressure?! I waived KR and Huck on after a half a mile, said I'd wind my way back to the store and started bawling. Yes, some of it was the oppressive heat and (again) humidity, but I still wasn't over the crap race the Saturday before and the news that my dad's once full thick head of hair was coming out in chunks, thanks to the chemo. As much as I try to stay cool and calm, the surface keeps cracking and with less pressure now.

The second and third reasons I've been a running slacker? Well, they make me much happier. I started biking to work, which is only 4 miles roundtrip, but, being Raleigh, you're either pedaling for your life up a hill or coasting down its backside. Along with that crosstraining, I've been following through with my self made promise to get more weights in. Sometimes its just 18 burpees in the lawn, but last night it was 1/3 of the p90x video that made me hate Tony Horton. For the record, we're doing better, Tony and I, thanks Huck :)

The last reason? Well, he's cute and fluffy and 5 weeks old and still mastering the pounce. It's super hard to wake up and not just let my little Wiley man play all day. The first day I had to leave him and go to work?! Slayed me! Now I get the anxiety women get leaving their babies to go back to work! But, we're getting into a routine now, and I'm fairly confident Wiley will live, and he's growing with minimal parasites on/in him :) and like I said, he's mastering the pounce!

I fear I might have to give up running outside soon. When it was 63, the coolest part of the day, and my lungs couldn't keep up?! No bueno! When I get into a real job, I'll probably check out these gyms that advertise for $10/month memberships and go run on a treadmill and take classes, too! Until then, I'll run as much as possible, keep biking to work (after my "saddle" heals some!), and fall in love with Tony. I've already agreed to do the bi's and tri's tonight, heaven help me! (UPDATE: did it. rocked it! WOO, baby!)

Here's to the next TV timeout!

-Syd

Yep...he might be cuter than Lucy, but don't tell the roomie!

Incredibly cute and maddeningly frustrating

Alright, let's start this off where I thought I would be gushing. This is my in my positively neon outfit for this morning's 10k. Huck and I signed up for the Run for Your Momma 5k/10k in the 10k division, obviously. If you can tell behind me, the ground is a bit sandy, the joys of running in Wilmington, NC. We came to his parents' place for Mother's Day and they live close by, so we figured we'd support a great cause (domestic abuse shelters), get a good run in, PR on a stupidly flat course, and originally, I thought my recent UNC-W alum cousin could run with us. She smartly declined, given the state of her liver last night and I'm thinking tonight, too!

 

Instead, what happened was the most frustrating thing to ever happen during a race. Huck and I realized the field was small enough, we could legitimately place in our age groups, so I told him to go run his race, I'd run mine. After about the first half mile, thanks to all the turns  on neighborhood streets, I'd lost Huck and most of the field.  There was one woman hanging out around me, so we chatted for about 2 miles, and got through a water and Gatorade stop. 

The numerous turns were easy to get through for the most part thanks to volunteers explaining just where we went since their little spray painted wooden stakes didn't match up with where the people were directing us. No big, right?

Until we got to a turn where the volunteer had his top half in a van, explaining where they needed to go to avoid road closures. We kept going on the road we turned down since we could see another white shirted person and runners on the street beyond that guy. Except... that white shirted man was watering his lawn and hadn't seen any runners pass by him, and the people running in front of us were 5k-ers. Cursed baby jogger people that only do 5ks actually came in handy! 

Our little trio turned around, ran up the main street we'd gone past and knew went to the finish/start line. People were cheering us on because we were the first 10kers to come through!...yeah, we crossed over the other set of timing stuff, yelled at the race director "WE GOT LOST!" He told us "its those headphones! You can't hear the directions!"

Yeah... I run with one earbud in when I'm on the sidewalks, so a race that forces me onto 2 lane roads through neighborhoods? You bed I'm keeping an ear out (literally) for cars and I guess "directions", but, as the Roomie said "audio cues?! What is this, Hunger Games?! No booming voice from above!"

It took me so much self control to not just tell the race director where he could shove my earbuds, so our lost trio turned around and just headed out the way we'd come. We decided we'd just add enough mileage to get to 6.2 and say "to hell with the course." 

This strategy meant there were no more water breaks, volunteers looked at us like we were crazy, and my favorite? When, after seeing Huck at the top of my mini-hill (like up 20 feet when my big hill is up 100), I knew something was seriously up. I told the volunteer that wanted me to run down a street to a FLIPPING CONE to shut the crap up, I'd gotten lost and didn't give a crap any more, so for the first (and last?!) time ever, I beat Huck across the finish line.

When every 10k runner got to talking, we realized nobody did the "right" course. What the race director had told us about running on trails? Never happened. Huck's GPS said he ran 6.5, I did 5.95 on my hacked course, volunteers were far away from injured parties, etc. One runner even said when this same group put on a half marathon, there were 3 water stops. After I survived my half, I was thankful for practically all 8 water stops! My 10 miler had 4 water stops... Huck and I were spitting mad, so we left to go meet my cousin for breakfast and said screw the awards. We didn't run the course, so why the crap does it matter if we got awards for our hacking? 

Worst. Race. EVER....and I've run some inaugural races and evil courses before!

What made my day better? When we went back to Huck's house, there was Cerra with her 7 puppies: 

We're pretttty sure Huck's male dog is the father. He's black, just like 5 of the pups!

See those precious little pups?! They were born on Wednesday, so these Friday night pictures are of literally 2 day old babies. They're squirmy and whiny and soooo adorable! Momma dog just lays there and accepts her duty as a milkmaid. 

But the best part?

Those are my two favorite men!

Wiley Mew is about 4 weeks old and his teenage mom had two of her kittens die and sort of gave up on this one, so he was placed in my arms by Huck's parents and it was instant love. Given that Huck has two big dogs that aren't used to cats, much less kittens, and my roomie is allergic to cats, I figured I'd just be surrogate mom for the weekend.

Until... we got back from the race today and for the 2nd straight hour, Wiley wasn't more than 5 feet away from me, a streak that's mostly been kept up all night, even when I was eating sushi for lunch, and Huck said "so... this can happen ONLY if you take care of it, clean the litter box, get it food, take it to the vet...but...because I trust you, we can take him home if you want." I had this tiny thing in my lap, so I couldn't do the same dance I did after a company said "yeah, we'll be making you an offer for a full time position in the Raleigh area this week, or maybe early next week" aka SUUUUUUUUPPPPPER EXCITED! 

 Sooo I'm a kitty mom! Wiley Mew (I named him, Huck and I went back and forth, his middle name was almost "Inigo" ) shall be called "Mew-Mew" until he stops making that sound, but we refer to him as "Wiley" in conversation :) The shirt I was wearing Friday night has become his baby Bjorn. I folded it in half hot-dog style, put him in the crease, and tuck the neck and hem under my arms so I can walk around while still snuggling. I made PB and Nutella sandwiches for breakfast like that today, so it works pretty well :)

Yeah, I think I'm going to like this...

Here's to the next TV timeout!

-Syd (and Wiley)

Bargaining for the Win

I'd gotten so used to the SC plan telling me to do an EZ 2 miles on Mondays that I just thought that's what I had to do again for Monday, and when I got home and was comfy in my chair, ready to destroy the kitchen cook more, I definitely got to a sad face when I went to confirm my target pace, and maybe finagle the run for Tuesday, not comfy Monday night, and discovered this week is all short runs but Monday was an EZ 4, not 2!

By this time, Huck, who had done p90x and biked over to my house to run with me and would have to bike the 3 miles back to his place when we were done, was game for 4. We bargained back and forth, played with routes on mapmyrun, and settled on a flipping hilly 3. I got out of my comfy cooking clothes and actually put a damp wash cloth on my back and tucked into my bra straps to help keep my cool. There's a heat wave rolling over Raleigh this week and I'm so not used to this running in 77+ heat! (Side note- its supposed to hit 90 multiple days this week, so maybe its kismet that no long runs this week mean less time to be in the heat, but still get acclimated to running in it... sneaky sneaky!)

Huck and I didn't talk about pace for this run, but he'd basically echoed KR's sentiments of "there's no reason for you to run 11 min miles when you can run 8:30s during speedwork for a mile and not collapse by the side of the road" at lunch on Saturday, so I was bound and determined to keep up with him. Did I mention that he'd already been working out for 75 minutes before we started running?! Total point of personal pride to not let this pre-tired man beat me! I just didn't want to run 11 min miles- I'd take 10:45s and say the heat and the hills were my lesson, so I was alright when, at 7 minutes in, the GPS app told me we were doing just that, 10:45s.

The route was running one street end to end, plus a little beyond one end to make it 3 miles and still have a long cool down to look forward to. The I wasn't used to the first part of the run, but it was an uphill, turn around, come back down, down, down, kill the evil hill I always mention, keep going, turn around, run down the hill, the end.

People who train on flats crack me up. In fact, I signed up for a race Mother's Day weekend and since its within running distance of the beach, methinks it'll be pretty flat. Can't WAIT to destroy that 10k!

Anyway, the second time I heard our pace, we were at the bottom of the long evil hill, and we'd dropped down to 10 min pace. I literally laughed outloud to Huck who was a few strides ahead of me. Normally, I'd yell at him about being a bad pacer, but I knew he was just pushing through, and it challenged me to a) keep up with him instead of slowing him down and b) get into my own little uncomfortable groove. I definitely couldn't keep a conversation, but I could eek out "you okay?!" every now and then.

At the 2/3 point up the hill (trust me, I've run this road way too many times to know just where I get to look forward to a break in the hill), Huck doubled over, and I kept running, but I was the good gf and turned around to see how he was doing. He waved me on, so I kept trekking. Before we got to the top of the hill, though, he had passed me again, but he had to stop again at our brief moment of flat, and when he told me "I feel like $***", I told him to just walk back, I'd pass him when I'd turned around. Yes, this sounds mean, but he told me to come run with him that night and "kick my @$$!"


I cheated the turnaround a bit because I knew Huck was back there struggling, and I figured that knocking off .2 miles when I had these hills around me wouldn't make or break me. I'll add it on to another run this week! I picked up the speed down the final hill when I realized I was due any minute for another update to say I'd been going for 28 minutes, so I wanted to finish the roughly 3 mile course before I got that notification. Final stats:

Like I said, warm night, flipping hilly, but I pushed. I feel great this morning, and my little damp washcloth helped keep me cool. It was great to have when we walked back on the cool down. My face turns into a salt lick when I run, so clearing that off and having a cool relief made a world of difference.

Gotta go put my big girl suit on! Not one but TWO interviews today!

Here's to the next TV Timeout!
-Syd

Downtown Challenge

Remember when I did the little Easter egg hunt around town? The same store and organizing group had a different challenge this past Thursday. In their Tuesday e-mail, they sent out the clues for Thursday's run, the text of 10 historical signs located around DTR- downtown Raleigh. There are over 32 signs in Raleigh, so knowing which 10 could give you points was key. Oh, as was finding out just WHERE the signs were. And then you had to make the most efficient route as possible to try to max out your options. Ohhh the strategy!

I looked up the clues and sign locations, completely messed up on one of the clues' locations, but still managed to map out a route that hit 8 of the 10 signs and was 5.3 miles. KR agreed to come with me, and since DTR is safe, but not exactly where I'd want to be with just another girl and my running gear, Huck agreed to be our running bodyguard as well. I kept looking at the map on Thursday and managed to cut out .4 miles of running, but keeping all 8 signs. By the way, you had only an hour to do this and get back to the store.

Huck and I loaded the mapmyrun route onto our phones and I had this scrap piece of paper with the turn by turn directions and little stars to remind me that hey, somewhere around here you should be looking for a sign! There were only a few signs that we had all to ourselves, making the process of finding exactly where on the corner our target was super streamlined. Our little trio took pictures at each stop, then figured out where to go next.

KR and Huck are about the same pace, so they ran ahead of me, chatted and every now and then turned around to go "hey, where do we go?!" or "come on!" Lol, I kept up with them pretty well, but I know they had to restrain themselves a bunch with me! In his boredom, Huck ran up a ramp and leaped over the railing at the top of the ramp onto the concrete sidewalk below where his minimalist shoes did jack squat to protect his heel when he landed. He now has a really pretty red bruise not on the heel that hurts, but on the inside of his ankle and chides me to slow down when we walk places together :/

When we got back to the store, 4.83 miles and 55 minutes later, we showed off our pictures for tickets. See the pretty pictures?!

It should be noted that my app never stopped, even when we paused to take pictures, cross the street or figure out just which way to turn and where! A free beer and mass amounts of water  made the pain go away, and I put my tickets in to try to win a foam roller, ice pack, visor or t-shirt/pint glass combination. KR was going for socks and the foam roller, and she did this squeal when they drew for the foam roller first and on her first attempt at the Downtown Challenge, she won the first item! She also won her pair of socks, so she was double happy!

Overall, it was a pretty fun run! Having Huck AND KR run together went very well, which I realized was a gamble since they've only met a few times even though they both hear tons of stories about the other one. Those two swapped notes and realized I can go faster than I have been, so I have this evil feeling I might start getting pushed more soon!

Here's to the next TV timeout!
-Syd

Because sometimes I wing it

And by winging it, I mean I use SC (smartcoach) as a guide when I'm recovering from the 10 miler. Monday was icky and rainy and while normally I'd love that, it seriously shot down my motivation to go run. Even the roomie wasn't going to hold me to our 2 mile date. Crap.

But then I committed a cardinal sin of running- I double booked myself! I asked both the roomie AND Huck to do 2 miles on Tuesday!!!...except the roomie went during the day since she had it off and that left Huck and I to do whatever for the evening.

When I thought I'd be double booked, I mentally moved Wednesday's tempo run to Thursday, figuring I'd do my Thursday miles on Tuesday. Confused yet? Don't worry, it'll all be working out in the end :) Instead, I went right instead of left as I left Huck's place (he lives in a valley so its pick a hill to walk up as your warmup!) and he suggested we do a route we'd mapped out a while ago. It meant we had to survive an evil hill, but at least it was done and over with at the beginning of the route, and relatively flat from there.

Huck asked what our goal pace was, and I told him "survive?!" after the gray shaded (aka evil) hill. Surprisingly, we talked from the start through that hill. I'd gotten details of the news from Saturday and I shared them with Huck, along with what I will and won't be doing. Right now, it looks like I'm going home for a very special holiday in June, both to be there for my family and run a race with some of them! I was so focused on the run as we talked that I didn't have any extra energy to cry :)

The mapmyrun lady told me our pace kept dropping... and dropping...even as Huck and I chatted a bit and I focused on NOT crying, so when we got a little bit beyond this awesome photo op, Huck went all Super Coach on me. It was neat having him coach me with fixes that I could do without messing up my form or other crazy stunt. He pushed when I needed it, and we agreed on start/stop points to test out our sprints.

Our fartleks were focusing on one step per sidewalk "square." When the squares were uneven- two where there should've been three- it was hard to keep at it, but to keep up the momentum of such long strides, your speed had to really ratchet up. I don't really know if my turnover increased that much, but lengthening my stride considerably dropped the average pace for our last mostly downhill/fartlek-ing .25 miles a 8:19 mile pace.

Overall, 2.25 miles in 22:10. I'll take it! Fun run for tomorrow night. I've already nerded out about it!!!

Here's to the Next TV Timeout!
-Syd

PS- My tech shirt for my half marathon? Unisex medium and I can swim in that thing. The Tarheel 10 miler tech shirt? I ordered a medium, thinking it was unisex and even if it wasn't, I'm an Old Navy (tall) medium, so even if its tighter than I like, its still not baring everything. When I got to packet pickup, they said these shirts ran small, so they bumped everyone up a size. I should've gone up 2. or 3. the front barely covered my belly button! I've lost most of this tummy and gained a defined waist since I started running! WT...! AND, I realize I have relatively broad shoulders for a girl, but the sleeves started on top of my shoulders by a good inch on each side. Combine that shirt with shorts that are a bit big, oooh dear I was self conscious. Someone yelled something at me from their car as they turned into their apartments but it was during the speed time and they can bite me, so I flashed them not one but two fingers in a gesture of peace- no really, the peace symbol! not two of the same finger but on different hands!- and kept going.

When the GPS gets stuck, just keep going

SmartCoach, my new best frenemy, told me to go run 8 miles at a 12:35 pace today. Since I'd been shooting for ~1.5 minutes faster than what SC tells me, I wasn't too worried when RunKeeper told me I was running an 11:34 pace, I figured I would pick it up as I warmed up. For these long runs, I figured since I was getting tired of campus, the evil NC Art Museum hills and near where I live, it was time to go on an ADVENTURE!

I've hiked quite a few miles of trails at Umstead State Park and the only time I'd really been on the bike and bridle packed gravel trails was to cut short a hike but there are lots of races that go through there, so it was time to go try it out!

I parked near the trail heads on the bottom of that map piece. We took the orange dots east to the road, then onto Reedy Creek Lake Trail. I'd read somewhere that the Airport Overlook was 3.1 miles, so I knew somewhere after that, we'd have to turn around. I part spaced out and part didn't want to have the voice in my head telling me how fast or slow I was or how much more I had to run.

Ignorance was total bliss! Huck and I passed these two guys running up a hill and smiling when we weren't even 1 mile in. Crazy guys, smiling while going up a hill! Except... we figured out why they were smiling! They were all DONE with hills! Seriously... I'd heard people say some crazy things about these hills, so I should've been more clued in, but this hill just kept winding around and going up and for every crest, there would be 2 seconds of downhill, NO FLATS and then more hill!

At 3 miles in, Huck got a call from his roommate explaining that he'd locked himself out and he needed to do X, Y, Z and etc. Huck explained we were 3 miles in and thus 3 miles away from a car, but we still had more to do. It was at this point that the GPS app stopped, which we didn't realize for who knows how long. Having never been on the trail, I wasn't certain of the random open space as the airport overlook, sooo we kept running. We were about to just say "enh, screw it!" when we saw a billboard shelter thing with a map in it, so we ran to that and realized we'd gone to the park's edge! Yeah, we ran to the right edge of that map slice which connects to a county park and a Cary greenway, definitely past 4 miles.

I was flat out deliriously happy at this point and both Huck and I turned on our GPS apps so we could figure out the "out" from the "back." Plus, we knew that all those hills we'd had to climb up the first 2 miles were going to be nice easy downhills to cruise down! ... except we forgot about that first hill, the one where we cruised down and Mr. Happy smiled up :/ I tried, oh how I tried, to kill that hill, especially since I know next Saturday I get a 1 mile uphill 8 miles in to my race but when we rounded a corner and Huck's "motivational" gasp was "yeah, don't look up" because we still didn't see the top of the hill, I winced and realized I couldn't quite keep my breath :( Some other runners passed us (sad face) and I had this "enh, good for you" which is neeever a good thing!...until we saw the pavement, our agreed upon stopping point. We kicked our butts from walking into "dear heaven, let us just be done" with a little friendly sprint race to see who would be first through the gate and we were DONE! (Huck won, which isn't all that surprising- he's faster/stronger but doesn't have the pink shoes like me ;D )

The final "back" stats were 4.3 miles at 10:53 pace, 500 calories burned for moi. For an 8 mile 12:35 long slow run, my 8.7 at sub-11 has me deliriously happy! Ice, NSAIDs and compression sleeves are my best friends, especially since the muscles around my butt are sore! Guess that's how you gain/lose a butt, going up those hills?! Good thing I got my interview pants taken in this week!

Here's to the next TV timeout!
-Syd

to Grandmother's house, we GO!

You know how I like freaking out when one thing throws me off my game? I was bound and determined to not have two bad runs in a row, and when it started to get dark, I figured I'd just throw on my gear and get my 3 done around home, not around the very evil lake with even more hills around the lake. Seriously, that lake is cursed! Anyway, I was fully charged, shoes on, when I got a "I'm on my way" text from Huck. Figured I'd rope him into running around home, but he reeeally wanted to do the trail around the lake and I it was part of the bargain from Monday. Argh... k.

Huck promised me trail, so I thought we were on the other side of the road, but no, we started running on the paved path, across the wooden bridge towards the evil cursed hills. But then we turned. I've gone past this spot a hundred times and never knew there was a trail there. Apparently Huck mountain bikes it often. Sooo it was over the roots, through the woods, splashing through the streams we went as the sun went to go keep people up in Australia. I had a headlamp on me (super awesome Christmas present from my aunt!) so I could better know when I was going up a sheer hill or down a root littered path.

A wider than normal creek bed as I officially couldn't see without light made me yell "okay, I'm done!" but I was promised that we were over half done. Thinking that meant it was shorter to go forward than go back, I sucked it up and kept going. When the shrubbery made a tunnel and Huck got further ahead of me than normal, I freaked. Darkness, woods enveloping me, unfamiliar terrain?! To a girl that's been told by society all her life that the way to prevent an attack is to not be out at dark in strange places,  this situation was CUH REEPPPPPY! Huck told me I was fine, I had nothing to fear, and started telling me "this one time, I saw this guy-" yeah, don't tell girls those stories until you're in a well lit area with lots of people around! Things like this still happen!

At which point the trail opened up to the asphalt path. "See! We're done!"...except there was still a mile to go around the lake. Huck and I were on different pages of "half way"- half through the trail or half through the lake?! I was scared and off my game, so I ran. No clue how fast, and every now and then I walked, but whatever.

Date night tonight and icing my shins as I prep for a long run tomorrow!

Here's to the next TV timeout!
-Syd

...so THAT's why!

I learned why the SmartCoach plan had me running every other day at that pace and that I definitely need to make Tempo runs my b**** the reaaaalllllly fun way Tuesday night! Huck and I met up at one of my favorite route spots where the houses are HUGE, partially on a greenway around a lake and sort of idyllic for our 10:30 first "warm up" mile. My shins were SCREAMING at me as we went down the hill from where we parked our cars, but I figured it would be fine once it leveled out.

Well, sort of. I had a mini freak out when we didn't know whether to go straight or turn around the lake, and once my "go! go! go!" focus gets messed up, its pretty darn hard to tune out the feeling of being lost while your shins hurt and now your knee hurts and TADA your surprise for THIS run is your hamstrings are tightening up while you're pushing pace. While literally saying "something generically motivating", Huck got to watch the side of me saying "yeah, see! go go! you've got this! tune out the pain, focus, you've only got 2 more miles left at this pace and then a super easy mile cool down!" try to take down the "expletive EXpLETIvE this HURTS!" side.

Unfortunately, the answer was solved by salt water, namely the tears that started streaming down my face as we kept running, finally knowing the route. We walked around a bit, looked at houses that we will probably never be able to afford and their lovely gardens, and plotted what to do. I finally let Huck convince me to do p90X plyometrics workout, which has lots of jumping around since "even though you might hate Tony Horton, he really does just want the best for you, and there's lots of low impact modifications you can do" according to the boy. We walked back to our cars, played on a swing set, got leftover Easter candy at CVS, and then conqured p90x- and I only did modifications for the very last set of stuff.

Different parts of my legs hurt last night as we saw Daniel Tosh, and now my cheeks and abs hurt sooo much from laughing, but it was totally worth it. Trying to conquer Lake Johnson with its 3 evil hills this afternoon. Thankfully this run is "easy" and it shall be treated as such, darnit!

Here's to the next TV timeout!

-Syd

You want me to do WHAT?!

Prescribed run: 2 miles at 12:35 pace
Actual run: 2.11 miles at 10:26 pace

How did I get that "prescription" you ask?! Well, you see, on the heels of that "ok, let's run a 2 hour half!" conversation with Huck, I explored around Runner's World website and found their "Smart Coach." The target race is Nov. 4, and it took some finagling, but I finally input all the right stuff to get the end race distance to 2:04, the closest it would get me, based on my first half results. And yeah, it spit out this for the first week. Yes, a 30 week plan starts with this :

PS Mom? If you put in my 8k time (55 mins), it starts you out at 12:30 pace and finish out at a 2:10 half, just sayin'!

It was supposed to be "easy" but Huck and I kept pushing each other. As he pointed out, a couple months ago, I'd yell at him, tell him he was fired, if he pushed pace. Now?! When my shins KILL on the uphill and I switch to the balls of my feet, I match his stride length and turnover and he warns me "don't push pace too much!" because our "easy" run has quickly turned into a "I'm not backing down, are you?!"

Running at 6pm was kind of BLEGh especially when you add the fact that maybe 200 feet of the run was flat?! It was 72, pretty sure cars kept kicking up dust into my eyes as I ran, and my mouth was parched by the time I was half up the hill. Loved that beyond the half point, Huck turned around and said something generically motivating and we had a hilarious "this is how I hurt" ... and kept running.

If I stayed on the balls of my feet as I ran downhill, I could match Huck's turnover and it hurt WAY less running! I also made sure to stretch like crazy when I got home. Like always, I have to remind myself that I just have to get past the first 5 minutes of the run and life is ... well, life?!

Oh, and as for the prescribed plan? I'll play it by ear, do what feels easy, even if its (hopefully) way above pace for SmartCoach :)

Here's to the next TV timeout!

-Syd

"Oh my gawd, you're beautiful"

I'm still in that post-run high, so with apologies for the scatterbrained, here goes the list:

1.  Loving that song right now! Hit play, and keep reading :D
2. Also super happy the weather in NC cooled back down a little so I didn't have to wake up before the sun to beat the sub-50's to start my run. Started out around 9am when it was sunny but 48*. As a "thank you" gift for mentoring for the 8k program, we got Brooks compression arm sleeves, and I had one on my right arm. No real reason except I wanted to rock the one sleeve look?! I took it off when I started warming up, about 2 miles in and tucked it into my shorts. Was suuuuper tempted to tuck it into my back and give myself a tail but when you're already wearing a neon green shirt that says "I got lucky..." on the front, well, I was standing out :/ Oh, and I totally rocked my aviators! I got "sport" sunglasses but they keep  trying to slip off my face, so I decided that even though my $10 polarized metal frame aviators aren't DESIGNED for running, if they work, go with it!
3. Totally about to make these babies when I'm done, although I am lacking green chiles. Good thing the Grub Cat around the corner has less than zero standards for my post-shower high fashion!
4. 
   Had an AMAZING post run high going on (will explain later), and even realizing that Huck and I had been locked out of his place didn't dim it much. Again, the weather was BEAUTIFUL, so we watered the new plants in the front, the food garden in the back, even the brussel sprout plants the bugs are devouring, and sunbathed on his deck as we relished the fact that at least BOTH of us stank :) Huck now has lantana and a blue (fave color) hydrangea (favorite flower) growing in his front yard. It looks super put together now. He's raising the bar for all his neighbors, muwhahahaha.
5. I'm going to probably keep running for as much as I can this summer, even if it means dying in the heat. Might have to do the run 6 days a week thing and make the runs short and at the crack of dawn...so I say in April when July's heat and humidity hasn't begun to wreck its havoc, but if I build up momentum, I won't want to lose it. I've decided the next goal is a 2 hour marathon, which equates to about a 9 min pace. Keep in mind that I just did a 2:30 half, which is a 11:20-ish pace. That's 2 minutes/mile over LONG distance to cut. Oh, and the goal race is a nice and hilly one in November and has just become the NC Half Championships- no pressure! If I increase speed, doing long runs will be less annoying and time consuming and I might start being in the first half of the finishers for races! If I want to keep running into my 70's, I've got to build some speed to lose over the next half century! So, 7 months (including the brutal NC summer) to drop 2 minutes off my race pace?! That's why Huck said "suck up the pain for your legs and let's go." His lower calves are killing him, so going up hills was painful for him and watching Huck admit pain isn't something I see that often, especially since he likes to be all macho and tough for me ;) Meanwhile, my shin splints make hills somewhat of a relief. Yes, my gluteus maximus and thighs kill, but at least the shins go "wheee!!!" for a bit. Yin and Yang, Huck and I are!
6. Out of somewhere, which now that I think about it, I have no clue where that came from, Huck decided our magic min. distance for today should be 5 miles. I mapped out a course from his place, threw in a killer hill that's about a mile and when you've almost conquered it, ratches up the incline just as a "hey, how do you like me NOW?!" I always have to tell myself to just. keep. running. even after I get to the top, teach myself that yes, you can kill the hill and then keep going :) For speed nights with the 8k training group, we used to go .15 miles down the street and RUN up that hill, then do that 6 times. That makes ANY other hill you ever have to do seem like a breeze, straights feel like downhills and downhills feel like you're more than coasting :) Oh, and this hill was about the halfway point of our run. But, once we got to the top, I caught my breath and gave Huck the "we're through the worst of it, I promise!" and he kept plodding. 
7. We walked through the shopping center a bit after the aforementioned evil hill. Don't want to tackle/dodge Whole Foods Saturday morning shoppers! Oh, and its the complex where Fleet Feet is, I was wearing a shirt that boldly proclaimed my FF allegiance, sooo I decided to set a great example!
8. We had to stop to cross a super busy road, and we knew from about that corner to our stop corner was 2 miles, straight shot, a few busy streets to cross, so Huck and I looked at each other and just said "kill it?!" We know I can run 10:30 miles for a while, so our goal pace for this 5-er was to drop the pace by 10 seconds. Not much, but enough to make it a little uncomfortable but attainable. If we'd set 9:30s or even 10s for the goal pace, when we kept going too slow, I'd have burned out and gotten way too frustrated. 7 months to drop pace, this was a long steady run, so only slight pressure. I'd started my running app (I'm on to Map My Run now, btw since I can load my pre-determined routes onto it and then make sure I'm on track if its roads/turns I'm not familiar with mid-run) before we actually started, so it kept telling me I was doing 12, then 11 min average pace, while Huck's more accurately started app said we were doing 10 somethings. He hadn't given me an update in a while, so standing at the stoplight, we agreed to start leaving more of ourselves on the sidewalk- major hill killed, less than 2 miles to go, knew the pace needed to drop a bit to be on goal. Green light...
9. GO! Slight downhill, and I was just re-warming my legs up after standing at the stoplight for longer than my shins liked. About halfway up past Meredith College, Huck suggested we kick it up, but we were a bit too far from the stoplight for me to steadily maintain the burst I knew I had. There was this patch of shade and it looked like around there was where the sidewalk got another few degrees of incline, so I spit out a "not yet." We kept plodding, although this plodding was quite an attack, but under that tree, I just ZOOMED! Out of Huck's mouth? "Oh my gawd, you're beautiful," even as I had to maneuver behind a car that was coming out of the intersection and threatening to derail my utter slaying of the hill and leaving the bf in the dust. Best. running. compliment. ever?! 
10. We had to stop at the light at the almost apex of the hill and Huck paused RunKeeper, saw our new average pace and said "flippin' A, we're killing it, but I'm not telling you because I don't want you to slack off. Let's just keep going like this and... wow!"
11. Nothing like the past minute to keep you motivated, so we kept going... and going...and going... hit one more stoplight and plotted. "Leave it all out here? Less than a mile 'til home? Its okay if we can't keep it up, but let's just see..." as we faced these rolling hills. They sort of suck because you can't see the valleys from even 1/4 mile away. It just plain seems EVIL, darnit! We got down, up, down, and I eeked out a "I make no promises to X street", the next top of the hill "driveway!", telling Huck I promised the driveway halfway up the hill. But then we got there, and I was letting out some growls to remind the hill that I that it was my b**** and just. kept. going. I could see the top of the hill and downhill slope to our stop point, sooo why not keep it up? 
12. I pointed out a car that was a bit before our stop street to end at, just to make our cool down longer since we'd gone beyond 5, so really, the harm of an extra 200 feet of cool down? Nada. Huck agreed and after the last cross street it was ON! We raced and sprinted to the end and it was about this time that Huck checked his phone, stopped it IMMEDIATELY to not let our lazy walking interfere with this apparent miracle we'd pulled off. 
13. 5.3 miles. 9:56 average pace. Goal pace de. STROYYYYED.

14. Yeah, I sort of feel like the bug now. Half that, and half "I wanna go dance party it UP!" But its amazing to have that under your belt and know that your 600 calorie burn for Saturday morning is dunzo :) 

Have an AMAZING Saturday!

Here's to the next TV Timeout,

-Syd

Bunny Ears and Easter Eggs

I'm signed up for this baby and I realized that 10 days is plenty of time to rest my poor shins and that today was as good as any to get back on the horse. Plus... there was THIS : http://www.capitalrunwalk.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/Easter-Egg-map.pdf

I mapped out the best route I thought I could do in the 1 hour. I'm going to let you guess and figure out what I could do, keeping in mind that the top of the Dan Allen deck is like... 4 floors?! I won't tell you until the end so go, search!

Huck came with me and I wore bunny ears and a pink top, getting into the Easter spirit- it was Maunday Thursday, anyway :) At each location, you picked up an egg, and different colored eggs meant different numbers of raffle tickets. We got back after our 3 stops, 4.8 miles (we got off my pre-planned 4.21 mile route a few times) and had 14 tickets (figure out where we went yet?!) so we dropped them in different raffle bowls. I went for a foam roller, pint glass and t-shirt, and visor and Road ID giftcard- I was totally thinking of you, KR! They had 1 hour with a yoga instructor, 8 week course for Yoga for Runners, and free Brooks shoes, but I do yoga on my own and love my Mizunos.

People LOVE talking to Huck because he's got Fila toe shoes, not Vibrams. This is also about when we discovered that both Huck and I had dropped some of our "Keep this Ticket" stubbs into the bowls. Oops...I won nada :/ BUT Huck got compression sleeves for his legs in S/M and (worst of all) Carolina blue. BLEGH! He got to trade them for large red ones- go WOLFPACK! I also ran into people I know thanks to the roomie and Fleet Feet-ness.

This run felt really good. We were going a 10:30-ish pace until we had to make sure we found the egg keepers and just where my super-awesome pre-planned route took us. The person for our final spot WASN'T THERE, and we had to sort of take some pretttty risky street crossings, so we were super bummed until we ran into the lady halfway back to the store. Nothing like last minute let down and then win :) My shins ached, but I made sure to stretch afterwards and just sort of realized this was the suck level, the music rocked, focus on the eggs and maybe a bit of chit chat with Huck ;)

Sooo we went to White Memorial Church, Fred Fletcher Park and then the Belltower. 14 tickets :) 28 total, 1 win, 4.8 miles, great night :)

Here's to the next TV timeout!
-Syd