Up into the double digits

I had a 10 mile long run this afternoon. I was kinda dreading it beacause I had stayed out late Friday and Saturday night with friends. The weather was okay, around the mid 30s and cloudy. Once I was on the road I actually felt really good and kept my heart rate in the upper 170s. Once I got to 9 miles I started feeling it and slowed down a little and had an average heart rate of 160. Overall it felt really good, and I spent the rest of the afternoon recovering. How many more days until the Madison Marathon????

Really Dragging Today...

Yestreday after a full day of teaching I ran home to grab my gym bag and went to the Y to hit the treadmill for 3 miles. I needed to do 3 miles but I thought I would do only 2 since I had a kick boxing class right after. I didnt want to be too worn out. I was feeling good though so I went to 2.5 miles and then to 3. After some stretching I went home to feed the dogs and then headed to my turbo kick boxing class. I've never been to a class like this so I didn't kow what to expect. The class was a lot of cardio mixed with kicking, jumping, punching, etc. It was really fun but a ton of hard work. I was exhausted after class. This morning I woke up with aches and pains. My body is just lifeless but I trudged through another kick boxing class and am so happy that my rest day is coming up on Friday!!!!

Finishing Off the Week Strong

I feel like all I do lately is teach, run and babysit (for some extra cash). I'm not spending enough time with my husband, dogs or having enough time to chill out. I rushed home form work everyday this week to let my dogs out, give them a pat on the head and then rush to the gym to work out or hit the treadmill. My mother-in-law was also in town for two nights so we had to make room for her and actually clean the house. I feel like this week I did actually get enjoy myself as compared to the last two weeks. Thursday night was dinner at a friend's place and then Friday I babysat all day and we headed to a local resteraunt for a fish fry with the neighbors. Saturday I got up early to go to Fleet Feet and meet up for a 3 mile fun run, they also had an open house so when we got back there were free bagels, coffee and great conversation. Went home to shower and my husband and I drove to New Glarus, WI. We found some place to eat lunch and then went to a winery for tastings, stopped at a couple shops downtown and then went to the New Glarus Brewery for a tour and beer tastings. It was a fantastic day. Later that night I had to babysit until late. Today I was a little worried about my run. Saturday are suppose to be my off days but I really wanted to get out to the fun run. I met up with the Fleet Feet group and we did a 8 mile loop. My legs felt like lead at first but after the first mile I started to feel better. I had about 4 people that were running at the same pace as me and we stuck together the entire run. It was a litlte hilly and challening route but it was also fun. We passed some beautiful areas of the Madison campus and peaceful lake views. We all had maps but since I never run in that neighborhood we were getting a little confused about the course. The greatest thing about the Fleet Feet group is that there is always someone there to help you find the right path and encourage you. It was a great run and I felt really good after.

Running Off Frustration

Yesterday morning I got into a fight with my husband because I bought him a box of chocolates for Valentine's Day (long story). Luckily for me it was right before I was leaving for my 6 mile run. I met the Fleet Feet Fun Run group at the arboretum. It was a sunny, beautiful day in WI, with the temps in the upper 20s. The running gruop was pretty large about 30+ people. There were pacers and the organizer rode the loop on his bike to keep track of everyone and help motivate. I kept up a good pace and was able to clear my head and enjoy the route. There was a 6 mile route and a 12 mile route. I did the 6 even though this is my recovery week and I needed only 5 miles. Half way through I had pain on the inner curve of my right foot but I kept running through the pain and it dulled down a little bit. Overall it was a great run and I came back on a runner's high and it lasted the entire day. I can't wait to get outside more for my weekly runs.

Back Into Training Mode

After running the Redwoods Marathon I ran the Turkey Trot 5K a couple weeks later. Then I took a break from actual training. I was still getting in maybe 6 miles a week just for the heck of it and I was concentrating on spinning and swimming. I came back from CA wanting to see what other races I could do. I was thinking of a half marathon while my husband was pushing me to do a full marathon. I wasn't really into running a full by myself. I wanted him to run with me but he had signed up for the 2010 Wisconsin Ironman so running a marathon with all of his other training would screw him up.



I finally was able to talk myself into it and signed up for the Madison Marathon in May. It's been three weeks of training and so far so good. I am following the Hal Higdon Beginner's Marathon Plan again but this time doing all the weekly runs. During my last marathon I had tweaked the plan a little bit so I wasn't running 3 days in a row. This time I am running about 9 miles in the middle of the week and then a long run on the weekend with 2 days of cross training. It's been hard running 3 days in a row after coming home from teaching. I've felt pretty good and have even been able to do some of my weekly runs outside which is much more preferable than the treadmill. It depends on how much snow/ice is on the roads. As far as my long runs go, I had a really great 6 miler my first week and then last week I headed to the arboretum for a 7 miler through the woods. It was really beautiful; there was a light snow falling and wild turkeys roaming about the woods. Tomorrow is my 5 miler and I am running with a local group for the first time. I would rather run with or around other people than in solitude.


I thought without my husband as a running buddy that I would be more inclined to walk and run at a slower pace, but I've been using a heart rate monitor that I got for Christmas and it really comes in handy. I try to stay in my zone for the entire run.


After the marathon I will need to step up my swimming and biking because I also signed up for the Chisago Lakes triathlon in MN. I will be doing the sprint triathlon while my husband does the Half Ironman.

The Redwoods Marathon

The week before the marathon was hectic. We had to arrange for a dog sitter for our 2 babies and I was missing two days of school so I had to make sub plans for Spanish. Making sub plans is always a big pain, especially if the sub doesn't know your subject area.
We were stoked to be flying to San Francisco on October 15th. We left from Chicago really early in the morning. We arrived in San Fran around lunch time and got our rental car, a.k.a. the hearse. The Chevy HHR, in all black looks like a mini hearse. We drove about 5 hours to Garberville, CA. It eventually got dark and we were driving on narrow roads that started winding their ways around enormous redwood trees. It was a little nerve wrecking having my husband drive but we made it safe and sound to our hotel. Garberville was not quite what I was expecting, instead of a quaint town it was a hippie town with a few restaurants and a lot of vagrants. Friday morning we woke early for a 30 minute run through the town, we had to be creative as it took only 8 minutes to run through the whole town. We grabbed a bite to eat and then left to explore northern California.
We made our way north and went to Ferndale which is a small Victorian village. It was very quaint and fun to walk through. Then we traveled further north to an old redwood sawmill. This tour was more for my husband who is a self-taught woodworker. It was actually very interesting. After the tour we headed further north to Eureka. Eureka was an actual city, with a boardwalk and a downtown. We went to a brewery and to a couple shops. On our way back to our hotel we drove on the Avenue of the Giants, which took you right through the Redwoods National Parks. The sizes of the trees are just astounding. Pictures can't capture the size of the ancient trees. It was beautiful and lucky for us we would be running along the Avenue.
On Saturday we had a rest day before the Marathon. We drove south to Shelter Cove and took in the sights of the ocean and played in the tide pools. We spent the rest of the afternoon walking around the Redwoods Park and following various nature trails. We filled up on carbs before heading back to the hotel to organize all of our running things for the next morning.
Sunday morning we woke early and grabbed some breakfast before driving to the start line. We arrived a little early to ensure we had a parking spot nearby. This marathon was extremely small and we knew that going in to it. There were a handful of spectators and maybe about 50 marathon participants and 100 half marathon participants. While we were waiting for the start we were looking around at the other runner and noticed that they seemed a little more seasoned than us. Let's just say I highly doubted if this was anyone else's first marathon.
The gun went off and we started running. The running was going well, although we were keeping pace with a 75+ year old woman. She was doing her 4th marathon and we chatted with her for ahile and then eventually passed her. It was beautiful terrain. We made it through 13 miles pretty easily. It was hard to see the half marathoners run to the finish while we had to do a U turn and keep on going.
It started getting a little tougher mentally because we saw lots of people coming back from the turn around point already. We made up a little game and decided to tell each other our favorite thing about being the age of each mile. Example: for mile 18 I would tell my husband what I liked best about being 18. It did work for awhile. We started realizing we were the last two people because of some of the comments made to us by the aid station volunteers, nothing rude but they could tell we were a lot slower than everyone else. We finally made it to the turn around at mile 20 and continued back. Lucky for us the aid stations hadn't closed yet, but as soon as we passed the volunteers took off. My stomach was churning; we had consumed Gatorade and gel and shot blocks. At mile 22 they had fresh orange slices and bananas. We filled up on those and it made me feel so much better. It was hard to keep shuffling along, for miles 23-25 we did a walk run combo. The last mile we ran and kept trying to motivate each other but when we saw the finish line and only the volunteers there (who were packing everything up) to cheer us on it was euphoric. We crossed the finish line in 7hours and 3 minutes. We got our medals, got some food and even a 6 pack of beer!
Running this marathon was one of the best things I've ever done in my life and it was so fun to do it with my husband. We expected a faster finish time but the second half of the marathon was a little bumpy and not well paved. The course was only open for 6 hours but we were so grateful to the volunteers who stayed and cheered us on at the end. They were very supportive and it was nice to have that. I remember telling my husband during the marathon, "I'm never doing another marathon!" and this year I've already signed up for the 2010 Madison marathon. I think it becomes sort of like an addiction. Overall I was extremely pleased with our entire Marathon experience; by the way, the little old woman didn't make it this time. She had to drop out of the race.

Training

My husband and I started training for our marathon in June 2009. We followed the Hal Higdon's Marathon Plan for Beginners. The Marathon plan has you run three days in a row, cross train and then rest before the long run on Sunday. Running three days in a row was a little too much for me, so we changed the plan a little bit and ran every other day and cross trained by swimming, biking or doing cardio at the gym. We always made sure to get in our long runs. The first long run is 6 miles according to Hal's plan. In the early summer we did our long runs in the mid morning to afternoon. In July and August when is started getting really hot we moved them to early Sunday morning, sometimes leaving at 6am. After running we would come home and stretch and then jump into our pool to cool down and get the blood out of our legs. Training for a marathon is a big commitment the time that goes into the training as well as not being able to do everything you want to. There were numerous occasions that we had to turn down invitation for a Saturday night event or not drink or leave early because of the long run the following morning. The training went well until mile 15. That was the furthest I had ever run before and after that run I had a constant dull pain in my heels. I went to the podiatrist who diagnosed it was plantar faciatis. They wrapped a piece of thin foam to my foot and told me to do some stretches or buy insoles. I didn't want to start running with insoles considering the marathon was about two months away.
I decided just to continue stretching and live with the pain. Despite the pain, every week I would look forward to the long Sunday morning runs because once we got out into the country it was very peaceful and I enjoyed being with my husband. It was something we could do together besides watching movies and going out to dinner. We eventually made it to our highest long runs. We were running 18, 20, 22 miles. We ran all around Madison and into neighboring small towns. My husband and I still talk about these runs. "Remember when we ran those 16 miles in the blistering heat, ran out of water and got lost?" I never thought that the long runs would be something I would cherish.
As the training was tapering, we were looking forward to our last long run, an 8 miler one week before the marathon. After runnig such long distances, 8 miles is nothing. Training was done and now we were anticipating the Redwoods Marathon.

The Decision to Sign Up

While our house took up most of our time after the half marathon in 2008, we kept talking about signing up for a full marathon and putting it on our bucket list. I always thought about what marathon I would do. If I was only going to complete one in my lifetime I wanted it to be somewhere beautiful. I looked up some marathons on the west coast, one of my favorite places to visit and came across the perfect marathon destination. The Humboldt Redwoods Marathon was the one I chose, it goes right through the Avenue of the Giants. I've been the the Redwoods briefly when I was a freshman in college. It's absolutely beautiful there and so serene. I knew my husband would love it because he is a serious woodworker and loves observing trees. We kept the marathon on our horizons but life kept us busy and it was something we kept pushing off. Finally in early 2009 I was bored at home and looked up flights to California. I found a really good deal so I booked two flights to San Fransisco, California. After that there was not turning back, we were going to CA to run our first marathon.