It's Official!

I'm officially registered for my second half marathon! Training starts this week. I'm super excited!

It's tomorrow!

I've probably started 20-30 different posts over the last 3ish weeks but never found the time or patience to sit down and finish one. Oh well.

In less than 18 hours, I'll be running my first half marathon. My emotions are all over the place right now. I'm nervous, excited, and everything in-between. I've been watching the weather forecasts like a hawk for the past week, but nobody can agree on what's going to happen because of the remnants of Isaac ... jerk. And it changes every 3 or 4 hours. I'm still not 100% sure what I'm going to wear, either. I'll probably change my mind at least a dozen times between now and when I leave for BG in the morning.

And after the race, I'll come home and shower quick, watch the beginning of the Ohio State football game (GO BUCKS), and finish packing. Then I get to drive 2ish hours to Ft Wayne, IN to celebrate a good friend's wedding! I can't wait to see S! I'm not COMPLETELY crazy, though. I already have a  hotel room reserved where the reception is for Saturday night. After the party, I'm going upstairs and collapsing on the king-size bed and hopefully sleeping better than I have in a long time. I may even have a friend coming down to stay with me for the night and hang out. I haven't seen them in a long time so it'd be nice to catch up ... especially in these swanky hotel rooms! :)

Maybe I'll even be making an extra stop somewhere in IN on my way home? Visit a friend or 2? We shall see.

Next post will probably be a ton of pictures ... and maybe an August wrap up ... and hopefully some jumping up and down excited-ness was well. Send some positive and encouraging thoughts my way, please! :)

Birthday and 2x the PDRs!

I turned 26 on Saturday and I'm still not used to it. It's really weird to think of myself as an "adult", but maybe it wouldn't be so hard if I was out on my own and working a "normal" job. Oh well. Going to have to wait a little while longer for that.

I didn't slack off my long run just because it was my birthday, though I did decide I'd rather sleep in a little longer and then run when it was a little warmer. My training plan called for 9.5 miles, but I've been trying to stay a half mile or so ahead of my long run distances [just call me an over-achiever] which meant ... my first double-digit run. Ever. *insert dramatic music here*

That tenth mile is about 2 minutes longer than the others because I had a moment where I was deciding if I was going to throw up or not. It wasn't pleasant, trust me. I haven't felt like that since the finish line of Happy Trails 5k over a month ago. But, I was able to enjoy the run for most of the time. I had an awesome playlist and there was a nice breeze blowing off the river in areas. It might have been a bit easier on me if I had run on pavement, but there isn't consistent shade on any roads near my house and I knew I could plan in a water bottle refill along the towpath.

One thing about my run that I WASN'T happy about ... it was also the day the metroparks was hosting the bike tours and I was running on the towpath trail that connects a couple of the parks. Most of the cyclists were very courteous of others on the trail, but there were a couple who REALLY ticked me off. I was yelled at to "get out the way" by a group of cyclists who were riding 2-wide in a really narrow area of the trail. I was already on the edge of the stone when this happened so I just held my ground and forced one of them to drop back and slide over. And then when I got closer to the Farnsworth shelter house the cyclists were using for lunch [near my turn-around point], I actually had someone ride down the MIDDLE of the trail [nobody else around] and clip my shoulder with their mirror. Of course, I yelled at him and he just looked back over his shoulder at me like "What?". Come on, jerk. You rode up on ME on a straight part of the trail, so you knew I was there [how could you miss the BRIGHT orange shirt?!] and your mirror hit me hard enough that it moved out of position, so there's no way you didn't notice that you hit me. No "sorry". Nothing. And, yes, I do have a light bruise on my arm. I didn't even notice it until I was leaving for the evening and my mom pointed it out. I have a few friends within the metroparks organization and I sent them an email about the situation. I know they won't be able to find out who it was, and I wouldn't expect them to, but maybe they'll say something to the specific program organizer and they'll stress the "rules of the road" next time around. Metroparks have been stressing the rotr with runners on their trails so maybe the cyclists need to be included in this crackdown.

I did have an awesome evening with some old friends, though. We got Chipotle and took it to a little seating area around the "pond" at the Fallen Timbers Mall, where we hung out until movie time. I've had a tradition for over a decade now of seeing a movie on my birthday, almost always either a Harry Potter or Batman flick. This year is was "The Dark Knight Rises". Freaking awesome. Besides the awesomeness of the movie, I got to see one of my favorite football players (Hines Ward) run across my favorite field (Heinz Field) one more time [PS - GO PITTSBURGH! Less than a month until pre-season starts! :D]. There was actually a kid in the theatre who yelled "Run Hines Run!" I nearly fell out of my seat laughing. Of course, we finished off the night with chocolate fudge cake and my favorite wine from Heineman Winery :)

This weekend was actually a double PDR weekend. I had planned on getting up "early" Sunday and going for a bike ride. I figured it would be a good mental and physical detox after Saturday. Instead, it go put off until the hottest part of the day and I took a route I hadn't so far ... the west end of the W-C Trail loop. A couple days away from the bike this past week must have been a good thing because my backside didn't hurt AT ALL at the end of this ride, so maybe that's the trick to putting in longer mileage rides?

I'll probably set 2 more PDRs next weekend, but I'm going to enjoy these ones while they stand. The double-digit run on my birthday was pretty darn special to me :)

It's official. I've registered for my half marathon. It's slightly more real now. I usually snail mail my race registrations to avoid the service fees, but I just wanted to get this done so I couldn't talk myself into backing out [which WAS a possibility of even with me being halfway through my training plan].

Also - Does anyone use special software or program to write your posts off-line ahead of time? Our internet is iffy at home right now so I've been working from either Panera or a coffee shop a LOT lately (I don't like going into campus unless I have to ... I just feel trapped in that basement lab). Preferably free? This is one of the reasons my posts have been so scattered lately. Sometimes I write out as much as I can in a word or basic text document, but I almost always end of having some weird formatting error or I can't get the post to look the way I want it to in the end and I have to waste time retyping everything once I get to internet. We're supposed to be up and running (and faster than before) by the end of this week, but I have a feeling I'm going to need this option more and more once/ if I get the kind of job I want. I can't spend ALL my time sitting in coffee and sandwich shops on blogger. lol

10 Days ...

... Since I last posted. How have I not made time to write this before now? Sheesh. And it's not like I've been super busy ... time just got away from me. Oh well. Let me esplain. No, let me sum up! (Name that movie!) I'll include some pictures to make up for all the text I'm about to blast you with.

Ready to go!

Last Saturday was pretty awesome. I ROCKED Happy Trails 5k. M decided to run it WITH me since he was in town for the weekend without the wifey (he hurt his hamstring so he's pouting about running "slow" while it heals). His wife probably isn't going to like this statement (sorry, E!), but I love that boy to death. He was one of the people who pushed me towards running when I was dealing with all that crap in my life and continues to be one of my biggest supporters. He knows EXACTLY how to push my buttons to make me run faster. He knew pointing out those teenage girls at the start line who talked through the National Anthem would tick me off and make me start faster to get ahead of them [proud granddaughter, niece, and friend of veterans and I've been raised to respect all symbols of our country: anthem, flag, etc.]. He knew telling me I couldn't do something would make me push that much harder to do it, even if it meant keeping me ticked off for all 3.1 miles. So thanks, M ... I think. lol. The best part? I beat my "old" 5k PR ... which was set on a relatively straight road course. ON TRAILS! I really think all the trail running paid off. I just FELT strong. You transition from pavement to sand/ dirt just past halfway and while others faded a bit, I pushed forward and felt "in my element." Is it weird that even though I felt like I was pushing my hardest during the race and almost threw up at the finish line (seriously, I was dry-heaving over a trash can next to a vendor booth), I walked away thinking "I could have run that even faster"? I haven't seen any pictures yet, but I'm sure I was grinning like a crazy person as I sprinted through the finish line. I'm pretty sure M and I scared the crap out of the people in the car next to us on the highway heading home because we were getting our dance party on, blasting LMFAO and whatever other crazy songs we could find on my iPod. :)

I hadn't been home more than an hour when I got a phone call saying I had won a door prize from one of the race's sponsors ... 3 canisters of Reliv's innergize (2 lemon and 1 orange). I'd never heard of it before, but I'm slowly learning. Maybe I'll do a review of it someday, but you can check out the link I provided for the product's website for details now. And, really, this little win came at an interesting time for me. Money is a little tight around here, so I've fallen back to my old friend Gatorade instead of spending the money on nuun or Zipfizz. Don't get me wrong, I love nuun and Zipfizz, but they just don't fit in my budget right now. I'm not particularly fond of how much sugar there is in Gatorade (especially with my family history of diabetes and my attempt to cut some sugar OUT of my diet lately), but it's worked for me for years. Our local Sam's stocks the big 76.5 ounce canisters of the Frost Glacier Freeze (the blue kind), my favorite, so I'm good to go for a little while (thanks mommy!). After a conversation with the Reliv product rep when I picked up my prize and a good friend who's a nurse and nutrition student, I decided to take my 8 oz serving of the innergize an hour or 2 before any runs or workouts (up to 2 a day) and rely on my gatorade to get me through the exercise. I've been doing this for a week now and everything seems to be going ok. We've had some obnoxiously hot days and I've done some seriously crazy runs in that heat (which I'll talk about more later), but I haven't gotten any dehydration headaches or muscle cramps. So, something seems to be working.

I had planned on Happy Trails being my last race before my September half marathon, but my cousin's wife messaged me about a 5k they they're going to be running this coming weekend for the church they both work for, the Global Distance Project 5k. My first inclination was to just go watch the hilarity of my cousin running a 5k, but his wife talked me into running it with them. So, one more.

We had 2 days of crazy thunderstorms at the beginning of last week, which of course I loved. Besides loving storms, I really enjoy getting out and seeing how rain water flows through our environment. It's the envrio science nerd in me, what can I say. :) I was out driving around when one of the biggest waves of storms came through so I headed to the nearest metropark, Side Cut. Boy, did I get a surprise!

Bench under water, broken pavement (already broken before storm, but had been
eroded and damaged even more), and  "bridge" about to go under water.

What I'm not showing you is that right above all this are 3 old canal locks. Normally, water barely trickles through them. That day, it was rushing. Somewhere up-run, there was a system that just wasn't able to keep up with the amount of water that was flowing. While I knew this wasn't a good thing, I was absolutely fascinated. I probably spent a half hour wandering up and down the walkways along the locks trying to take pictures from under my umbrella.

The ungodly hot and humid day after all the storms, I went for my normal run at Oak Openings. I should have known I'd find a tree down across my planned trail. *rolls eyes* And, because I was too stubborn to re-route my run, I decided to go THROUGH it (there was no going around it - the ferns were too thick). There was a fork in the branches that I knew I'd fit through, so I went for it. Stupid me. The branches scratched up my right thigh and ankle pretty good (which was really uncomfortable as my legs got sweaty later on the run), but it wasn't until the next morning that I noticed I had HUGE BRUISES striping my thigh as well. This really was the trail run from hell. Once I completed the Sand Dunes loop, I switched over to the Ferns and Lakes loop, which was an even bigger mistake. I really should have just called it a day and gone home. Besides almost stepping on a squirrel AND a snake (only the 2nd time I've EVER seen a snake ON a trail over there), the heat and humidity trapped in the woods just drained me and I had to abort the loop and run back to the car on the paved portion of the all-purpose trail. It ended up being about the same mileage as I would have done, but a LOT less stress and effort.

And, of course, this was also the day we couldn't get any relief from the heat at home either. We found out the a/c was broken when we went to turn it on (house actually got 5* HOTTER), and the chlorinator in the pool malfunctioned and the chlorine got so high your eyes burned just going NEAR it! We completely detached the chlorinator and it's JUST getting down to the level where swimming is comfortable again. As for the a/c? There was a wire broken on the compressor (we suspect dad did it when he decided to power-wash that side of the house 2 weeks ago). It took the repair guy 5 minutes to find and replace it. $85. Ugh. Let's just say everyone in our house was a little testy for a couple days. I pretty much holed up in my bedroom with my 3 fans, cups of ice, and movies when I wasn't freezing my butt off in my basement lab on campus. If I wasn't already intimately aware of the creepy crawlies and odd late-night sounds down there, I may have just brought an air mattress to campus and spent the nights down in the lab. The last time I bothered to look at the thermostat in there (it reads the temp but doesn't actually control anything ... how crappy is that?!), which was Thursday afternoon, it read 62*. I was wearing jeans and a long-sleeve tee all day.

Saturday is, of course, long run day for me. Since I had a 5k last weekend and another this coming weekend, I NEEDED to do a long run THIS weekend. I hadn't really explored the towpath trail between Bend View and Providence so I figured I'd run down to Providence and back, and maybe down to the Bend View shelter house and back depending on how I felt. According to the sign, it was 3.2 miles to Providence from the Bend View parking lot. To keep me from constantly watching my Garmin, I turned it on my wrist. The run TO Providence was pretty nice, actually. Even with the oppressive heat, I was in the shade and catching the breeze off the river for most of the way. Once I reached the dam, I looked at my Garmin. Almost 5 miles. Crap. This was already turning out to be a longer run than I had wanted. Since one of my fuel belt bottles was already dry, I tried to find a drinking fountain around the mill to refill it. No luck. I tried the water from the sink in the bathroom, but it was just plain nasty. I would have thrown up if I tried to drink that on a run. So, long story made WAY short: ran out of water around 7 miles. Walk intervals got longer and more frequent until I decided I couldn't run any more. Inhaled an entire bottle of Gatorade once I stumbled back to my car. My legs felt completely trashed all day yesterday and they're still a little tired today. I need to get better with my hydration and nutrition. Quick. But at least my first 9.5-miler is in the books :)

... And now I need to go because I'm getting trash talk texts about Saturday's 5k. I love that boy, but I'm going to kick his butt! I love my family :)

It's Wednesday Again?

I feel like my head hasn't stopping spinning in a week and a half!

$6,000+ and a refurbished engine later, we now have dad's truck back from the dealership. Apparently a piston seized in the engine while mom was driving the camper out to Sandusky for Ohio Bike Week. Luckily they weren't far from home and we were able to rig up a hitch for mom's SUV to get the camper the rest of the way there and then home again. According to dad, the only thing more obnoxious than dealing with the truck was dealing with the mayflies. I guess they had 2 different hatchings while they were out at the lake ... and those suckers make a MESS.

I found 8 of the 9 codewords for Week 1 of "The Great Park Search." I never went out to the Bay last week so I never bothered with Pearson's codeword. So far this week I have:

[Funny story. The older gentleman I saw running around with a clipboard last year collecting code words? I ran into him for the first time this year while I was getting Farnsworth's word yesterday. And he recognized me right away. He made a joke about how I was going to be his main competition again this year. I just laughed and walked back to my car. lol]

Mule's "hotel"! They weren't there, though. I think they go "home" on days they aren't running the canal boat.

The granite glacial erratic! I love this thing [Yes, I'm a nerd].

... So I'd say I'm doing pretty well. :)

Great Park Search is helping keep me honest with my #RWRunStreak too. Once I know where the codewords are in each park, I know the trails well enough to know where I can get in a quick mile or so run on my "rest" days. As much as I'm enjoying the challenge of the streak, I'll be glad when it's over. I'm finding more and more how much my legs really do need those rest days, especially as I'm increasing my mileage for half marathon training. I can feel the tiredness in my muscles when I go out for my 3-milers. Probably not a great thing when I have my 5k this Saturday, but oh well. Its more than halfway done and it won't affect my half marathon training in the long run.

This week officially starts my half marathon training. With this, I'm getting serious about recording everything in my journal. I'm still playing around with what exactly is important enough to record. I'm just not sure what kind of details would benefit me being able to read about later. Any tips or ideas?

Hopefully next time I'll talk more about my actual runs and maybe a rant or 2 about trail running in the metroparks. I've got a couple good stories from this past week. lol

What kind of things do you record in your running journal? Every little detail? Or are you a minimalist?

Streaking and Upcoming Races

Are you participating in Runner's World's running streak? You run at least 1 mile EVERY DAY between Memorial Day and July 4. Just 38 days. You can check out the action on twitter using #RWRunStreak. It may be a bad idea for me, but I'm going for it. I like challenging myself.

I got in Day #1 of my run streak last night at Oak Openings. Holy cow was it warm and humid, even back in the dunes! I giggled a little bit because there were SO many people around Mallard Lake but I didn't pass ANYONE out on the trail. It's like people think Mallard Lake IS the ENTIRE park (and they're SO wrong!). Despite the oppressive humidity, I still enjoyed myself. My music was turned down enough that I could still hear the birds and wildlife around me. And I almost tripped over a squirrel who didn't move out of the way until the very last second. Oh, and I ran the loop the opposite direction I normally do. Bad idea. I hate running UP the dune face and then DOWN the stairs. :-P

As (some of) you know, I hit my goal of a sub-30 minute 5k race a couple weeks ago, more than 2 months before I had planned on. I'd been saying for the past year that I had to hit that before I'd consider a longer race (I'm not counting my St Patrick's Day 7k, lol). Even though I'm really proud of myself, it left me with a decision to make ... do I now set myself a quicker goal and go for it again or do I start looking towards longer races ... maybe even a half marathon?

I'm already registered for one more 5k, Happy Trails. It holds a special place in my memory because it was my first 5k last year and it reminded me why I enjoyed being competitive and racing in any form. My "training" for Happy Trails last year was just finishing Couch to 5k and seeing how long I could run without walking. And no real trail/ off-road running. This year, I'm taking a slightly different approach. Since about half the course is unpaved trail, I'm putting my trail shoes to good use and running AT LEAST ONCE A WEEK on the metropark trails. I haven't been running at the actual park where the race is, but I'm very familiar with it (I used to live right around the corner from there) and I think the trails I've been running are more difficult. Plus, the race avoids the dunes and major hills and the trails I've been running out at Oak Openings don't. I go to group run every Thursday night and I'll use those as my speed workouts (since I was doing that already anyway. lol). The race course will be marked a couple days ahead of time, so I'll probably put in 1 or 2 practice runs the week of, though I heard the course is the same as last year.

As for the future ... I haven't signed up for anything yet since I could end up on the other side of the country by the end of the summer but, yes, I'm looking at a half marathon for September 1. The Boy Scout Council my dad and brother are a part of put on the "Soaring Eagle Runs" every year in Bowling Green, Ohio. Course can be viewed HERE. There is the "Boy Scout Half Marathon", the "Tenderfoot 5k", and the "Tiger Cub Half-Mile Run". They are "dedicated to recognize and support our youth and the Scouting traditions and values, from Tiger Cubs to Eagle Scouts." These races are an amazing value too. If you register online by the end of June, the half is only $28, $33 if you register before August 21, and $40 if you wait until the day of. All early registrations will get a wicking race shirt. It sounds like is great support along the course as well (but you can read more about that on the website if you're interested).

Since it IS my first time running a half marathon, I've been spending A LOT of time pouring over all the different training plans and I THINK I may have found one that works for me (well, at least better than the other ones I've found). I'm using Hal Higdon's Novice 2 Half Marathon Training Plan ... with a few tweaks:

That purple star on the 21st? My 26th birthday! :)

Cross training will probably be a combination of mountain biking, swimming, and hiking.

I'm planning to use Tuesday as my trail run days since they're only 3 miles. Trail running will make me stronger, plus I like running in the shady woods in the middle of summer. :)

Thursdays will continue to be my speed workouts at group run. It works out well, distance-wise, and I enjoy the opportunity to test myself against some faster runners since I usually run alone.

The major change I made to the plan was with the weekend long run. Higdon's plan has the distance increasing pretty much 1 mile per week, but I need something more gradual. Running this much (and often) every week is going to be enough of a challenge. My plan is to do my longer runs on the canal trail or a loop of the paved roads and trails at Oak Openings (if I can get up early enough that it won't be blazing hot - very little shade on this route).

My concerns:
- How will my body (especially my shins and ankles) take to running this often and this many miles? I'll need to pay close attention to aches and pains.
- I need to figure out a nutrition/ refueling strategy. I've never used GU or anything like that before. I guess it's time to start experimenting. Any suggestions or tips?
- I'm going to need new running shoes soon? I'm saving up the money now, but I know the bottom is going to drop out of my checking account very soon, so I'm nervous. How late is too late to introduce new shoes before a race?

What do you think? Any suggestions? Tips? Holy-crap-are-you-crazys?