August 2009 Totals

August was a pretty good month despite still being sick at the beginning of the month and tapering and recovering after my half marathon. September is looking to be a HUGE month!!!

Swim: 10,200 meters (won't be any swimming for a while--stupid finger!!!)
Bike: 54.99 miles (seriously, 0.1 miles?)
Run: 81.1 miles

The week has come to a great close

This week got off to a great start with a solid track workout and a tough swim, but took a turn when I fell and broke my finger. But, surprisingly, even with the accident I still managed to get in all my workouts. Today's workout was a descending two hour run. Dave joined me today on his bike and carried my water and even entertained me but finding a classic rock Pandora station on his iPhone. That's probably my least favorite type of music! After a horrible zone 3 run on Friday this run was 180 degrees the other direction. I hit all my zones and had great paces. The workout was exactly the way it was supposed to be. I ended the week with 29 miles which is a pretty good week for me.

Looking forward to next week...

Thursday Thoughts (on a Saturday)

I went to the local middle school/high school cross country race a few days ago. The Ohio High School Athletic Association has a rule where no athlete, regardless of sport, is allowed to wear any jewelry during competition. This includes earrings, hair pins, etc, and even includes the rubber bracelets like "Live Strong" bracelets. However, runners are allowed to wear watches. When I coached you weren't allowed to use them to pace like putting it on a beeping mode. But, I noticed in the race the other day that several runners were wearing Garmins?

So, is that cheating?

Foto Friday-More pictures of the finger

I tried my best to take pictures of my jacked-up finger. Surprisingly it doesn't look as bad today as we thought it would. Guess the ice yesterday helped keep the bruises away. But, you can kinda see the bruises and you can definitely see the swelling in these pictures.

Trippin'

I chose the wrong week to stop drinking.

This morning I headed out on my run. Not even a mile into it, I rolled my right ankle which caused me to fall on my left side. I did a little damage to my knee. This picture does not do all the cuts, scrapes, and bruises justice.



That wasn't the first part. When I fell I landed on my left hand smooshing my fingers straight back. Immediately I knew something was really wrong. My left ring finger was throbbing and REALLY painful. I took some deep breaths trying to keep myself from getting sick. I tried to jog home, but my fingers were throbbing so badly I couldn't. I got home, called the doctor and made an appointment for later in the day. My ring finger was swelling bigger by the minute and turning lovely shades of black and blue.

The doctor saw my knee first. "Oooh!", he said. "That looks bad." Then I showed him my finger. He sent me directly to X-ray. She didn't have a hard time figuring out what she was supposed to get film of. Then he showed me the pictures. Broken. Crap! I chipped part of the bone off in my knuckle. He put it in an ugly split. That's going to be lovely when I'm a bridesmaid next week. I go back in two weeks for more X-rays. And, there is no swimming for probably a month. At least I can run.



Thank goodness I don't wear my wedding rings when I run or else they would have been cut off today.

A Little Miscellany

A little bit of miscellany today....

• On my bike ride Sunday I forgot to wear my sunglasses. I didn't think this was a big deal. Up until this summer, I never wore sunglasses. However, I have had something in my eye since then and it is REALLY bothering me. No amount of eye drops or sleeping is helping.
• I went to the local middle school/high school cross country race this evening. The girls I used to coach are now seniors so this is kinda the last hurrah for me as far as knowing anyone participating. What was interesting to me is that I never heard any of those athletes breathing hard and it didn't seem like any of them were working very hard either. Is that what I look like when I'm running? I'd like to believe I'm hauling and working hard all the way to the finish.
• With only a few weeks until the marathon I've decided to give up the alcohol until after the race. Why? I don't know. I figure I'm investing a lot financially and hoping to do really well with a possible new PR so why sabotage it by not following through on all aspects of my training? This will be hard as I'm part of a weekend-long wedding next weekend in California and love me a good glass of wine.
• I've had headaches every day for weeks. When are those gonna go away?

Finally, if you are in the New Albany area come to the high school football game on Friday. Not only is it the alumni game, my dad is being inducted into the high school athletic hall of fame for his 20 years of time keeping volunteer service for football, basketball, and track. See you Friday!!

Come out of the closet

I think Dave is pregnant. He seems to be nesting. He came home from Yellowstone on Sunday and hasn't stopped working. That's so un-Dave like. He came home with a plan to redo our bedroom and make it more adult-like. Funny part is, I had thought of ways to improve our bedroom while he was on vacation. Right now it's just a catch-all for all our shit. Being that we have a first floor master, we should probably consider making it nicer. My thoughts are in my head knowing full well it's never going to get done. We have so many projects going on in the house and NONE of them are finished or may ever be finished.

Dave seems to be taking this seriously, though. His plan today, clean out the closet and figure out a way to put his dresser in there. Did I mention he also joined me for ice cream post-work, mowed the lawn, went to the grocery, and helped make dinner? I know! Serious nesting!

Unfortunately, this is what our closet looks like right now. And I'm guessing it's not going to get any better before bedtime, which means this is all the crap I'm going to trip over when I have to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night.





I think it's time for Dave to sign up for another race.

The countdown has begun

It's seven weeks until the marathon and things are starting to ramp up. This week doesn't involve a whole lot of miles, but it does involve a lot of hard work. Today started with drills on the track. I coached track (distance) for six years and although I emphasized doing drills, I really didn't understand their importance until I started being coached. What people don't understand is that doing drills are just as effective as running miles and miles and can totally replace a workout of miles and miles. Coach emphasizes form because without good form you can't continue to get faster. Today I concentrated on form. I was sweating bullets, my heart rate was really high, yet in one hour I only ran a whopping 3.91 miles. However, I am as sore as I would have been had I been doing full out sprints over and over again. Today's workout wiped me out. I stretched, drank a recovery drink, and slept for two hours this afternoon. I was spent. And tomorrow, there will be another hard workout. There is a race on the horizon and it will be good.

Time for a Change?

I like to consider myself a purist when it comes to running. Most days I go out with only my shoes and a watch. Since I became a runner I have been faithful to one watch company, Timex, and have gone through many version including two heart rate monitors of the Timex Ironman series. I haven't been doing as much heart rate training this summer as last, but I noticed a few weeks ago that my heart rate chest strap was acting poorly. I got a new battery for the strap and inserted it on Saturday for a run. Usually it takes a few seconds for the watch to pick up the heart rate. I waited and waited and it never appeared. Crap! So in less than two years of owning this system, I will be sending it back to Timex for the second time.

I will admit, I own a Garmin 405 with a heart rate monitor. I can wear that, but unless I have a speed workout to do, I am not a fan of wearing the Garmin. I get distracted by all the features and knowing how fast or slow I am going.

Is there anything better out there? The reason I went with Timex is that it seemed reliable and it's affordable. I'm hesitant to go with Polar because it's soooo expensive and if I'm going to spend that amount of money I might as well go with all the features of the Garmin.

For now, I will stick with the Timex for whenever I'm just running with no heart rate or pace.

Getting it off my chest

Tonight I got a parking ticket, which really pisses me off because I paid to park tonight. I was parked in a lot where the numbers are painted on the lot and then you slip your money into the little keyhole. The thing was, the numbers were so faint that you couldn't see what your number was so I guess and I guessed wrong. So instead of the $3 I paid, I now owe $15 for guessing wrong. Argh! I'm calling on Monday and give those people a piece of my mind.

This was also capped off by finding out that I was supposed to be out of the building by 10:30, while I was loading my last load at 10:30. Did they not see I was working the entire time to get out of there as fast as I could?

I had a great night tonight at the wedding we did, why did it have to be ruined by these two, out-of-my-control, things?

Foto Friday

I have really enjoyed taking pictures for myself this summer and I've absolutely loving the Through the Viewfinder pictures. I recently got a few printed out and I think they look amazing!



And here's the newest one I took this week.

Thursday Thoughts

Thank you all for your opinions yesterday, but most of you chose wrong. :) Yes the Echos are more comfortable but I just can't part with $130 for a pair of shoes I'm not going to be wearing every day. The Echos looked great on the rack, but on my feet they kinda looked like witch shoes. So, I went with #1 from DSW.



Boy my calves look huge!!!

Now on with Thursday Thoughts. There hasn't been a whole lot of running/triathlon talk on the blog this week. Let's change that. As I alluded to earlier this week I'm taking steps to improve my diet to be able to train strong and not get sick as much. Today I got serious, or at least that's what Coach said, as I drank an Ensure with high protein after my run. And to my surprise it didn't suck.

What do you do, nutritionally, to aid with recovery?

Or for you non-runners/triathletes out there, what do you like to eat before or after a workout?

My Carrie Bradshaw Moment

There are some things going on in my life right now that I can't talk about publicly. They are causing me stress, though, and some days making it really hard to just make it through the day. Yesterday was one of those days. And with Dave being gone and unreachable yesterday was particularly hard. But my friends lifted me up and made nice offers to me and to that I say thank you.

I did do something nice for myself yesterday and that was shoe shop. Now I thought it was kinda funny because isn't that what women do when they get stressed and how funny would it be when I came home with a new pair of running shoes? But I didn't come home with a new pair of running shoes. Instead I came home with two pairs of heels that I just love. I am going to return one pair today and I've already made up my mind which pair I'm taking back.

I thought I'd get your opinion though about which one you like better. A little background...One pair is from DSW; the other pair from Nordstrom. One pair cost $134; the other cost $34. One is more comfortable than the other. Which one do you like better?

Shoegasm #1:

Shoegasm #2

Today is post 800 and I have something glorious to show all the ladies, but alas a friend has invited me over so I may not get to it tonight. Let's celebrate post #800!!!!

While the cat's away, Mer needs something to do

Dave went to Yellowstone with his Dad and brother on Friday and will not be back until this coming Sunday. This is the longest we've ever been apart and to top it all off, he doesn't have cell phone coverage as he is backpacking and camping and whatnot. This summer I've gotten kind of used to being alone during the day but I know some time between 5:00 and 6:00 that garage door is going to open and Dave will be home. Not so this week. And...I don't know what to do with myself!!! I'm on a recovery week so it's not like I have a whole lot of training to do. Yesterday I didn't leave the house until dinner because my sister invited me over. Otherwise I would have spent the whole day without saying a single word out loud. Today I left the house for a swim and to go to the post office. I didn't shower until noon. This could be the longest week of my life.

I need something to do. Any ideas?

Food for Thought

As much as I've struggled with motivation this summer, I still have this inner desire to kick some ass. Not doing as well as I wanted to yesterday in the race has only fueled this fire. I'm guessing Coach is going to love reading that!

By the way, I don't know what the women who were giving out the awards yesterday were thinking. According to the official race results I finished 2nd in my age group. And I'm guessing the women who finished 1st, 2nd, and 3rd overall were double-dipping because 1st and 2nd were in the 30-34 age group, which would have pushed me to 4th in the age group.

Back to the point at hand...there is one part of my training plans that I've never put any effort into: nutrition. I figured I could eat anything because I was burning the calories. I have maintained or lost weight and that has made me happy. What I have neglected to realize is that not only is food fuel, it's also super-important for recovery and to keep healthy. Here's the problem, I'm really picky about food and only like a handful of things. Those things do not include fruits and vegetables or anything that might be called whey protein. Today, though, I checked out a book from the library and plan on getting the supplemental cook book and really force myself to improve my diet.

I will say, when I went vegetarian for a month two years ago I never felt better, but I couldn't keep up that lifestyle. I will keep you all up to date on how this attempt go. This effort may be harder than any training plan I've ever tackled.

Lifeline of Ohio 1/2 Marathon 2009

I knew there would come a day when I wouldn't reach a new PR while working with Coach. Today was that day.

Being a marathoner, as I'm sure with all endurance sports, is weird. You train for months and months for one event, putting all eggs in one basket. My training for this half marathon was awesome. I put tons of energy and effort into my training, hitting paces I had never had before, and was ready to set a new PR. But three weeks ago I got sick and I'm still coughing a ton even though I feel pretty good. I missed some good training during that time and it was well know, though unspoken, that I wasn't 100% for this race. But due to my wedding schedule, this was really the only half marathon I could run. Plus with a price of $20 it couldn't be beat.

Dave used to never attend my races, but since I got him into triathlon last year he hasn't missed one of my races. I've gotten used to him being there. He's on vacation with his dad and brother right now so when I showed up at the race course this morning I was already feeling a little off. I wondered who was going to hold my racing shoes while I warmed up? Who would take pictures? Who would cheer me on? I wound up warming up in my racing flats and leaving everything else in my car. No pictures, sorry. And I was my own cheerleader by wearing my iPod for the first (and hopefully last) time in a race.

I started out just right in the first mile--7:13--but at the end of that mile I developed a stitch under my ribs that would not go away. It stayed around for 4 miles. I sped up; I slowed down; I changed my breathing patterns; I stretched my hands above my head; and finally I had to walk to finally get it gone. This was the first of many walks during the day.

Mile 2--7:22
Mile 3--7:33
Mile 4--7:48

By the end of mile 4 things were going so poorly that I actually thought about dropping out at the half way point. I thought about what I would say to Coach and Dave and knew that I could just slow down and gut it out. Plus, I missed the turn to get back to the beginning.

Mile 5--7:13
Mile 6--7:50

The race spotlighted organ and tissue donation and had a huge contingent of hundreds of people whose lives had been affected by donation. The race also featured a 5K in addition to the half marathon. Unlike most races that start the shorter race just a few minutes after the longer race, this race started the 5K 45 minutes after the half marathon. Here's the bad part: the half marathon is a two loop course that shares the course with the 5K. So, do the math...I came through the half way point around 45-50 minutes, which means I was right in the mix of all the 5K walkers. I weaved and got myself up to the sidewalk to avoid all the walkers. When the 5Kers got to their first water stop, around 7-1/2 miles for me, I ran smack into the back of some dude. I yelled at him to move. Come on! Finally I reached their turn-around and then I was all alone. There was no one behind me and no one in front of me. This is when things got dark.

Mile 7--7:31
Mile 8--7:51

My head kept yelling GO GO GO but my body just wouldn't move. People would catch me, pass me, and leave me in the dust. I did math in my head thinking I could go 8:00/miles and still make 1:40. I just wanted to be done. At the second turn I tried to count thinking I was in the top 10-15 women. Things got so bad I even walked at the 12 mile mark. Seriously, Meredith, there's one mile left.

Mile 9--7:57
Mile 10--8:25
Mile 11--7:44
Mile 12--8:15

Finally I made it up that last hill and chugged my way past the walkers again and up to the finish holding off the girl behind me.

Mile 13--8:15
Final time (unofficially)--1:41:51

According to my previous races, this is my third best time by one whole second. Up until this past February I would have been ecstatic with this time, but because I had worked so hard and knew I could get a new PR, I have to admit I'm disappointed. I know people would give their right arm for a 1:41 half marathon but I'm just not satisfied. After talking to Coach and realizing what I should have been able to run had I been healthy I was even more disappointed. The facts are the weather sucked (it was in the 70s with like 85% humidity--summer has finally come to the Midwest) and I just wasn't 100%. And those two combined to the perfect storm. Let's be honest I'm a much better runner than I was a year ago. Working with Coach and do all my training by myself has allowed me to focus fully on me and my goals. Had this race happened a few weeks early I would have crushed my PR. And that PR will come. Now it's time to look towards October and the Nike Women's Marathon.

Foto Friday--Hartford Fair Edition

My sister lives out in the sticks. Actually, it's only a 1/2 hour from where we live but it is COUNTRY! There is a really popular county fair about a mile from her house and yesterday I attended for the first time. I took along my TTV contraption and took a lot of pictures.

I'm really digging these pictures and I've been thinking about selling them. I have my own shopping cart that I use for the photo booth, but I'm not really driving any traffic there. I've been thinking about using Etsy, but I'm a little nervous about how much of a cut they take. What's your thoughts on this? Do you think people would be interested in buying these pictures?

Here's a few of my favorites from the fair yesterday.

Thursday Thoughts

This morning while running I heard something hit beside me. I knew it had been a bird dropping and I thought, "woah, that was close." Then my watch beeped to change intervals, I looked down at it, and it was covered in bird poop. Yuck!

So what has been the grossest thing that has happened to you during training or racing?

Pikes Peak Marathon

My friends Andrea and Helen are doing something absolutely crazy this weekend: running Pikes Peak Marathon. You've got that right. They are running 13.1 miles up to the summit and then 13.1 miles down. I have to admit, I'm nervous for them. The summit is over 14,000 ft. Now I've been over 13,00 ft. and I thought I was walking on the moon. It was hard to breathe and I felt like I was moving in slow motion. Andrea has been training on Pikes Peak as she lives near there, but Helen lives about 20 miles from me. I think her "mountain" training has consisted of running up and down stairs in her office building.

Andrea and Helen, good luck and please be super-safe.

Vacation Bible School

Last year I got invited to speak at a vacation Bible school's "Sports Camp". I spoke about running and triathlon. This year Dave was invited to share his experience about Ironman. The topic for today's VBS: self doubt.

Dave did a fantastic job of speaking at the kids level and tried to make them understand the enormity that is Ironman. He spoke up training 6 days a week. He spoke about the number of hours it took him to complete the race. He brought props: his swim cap, a cowbell, his race number, and his bike. He let the kids pick up the bike to show them how light it was. What I thought was brilliant was how he incorporated self doubt he felt about signing up for the race, training for the race, and finishing in the race while in the race. I'm not sure the kids really grasped it, but the adults that were in attendance gasped and giggled as Dave made jokes about only having 20 miles left in the race.

Thanks Jon and Tamara for inviting us along this year. Those kids are a blast.

Two old married folks

Dave and I are, seriously, an old married couple. It might surprise you to know that most nights we play card games. Usually our game of choice is Five Crowns. But Dave recently taught me how to play Hot Dice and it's my new drug of choice. The game is played with 6 dice. I would explain the rules here but I'm typing this on my iPhone and that's a lot of thumb typing. All I can say is that it is awesome. Go online and look up the rules. Or if you're on Facebook and play the games on there it's called Farkle.

With a little bit of regret...

This morning Dave and I donned our helmets and cleats and boarded our bikes into New Albany. This morning there was a 10 mile race through the trails we run every day. I have run this race twice before and run it well, but this year I decided not to do it and concentrate on the half marathon instead. We camped out at the 2 mile mark and watched the runners come by. Immediately we realized it wasn't a big race and there weren't a ton of fast runners. The mortals were out today. We helped the volunteers pick up the cups and then waited for the lead runners to come back. Now we were stationed at mile 9 as this was an out and back. The first runner came flying by and we hopped on the bikes again and headed to the finish line barely beating the first runner there. First runner: 1:02. Nice! Then we waited and waited and waited to see the first woman. We had a friend out there who was the lead runner by A LOT, but she was using the race as a long run and decided to not finish the race and continued to run without crossing the finish line. The first woman came in: 1:20ish. That's an 8:00 pace. While that's excellent there was a part of me that knew I would have run this race had a run it. Grrr! That would have been two wins in one year. But, I'm 6 days away from my next PR :) and ready to rock the half.

Head Case

It's been a rough week of running. For as much success as I've had physically--good paces, solid runs--I have been mentally destroyed this week. There's a lot going on in this little noggin. First off, I've been fighting a cold/sinus infection for 13 days. Yeah, 13 days! I thought I was better but I've been waking up every day pretty much feeling the same way--not bad, not good. The sinuses are killing me, though. Yesterday my back teeth hurt. Today my front teeth hurt. With every step I take, my teeth feel shooting pain. Coach has scolded me--no running until I see a doctor. After all, I do have a race in a week.

Secondly, I've been fighting some nasty demons in my head. A year ago no one read my blog and not many people cared about my running. But I've turned in some good performances this past year and along with blogging every day, I feel like the weight of the running world is on my shoulders. The expectations have gotten so high. How am I ever going to live up to them? Of course, I know I'm the only one who has put these expectations on myself. If I set the goals, I can achieve them.

It's been a tough week. But, coach has sent me some rah-rah e-mails and Dave has given me plenty of hugs. Hopefully with a little bit of antibiotics and a good race next week, my head with be back to normal.

Foto Friday

Seriously, do I not have the best job in the whole world?

Thursday Thoughts

A friend told me this week that our internal clocks are genetic. I was complaining that Dave never got up early to do any of his Ironman training and she said it was because Dave "couldn't" get up early because that was the way his body was programmed. I don't know if that's true or not, but it got me wondering...what time is your internal clock set for?

Intrigue

Our "group" consists of a bunch of runners (and some REALLY good runners at that), with those runners also as wannabe triathletes. Most of us have tackled a triathlon of some kind either a sprint or a few of us have even gone on to do half Ironmans, but Dave has been the first one to tackle the monster: Ironman. Now that he's completed it, the questions have been coming rapid fire. Everyone is really intrigued--intrigued to the point others are wondering if the Ironman will be their next race.

Me included.

Tonight we had dinner with some of our running friends and the questions were non-stop. By the end of it I think we were all convinced to give it a try. Or should I say tri. :)

Let's Talk About Socks, Baby

I've been running for 8 years and really haven't thought a whole lot about socks. As long as they didn't bunch in my toes or cause blisters, then they were okay in my book. And considering I don't have problems with bad toenails or blisters, then most socks worked for me. When I finished 2nd in my age group at the Crystal Coast 1/2 Marathon, I won a gift card to a local running store. I used that gift card for two new pairs of socks. And WOW! They were like the best socks I've ever worn.

The brand of the socks is Balega. They have a perfect amount of cushion and I love the extra fabric around the achilles tendon area. My racing flats really rip up my achilles area so these socks really make a difference. The same manufacture makes Zulu socks which are made out of bamboo. I haven't tried them yet, but I know they are cheaper.

Let's talk about compression socks. They seem to be all the rage right now, and yes I own two pairs. One pair I bought at Meijer and they fit really tight. The other pair are Sugoi. I like them both and think they are both effective. Now I don't wear them while running because that's now what they're for, but I do wear them after hard workouts to aid in recovery. I feel like I get less sore when I wear them for a few hours after hard workouts. I also wear them when I'm flying to keep from getting blood clots. Multi-use!!!

What sock brands do you swear by and why?

Hard, Harder, Yuck!

So now that I know you guys actually know how to comment, please feel free to leave little comments like "nice run Mer" or "come on, wuss, you can do better than that". And now, on with the post...

I love that Coach names all my workouts. Today's was called "Hard, Harder, Hardest." Since my Garmin can't use that many characters I called mine HardHarderYuck. He he he! The workout called for intervals at half marathon pace, 10K pace, and 5K pace at differing time segments. And I wasn't allowed to use a heart rate monitor or Garmin. I had to keep track of the intervals somehow so I did use my Garmin but I used a lovely green sticker to keep from peeking at the paces:



Honestly, I didn't think this run was going to go real well. I've been fighting this stupid cold for a week. Just when I thought it was better it turned into a sinus infection. Ugh! But, I was feeling well enough to give this workout a try. Surprisingly, I think the workout felt good and hard but nothing I couldn't handle. And shockingly, my paces were WAY better than I expected pulling in a half marathon pace interval at 7:09, a 10K pace interval at 6:58, and a 5K pace interval at 6:51.

A year ago if you told me I would regularly be running sub-7:00s I would have told you, you were crazy. But something's changed not only physically but mentally. It's not expectation to run that fast and to be confident in it. I'm excited to see how it all pulls together. There's an "A" race on the schedule in less than two weeks.

Come Out, Come Out, Wherever You Are!

I set a goal this year to blog every day. So far I'm at 100%. I'm even further along than half a year because I actually started 21 days before the start of the year. Not every post is fantastic. I struggle a lot of days to figure out what the heck to blog about. But, it's getting easier and less of a chore.

What I have noticed by blogging every day is that my statistics continue to rise. Yet, I rarely get more than one comment per entry. So today come out, come out, wherever you are and leave me a message. Just say hi. Let me know where you're from. Tell me what you like (and don't like--be nice or I won't publish you) about the blog. Tell me what you want to read or see more of on the blog. I'm also always looking for new exciting blogs to read, so if you're a blogger, please, please, please drop a comment.

Thanks again y'all for following me on this journey.

July Totals

I was rocking July. I had only missed one running workout and only a small handful of other workouts until the very last week when I got sick. Gosh darn it! I was totally on pace to break a 100 miles this month.

Swim = 8,000 meters

Bike = 70.55 miles

Run = 77.88 miles

Other = 1/2 hour of core workout