Half marathon - Support and Motivation!

NotAllWhoWanderAreLost

yay! Congrats!!!

pinbotchick

Sorry about your half ladies....If I had to run by corn for 13.1 miles, I'd really be hoping that a baseball player would pop out like in Field of Dreams, lol.

"Is this heaven?" "No, it's Iowa."

I could quote Field of Dreams all day long. Love that movie!

I'm thinking I'm not doing a half-marathon this fall... Found out I'm 5 weeks pregnant!! Glad I didn't sign up for the Mini (Indy) next May!

First off - Congrats Lhuffman!!!!!

Second - that reminds me that Kirk Gibson has a vacation home 5 miles from me. I may need to map out my longer routes to "jog by" his home... I'd really laugh if he came out of a corn field...

I've been lazy today and I blame it on meteors!!! I was up and outside from 2:40 to 3 am watching the meteor shower and it was so worth it as I saw 20 shooting stars!!!! I didn't get back to bed until after 4. I skipped the morning workout and just did 15 min of stretches....

lisajuly

I'm thinking I'm not doing a half-marathon this fall... Found out I'm 5 weeks pregnant!! Glad I didn't sign up for the Mini (Indy) next May!

Congratulations Lindsey! Wishing you a happy and healthy 9 months. :flowerforyou:

lisajuly

Cross train day for me. Kinda slacked, but at least i got something done.

Walked 20 min outside
15 min interval program on tm
25 min weights

lisajuly

Got my long run done, a day early. 7.4 mi @10:38 pace.

I'm off for the weekend. I'll try to check in tomorrow, but will definitely "see" you all Monday

:flowerforyou:
Lisa

pinbotchick

Great run Lisa!!!

Despite the rain (which actually kept me cool and hydrated), I got in 8 miles this morning at 13:45 pace. Hopefully my shoes dry out before tomorrow's 2 mile run. I'm off to stretch and shower.

pinbotchick

I failed on getting in the 2 mile run but did walk 4 miles at slow 2.5mph pace with my mom and her friend. My mom wants to walk the Mackinaw Bridge over Labor Day weekend and I promised her we'd take some longer practice walks to get her ready for it. My intention was to get up early an run the 2 miles before the walk but stayed up to late helping little bro turn 40 last night. It was too hot and humid when we finished walking at 10...

So running summary for week 7 - 16 miles completed. 9 weeks until my race. Next week is an easy week for me with 3 runs each 4 miles.

I hope everyone had a lovely weekend.

Iffer75

Just a quick update to everyone. I started week 3 today and am feeling pretty darn good. My arms are feeling strong. Can't wait to see what they look like in my dress. 12 days left until my 10k and wedding day. I know I can do it.
I ran 4 miles last nite and it went fairly well. My last mile was my best, my breathing felt really good and I just had more confidence in that last mile. Today was strength training and core. I am starting to feel like I am back into a good routine. I do love working out in the morning, so I have time to be with friends when I get off work, rather than having to workout. Also, getting the finishing touches done for the wedding. I think I am there. Flowers, check. Cake, check. Dress, check. Park rental, check. Bridesmaids dress, check. Shoes, check. Oh, get Jon's pants and shirt dry cleaned. Reservations for reception, check. Guitar player with equipment for special song, check. Working on my own vows. Confirm hotel rooms. I think that about covers it. Anything else anyone else can think of?

I hope everyone is doing well. Here is to another AWESOME week. :bigsmile:

akasullengal

I keep on forgetting to check in here. I'm still alive, and still training.

I had a run in with weather over the weekend and my long run (6 miles) didn't happen. The humidity was close to 100% and the air was so thick and disgusting. And I was pissed, cause I got up early on a Sunday and everything... for nothing. Okay, I did 2.6 miles... but it was nothing like what I wanted. Shows you have far I've come when 2.6 miles is a piddly run.

Anyways, hoping this week goes better. The weather has broken this week and I hope it lasts through the weekend. Come on Fall.. get here soon. Got back from my "short run" for the week. 4.5 miles at a 12:39 pace. I felt like I was moving pretty slow through a lot of it, so I know I can improve upon that time. The weather was perfect though. 60 degrees and low humidity. If only it would always stay that way! Yesterday, I did an hour on the stationary bike- the gym was uber cold yesterday (problems with the cooling). It.was.glorious. So good start to the week in terms of training. Let's hope it continues that way.

pinbotchick

Nice run Kristina!!!

Oh Jen - I feel for you... It sounds like your organized. Just make sure to take time to enjoy life. I'm glad your feel great with your workouts.

I too love this cool weather. I slept in and am now running late but wanted to check-in. I couldn't seem to pick up any speed today - my body just feels fatigued but I got in 4 miles at 15 min pace. Maybe I should have picked a flatter run or listened to music. The book I'm listening to isn't my fav but it's for bookclub tomorrow so I have to finish it (*sighs*)... Only an hour and 12 min left now.

Enjoy your day and RUN RUN RUN

lisajuly

Hi everyone! Hope you all had a good weekend. I've recovered from two days in the sun listening to music. Dang, I'm not as young as i used to be, lol.

took an unscheduled day off yesterday-it was strength & stretch day, and i believe i can make it up this week. back to running today. decided to do a different loop today because out and back just wasn't doing it for me, and i misjudged the distance.

So, I stopped at 6 miles and walked about 1/2 mile back to my car which was at my kids school.

ok, off to do errands and to watch Sunday's True Blood

Iffer75

Thanx Victoria. I am feeling amazing. I am ready for my wedding and can't wait to see Jon's face when I walk up to him in my dress. It will be an exciting day for sure. Everything is starting to fall into place.

I ran another 4 miles this morning and it felt AWESOME. I shaved off another 1:09. So in the last 2 runs I have shaved off 2:59 mins on my last timed 4 mile run. I can't believe it. I am finally starting to feel like a runner. I am still slow, but I can make it with no problem. Maybe someday I will work on speed, but for now being able to cross the finish line with a smile and standing up will be a good thing. :bigsmile:

lisajuly

Speedwork today. Sometimes, I REALLY REALLY REALLY hate Wednesdays.

5.4 mi total. It looked like this:

1 mi w/u @ 5.5 mph
4x400 @ 6.3mph
4x400 @ 6.6 mph
2x400 @ 7mph
1 mi c/d @ 5.7 mph

recoveries were 35-45 seconds at 4mph

(and at the very end, i walked another .5 at 3.8-4mph)

Jennifer, I can't remember--is it this weekend you're getting married or next? Not often I read a race report and a wedding report on the same day, lol. :happy:

akasullengal

Hello all! I'm proud of myself for hitting all my training days so far this work week. As long as I hit my long run on Sunday, I'll be a perfect 7/7, which is great, as for the past few weeks there's always bees something not on point... either missing a day, or having to cut a run short, etc.

Anywho, yesterday was a crosstraining day. As it was a long workday, I took a long lunch at ellipticaled for about 40ish minutes (3.7 miles). Felt good.

This morning was another "short" run- 4.5 miles in 56 min (12:26 pace). Pleased with it. Weather was nice as well! The Sunday- 7 miles. EEP- that sounds like crazy talk, but it's only about 3/4 mile more than I've done before. I know I can do it.

Best of luck to everyone on their training. Keep it up!

pinbotchick

I'm being lazy today - slept in and skipped my run. My body needed a break and it storming pretty bad outside. If it's nice weather tonight, I may try to get the 4 mile run in.

Great job to all that managed runs in the last few days!!!!

Iffer75

LIsa-It is next weekend. 9 days and counting. LOL I am looking forward to the run in the morning. That will probably be the only us time all day. I did have one friend suggest that after the wedding we take 5 mins to ourselves to revel in the fact of what we just did. hehe

I have been doing really good with my eating this last week and am very proud of myself for that. I really have not lost any weight, but I can definitely see a difference in my body. I put on a shirt this morning for work and it is too big. I wore it just a couple weeks ago and it looked fine. So, I may not being losing on the scale, but I am otherwise and it feels great. I guess I am pretty happy with where I am at. After the wedding I will concentrate a little harder and try to get down to the 155 goal I set for myself.

Keep up the AWESOME work everyone and have a beautiful Friday Eve!!! :bigsmile:

lisajuly

X-train day for me.

20 min interval program on the tm (about 1.25mi) & @ 30 min weights.

Kind of in a funk. Not wanting to do much of anything.

lisajuly

5.21 miles today at 10:31/mi pace. It is HOT out there.

No long run for me this weekend. Last week's schedule called for a 5K on Sunday and I switched weeks. This weekend, I'm doing the Warrior Dash, which is a little over 5K, but has 10 or so obstacles on the course (climb over cars, climb thru tunnels, run thru water, jump over fire, etc.). So, I'm really not going for time, I'm racing for fun and the hope that I don't injure myself, lol, or get any burns on my legs (*JOKING* ~ they are really little flames). It's up at Copper Mountain and while i live at 1 mile high, I'm sure the altitude there is going to kick my butt..i think the race is at 8000 ft or so.

pinbotchick

Lisa - have fun at the warrior dash!!! That sounds sooooo cool. I looked on-line and there are none in my area. Maybe I'll plan a vacation to one someday.

Kristina - good luck tommorrow. You can do it!!!

Jennifer - I'm getting excited for you.

I'm with you on the getting tired of everything. I skipped Thurs run so added that 4 miles to today's 4 miles and ran 8 at leisurely pace of 14:30. I just want the race to be over but alas I have 7 more weeks for training. Total running for this week 12 miles. Next week my long run increases to 9 miles.

akasullengal

Made it through an entire week or training without skipping or copping out on something! *twirls*

This morning did my longest run yet: 7.01miles at a 13:28 pace. I'll take it. Body was definitely tired during the last couple miles. I think part of it was due to that last week's long run didn't happen due to the high humidity, so it had been 2 weeks since I'd run 6 miles even, so it was a bit painful. Next week I'm supposed to go up to 8, but I might repeat this week's long distance to feel a bit more comfortable. I have a bit of wiggle room, as I picked a 12-week training plan for like a 15-week time period, and haven't repeated a week yet.

My legs are tired. Shall now have a lazy day. Hope everyone is doing well!

curlytop89

Hello, I am in Mississippi, so it is super hot and humid here even until the end of september, but I am interested in doing a half marathon maybe in Nov or December. I had hernia surgery so I was down and out for 6 weeks and am trying to get back with it. I have a 1 year old too to keep track of. Mostly I take him in the stroller with me, but it is so different trying to run with a jogging stroller than just on your own. Plus we have a pretty hilly road and I don't want to lose the stroller down the hills, ha ha. It does have a safety strap though. I do notice that I am not quite ready for the hills while pushing the stroller anyway with my recent surgery, but I walk, and have a treadmill. Sometimes I take the baby to a 1/2 mile walking path in town to walk/jog on, but that gets boooorrrriiiing if you know what I mean. I jogged 3 miles the other day on fairly even ground and it was pretty muggy even at 8am, but I felt okay. Pretty tired when it was over. I tried a half marathon a couple years ago and it was in July and I had to train and do my longs run on pretty hot days, even in the morning. By the time the race day came, I just wanted to get it over with. I was so burnt out. I thought maybe if I took it slower and ran going into the cooler season I might do better. There is a half marathon in Louisiana or MIssissippi towards the end of November and one at the beginning of December, so I thought I would try one of those. What do you think?

pinbotchick

Curlytop - go for it!!!

I started the day right with a quick 2 mile jog at 13:16 pace. I tried to do speed work but then realized I like my slow pace and settled in for a quiet foggy jog.

akasullengal

Failed at getting my morning run in this morning. It's hard, when your alarm goes off, and you look at your window and the full moon shining in your face is what wakes you up and not the run. Didn't get enough sleep last night, and I didn't get exercise in, so I'll certainly have to do something Friday instead to make up for my rest day. I'll either do Monday's work this evening (dvd and/or abs/hand weights) or if it's not too hot, I'll try and get my run in when I get off work. Otherwise, I'll get the run in tomorrow morning instead and do my second one on Friday.

Joyjmb

I've done three 1/2 marathons:
1st 3:18
2nd 3:04
3rd 2:51

Remember, the goal is not to WIN. The goal is to finish!!
Whoooo you!

lisajuly

5.26 mi tempo run today (switched today's run for tomorrow's)

Mile 1: 10:56
Mile 2: 9:52
Mile 3: 9:46
Mile 4: 9:30
Mile 5: 10:38
last .26: 2:44 (10:38/mi pace)

Did my Warrior Dash on Sunday and it was so much fun. I'm happy to post my race report here if anyone is interested, but I didn't want to take up space if no one is interested. I'll just say that I love my fuzzy viking helmet and running at 10,000 ft is freakin' hard especially when the first mile or so is UP a mountain...and that's coming from someone who runs at 5280 all the time.

Ate too much crap the past few days, need to get back on the wagon.

curlytop89

Lisajuly, I would love to see a picture of you running in your fuzzy viking cap! I think I am going to try this half marathon biz. I like to have something to work for. If I finished in under 2:30 I would feel great, but just jogging the entire distance would make me feel good. I have never run that far without walking before. Anyway, I will see how it goes.

akasullengal

Shifted my training down by a day this week to compensate for having my rest day Monday and will workout Friday instead. Got up this morning and did my 4.5 miler in 60min (13:20 pace). Pretty slow for me... I'm usually more around 12ish min/mile averages, but I was really not engaged in getting up and moving this morning. So, I'm just glad I got up and did it and did the full distance, even though it was at an easier pace. Tomorrow's a crosstraining day- will probably do a dvd as I still haven't gotten my bike fixed yet and the gym is closed for 2 weeks for their annual renovations.

lisajuly

5.45 mi run today.

I switched my regular run and speedwork/tempo run days this week by doing a tempo run yesterday. Which made my easy run much harder today, lol. I can't really complain, because i was shooting for 11 min miles and came in at an avg of 10:40/mi. But, my legs will be toast until Friday.

Curlytop, i don't have a picture of me running with the viking hat, lol. Too darn hot, plus, with all that mud it would have been trashed and the hat was a major reason i did the race, lol. i don't know how to post pictures here...does anyone know if we can do that? if not, I'll try and make it one of my profile pictures.

pinbotchick

Great run Kristina!!! Way to be flexible!!!

Lisa - You're times amaze me. I'd love to hear about your warrior run progress and I want to see a picture too!!!

Curlytop - My goal is just to finish the race... If I can do this run, anyone can.

Jennifer - good luck this weekend on the run and the wedding!!! Yes we will want pictures from those events as well.

Today was cross training with an 11 mile bike ride this morning.

lisajuly

OK, here's my race report (warning....LONG)

So, I suckered a (non-running) friend to do this race with me at Copper Mountain. It was the fuzzy viking helmets that convinced us to register. And the beer. The shirt and medals were just bonus.

You'd think that someone who has averaged close to 25 miles a week running this year would be able to run @3.3 miles with their eyes closed. But, there was one little problem. The race started at an elevation at 9,700 feet. And the first mile or so, went up, up, up...and up some more. So, I'm admitting this early, I had to walk part of it. I may be used to running at 5280, but 10,000 ft is a whole other issue.

okay, so they told us to be there an hour before our wave started at 12:00. So, Barb and I were hanging around the back of the starting area around 11:30. And then everyone started to run. ??? I asked some guy if this was the noon wave and he said no, but to run anyway it didn't matter. His wave had been at 10:30, and he didn't make it for that....so off we went.

(Just a suggestion, you may want to watch this video for a clearer explanation of all the challenges http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gJqk762PHH8&feature=search).

The first quarter mile was flat and on paved road. I jumped/climbed over 2 sets of junk cars. shortly after that, the trail turned off the road and onto grass/rock/hill. We ran over a bridge, and then had to pull ourselves up this wood thing with a rope ladder. Shortly after that was a wall of hay, which was pretty easy to climb, but i kind of slid down the back side and landed on my hands and knees. Oh, and there was a field of tires. I had memories of Plyo X and Tony Horton yelling at me to keep my knees up.

And then the uphill really began. Switchback after switchback after switchback. In full sun. I'd walk a bit, run a bit, rinse, lather, repeat. I began to wonder how people who came from non-altitude places did because I was getting my assed whooped. I kept looking at a couple of switchbacks below me to make sure my friend was doing okay. Barb kept moving along and I figured if she made it all the way to the downhill, she'd be able to finish the race.

i was never so relieved to see the course go downhill and let gravity take me as fast as i could run. Shortly after the water station, I noticed a lot of fans lining the course, cheering on the warriors and wanting to high-five everyone. Yeah for fans!

And then came the mudpit with four strands of barbed wire crossing it in different places. I got under the first two wires with minimal mud, but you know, the volunteers at this challenge station were guys and guys, for some reason *rolleyes* really, really, really want to see girls rolling around in mud. And so, instead of ducking under the wires, i crawled thru the mud, much to the delight of everyone around (except probably me). So, did you know that after crawling out of a mudpit, you gain about 20 lbs in mud? After cruising downhill at a pretty fast clip, trying to even stand with all that mud on me was a challenge.

I finally got going again and the next challenge was tunnels. With mud in them. On a slight incline. Mud in tunnels makes things very slippery. And having a semi-bum knee, we'll i can't be on my knees that long (hey, no giggling), so i got thru the tunnel by crawling on my hands and feet while murmuring "please don't let me slip backwards, please..." Ah, sunlight again. Next challenge: 3 walls, waist-high and about 10 ft apart that you have to hurdle over. First one, I hurdled over. #2 & 3, well let's just say, not as graceful, lol. More like throw a leg over, then haul the rest of the body over.

run a bit more..oh look, it's the rope ladder wall, with the platform on top and rope wall to get down the other side. Easy compared to the other challenges. Oh, look...wood planks about 6" wide going across a ravine. Fun for someone with no balance

Run a bit more. Oh, it's the stream we have to cross. I don't really care that it's really cold water, hey, I'm going to take a few seconds and wash some of the mud that's caked onto me at this point.

Run, run, run some more. I know I'm coming up towards the end so i'm trying to run as fast as I can. Oh look...it's the rows of fire. hmm, those flames are a little higher then they showed on the website. Run, jump, run, run, jump. No burns....Woohoo! That was the last challenge and i just ran as fast as i could the last quarter mile to the finish line where i was handed my finisher's medal. 41:08, 45th out of @ 200 (??) in my age group.

I went back to the fire area to wait for my friend to cheer her on. As soon as I saw her, I started yelling her name to cheer and then ran along side the barrier with her towards the finish. I am way proud of Barbara...she kicked but for someone who doesn't run on a brutal course. First stop after water....the beer tent.

We wandered around for a while, listening to music, looking for our friends and laughing at a lot of costumes. For the record, Underoos on top of bike shorts do nothing for me. Those that ran in costume...well, i give you a lot of credit because it was hard enough for me in shorts and a tank top. Before going back to our friends' condo, we hosed off but that only took off the first layer of mud, lol. There's a reason why the race people tell you to bring a change of clothes and a garbage bag

Thanks for reading. If you ever get a chance to do a Warrior Dash...DO IT! The swag is awesome, the people are great. It was probably the hardest, but most fun race I've ever done under 5 miles..it's one HUGE party (and I'd probably kick butt at sea level)

ETA: i'm in the black & purple.