Rain rain and still more rain

I don't think I'll be running in another race in Missouri. No offense to the state or anything but it's seriously NOT conducive to me running at all.

Key points

• A half I can pace on my own, my stats prove that much! 3 sets of 2 miles I ran the same time in!
• I ran through shin deep water that was ice cold!
• I started passing people at the end of the race, amazing feat. I blame the walking up the hills.
• I still managed to come in a decent time even though I walked. Maybe there's something to the whole "walk-run" thing after all!
• My friend Rob is totally awesome for putting up with me and this crazy running notion of mine!
• I have 2 videos about 10 minutes each of the race down below the stats.

I drove over to my friend Rob's house on Thursday from southern Illinois to Columbia, MO. It was about a 4 hour drive.

When I got in, he gave me a booklet of a festival that Columbia was having called Roots 'n Blues 'n BBQ. I was going through it and I saw an advertisement for a half marathon. I got all sorts of excited reading it! I immediately got online and was looking up information. Then I saw the price. $60 and then a $12 late fee. Ouch. For a half marathon?? So decided not to do it.

The original plan was to run 8 miles on the Katy Trail while Rob biked along with me. I am in taper mode after all and my marathon is only next weekend. Another reason not to do the run, it's all hills and I don't need to injure myself with only a week to go!

Next day, I was in the shower and was thinking about this race again. How cool would it be to say that I did a half marathon in Columbia with my best friend watching and cheering me on? They did have a 10k option and I could do that but I'd rather do the half.

So I get dressed go out and look at Rob and say, I think I really want to do the half. :-) We find out where we can go sign me up since there is no race day registration and head on down there. They only charged me $10 for the late fee. And I wasn't guaranteed a shirt since I was late. I had to go pick up one after the race. I also read after I got my packet that there are no medals but instead a finisher's glass. Hmmpf.

Rob and I decided to have a chill night on Friday night and since I needed to carbo load, we ordered some fantastic pizza, cheese bread and watched 3 movies that evening. It was fantastic! Got everything all laid out and prepared that evening as well. I'm pretty lucky that I had a good arsenal of stuff to bring with me these days!

Up early at 5:45a since the race began at 7am (!!!). Walked out the door and it's pitch black and raining. Not just sprinkling but good sized drops. Craps. Rob said that he heard it waking up, but I didn't. I grabbed my sweatshirt to wear while we were waiting around. It was kinda cool about mid-high 50's.

Gee, does any of this sound familiar?? A reminder of my St. Louis Marathon back in April.

Took only about a 20 minute drive down there and found a decent parking spot thanks to Rob looking that up the evening before. Walked on over to the start and while I was in the port-a-potty I heard it started to rain harder. Walked out and sure enough, it was coming down harder. Fantastic. Rob & I gathered & huddled underneath a walkway to protect us from the rain. Soon it was time to head on over to the start line.

They did have pacers in this race so that was awesome. I saw one holding up an inflatible hand and it said 1:30. Whoops. WAY too fast. Walked back and saw the 1:45 and then finally the 2:00 guy. He also had 2:00 written on his back in big numbers. I knew I wanted to stay with him but if I lost him, no biggie. A half I can pace on my own, a full marathon, I can't.

I had brought my water bottle pack with me but decided at last minute that I didn't really need it since it was pretty cool. I wanted to practice wearing it in a race if I decide to wear it in Milwaukee. I also handed over my sweatshirt to Rob, hugged him goodbye and he walked away.

We were standing on a hill and the rain you could see was just coming down in streams on the road. I already knew this was not going to bode well. I did see Rob after I passed the start and we waved at each other again.

I was going pretty even keel the first few miles of the race. Wasn't pushing it or anything. Ran up a few hills in those first few miles as well. Again, not a good sign for what was to come in the rest of the race. But my breathing was. I saw the 2:00 pacer well ahead of me and again wasn't too worried about it. The first mile was running through the campus of University of Missouri, where Rob teaches and even past the stadium where they play football.

Then we started to head out of town, south. And down the steepest bloody hill I've ever seen. I kept running but I ended up kinda galloping down it. That's what people were commenting on it anyway (in the video). That 2nd mile I ended up going 8:46! Right after this, I saw lightning in the sky. That I was surprised to see. I thought I saw it back in first mile but thought maybe it was just someone's flash. But this was definitely NOT mistaken. It was in the sky as I was running down a hill.

Then we hit up the trail. Not quite sandstone like the one I run on but gray stones but it wasn't pebbles either so that I was glad. Then it started raining harder. Not pouring but I was definitely getting wet. Even running under the trees of the trail didn't help things. I started to get worried about my Garmin at this time. Again, remember St. Louis and how Phil died after that race?! I kept my hand upside down to keep the rain off of it but not sure how much that was helping. Rain was dripping off of my hat by this time and hitting my hand with my camera in it too. Nothing was soaking it up anymore.

On this trail we ran around a very pretty lake. Got some good pictures. That was when mile 6 marker was upon us. Halfway there! I ate my jelly beans at this time so I was able to get them out of my hand. Also when the leaders were looping back on us. And when we hit the biggest UPHILL I have seen yet on this course. I'm not ashamed to say this. I walked up it (in the video).

At mile 8 I saw Rob. He manged to find me on the way! Which was a very lovely surprise! I didn't know he was gonna be there! After we parted ways, the lady beside me commented on me bringing my camera. I said yep, I have on the past 3 halves and past 2 marathons. She asked me what marathons I've done. Told her and then said that I have one next week. Wanted to know where that one was at and told her Milwaukee. I said because of that, I'm not looking to do anything special with this one. Just run it, especially since I come from pancake flat northern Illinois. We talked a little more and then I put in my earbuds again and we played leapfrog for a while but then she took off and that was OK by me. It was all subdivision running on this part so we had more spectators since they were just standing outside of their houses. I also noticed right before I saw Rob that it had stopped raining all together! YAY! 2 more hills, 2 more walks.

Then after 9 miles, I ran back down that hill and was totally picking up a ton of speed. I passed a group of girls (in the video). At the bottom of the, took a turn and back up another hill. This one was shorter but a lot steeper. I again walked it but even that was difficult!! The gaggle of girls passed me yet again (in the video).

Right after 11 miles, we got on the main road and I started passing people again (in the video). Not sure how that was happening. I told myself that I needed to wait until after mile 12 to start kicking it. Needed to make sure I had enough in the tank for that. Off the highway and down to the Katy Trail again but we ran into a problem. A fast moving current in the tunnel we had to go under. The amount of rain that Columbia had that morning flooded the tunnel and we had to wade through it. It wasn't just a tiny stream. This was to my shins. And it was ice cold water. Halfway through my feet and ankles were numb and pins & needles. Coming out of the water, I started running again and they HURT so bad!!! (DEFINITELY in the video)

I had realised by this time that my Garmin watch was off by a few tenths of a mile. So by the time we reached the 12 mile mark, my watch was saying 12.2 miles. And it kept going higher and higher. I really started gunning it once we got off the trail and onto the city path along the river. I passed a few people (two I had to squeeze through the middle of) and one I told him twice that I was coming up on his left so he wouldn't drift left as we made a slight turn.

My Garmin ended up saying that I ran 13.54 miles in 2:08:49. I forgot to stop it as soon as I crossed the finish line. But since this race was chip timed that's OK. The official time was 2:08:37. It seems I keep getting slower in my half marathon times. But again, I must remember, I'm not used to hills nor was I actually wanting to break any time barriers!

I got a free meal ticket. They had Rock Star energy drinks, brisket/pulled pork (I gave Rob the sandwich), coleslaw, frozen bananas. It's funny because as we were standing around eating, the sun came out. If they only held it an hour later, 8am instead of 7am, the race would have been very pleasant. I got a shirt as well and also a finishers pint glass.

We heard the 10k results. In my age group, 3rd place ran 56:11. I very well could have had a chance in placing!! Though of course, I have no idea cause of the hills.

All in all, it was a very good race. I am really proud of myself with the time & the hills. And I'm very glad to have a friend that was willing to hang out for 2 hours while I went out and ran. And also very glad that we got to share in this experience too!

Activity Route: -- Elev. Avg: 661 ft Location: Columbia, MO Elev. Gain: -16 ft Date: 09/26/09 Up/Downhill: [+951/-967] Time: 07:04 AM Difficulty: 3.7 / 5.0 Weather: Overcast 55 F temp; 92% humidity 55 F heat index; winds SE 7 Performance Distance: 13.52 miles Time: 2:08:50 Speed: 6.3 mph Pace: 9' 32 /mi Heart Rate: 176 bpm (Avg) Calories: 1424 197 bpm (Peak) Map Elevation (ft) Pace (min/mile) Heart Rate (bpm) Splits Mile Pace (min/mile) Speed (mph) Heart Rate Elev Gain actual +/- avg actual +/- avg 1 9' 19 -0' 13 6.4 +0.1 160 +23 ft 2 8' 46 -0' 46 6.8 +0.5 176 -66 ft 3 9' 07 -0' 25 6.6 +0.3 175 -59 ft 4 9' 15 -0' 17 6.5 +0.2 174 -23 ft 5 9' 15 -0' 17 6.5 +0.2 176 +6 ft 6 9' 14 -0' 18 6.5 +0.2 177 -17 ft 7 10' 06 +0' 34 5.9 -0.4 178 +66 ft 8 10' 06 +0' 34 5.9 -0.4 178 +99 ft 9 9' 15 -0' 17 6.5 +0.2 179 -39 ft 10 10' 21 +0' 49 5.8 -0.5 174 -69 ft 11 10' 21 +0' 49 5.8 -0.5 177 +82 ft 12 9' 14 -0' 18 6.5 +0.2 178 -92 ft 13 9' 56 +0' 24 6.0 -0.3 183 +50 ft end 8' 50 -0' 42 6.8 +0.5 191 +23 ft Versus average of 9' 32 min/mile

Posted from bimactive.com

Videos
I included duration of the clips so you know when you can skip over them. Sometimes I talk in the clips, sometimes I don't. Both videos are pretty long, almost 10 minutes each. Sometimes I don't exactly have the most steady hands while I was running. Sorry for that. Even I was getting sick watching the swaying! But seeing the people pass me as I'm walking up the hills are impressive!

Columbia Half Marathon -- 1st half


Columbia Half Marathon -- 2nd half (also with the water in the tunnel, this is a Must See)

Categories: pictures, races, Roots 'n Blues 'n BBQ Half Marathon

Running around Rend Lake

Well, I figured out my headache from yesterday. It was a caffiene headache. Didn't have anything but water all day Saturday at the Air Show and then woke up Sunday with a headache. After 5 Advil (2 pills, then 3 pills later) wasn't doing anything, had a Mt. Dew on the way to St. Louis and that seemed to do the trick! Was able to attend the Cubs game at Cardinals without a headache! And what a great game it was! Another close scoring game that this one went into extra innings and top of 11th, Cubs managed a 3 run home run which made it 6-3 and we held on to the that and won the game! Good thing I took today off after all!

And so I slept in quite a lot this morning since we got back around 1am. Finally headed out there to Rend Lake around 10am. As you can see below, the difficulty is 4.2 out of 5. And then when I started the humidity was 92% and a temperature of 67 degrees. So the below numbers were after the run ended. But it didn't matter cause 67 degrees and 92% is pretty much the same as 81 degrees and 69% humidity. All I know is that I was soaking wet well before I was done and I didn't even dump any water over my head.

I saw loads of wildlife; 2 fawns that the spots were slowly fading away. 3 groups of turkeys, one was on the pavement path that I was running on. About 10 of them went right and 1 went left, soon they realised that the one went and the others quickly turned around and crossed over the path again to meet up with that one. I thought it was weird, usually majority rules but this one that went left must have been the leader. Lots of spiders on the path, wully bullys, hawks, and even a nice gnat flew into my eye on the first .1 mile. That HURT bad. Took me a minute to get that thing out of my eye.

I did walk a lot towards the end but that was because of the hills and heat. The sun had started coming out and was warming things up quite a bit. I can only hope that Milwaukee doesn't have any humidity for their marathon otherwise I'm toast. My miles weren't that far apart in times so I guess that's good. I did pause for a bathroom break in mile 8 so that's why there's a 2 minute gap.

After the run, I went down towards Rend Lake to get into the lake. But unfortunately, since I wasn't at a beach it was muddy and my shoes were laden with mud pretty quickly. But I got down to the shoreline and dumped water on my arms, shoulders, head and my legs (which also got my shoes & socks wet). Felt soooo good.

Speaking of shoes; I wore my old shoes on this run. No burning feet. So yea, I think I'm going to take my shoes back up to the store that I bought them from and ask them if they are in fact narrow cause I know for a fact I ordered a narrow. I hope they can tell cause the info under the tongue doesn't say anything about it being narrow (like a width size or anything.)

Now my brother and I will be going out on a Harley ride and then hitting up my favourite Mexican restaurant and will be eating my 1300 calories that I burned back!

Activity Route: -- Elev. Avg: 432 ft Location: Valier, IL Elev. Gain: -4 ft Date: 09/21/09 Up/Downhill: [+688/-692] Time: 10:19 AM Difficulty: 4.2 / 5.0 Weather: Partly Cloudy 81 F temp; 69% humidity 85 F heat index; winds S 12 Performance Distance: 12.25 miles Time: 2:01:07 Speed: 6.1 mph Pace: 9' 53 /mi Calories: 1308 Map Elevation (ft) Pace (min/mile) Splits Mile Pace (min/mile) Speed (mph) Elevation Gain actual +/- avg actual +/- avg 1 9' 28 -0' 25 6.3 +0.3 +6 ft 2 9' 24 -0' 29 6.4 +0.3 -13 ft 3 9' 39 -0' 14 6.2 +0.1 +43 ft 4 9' 47 -0' 06 6.1 +0.1 -23 ft 5 9' 26 -0' 27 6.3 +0.3 0 ft 6 9' 37 -0' 16 6.2 +0.2 -13 ft 7 10' 03 +0' 10 6.0 -0.1 +10 ft 8 12' 10 +2' 17 4.9 -1.1 0 ft 9 9' 29 -0' 24 6.3 +0.2 +4 ft 10 10' 05 +0' 12 6.0 -0.1 +10 ft 11 9' 51 -0' 02 6.1 +0.0 -3 ft 12 10' 10 +0' 17 5.9 -0.2 -3 ft end 8' 48 -1' 05 6.8 +0.7 -16 ft Versus average of 9' 53 min/mile

Posted from bimactive.com

Categories: 12 miles, Rend Lake, southern illinois

Supernatural Running

This was too funny NOT to share. Naked running or Supernatural Running. :) Someone makes a special appearance at the end!!

In running news, I did run 3.5 miles earlier this week in my old shoes. No problems. Though it was only 3.5 miles. We'll see how the longer run goes.

I didn't have time to run my 12 miles yesterday since I had another air show to go to. I was going to go this morning but alas, I woke up with a headache, feeling hungover (even though I wasn't). I'm thinking it was just from being dehydrated and sunburned on my face. Unfortunately, I had decided I was going to go so I at my oatmeal this morning. I'll have to try something different tomorrow then. I have a Cubs @ Cardinals game tonight and it's a night game so I have off tomorrow from work and I'll be leaving that evening to come back to DeKalb. So I can run in the morning around Rend Lake before leaving. It'll be a few days since I ran but that's OK. I think I still have it in me. At least, I hope I do!!

C-17

What can I say? I like men in uniform that carry guns...

Nephew didn't like the loud noises!

FA-18

Heritage Flight: P-51 Mustang, F-16, F-4, F-15

Canadian Snowbirds

F-16

Categories: pictures, video

Taper begins

This tree seems to think it's Autumn already.

I am very angry at my shoes. The only reason why 15 miles took me so slow & I had to walk so many times is because the bottom of my feet were burning. They were rubbing in not a good way. I have developed blisters on my feet that I have never gotten before wearing any other brand of shoe! Even the previous model of the same shoe before this one. I am sooo not happy. I'm wondering if my shoes are in fact NOT narrow like they should be. So I think what I'm going to do is go back to my previous shoes and run in those from here on out during my taper. I only have 354 miles on them. They could potentially last me until approximately 450 miles. I have a few maintenance runs during the week, 12 miles and 8 miles for my long runs the next 2 Saturdays before Race Day on October 4.

So my run today was decent enough. Except as I mentioned by the end, I had to keep walking because my feet hurt. Not because I was tired or achy or sore but my feet were burning. When you're on your feet for this many hours, you need them to hold you up otherwise you will fail.

Wow, so I can't even talk anything about this run because all I can think about is my GD feet! I only wonder how things would have turned out if my feet were not bad. Would I have been able to keep up the pace??

I did get some of the typical aches and pains of taper paranoia. My left shin, left knee and right hip hurt. They went away. I started to have my doubts with even completely 11 more miles after this 15 miles. Would I be able to do it? What was I thinking? Why do I do this to myself? How can I even think of doing 2 more next year?

At 7 miles I stopped to have some Watermelon Sports Beans. At 14.5 miles, I filled up one of my water bottles at the spicket near the front of the condos. And then at 14.8 miles, I passed someone watering her plants so I yelled out I'll take some of that and she turned the nozzle toward me and I ran over to her and my front and my back got sprinkled on. Felt soooo good! I had goosebumps for the rest of the run!

Something interesting did happen at about 4.5 miles or so. I was coming up to a walker facing me with 2 dogs. Behind him was a woman on a bike coming towards him. I warned him of her behind him that way he could tie up his dogs and let her & I pass without bumping into each other or him. After she passed, I said to him, "They never tell you when they're coming up behind you." He just smiled and nodded. I then heard the woman on the bike say something but I still had my earbuds in and Steve Runner was still talking so I didn't know exactly what she said but it sounded like "I ___ told him I was behind him." Don't know if that was "did" or "would have" or what but I don't care. She was not happy and I'm not happy with bikers at all. She saw me again when I stopped for my jelly bellys and again she said something to me but I had my back to the bike path cause I wasn't sure of the way I was going to go after I ate them but I ignored her. No idea what she said this time around.

This week, I didn't want to run. I was apathetic about EVERYTHING it seemed. Work, waking up, eating, running. So not like me. I forced myself to run on Wednesday morning and I squeaked out 3.5 miles. Didn't even blog about it that's how apathetic I was even with that. I had cereal every night for dinner. Didn't feel like cooking and hadn't gone grocery shopping in a while. Apathetic about running. That is sooo not like me!! Luckily I think it was all hormonal for it seems the apathy is now gone but the cereal phase certainly is not! I'm addicted to the stuff it seems!

This song is gonna be my mantra; for more reasons than just running:

Activity Route: -- Elev. Avg: 857 ft Location: DeKalb, IL Elev. Gain: +7 ft Date: 09/12/09 Up/Downhill: [+538/-531] Time: 08:38 AM Difficulty: 3.5 / 5.0 Weather: Fair 73 F temp; 68% humidity 73 F heat index; winds NE 6 Performance Distance: 15.01 miles Time: 2:28:36 Speed: 6.1 mph Pace: 9' 54 /mi Calories: 1595 Map Elevation (ft) Pace (min/mile) Splits Mile Pace (min/mile) Speed (mph) Elevation Gain actual +/- avg actual +/- avg 1 9' 24 -0' 30 6.4 +0.3 +27 ft 2 9' 18 -0' 36 6.5 +0.4 -17 ft 3 9' 36 -0' 18 6.2 +0.2 -10 ft 4 9' 27 -0' 27 6.3 +0.3 +36 ft 5 9' 25 -0' 29 6.4 +0.3 -36 ft 6 9' 36 -0' 18 6.2 +0.2 -10 ft 7 10' 06 +0' 12 5.9 -0.1 +39 ft 8 9' 52 -0' 02 6.1 +0.0 -16 ft 9 9' 56 +0' 02 6.0 -0.0 +17 ft 10 9' 48 -0' 06 6.1 +0.1 -16 ft 11 10' 05 +0' 11 6.0 -0.1 +6 ft 12 10' 39 +0' 45 5.6 -0.4 +23 ft 13 10' 50 +0' 56 5.5 -0.5 -23 ft 14 10' 37 +0' 43 5.7 -0.4 +7 ft end 9' 59 +0' 05 6.0 -0.1 -13 ft Versus average of 9' 54 min/mile

Posted from bimactive.com

Categories: 15 miles, DeKalb Nature Trail, feet, shoes, taper