Playing catch-up

I know, I know. I haven't been a good blogger lately. But I have been a decent runner, y'all just don't know about it. :)

I have been running. In fact, I ran just 6 days after my marathon and that was a 10k in the middle of the afternoon on trails (read: rocks & hills). Just over an hour time too. Needless to say, this has been, by far, the best marathon & recovery period of my life. I might actually say screw pace groups from now on. I know my body best after all. Phil (my Garmin 405) and I all the way baby!

I have actually only been running 10k distances in the month since my marathon. However, I decided after dropping off my nephew with his parents and driving back to northern Illinois (7 hour car ride round trip), I'm going to get back to it. And I ran 10 miles at 7:30p Sunday evening. That was epic. I was sore that night but it was great to hit double digits again. Even my first 4 miles were really consistent at 9:35 pace!

But now I'm thinking forward. I really have no plans for any races this summer. I haven't signed up for anything yet. I have a few in mind. An 8k in Rockford. Found out about a 5k the day before the 8k. I figured that will be a challenging weekend and might be good to test. Other than that, I really don't know of any races to do. Nothing really stands out as something I want to do. I'm still debating whether or not I am going to a fall marathon. If I do, it's going to be the Indianapolis Monumental Marathon in November. (Which will be tough to train for with a 2 week trip to India happening at the end of August but we'll see.) So yea, if there's a race out there in the far western suburbs, let me know about it. I would still like to try for a half marathon PR sometime as well. Preferably while NOT training for a marathon. :-)

Then I've been thinking more and more about a triathlon.

Now, I haven't been swimming in months, thanks to canceling my YMCA membership. But I might join Luke's here rather soon (more on that later). But I would like to see a triathlon happen first before jumping in. I especially want to see how a transition is done between the swim & bike part. (What exactly do you wear under a wet suit?) There was one last weekend but I had my nephew and couldn't drag him out of bed at 7a to go stand around watching a bunch of people do crazy stuff. There's another triathlon at the end of July. However, it's the day after Luke's sister's wedding. And the one that I actually want to do, is August 1. So I don't think I'll be able to do a tri this year. But I would still like to see one happen.

I have my first official bike ride this weekend. I plan on getting together with my good friend, Kevin (with whom I've done many bike rides with -- RAGBRAI being one of them) and we're going to go around the southern Wisconsin countryside for 31 miles. Luke will be joining us on his mountain bike but I don't think he'll have any problems keeping up with us.

To get my saddle bones ready for the mileage, Luke & I went on a bike ride Monday night. We went almost 18 miles. And we both felt really good afterwards. Even though he had a high mileage weekend (30k total) and I had ran 10 miles the evening before. The only part of me that's sore is the top of my shoulder/neck muscles. That's just from having my shoulders so high up by my ears. I really want to get aero bars and I will one day!

I haven't lifted any weights in 2 weeks and Monday after work was my first time so I only did the circuit twice. I also opted to go down in weight by 10 pounds for each machine. Except for the butterfly. I still managed to do that at 30 pounds! My abs are a little sore but other than that I feel fine.

Tonight is going to be packing and packing. That counts as weight lifting right? :-) But really, I'm going to be getting out of DeKalb and moving to Geneva. I've already been living there since the beginning of May, which is why you haven't seen any of my normal running routes and why they've all been over there. It's an interesting transition for both of us. I remembered why I decided to go broke my 3rd year after they raised the rent on me quite considerably. I hate packing & moving. What sucks is that I've helped several people move but of course, I helped them all move OUT of town, so they can't come back to help ME move. Luckily, I now have the boyfriend's friends to help out if needed. :-)

Categories: 10 miles, biking, Indianapolis Monumental Marathon, moving, races, triathlon

A fast 10 miles

OK, so this is going to be a completely opposite run description than my 9 mile from last weekend.

This 10 miles was one of the best ones I've had in a while. To get right to the point, I finished 8 minutes faster than I had told Luke I would, for an average of 9:16 min/mi. I have no idea what happened.

Didn't do anything different the morning of before my run. Had a bagel & cream cheese and a half a bottle of Gatorade as Luke drove us up to his parents house. Had my iPod with me, which I didn't last weekend. Maybe that's the difference right there? Another difference, I didn't know the route too well. Friday night we mapped out a 10 mile route around his parents neighbourhood. I printed it out on Saturday morning and uploaded the course to my Garmin. And finally, the temperature was in the low 20's & a slight wind. Nothing like last week's strong wind. But I figured with the cold & new route I would be slow.

I left Luke at his parents house to chop wood (he's slightly injured so not running before his 15k this coming weekend) and told him I'll be back in 1:40, 10 minutes per mile pace and off I went. He watched me leave and as I looked back behind me when I got to the end of the driveway he was still watching me. Poor guy. He misses running.

I left my Garmin on the navigation screen so I can see the directional arrow which meant I couldn't see my pace or my time. I did get chased by a little Shi Zu dog right at the heels. I was so afraid I was gonna kick him! I kept telling him to go back but he wouldn't listen. Finally I stopped my watch and turned around getting ready to pick him up and take him back to his house when his ears perked up and he went tearing back to his garage thankfully.

There was one huge hill that I ran UP. Only because I went opposite of how Luke told me to go but the route had a half mile tacked on at the end and I didn't feel like walking half mile back so I figured I would take a few short cuts here & there. Bad move for this area. It's around mile 5 on the elevation chart. Check it out. That hurt me bad.

There was another hill at mile 8 that kinda hurt my legs and a final hill at mile 9 that I really started to feel soreness in my calves. I was thinking Luke is gonna give me a calf rub when I get back!!

My slowest mile was in fact that 8th mile with the 3rd hill; 10:03. That's when I decided to switch screens and I saw that my average pace was 9:18 per mile. "'Scuse me? I'm what?!" I never figured I would have seen that pace on my watch. I didn't feel like I was going that fast, that's for damn sure. And I finally got that knocked down another 2 seconds in the last mile of my run.

Came back to his parents place & Luke wasn't there. :( I was so ecstatic about my run that I wanted to show him. I managed to even take a shower & eat before he got back. When he came in, he told me I looked sad and was afraid my run didn't go as well. I did tell him that I was a bit disappointed that he wasn't there but I got over it as I went to tell him that how it went. And then he gave me a quad & calf rub over my jeans so all is good. Plus, he told me he was out shopping for my Valentine's Day present (last minute of course) and had to stand in line for 30 minutes. Ah, dating a procrastinator, fantastic. He did say that next time he's gonna go shopping earlier cause everything was picked over and thought about getting me a running silhouette pendant.

Then as I was sitting on the couch, I was actually feeling good muscle wise. So I thought outloud about actually doing something on Sunday, which I normally don't do. He suggested going to the gym and swimming together. Works for me!

We spent an hour & a half on weight machines on Sunday. OUCH. Dumbbell bench presses, fly machine, incline sit-ups, SQUATS, dips, crunches, obliques, calf presses, leg raises, upright cable rows, leg presses. The squats was interesting since I used a bar and well, I have really never done any squats before. Then we played a bit of basketball. He blocked my shots nearly every single time. Out ran me for the rebounds. I couldn't get by him not one bit and he even managed to knock the ball out of my dribble a few times. I do NOT like playing basketball with him. The only thing that I was good at was keeping him from getting to the basket too well.

After all that, Luke went swimming because I forgot my swimming suit at my house. I thought I grabbed the bag that had it but grabbed a backup running outfit. So he swam, while I critiqued his form. He's not exactly the best swimmer. For once I have him beat on something for sure.

Later that night my muscles started to hurt. Specifically my quads. Stupid squats. Today everything felt OK except for my stomach muscles, more specifically my obliques. Stupid crunches. So I knew the run tonight was going to be tough. This is my step back week so I only have 5 miles on Monday, Wednesday & Saturday. And sure enough, it was tough. I did it at 1% incline for the majority of my run but not all the time. And I kept it between 6.0, 6.1 and 6.2 mph. Nice and slow. My hamstrings are feeling it now. Wednesday's run should be better, I hope!

Activity Route: -- Elev. Avg: 0 ft Location: Cherry Valley, IL Elev. Gain: +0 ft Date: 02/13/10 Up/Downhill: [+0/-0] Time: 11:55 AM Difficulty: 0 / 5.0 Performance Distance: 10.01 miles Time: 1:32:55 Speed: 6.5 mph Pace: 9' 17 /mi Calories: 1062 Map Elevation (ft) Pace (min/mile) Splits Mile Pace (min/mile) Speed (mph) Elevation Gain actual +/- avg actual +/- avg 1 8' 48 -0' 29 6.8 +0.3 -- ft 2 9' 19 +0' 02 6.4 -0.0 -- ft 3 9' 10 -0' 07 6.5 +0.1 -- ft 4 9' 07 -0' 10 6.6 +0.1 -- ft 5 9' 19 +0' 02 6.4 -0.0 -- ft 6 9' 30 +0' 13 6.3 -0.2 -- ft 7 9' 32 +0' 15 6.3 -0.2 -- ft 8 9' 03 -0' 14 6.6 +0.2 -- ft 9 10' 03 +0' 46 6.0 -0.5 -- ft end 9' 02 -0' 15 6.6 +0.2 -- ft Versus average of 9' 17 min/mile

Posted from bimactive.com

Categories: 10 miles, Luke, weight training

Running 2 days in a row?!

Wow! The things I do for boys and happiness.

I ran my first double digit since the marathon on Saturday. Luke and I went up to Rockford to run on the Perryville Path. I've seen bikers on it plenty of times. We started from Midway Village and followed the path through there and then we went through a small neighbourhood (not on the path) and then later picked it up again. It was such a good

We decided to try something different this time. We stayed together for the first 2 miles until we got to the path and then he took off at his normal pace. It was awesome. Because then I got to listen to my music and run at my own pace and he got to do his own thing and we both got to go different mileage too.

It was funny; when we first took off, it didn't look like he really running any faster. Sure, he was leaving me behind but it really did look like I could keep up with him and then sooner or later, he was just a speck in the distance.

I ran 5.1 miles up and turned around. I figured that Luke would have passed me at some point in running back but he never did. I skipped the neighbourhood run and just followed the path south of where we started and came back up another entrance.

It was a pretty nice run/path except for one part. We had to cross Perryville. Which is pretty busy all the time. The run up wasn't too bad of a wait, I got the turn light so I was able to go pretty fast. However, on the way back, it SUCKED. I just missed the light so I had to wait and wait and wait. I hit the pedistratian light but I still waited for an entire minute at the light before I crossed illegally and when the north south traffic was stalled a little bit, I hit the road fast.

My original time goal was to at least run the second half faster than the first half. And I was doing it by a whole second by the time I got to the light (and 3 miles from the finish). But that minute added on 10 seconds to my time and it went from 9:06 to 9:16 and I only got down another second for the average pace by the end of the run.

However, at the end of the run, I saw Luke waiting for me. I was about done at 10.4 miles so I kept going until 10.5. At 10.45, I kicked it up a notch and around a corner started going faster. NOT a good idea at all! Once I was done, I started walking and my groin or inner thigh was hurting. Even Luke couldn't keep up with me! But in his defense, he didn't run all of last week cause of work. Didn't even go to the gym. Which is why I'm very impressed that he managed to run as far as he did. We're guessing he went 13 or 14 miles while I went 10.51.

Later was pasta with his parents. :-)

Look, he does exist!

Um, so really? I had to stop for a dead end?

Pretty!

Yep, I finally got a picture of him & I! Not the best but it'll do.

**********************************

Sunday had us going for another run, this time in DeKalb. He usually runs Saturday & Sunday. I normally don't. And with this groin pull, I didn't know exactly if I should. But I toughed it out and managed to get another 6.2 miles in. Luke was incredibly sore from Saturday's run AND that we played dodgeball Saturday morning and that uses muscles we haven't used in a while (throwing arms & the like).

We both agreed that yesterday's start, running together and then him taking off was the best thing for both of us. I didn't feel like I had to run faster or feel bad since he was running slow with me and he didn't have to run slow or feel bad for me running faster than I should. So he ran with me until we got a agreed upon point and then he took off.

Decided to run down to NIU and mentioned running to the Engineering building but since it was Sunday, we figured it was closed. I decided while running that I was going to go less than he was. Well, at 3.1 miles, I didn't want to risk my groin anymore so I turned around. I had lost him a long time ago, lots of weaves and curves. I didn't even see him in the distance on this route.

However, on my way back he did end up passing me. I had turned around saw him a bit behind me so I knew he was coming up on me. I was so afraid that I was gonna feel bad when he did but he put his arm on my waist and around my lower back as he passed so it was nice gesture that didn't make me feel bad after all. Said that I was going at a pretty good pace. A lot slower than the previous days longer run but I equate that to my groin pull. As he passed me, I did try to match foot fall to foot fall with his and it worked, I did speed up quite a bit even though his legs are like super longer than mine. (he's a few inches taller than me when we're on our feet but when we're on our knees, we're pretty much nose for nose, which means my torso is long)

I finished up with 6.2 miles and I really kicked it into high gear to keep my avg pace under 9:30 min/mi. Luke had ran to my apartment and looked at the clock and had run back to meet me. I was pretty happy with my time overall.

My stats for the two runs:

Activity Route: -- Elev. Avg: 881 ft Location: Cherry Valley, IL Elev. Gain: +7 ft Date: 11/14/09 Up/Downhill: [+367/-360] Time: 01:55 PM Difficulty: 3.1 / 5.0 Weather: Overcast 57 F temp; 69% humidity 57 F heat index; winds W 7 Performance Distance: 10.51 miles Time: 1:37:16 Speed: 6.5 mph Pace: 9' 15 /mi Calories: 1110 Map Elevation (ft) Pace (min/mile) Splits Mile Pace (min/mile) Speed (mph) Elevation Gain actual +/- avg actual +/- avg 1 8' 53 -0' 22 6.8 +0.3 +10 ft 2 9' 36 +0' 21 6.2 -0.2 +16 ft 3 8' 47 -0' 28 6.8 +0.3 -26 ft 4 9' 12 -0' 03 6.5 +0.0 +16 ft 5 9' 05 -0' 10 6.6 +0.1 +17 ft 6 9' 08 -0' 07 6.6 +0.1 +6 ft 7 10' 09 +0' 54 5.9 -0.6 -29 ft 8 9' 18 +0' 03 6.5 -0.0 +4 ft 9 9' 23 +0' 08 6.4 -0.1 +3 ft 10 9' 12 -0' 03 6.5 +0.0 -10 ft end 8' 40 -0' 35 6.9 +0.4 0 ft Versus average of 9' 15 min/mile

Posted from bimactive.com

Activity Route: -- Elev. Avg: 857 ft Location: DeKalb, IL Elev. Gain: +0 ft Date: 11/15/09 Up/Downhill: [+164/-164] Time: 11:37 AM Difficulty: 2.2 / 5.0 Weather: Fair 43 F temp; 57% humidity 43 F heat index; winds N 12 Performance Distance: 6.20 miles Time: 0:58:20 Speed: 6.4 mph Pace: 9' 25 /mi Calories: 662 Map Elevation (ft) Pace (min/mile) Splits Mile Pace (min/mile) Speed (mph) Elevation Gain actual +/- avg actual +/- avg 1 9' 40 +0' 15 6.2 -0.2 +36 ft 2 9' 19 -0' 06 6.4 +0.1 -39 ft 3 9' 26 +0' 01 6.3 -0.0 +4 ft 4 9' 16 -0' 09 6.5 +0.1 0 ft 5 9' 32 +0' 07 6.3 -0.1 +36 ft 6 9' 20 -0' 05 6.4 +0.0 -20 ft end 8' 46 -0' 39 6.8 +0.5 -16 ft Versus average of 9' 25 min/mile

Posted from bimactive.com

Categories: 10 miles, 6 miles, Luke, Perryville Path, pictures

Labour Day weekend in Madison

What a funtastic weekend in Madison!

Friday had me going to a bar on the East side that had me watching the most wonderful view of a sunset on Lake Monona.

Saturday had me waking up and running 10 miles. I must say though, this was the hardest 5 miles of my running life. I had no idea when the next mile marker was going to take place or where it was or how to get there! At first I was on a bike path, then it went onto a sidewalk but I was still following the signs for the bike path and then I found another bike path through a high school football & soccer fields then back out of the path and onto sidewalks again. It was odd. I thought Madison had more bike paths then this! I'll look for maps later on since I have a feeling I'll be visiting Madison a lot! This was also the first time that I had a run that took me across major roads and I had to cross them. I also stopped for a long time in Mile 6 at a Citgo to fill up my water bottle since I had almost ran out.

Saturday afternoon had me going to Taste of Madison. Walked around the Capital Square and was checking out all the foods & bands. It's different than the Taste of Chicago where it's a ticket system, this is cash-based and no "tastes." Full portions here. I had a few different items, this one is a portebella sandwich on a bagel. I'm glad no one got a picture of me eating it! Messy messy messy!

Saturday evening was the highlight of the entire weekend. NIU vs. UW-Madison. I can't believe how great the seats were that we got very last minute! They were end-zone but only 5 rows from the front! We ended up losing 28-20 but scored 14 points in the 4th quater alone! We were staging a comeback! Kevin & I are NIU alum and his wife was born in Milwaukee and attended Illinois State so we were giving her a hard time for being a "traitor" and wearing UW garb! We were getting heckled a lot, especially in the 4th quarter when Badger fans started to get worried when their lead started to slip.

I was so sore though, walking back to the car after the game. From the run and then the walking around Taste and then the game, my body is definitely letting me know it's age!

On Sunday morning, Kevin & I tried to go on a bike ride. However, that ended up failing. At 4.5 miles into the ride, I heard this whoosh, whoosh, whoosh and then a whoooooooooooooosh. My front tire got a flat. Oh great. And this was happening on a pretty woody, downhill part of the ride and Kevin was far far ahead of me by this time. I yelled his name but he didn't hear me. Luckily, as I was walking my bike down the hill, a guy passed me and told Kevin (since he was stopped) that I was walking my bike. So he came back to find me. As we were at the bottom of the hill getting his CO2 pump ready, we were getting bitten by mosquitos big time. So we decided to leave the area and just have his wife come and pick us up. Up to a neighbourhood where the mosquitos followed us for a bit. We went to an intersection and sat down and decided that we both would try to change the tube in my tire. Apparently, we didn't do it right though since the tube went flat again as it was on my bike rack these past 2 days. I took it down to North Central Cyclery and got a new tube and they fixed it up for me. (On a side note, I got a NIU Cycling Jersey while down there too!)

We got it finished just as Jess was pulling up! HA! Kevin took off to ride back while Jess & I went to Wal-Mart to pick up a few things for...

The beach! Nothing really to report here. We pretty much just laid around getting some sun. The water was a bit too chilly to really get in there. Later on that night was a fire pit and rum runners and neighbours in the cul-de-sac. Good times.

Monday was a relaxing day. I didn't do any exercise but it didn't mean I was just lounging around! Down a local pool, they closed it down for humans but invited canines and their owners down so the doggies can enjoy the pool for a day! It was great fun seeing all the dogs running and playing with each other. Later on was grilling out and then I headed on out back to Illinois.

It was the first time that I was actually truly sad leaving Madison and going back to DeKalb. It was just that great of a weekend!

Activity Route: -- Elev. Avg: 1033 ft Location: Verona, WI Elev. Gain: -50 ft Date: 09/05/09 Up/Downhill: [+442/-492] Time: 07:56 AM Difficulty: 3.2 / 5.0 Performance Distance: 10.00 miles Time: 1:40:57 Speed: 5.9 mph Pace: 10' 06 /mi Calories: 1069 Map Elevation (ft) Pace (min/mile) Splits Mile Pace (min/mile) Speed (mph) Elevation Gain actual +/- avg actual +/- avg 1 9' 05 -1' 01 6.6 +0.7 -89 ft 2 10' 00 -0' 06 6.0 +0.1 +16 ft 3 10' 14 +0' 08 5.9 -0.1 +7 ft 4 10' 34 +0' 28 5.7 -0.3 +4 ft 5 10' 32 +0' 26 5.7 -0.3 -39 ft 6 13' 28 +3' 22 4.5 -1.5 +82 ft 7 9' 53 -0' 13 6.1 +0.1 -46 ft 8 11' 11 +1' 05 5.4 -0.6 -3 ft 9 9' 53 -0' 13 6.1 +0.1 -27 ft end 10' 09 +0' 03 5.9 -0.0 +40 ft Versus average of 10' 06 min/mile

Posted from bimactive.com

Activity Route: -- Elev. Avg: 1004 ft Location: Verona, WI Elev. Gain: -98 ft Date: 09/06/09 Up/Downhill: [+318/-416] Time: 10:44 AM Difficulty: 2.6 / 5.0 Weather: Fair with Haze 72 F temp; 65% humidity 72 F heat index; winds Calm Performance Distance: 5.01 miles Time: 0:51:05 Speed: 5.9 mph Pace: 10' 10 /mi Calories: 338 Map Elevation (ft) Speed (mph) Splits Mile Pace (min/mile) Speed (mph) Elevation Gain actual +/- avg actual +/- avg 1 5' 12 -4' 58 11.5 +5.6 -20 ft 2 4' 11 -5' 59 14.3 +8.4 -26 ft 3 8' 08 -2' 02 7.4 +1.5 -91 ft 4 4' 29 -5' 41 13.4 +7.5 +63 ft end 30' 46 +20' 35 1.9 -4.0 -49 ft Versus average of 5.9 mph

Posted from bimactive.com

Categories: 10 miles, biking, Madison