Saturday morning met up with A and some of our mentees at the towpath for a short group run.  I was a bit surprised that anyone showed up so that was nice.  We just ran for 34 minutes because I didn’t want anyone doing more than they were used to.  I felt like I could’ve gone much longer but I knew I was running 18 today so I didn’t. It was really warm yesterday, I was in shorts and a tank top.

After the run I went out with A to lunch and then we went shopping for our Halloween costume accessories.  It was fun.  I dressed up as a 20’s flapper girl ala Chicago style.  I have to say my costume was pretty good.  A took tons of pics so I will post some when I get them.  We went out to a few bars for some fun and dancing and got back super late.  My hubby and I did the designated driver thing so while we were sober it was a long night for us.

I got up this morning on about 4 and a half hours of sleep and headed to Solon for my last long run.  I felt like I had been drinking which I chalked up to dehydration so I drank two full glasses of water on the way out and made sure to bring my fuel belt full of water.

Headed out for the 8-mile loop at 6:40 banking on taking somewhere between 72 and 75 minutes to complete that and get back in time to start the 10-mile loop with the group at 8.  Well my legs love the cold weather.  I cruised past the 6-mile mark at 49 minutes and came in from the 8-mile loop about 4 minutes faster than last week at 68 minutes!  Not too shabby since I think that course is actually long.  So I had plenty of time to make a pit stop and get some fluids.  My left ankle at this point felt kind of bruised, like my shoe was rubbing it, which is weird because I haven’t noticed anything like that with my new shoes yet.  My right hip also was a bit annoying, like it wasn’t quite in place or something.  Neither thing bothered me while I was running, only when I was resting.  Weird.

Headed out for the 10-mile loop with B and we both decided we were going to take it easy.  J  I ended up running faster that first 6 than I had earlier that morning.  At that point I was feeling pretty good so I decided to do the 12-mile loop and take on the hill again today.  I knew coach K probably thought it was best to put in a second 20 miler anyways, I was just being wimpy when I told him I would only do 18. 

The hill was rough today but I toughed it out.  At that point I was with A and G and we started talking politics which spurred me through the last two miles with ease J  Finished the full 20 miles in 2 hours and 42 minutes!  Had I been running the marathon today I probably would’ve qualified for Boston.  I need a 3:40 to qualify.  So if I get good weather in Richmond I should be able to have a good race.  I think the cool weather is key for me going fast.  Of course I don’t know if I could have ran that time today without the brief stops after the 8 mile loop and the water stop at 14.  With those stops the 20 miles took me about 3 hours, so if my body relies on those stops I am more likely to run a 4 hour marathon.  We will see.  The plan is to try for an even marathon at 8:24 pace.  I will just write all of the splits on my hand the day of the race and do my best to stick close to that.

Now I have a Tuesday speed workout, Thursday tempo run, Saturday easy, and Sunday 12 miler then nothing more than 30 minutes until the race.  I will probably go stir crazy this week with three full rest days but I can tell me body needs it.  My right quad is a bit sore and the time off will hopefully clear up my bruise on my ankle from today.

I have decided that Mr. Ehansen needs to get into shape too so tonight we went to the fitness center.  Mr. Ehansen did 20 minutes on the stationary bike and I ran on the treadmill.  When we got back I did the 20-minute Pilates ab workout.

Treadmill running sucks!!! Avoid it at all costs!  It is boring and the treadmill lies about your pace I swear J It always says I am going slower than I think I am.  Oh well.  I did a little over 2 miles averaging a pace of 8:20 according to the treadmill.

My hamstrings were actually slightly sore today, as if I had run hard J  That is pretty cool since normally my quads are sore which doesn’t make any sense since you use your hamstrings the most while running.

Tonight I learned that you really should give yourself more than one days rest between a 20 mile run and track workout.

My quads were still a little sore going into tonights run, but my body just wasn't up to a really tough workout.  Since it was the last track workout of the season I really wanted to go though.

I still had a good workout but it was a lot tougher than usual and I couldn't go quite as fast as I would like to.  I think I may have earned myself a rest day tomorrow...we will see how I feel when the alarm goes off.

We did the usual mile warm up and cool down tonight.  The workout was 2 sets of 1000, 800, and 600 to get in a total of 3 miles of intervals.  Here are my splits:

3:58, 3:18, 2:29, 4:10, 3:23, 2:22

I saved a little face on the last 600 and didn't totally slack off during the cool down.

Made it home in time to watch the Charlie Brown Haloween special :)  One of my faves.  Haloween is one of my fave holidays...this year we don't have anything planned though.  Well I guess I have plans they just aren't involved with a holiday :)  I plan on running 18 miles for Haloween ;)  Maybe I will get a pumpkin to carve so I can make roasted pumpkin seeds.

Went downtown this morning and did a 5 mile race with A, C, and S.  Had a good time.  I have a twenty miler tomorrow so we just took it easy and did it like a workout.  It was a small race so even though I was sand bagging I came in first in my age group.  The first girl runner finished just over 36 minutes I came in around 43.  We kept a 9:15 pace for the first 3 miles or so and then we started picking people off.  It was neat running a race that way so that you had a lot of spare energy to finish strong.

For my "troubles" I got a water bottle :)  S got one too for 3rd in our age group, it was her first 5 mile race!  C did an awesome job and beat her 11 minute pace!!!  Big thanks to A for keeping with me until the end!  We got nice long sleeved t-shirts too!

We neglected to stretch or put our legs up after the race so my legs are achey now.  I will have to put them up before bed and hope for the best tomorrow :)

I got in a 40 minute run this morning.  I just ran out and back from the apartment since I needed to get out of work by 5:30 for the Team in Training kickoff meeting.

You get to a point in your training when you just know your body.  You know how you are going to feel during different workouts, when your muscles will get sore, when you will get that "runner's high".  So when your body doesn't behave like it normally does it throws you for a loop.  This happened to me this morning and I am not sure why.  I felt like I was dragging ass for the first 20 minutes of my run.  My normal groove hits around 10-15 minutes.  Today it didn't hit until around 20-25.  I am going to chalk this up to what I think was a slight incline on the way out.  I think that my legs are used to the rolling hills on Thursday and weren't prepared for a change.  It is funny because I think my legs "know" the weekly routine now.  Tuesdays are short and fast, Thursdays are trails, Saturdays are medium distance, and Sundays my legs know they are there for the long haul.

I have felt sluggish the past couple of days.  Hopefully I get it together before Sunday's 20 miler.

Tonight was the kickoff meeting for the Spring Season with Team in Training.  So far we have over 20 people signed up to do the St. Anthony's Triathlon in April!  It is going to be so awesome!  I really hope I can help all of my participants exceed their fundraising goals!

Training doesn't start until January 1st so I will have some time to rest in between Richmond Marathon and that.  It will be nice to take a brief break and then build back up.  Hopefully I don't get fat with all the Holiday's coming up :)

Just went on my daily walk for coffee with my office mates and we saw Jerry Springer in Starbucks.  I would not have even noticed I am so oblivious sometimes.  It struck me as odd that he didn't have a bodyguard or something. 

I had the intention of riding my bike in from the west side this morning but I was stuck in traffic for over an hour, hopefully I will still have time for a bike ride this evening before dinner.

Wasn't especially looking forward to tonights track workout but I wasn't dreading it either.  It went okay, not as great as last week though.

I did a mile and a half warm up.  The workout tonight was 3*400, 3*800, 3*400.  Then a mile cool down.  Here are the splits:

1:32, 1:31, 1:33, 3:20 blah, 3:20 grrr, 3:08!, 1:37, 1:32, 1:23!

Watched Enemy of the State tonight.  Very interesting in light of the Patriot Act.  Wonder if that is why they have been showing it on television so often lately.

Hopefully I can drag myself out of bed for a swim tomorrow morning.

I woke up at 5:45 this morning and went to Solon to run.  I ran the 8-mile loop by myself before the group run at 8am.  I think the loop is a little long.  I hit the 6-mile at 54 minutes and figured since I was warmed up I would be back to the bagel shop around 70-72 minutes.  But I didn't get back until about 76 minutes.  It worked out well because I started my run at 6:35 and got back with about ten minutes to stretch and rehydrate before going out for another 10 miles. 

It was pitch black out when I started the first loop and it was cold!  I had on a pair of thin windbreaker pants, a long sleeved shirt and a jacket.  (all reflective of course)  By the time I finished the 8-mile loop though I was warmed up enough to lose the pants and jacket. 

I got in about 7 miles with A and G before turning off and finishing up the last three by myself.  I think I did pretty well today.  I was a little slow on the 8 miles by myself but I did all 18 in 2 hours and 40 minutes.  I can live with that :)  I felt good the whole time even though the only fuel I got was some saltine crackers after my first loop.  My legs were a little sore the last mile or so but I think that should be expected.

I only have one more long run before "taper" for the Richmond Marathon.  Since I don't really put in high weekly mileage I will only really be cutting back on my Sunday runs.  I definitely feel like I can finish the marathon so that is good.  The question is whether I can do it in a reasonable amount of time :)

I drove downtown this morning and did the Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure 5k.  Other than some traffic issues due to the large amount of people and the long porta potty lines it was a good morning.

I ended up parking down by my office and jogging over to the race so that I wouldn't have to wait and get off at the exit near the start (i don't think i would have made it on time)  Traffic was backed up from the west 3rd exit past the e 9th street exit because they had closed it down.  Luckily I was able to squeak by and get over to the Detroit Bridge fairly quickly.

I think they said there were like 20,000 people there this morning!  And I believe it.  I finished the race in 22:30 and then ran the course backwards for a ways to see if I could find some friends that were supposed to be walking.  The streets were literally filled with people for at least a mile or more (i never did find my friends).  It was absolutely amazing!  I got back to my vehicle about an hour after the race started and there were still walkers coming in. 

I was hoping to have a slightly faster run but considering I haven't really been training to run fast and short distances I am pleased with today's results.  Plus there weren't any mile markers so I really couldn't gauge how I was doing.  It was a nice way to get in a good workout though while helping a good cause.

Last night I went for a bike ride when I got home.  45 minutes/just over 10 miles.  It was super windy and what was supposed to be a joy ride got a little rough in the wind.  But I am glad that I got in the workout, I can blame the slowness on my switch back to hybrid tires :)

Went to the library and checked out two Gregory Maguire Books: Wicked and Mirror Mirror.  I have read Wicked before but after listening to the soundtrack I had a craving to read it again, very good book.  The musical took some liberties but I still really would like to go see it on Broadway, the music score is absolutely fantastic.

Well I have been a slug since the race and just been reading all day so i should probably try to find something productive to do before dinner.

Had a wonderful 47 minute run this morning at North Chagrin.  I did the Bridle trail loop from Strawberry around the park by Squires Castle and back.  It was very beautiful out this morning, nice and cool. 

Other than losing the trail for a little bit I had a great trail run.  It is nice to get off the roads every now and then.  Although the hills are a bit tougher :)  Have to shorten the stride and get a little out of breath but it is all good.

Wow it has been over a month since I have done a serious pool workout.  Today wasn't really serious but I did manage to swim for 40 minutes this morning before work.  Mostly I just realxed and had fun practicing backstroke and breastroke for fun.  I did do a set of 3*200's which was good.  It was very nice to know that my stroke didn't go completely to heck with all of the time off, but I definately needed some drills as reminders :)

Tomorrow will be my first Thursday run by myself in awhile.  We will see how that goes :)

I had a wonderful workout tonight!!! I was actually looking forward to my track workout all day so that probably helped a bit J

I wanted to keep 6:30 pace the whole night and that is exactly what I did!!!  I had a nice mile warm up by myself and ran consistent 8:40 pace which is what I want to run in Richmond in order to get G to qualify for Boston, so that is a good sign that my warm up pace is right there comfortably.

The Tuesday track workouts always consist of 3 miles of intervals.  We have lately been doing a three-week cycle.  First weeklong intervals, second middle distance, third week short distance intervals.  Tonight was a long distance night, which is sometimes great sometimes not for me J We kind of met on the middle ground and did 1mile, 2*800 meters, and 4*400 meters.  Luckily we did the workout in that order, which is much nicer than the other way around J It was cool out so the weather was perfect for a hard track workout.

Here are my splits for the evening:

1 mile: 6:30!

800: 3:14!

800: 3:15!

400: 1:36!

400: 1:34!

400: 1:31!

400: 1:27!!!

Then had a relaxing mile cool down at 9:26 pace.  When it gets this cold running hard wreaks havoc on my lungs.  I have been coughing all night.  But it was so worth it!  I have had three great workouts in the past 4 days J My calf is better!  Life rocks! 

You couldn't ask for better running weather than what I had this morning for my 15 mile run.  Very cool and sunny.  We blew past mile 6 at 48 minutes!  Not too shabby for a pace that felt relaxed.  Last week we hit the 6 mile around 50 minutes and I thought we were going hard, and three weeks before that I thought hitting that mark at 54 minutes was very impressive :)

The 12 and 15 mile loops that we do on Sunday's go through mostly flat terrain but there is a hill around mile 9 that lasts until around mile 10.  It is a bear on my bike but the past three runs I have done here I have been with a group and chatted the whole way up with no problems :)  Hills have always been difficult for me so it is nice to know that I am getting much better at them.

One of the guys was nice enough to do the 15 mile loop with me so I didn't have to run by myself at all today.  We ended up running 15 miles in 2 hours and 5 minutes.  I felt really good the whole time, a little tired once we were almost finished but I was able to pick up the pace and finish strongly despite of it so that was great.

My calf didn't bother me at all today!  Everything is a little sore but that is expected since I pushed my muscles for a longer time than they have ever been pushed on a run.  I will rest tomorrow and if I feel good I will head to the track on Tuesday.  I have started to fall into a good running schedule where I have more group or buddy workouts so that is nice.

Everyone has breakfast at the bagel shop after the Sunday runs and chats about all the races and running ideaology (sp?).  It is a really fun group but man some of these guys get fired up, very heated debate this morning about "junk" miles.  It was interesting to hear two very different perspectives on training and logging in extra miles.  But that got a bit heated so I ended up carrying around one of the guys daughters and looking at the fish tank :)  She was so cute!  Very curious, beautiful eyes.  Almost makes me want to have a baby :)  But I think I will make a much better auntie than mommy :)

I am going to go get the ribs ready for dinner, read, and take a well deserved catnap :)

I had a Team in Training Informational meeting this morning.  Unfortunately only one person showed up besides the mentors and she was alumni so she didn't really need the information. I think the ciombination of the Akron marathon and Bush being in Cuyahoga Falls today kept people too busy to show.  (A was running Akron today so I nee dto check teh results and see how she did.  A bunch of SERC runners were also going to be there.) So we just sat around and chatted for a bit. I believe 13 people are signed up for the spring triathlon so far! 

After the meeting C and I went over to Hunt Farm and ran on the towpath.  It was raining lightly and a bit cold but all in all pretty good running weather.  (Of course it is absolutely gorgeous out right now, sun shining cool) : )  I ran a 5 minute warm up with C and then kept a pretty steady 8:15 minute mile pace for the rest of the 6 mile run.  Total run time around 50 minutes.  I stopped my watch in the first mile while I tied my shoe and forgot to start it again until I hit the mile marker and saw 7:30 and knew that couldn't be right :)

Mother nature was at her prime today.  The combined rain and fall leaves swirling on the trail made for a pretty run.  I am glad I got in the solo run because I need to get used to running by myself and not talking if I am going to survive the Richmond marathon.  26.2 miles without conversation is going to be rough.

After the run we went to Peninsula for lunch.  The town was busy because of a peddlers market.  I had chili which was perfect for warming up!  Then we went and checked out Century Cycle.  I talked to the guy in the shop about trainers and it sounds like a worthwhile investment.  In the fall and winter it may be hard to find time to get in a long bike ride while it is still light out (and not freezing) so having a trainer would allow me to keep riding.  Only draw back is that your front wheel is stationary so my bike computer won't be able to track any mileage...I am sure there is an alternative to that though.  The first decent trainer at their shop was $160 so if I set aside some money the next couple of weeks I should be able to get one before it gets cold out.  That will be a double bonus because then I can hang out with my hubby while working out.

After that I headed to the library and got my library card finally.  I requested a book on endurance athlete nutrition that C recomended and got a few books on marathon training, triathlon 101, trail running, and the everything bicycle book. I also picked up the musical CD for Wicked..I loved the book and if the music is good I would love to go see the Musical on Broadway.

I ended up riding just over 9 miles on the bike yesterday which was good.  I read an article yesterday about why high cadence cycling is more efficient than pedaling hard at higher gears.  The basic jist of it was that high cadence uses energy from fat while a low/higher intensity cadence burns carbohydrates.  This must have been the key to me losing all that weight so I need to make sure I don't slack on the cycling because my metabolism has already slowed down even though I have been running a ton.

Tomorrow will be my first real test in my quest to run the Richmond marathon.  I am going to do a 15 mile run!  We will see how my body handles the extra mileage.  My calf felt great today, just a little tight after the run so I think as long as I listen to my body tomorrow and don't push too hard I will be fine.

This year has been so great because I have had so many "firsts".  My first sprint triathlon, my first international, my first half marathon!  And next my first marathon :)  At this rate I will be signing up for an Iron Man and an Ultra in two years...not!  I think I would love it but I don't know how anyone could find the time to properly train for an ironman or ultra.  I struggled enough with the time it takes to train for the regular distances :)

I am off to check the Akron Marathon Results and put my hybrid tires back on my bike :)