In Training: Marathon Weekend 2015 (Dopey Challenge)! **COMPLETE**

[Ariel484]

Just a little over 2 weeks until your trip! Hope all your training is going well and that bug is gone.

Thanks!! I know, I feel like it's still so far away but at the same time I know the days will fly by.

The bug is gone, thankfully!

 

[Ariel484]

Week 3 of JJ5K/W&D Training
Monday, October 13, 2014 - Sunday, October 19, 2014

17 miles completed
41 miles completed in JJ5K/W&D Training so far
585.71 miles completed in 2014 so far

Monday, October 13: 60-minute Core class + Run #1 (3 miles on the treadmill)

Happy Monday!

So, I have decided that despite the fact that this new core class kicks my butt, I want to stick with it. Not only stick with it, but fit in an additional class each week. Today was the first day I did that!

This class is offered 3 times per week - Fridays at 5:15 (45 minutes) and Mondays (5:15 or 6:15, both 60-minute classes). But here's the issue - I don't want to give up running 4 days per week. I don't want to give up yoga twice per week. And I definitely need a rest day.

Eventually I figured out that the best way to make this work with my current schedule was to double up on something. Fridays are Core and yoga, so now Mondays are going to be Core and a run (whatever my shortest scheduled run of the week is). Unless I die. This means giving up IronStrength - when I told my doctor about the routine she didn't see too impressed with it, so I'm hoping that Core class will be a good replacement...especially since that is what she recommended, along with yoga.

With that in mind...new training schedule:

So today was my first Core/run day. I arrived and tried to find a spot far away from the - ahem - witchy lady from Friday but there weren't many left. Eventually I just thought, "screw it" and set up my stuff a couple of people in front of her. She didn't bug me today.

Class was good! I felt like I was keeping up better this time...except for one series that was 5-7 minutes (maybe? They don’t have a clock in their studio, which is probably a good thing as I'd just stare at it the entire time) where I felt like I completed MAYBE half of the exercises. These involved the little frisbee-like things on my feet, and putting a "body bar" on top of the BOSU trainer. Then we were supposed to do push-ups with our hands on the body bar. Last week I thought the frisbee things were my least favorite thing, but after today I think the body bar takes the top spot. At one point we did side planks on our forearms, which I'm okay at but I managed to come down on the ground in such a way that I'm sure both of my elbows will be bruised. How attractive.

ALSO - the doctor I saw for my foot was in the class! She practices what she preaches. I don't think she recognized me but that's okay.

After class I hopped in my car and drove to the gym at work for 3 miles on the treadmill. I stuck to running 3:00/walking 1:00, just like Saturday. For the first mile I did the running intervals at 5.8MPH (10:20/mile), then moved up to 5.9MPH (10:10/mile) for mile 2, and then 6.0MPH (10:00/mile) for mile 3. For the last couple of minutes I upped the speed a bit and eventually got to a 9:31/mile pace, which I held for...I don't know, 30 seconds or so? And except for feeling like it was 1000 degrees in the treadmill room, I felt really good! No foot pain...a bit of soreness from core this morning. Total time for the run was 34:04, 11:21/mile pace. And with that, I am off to get a very LARGE cup of coffee.

#magicaldisneypicschallenge Day 13: clouds...a cloudy day on Castaway Cay isn't so bad when you're in a cabana with awesome friends and tasty beer! This picture is from last September.

Tuesday, October 14: Run #2 (3 miles on the treadmill)

Another good run for me today! Easing back into training seems to be going well. It was sort of interesting because for the first 0.5 miles or so I felt really stiff...where I didn't feel stiff at all during yesterday's run. I guess Core class was a good warm-up.

For now I am still running 3:00/walking 1:00 - that is feeling really good for me. I definitely think I am progressing because I remember thinking I didn't feel like I had the endurance to run more than 2.5 minutes at a time last week or whatever, and now I'm feeling good at 3 minutes. Woohoo!

I had sort of a weird method for my run this morning. The treadmills at work have an option for you to input your goal distance, and if you do that it'll flash a message every time you get 10% of the way there. So there's a message when you’re 10% done, 20% done, etc. I wanted to up my speed a little bit and decided to use these 10% indicators to break the run up. I did the running intervals at 5.8MPH (10:20/mile) for the first 20 percent of the run - until I hit 0.6 miles. For the next 40% of the run I moved up to 5.9MPH (10:10/mile). For the final 40% of the run (1.8 miles and onward) I did the run intervals at 6.0MPH (10:00/mile) and upped the speed a bit over the course of the last quarter-mile or so, topping out at a 9:31/mile pace. No foot pain at all! Yessss.

This run WAS faster than yesterday's, but only by a few seconds - 33:58, 11:19ish/mile pace. Once again, the treadmill room was stifling. Blech.

I think I am in a good little pattern for this short JJ5K/W&D training cycle - up the run intervals by 30 seconds for the long run. Then starting on the first run of the next week, keep that interval and with each run as the week goes on, try to go a bit faster. Then up the interval for the long run and repeat. All of this along with upping the weekly mileage, of course. It seems to be working for me - I'm seeing improvement but I feel like I'm also not doing too much, too quickly. The added test this week is adding in a 3rd day in a row of running tomorrow (and I guess also adding in the second Core class, but I did survive that). I'm hoping it'll go well!

Speaking of Core class...my abs are SORE. Specifically my upper abs. Yowza! So no additional abs stuff or push-ups for me today. I did do some balancing stuff on the BOSU ball. I have been forgetting to do that (along with the other rehab stuff I am supposed to be doing)!

Still doing well on the water thing (drinking 3L per day). I feel like it may already be helping my skin? Or I could be making that up. But if my skin (a MAJOR source of insecurity for me) gets better from this, that would be awesome.

#magicaldisneypicschallenge Day 14: pink. Last year I didn't try to dress on theme at all for the Jingle Jungle 5K or the Wine & Dine Half. This year I'm going to try a little harder!

Wednesday, October 15: Run #3 (3 miles on the treadmill)

Another 3-miler today! What a repetitive week.

More 3:00/1:00 intervals. For the first 3-minute run, I ran at 5.8MPH (10:20/mile)...then I bumped it up to 5.9MPH (10:10/mile) until I got to 1.5 miles. I did the last half of the run at a 10-minute pace and upped the speed a bit for the last quarter-mile. Total time for this run was 33:42, 11:14/mile pace. The pace is slooooowly inching downward.

Two bad things about this run: 1. It was HOT and HUMID in the treadmill room this morning. I felt like I could taste the humidity. Not pleasant! And 2. I did have some arch pain toward the end of the first mile. That was a little frustrating.

But...I know that the warm, humid conditions of the treadmill room are going a long way in preparing me for Wine & Dine. Last year I know some people really struggled at that race, where for me, it felt downright pleasant out. And the foot pain was only temporary - it went away after a minute or two and I felt great for the rest of the run.

After the run I did Extreme Abs and some push-ups: 3 sets of 5. Not much, but better than nothing. Then I did some one-legged balancing on the ground and on the BOSU ball. Definitely improving at both.

In other news, my tiny brain is struggling to comprehend this new running schedule of mine. For the past few weeks I had Monday as a rest day, then ran Tuesday - Thursday. Now I'm running Monday - Wednesday and all morning I've been thinking today is Thursday as a result. It's not. Boo.

#magicaldisneypicschallenge Day 15: Mickey. Smooching his main squeeze on the Disney Dream just a few months ago!

Thursday, October 16: Rest Day

**WW UPDATE**

Great weigh-in this morning for me - down 2.8 pounds! I'm just 0.4 pounds away from getting rid of what I gained during my injury lay-off/work trip. Awesome. I'm really hoping to string together a couple of good weeks in a row here, because it is BEYOND old to have been gaining and losing the same 1-2 pounds over the last few weeks. Of course, I probably could try to eat better to rectify that...

Today is a rest day for me, and apparently my body really needed it - I was in bed by 9:45 last night! Pretty unusual for me, but really, it's probably around the time I should be going to bed every night. I got almost 9 hours of sleep and it was glorious.

Not a lot of news otherwise, except that there are more and more signs that Wine & Dine weekend is getting closer. I signed up for runner tracking yesterday (any time a race has tracking I always have the alerts emailed to me, as a keepsake) as well as the commemorative Wine & Dine bookmark today. The bookmark is an...interesting choice (last year it was a 5" x 7" "art card") but hey, it's something from the race that is free, so I'm not complaining.

Another sign that it’s getting closer is my normal increased pre-Disney race paranoia that I will get sick. Not with Ebola (despite the fact that the news broke yesterday that one of those nurses from Dallas that has Ebola FLEW ON A PLANE to Cleveland after she was exposed - same airport I just flew from/to for work - and stayed in the Akron area for awhile before going home and getting diagnosed...I mean, REALLY?! ), but with a cold or flu or something. I did get my flu shot, but as I sit here at my cube I can hear people around me hacking. Not just clearing their throats, but in a way that it's obvious that they are coming into work sick. I HATE when people do that. That’s why we have sick days!! It's just so...inconsiderate and unnecessary. And even if they don't want to take the time off, we're all set up to work from home if the need arises...so do that! Bah.

On my way home from work yesterday I picked up some Purell and Lysol wipes, and Lysol'd my desk and cube a this morning (which really needed to be done anyway, I hadn't cleaned it in awhile ). I swear I am not normally this paranoid, but I just feel like I'm surrounded by germs all of a sudden! And this has happened with every Disney race I have ever done.

#magicaldisneypicschallenge Day 16: detail. Love these little tiki guys in 'Ohana!

Friday, October 17: Hot Yoga Flow

No Core this morning - I set myself up for a stupidly busy day so Core got the ax.

Day started out with some work followed by appointments. The first was just a yearly check-up - nothing too exciting there.

The next appointment - physical therapy! Finally. Since I'm feeling so much better now I really considered canceling this appointment, but I'm glad I kept it. The guy was really knowledgeable and in-depth. He tested my flexibility (which he deemed good) and stability (which he deemed...not as good). He had my run on the treadmill...grand idea, except that I didn't have my running shoes with me! What an idiot. I made due in those newer Nike shoes I got in Chicago, and the guy said my form and cadence looked good.

In the end he said to continue on with Core and yoga. He also gave me 2 exercises to do - planks and one-legged squats. Both are supposed to help me become more stable, because if my hips and knees are out of whack, that's where problems come in. The squats in particular are hard - it's almost impossible for me to stay totally steady while doing them, which is the whole point...and evidence that I NEED to get more stable.

Later in the evening I went to a hot yoga class, which felt awesome as usual. Love yoga!

#magicaldisneypicschallenge Day 17: morning. This is the sun rising over Tomorrowland during the 2013 Walt Disney World Marathon...so I was approaching Mile Marker 6. Just before 7AM I think? This is one of my favorite pictures I’ve taken on a race course.

Saturday, October 18: Run #4 (8-mile out-and-back)
Weather: 46 degrees, overcast and windy with some rain

Another week of injury-free running is complete! Woohoo!

This run was TOUGH. From the beginning my legs just felt like they were incredibly tired. I'm not sure if it was from upping the mileage, or all of those squats I did in PT yesterday, or yoga...or a combination of all 3? Who knows.

I also found that I was really struggling mentally during this run. I remember getting to a point right before that half in September where I felt like the longer distances weren't seeming so long to me, but that wasn't the case today. So that was disappointing. And the wind sucked. The lucky thing is that the rain held off until the last mile of the run, and even when it did rain it was just a bit of mist.

Total time for the run was 1:27:50, 10:58/mile pace. I upped the intervals to running 3:30/walking 1:00, so that probably contributed to the dead legs feeling I had. I had half a Honey Stinger Waffle at the halfway point and took water with me...my stomach was cramping a bit toward the end of the run but felt good overall.

Then later in the evening Will and I headed out to this Italian place downtown that we really like. I had a filet with Gorgonzola sauce and gelato for dessert...YUM.

Well, as we drove home, my stomach really started to bother me. It got worse and worse, and I ended up quite sick that evening. I'm thinking it was my body not used to running for so long (since I had some stomach cramps at the end of the run) plus the rich food I had for dinner. Blech! DEFINITELY something to keep in mind with the Wine & Dine after-party!!

#magicaldisneypicschallenge Day 18: us. Finally convinced Will to do a Disney race with me last year! At this point I think we were halfway done with the Jingle Jungle 5K. Most fun I have ever had during a Disney race!

Sunday, October 19: Unscheduled rest day

In light of last night's stomach issues, I thought it best to take a rest day today. Stomach feels almost 100% luckily, but you never know!!

#magicaldisneypicschallenge Day 19: icon. This. Our Spaceship Earth!

Continued in Next Post

 

[dmross]

Oh the pre-race paranoia! I know what you mean! Lol, use your anti microbial supplies with great flourishes at work.

All somebody did today at work was say the words "sore throat" and I felt myself take a defensive stance aka Darryl from the Walking Dead.

We're so close! I can't wait!!!

 

[annmarieda]

Ok, I am going to try and get caught up on your thread... try being the key word here.

Can I just say...these skirts really ARE addicting. They have been talking on the FB groups about PeacockIris skirts becoming available, and from the pictures it just doesn't look like a color combination I would LOVE...but I saw that it was available and actually had one in my cart yesterday. EVEN THOUGH I DON'T REALLY LIKE IT THAT MUCH! I didn't buy it, but boy, the impulse to purchase is definitely real...

I totally agree! I sometimes wonder if I would have the skirts I do if I didn’t impulse buy them.. I mean I see one go up for sale on one of the fb groups and I think I need it. Course, maybe I do. I wore so many on my trip at the beginning of this month...and with running... it seems as though I don’t have enough of them clean at one time to run and just wear. (although I don’t “just wear” as often at home since I don't wear them to work)

So yeah, embarrassing and upsetting because I felt terrible that the person who bought it from me was disappointed, and I didn't want to be thought of as shady.

I hate that feeling. I really shouldn’t care what people who are online who I probably never ever would meet think of me...but I do. I like to think of myself as not shady....so the idea that someone out there might? Well, that will give me an ulcer just thinking about it.

The person that bought it after I re-listed it actually posted a picture of the skirt on one of the FB pages thanking my with a little face...so it definitely worked out, and I definitely learned from that experience! I will be much, much more careful next time.

I am glad it worked out. I think sometimes it is all in expectation. I bought a skirt from someone and it is very very VERY far from perfect. She let me know ahead of time and I am happy...very happy with that skirt.

AHHH you're running in Disneyland this weekend!!! So jealous!! You're going to have so much fun!

Oh my gosh! Can you believe it has been that long since I have been on dis? The month between the DLH and the ToT flew by...and since the ToT time also has flown by.

Not a great start to my Monday! I woke up at about 3:40 AM and had a lot of trouble falling back asleep. I was just thinking about the upcoming day/week and couldn't turn my brain off!

That is crazy early. Maybe you were in pre disney race mode?

Also, the dog was snoring (he sleeps in a crate in our room) so that was not helping at all! Good thing he's such a cutie.

I am sure it does...he is very cute. :

: The hits just keep coming!

Oh my! That was quite the morning!

And then I added a day onto my Wine & Dine trip![/URL] Hooray for turning a potentially bad Monday around!

Yay!!! Adding a day is always the best way to turn around a day. I have to post to my TR..but lets just say I may have had to do that to two of the remaining three trips I have planned.

**RAW THREADS RANT AHEAD**

There's no getting around it - the RT tanks are the problem. Now that I know they make me chafe (and don't breathe super well) I barely even want to wear them. So I'm pretty sure I’m going to start selling them, one by one. Part of me thinks they still may work for shorter runs, but I'm just not sure.

I do feel your pain with this. Funny thing is... I have had them work absolutely fine and then absolutely not. In fact the black minnie bow tank I wore in January without incident. Yet it is one that now will totally give me trouble at anything over 4 miles. Maybe they wear out quickly? I am keeping mine... I did wear that exact tank last night over a long sleeve tee. So that is probably how I will use them as they “go bad”

So now I'll have 2 of them gone but only have to go to the post office once. I also wised up and bought a 5-pack of shipping envelopes from Drug Mart yesterday for $4.50, so that should cut down on my shipping costs (since I'm such a frequent visitor to the post office lately I know their envelopes are more like $1.30 apiece). No takers on the other tanks yet. Fingers crossed!

I am glad they are selling and very smart to purchase a 5 pack of envies!

The big conundrum is that I was planning on wearing the Tiana, Elsa and Sea Witch tanks for upcoming Disney races...but it seems stupid to keep them just for those races and then sell them afterward. I'm going to think about it a little more, but right now I am leaning toward trying to sell the tanks (I think I can get $30 for the ones that do sell since I've only worn each one once - ARRG I wish I would have figured out this chafing thing earlier, before buying so many!) and figure out something else for the races.

I think they make me so sad because they are probably among the cutest and best “disney race” shirts around. I know I planned a lot of my race outfits around them too.

One possible solution is to try the "street v" Raw Threads shirts - these are basically v-neck t-shirts. I have 3 of those right now - the Reindeer Bow (Anna-inspired), Mermaid and Beer Run. All 3 of the tanks I was planning on wearing for Disney races - Tiana, Elsa and Sea Witch - come in the street v style, so I'm thinking when it starts to cool off a bit I'll try a few longer runs in one of the street v shirts I already own. If I don’t chafe, then I'll probably order the street v version of Tiana, Elsa and Sea Witch (or grab them from the RT booth at the Wine & Dine expo). If I do chafe then I'll STOP buying RT stuff for running and just stick with the Nike dri-fit tops.

Obviously I am horribly behind... but did you try this? Did it work? I am hoping that you can salvage some of the shirts since they are cute and perfect for Disney races.

is definitely frustrating, but it's also part of training to figure out what does and does not work...and these tanks are not working for me. And I am SO glad that I can possibly sell some of them on Facebook so that it's not a total loss!

I think it is also frustrating that what works one day may not on another.

today...NOPE. See ya later, speedwork!!

 

[annmarieda]

A little voice in the back of my mind was saying, "It's okay to cut the workout short if you want to"...but really I would have had no good reason to do so. I'm not injured or anything...just whiny.

I hate that little voice!

In the end, I ended up sort of checking in with myself after every other interval to see how I felt and continue to make the decision to keep going. The first few were tough but I finally felt warmed up by the 4th or 5th interval. I think in my mind I didn't believe I was actually going to finish the workout as scheduled until the very end of the 10th interval. Total time for the workout was a little over an hour.

yay for sticking it out!

on Instagram one of my friends had a post about how she was dreading her run this morning, but her son said to her, "Mom, keep in mind that you aren't doing this because you have to. You want to. There's a difference." Smart kid! I didn't HAVE to finish this workout...but I wanted to because I knew it would make me stronger and (hopefully) faster. That's something I'll have to keep in mind over the next few months.

That is a wise boy!

Packet pick-up started for the half marathon yesterday - so early! I'm a little disappointed in the race shirt...it's just kind of blah. But I'm still looking forward to the race itself.

Don’t you hate that? I have so many shirts that I just am not a fan of. I guess though that they can’t all be shirts that would get worn over and over.

In other news, I have those two Raw Threads tops packed up and ready to ship on my way home from work today. There is seemingly zero interest in the other tanks so far. :Sad:

Yay for the two... hopefully the others have gone by now too.

With my recent increase in mileage, I have definitely been feeling hungrier than normal, so I've been having lots of snacks. I think normally this would be okay, except that I really haven't been doing a great job of keeping track of said snacks. So I was relieved to weigh in this morning and see no change in my weight this week. I definitely think this is going to become more of a challenge when Dopey training starts.

Oh that increase in hunger! It doesn’t seem fair... I mean why does our bodies go into “stock up” mode so easily????

After this my day pretty much went to crap. There's been some drama with a friend of mine (nothing that I am directly involved in, but I'm still pretty stressed out about it) and today at work I found out I need to work on something that is due on SATURDAY. And no one told me about this until noon today. Ummm, thanks?! Rough afternoon over here.

I am sorry that you had drama... drama is never fun

The work stuff continues over here, but it's much less stressful. After letting it ruin my afternoon yesterday today I’ve just decided to not let it have that much power over me. I'll do what I can during work hours, and that's it (unlike the person that is charge of the project, who sent me emails at 9PM last night. Nope, that's zoning-out-on-the-couch time in this household!). It's about noon and the emails have tapered off, so hopefully my part is done or almost done.

Good for you to not let it ruin more of your time!

After taking care of some of that stuff I did manage to head out and get my run done. It was...okay. The weather definitely helped. I did the first mile a little too quickly, the second mile about perfect, and struggled for the third. I felt like I was all-out sprinting toward to try to hit that goal pace, and I did end up getting there...but I really cannot see keeping that up for 10.1 more miles. Eek!

Splits:

Mile 1: 9:39
Mile 2: 9:45
Mile 3: 9:48

Total time: 29:14, 9:44/mile pace

I can never maintain for an entire half... that would be an awesome pace if you could! Even for just the three...that is an GREAT time! :thumbsup:

Uhh....yeah. Clearly this did not go well.

First, what happened before the run - I stopped at D-I-C-K's Sporting Goods to buy a couple of the Nike tank tops I like so much. I haven't bought any in a few years, but I know my size so I just grabbed 2. Before the run yesterday I ripped the tag off of one before putting it on (foreshadowing...) and...PROBLEM. Apparently Nike has change the way they make their tanks. The thing was huuuuge on me. I was so mad! Luckily I was able to return it later with no questions asked. Crises averted!

So glad the crises was averted.

my Elsa bow RT tank sold! Woohoo! Just 3 more to go.

Yay!!!

 

[annmarieda]

So...the run. The weather I always add to these outdoor running posts are what Garmin has on the Garmin Connect website, but when I went out to run it my phone indicated temperatures were already in the mid-80s, and it felt like it. It was hot and the sun was beating down on me and giving me a headache.

That sounds completely miserable!

I was so over it from the beginning. I was looking for excuses to stop...and eventually I just did. I made it a little over 4 miles before calling my husband to come get me (who sounded relieved - he was drenched in sweat just after running the dog outside), and while I waited I walked/jogged a big until I made it to 4.5 miles.

I think those make for the worst runs...the ones where you are not in it from the very start.

Normally when I cut a run short I feel pretty guilty about it, but not this one. It was just too hot out - if I'd kept going I'm pretty sure I would have been sick and miserable. And to be honest...as embarrassed as I am to say this...I just didn't want to do it. I think a lot of that is knowing that Dopey training is coming up, and if I'd done this run I would have had my long runs from the last few weeks (9 miles, 10 miles, 15K, 11 miles, 12 miles, the half marathon, and then the first Dopey long run of 13 miles) all right in a row, and that just overwhelmed me. So I'm giving myself a break this week and hope to do better later.

Sometimes... I think it is just better to allow yourself the occasional (emphasis on occasional because it can become way to easy to make it habit and habit is not what is good) a break.

Sunday, August 31: Rest Day

Yay! Rest days are great aren’t they? This was not a rest day for me... DLH day!!

Race T-Shirt Quilt!

That is such a cool idea!!

I've been running for 6 years now, and a big part of running for me has been participating in races. Almost all races include a shirt with registration, and recently I've been noticing that a lot of my races shirts have been going unworn for awhile now...either because they get passed over for other shirts or because they're gigantically unflattering on me (I'm looking at YOU, runDisney shirts from 2011 - 2013).

I have that same trouble... only not quite as bad since my running carreer is far shorter. I do know what you mean though... lots of shirts that just NEVER are worn. I have a neon mustard yellow shirt (yes...it is like glowing yellow mustard color) with emerald green writing on it from a st. paddy’s day race. OMG - so hideous I have never worn it (along with many others) This would be a great way to remember the races...and still put to good use those shirts. Cause... I wouldn’t just toss them or give them away. They do “mean something” to me... just can’t wear them.

I have always thought race t-shirt quilts were a pretty cool idea, but I am NOT a sewer. My husband's aunt is a very talented quilter, but I didn't want to ask her to put something so large together for me. I am subscribed to LivingSocial emails (a lot like Groupon) and a couple of months ago one of the featured deals was for a t-shirt quilt from Project Repat. This seemed like exactly what I needed - it even specifically said they could use dry-fit shirts - but I put off buying it for a few days, long enough for the smallest size ($45 for 12 sides of shirts) to sell out. So I bought a deal for the medium size ($75 for 20 sides of shirts). The other option was $85 for 30 sides of shirts. This was late July.

Not entirely cheap... but definitely I think worth it!

From the beginning I thought it would be cool to have my 4 shirts from Marathon Weekend 2013[/URL] be the center row. From there I tried to arrange them chronologically, but I thought the color placement didn't look good this way. Mostly I didn't like how there's a big white blob at the top.

I agree..the white at the top didn’t quite work. However putting the marathon weekend ones in center was perfect!

So I kept the middle row the same but moved other things around. I did have a little bit of a method I was following (namely having similar/the same race shirts mirroring one another...i.e. Disney 5K races in opposite corners, 10-miler shirts mirroring one another, etc.) until I came up with an arrangement I liked:

Perfect!

I was supposed to send in my shirts and picture, and if I wanted to use 2 sides from 1 shirt I needed to cut that shirt in half and include both sides in the picture (if that makes sense...I had 2 shirts I wanted to do this with). I also cut the sleeves off the shirts so they would fit more easily into the envelope.

I know it is weird..but the cutting would have made me nervous. Did it make you at all?

I kept the sleeves from the longer Disney race shirts...one of my favorite details is how the park icons that are on the courses are printed on the sleeves. I'm not sure what, if anything, to do with these - sew them together end-to-end to make a scarf?!

I wonder if they could be put in some sort of shadow box? I agree they are super cool!

The envelope went out in the mail August 10 or 11, and I got an email that it had been received on August 14. On August 28 I got an email that it had shipped, and it was on my doorstep 2 days later!

Here it is (I didn't totally smooth it out, oops)!

I love it!

I've also been giving some thought as to what I want to wear for my upcoming Disney races (6 of them...lucky me!).

You have me beat! I just had/have 5 :

At this point the only outfit I am 100% decided on is the one for the marathon. I THINK I know what I'll end up wearing for the Jingle Jungle 5K (waiting on my friend who is running it with me to pull the trigger on her outfit) and I have the top I'm wearing for Wine & Dine...just need to decide on a skirt. Which will influence my Sweaty Band selection. Important life decisions here, people.

they are important life decisions!

During the run I tried out a new running top. I mentioned last week that I went to D-I-C-K'S and bought 2 Nike tops that ended up not working out. I saw another top - different style - that I liked on a mannequin, but couldn't find it in the store. Turns out it was the last top in the entire store...so why it was on the mannequin, implying that it was still available for purchase there, I'm not sure.

I agree..that is weird. Why have it on the mannequin if it isn’t in store to purchase?

The tops arrived yesterday and I tried them on - and they fit! I took the tags off of one and used it for my run today, and it held up. So far so good. I'm keeping the tags on the other two until I do a long run in the one I wore this morning (that’s called LEARNING from one's mistakes...i.e. what I did not do with the RawThreads tops ). If that goes well that I'll keep all of them - if not, at least I can return two.

Good plan.

What doesn't show up very well in the picture is that the entire back of the tank is mesh...so obviously that meant that it breathed really well during this morning's run. Since it's the end of the summer season these tanks were $25 apiece (originally $38) and they seem a lot more promising comfort-wise than the RawThreads stuff.

I wondered what made them “hypercool” and to get them at the end of the season is a great idea!

This cycle of gaining and losing the same 0.4ish pounds is getting old. I'm hoping to chill out and break that cycle this week.

It could be that you are just maintaining...and while I am sure it is frustrating to not lose...at least you are maintaining and that is not an easy task

dumb as it sounds, part of what was making me so stressed out was trying to sell those stupid RawThreads shirts. I just feel like such an idiot for buying and wearing a bunch BEFORE trying one on a longer run and figuring out that they don't work for me. And they're expensive, so I really want to get some of that money back - and they hadn't been selling. But then yesterday afternoon I got a message - someone wanted to buy one of the tanks!!! And not just any tank, but the Dopey tank - the one I thought would be the hardest to sell. I was SO relieved.

I can understand why this would cause you stress and so I am glad they are selling!

got better - later this same person sent me another message and asked if I could also add the Minnie bow tank to her package and give her a small price break. It was a totally ideal situation - she was more than generous with what she was asking for (knocking just $2 off the Minnie shirt price) and this way I'd only have to make one post office stop, use one envelope and pay for shipping once. AND...I'd get rid of another tank. Such a relief.

now I have just one tank left (the Tiana bow tank) and 3 shirts with sleeves (the mermaid shirt I wore for the Royal Family 5K, the Beer Run shirt for Wine & Dine, and an Anna bow shirt). I'm not as anxious to sell the 3 shirts with sleeves because I can wear them for strength training. The Tiana shirt is still up for sale, but I'm trying not to flip out about it.

Good to not flip out.

mean really...look at how much space of this post I devoted to whining about selling these dumb shirts. I told my husband last night how much this had been stressing me out and he was just looking at me like..."WOMAN, chill!" So that is what I'm going to try to do. They're just shirts. Everything will be okay. I'm ridiculous.

If it were me... I would be fixated on just the same thing. I would feel like kicking myself for buying so many... then mad that they didn’t work... the frustrated that I had to sell them... then worried they wouldn’t sell. Believe me... I get how this took up some space on your thread. It would have mine as well. : and for the record... yes, everything will be okay... and no you are not ridiculous.

Way back in December I signed up to run the Rock & Roll Cleveland Half Marathon, scheduled for October 11. A few weeks back I transferred my entry to the 5K so that I could run it with my 13-year-old cousin. This morning I got an email - the race has been CANCELED. I'm stunned!

I think it is odd when races get cancelled after registration has began...of even before. (have you heard that ToT will not be back in 2015? )

More race news...yesterday I got the news that my in-laws are coming to our place for Thanksgiving this year. Normally we go down to see them and stay there for a couple of days. Instead, this year they will come to us on Saturday of Thanksgiving week...so we'll be home for Thanksgiving. This means that 1. We can have Thanksgiving with my family - 2 Thanksgivings! and 2. I can sign up for Cleveland's Turkey Trot.

[/quote]

That is awesome! You get to have more family time for thanksgiving AND get to run a race.

 

[annmarieda]

RACE RECAP: 2014 River Run Half Marathon
Sunday, September 7, 2014
Weather: 55 degrees and 94% humidity, sunny

I normally love recaps... this one just made me sad. Started off good though. Sounds like great weather.

[ Race outfit:

And how cute is your outfit! I LOVE the skirt!

woke up at about 5:30 and was on the road by 6:15, drinking coffee the entire way. The race goes through our local park system and is a point-to-point course. Runners could either park near the starting line (meaning they'd have to be shuttled back up to their cars after finishing the race) or closer to the finish line (meaning they'd have a longer shuttle ride to the starting area and a shorter shuttle back to the cars after the race was done). I chose to park closer to the finish line because it was just one town over from where I live, meaning I'd have a pretty short drive home.

I am not sure how much I like that. I guess though it isn’t too different from Disney. We start in different places than we finish.. I must just forget about it though since I don’t drive myself to the start of from the finish.

This ride seemed to take FOREVER. We drove to the park system and ended up driving the entire course, so I know we couldn't have driven more than 20 miles, but the buses were only going 30MPH (I know because I was sitting right behind the driver). The drive took 45 minutes!!!!! I couldn't believe it.

Ok, so speaking from recent experience...that is VERY stressful.

During this ride I was listening to the people behind me chatting - one of the guys had done the race before and was pointing out that the rode we were driving was really curvy and winding, so it would be important to run the tangents I made a mental note to remember that.

I normally am inclined to do that. My dh not so much. I had to really try and get him to move from his “comfort” spot on the course to cross over...even when I knew we had an outright turn coming up.

Our driver was not the smoothest and I'd had a ton of coffee, so I was more than ready to get off that freaking bus by the time we pulled into the starting area at 7:30. And then I saw the porta-potty line. It. Was. HUGE. They had a bank of 8-10 porta-potties and it was not enough. But there was no way I was skipping my pre-race bathroom stop, so I waited. By the time I got through the line and did my business it was 7:55. The race was due to start at 8...there were LOTS of people still in line.

And this is where I started to think “oh no”.

The first 0.25 miles or so were REALLY crowded. I think there were about 1500 participants, and there were points during the first few miles where we had just one or two lanes of the road to run in. It very much reminded me of the crowding that happens during Disney races. We were all crammed together and with the humidity, it was just not pleasant!

That is always my least favorite part of any race.

But once we got to spread out a bit I felt fantastic. The scenery was really beautiful and I was comfortably keeping up a faster-than-expected pace.

Mile 1: 9:46
Mile 2: 9:39
Mile 3: 9:32
Mile 4: 9:41
Mile 5: 9:58 (took a short walk break and a salted caramel gu somewhere in here)
Mile 6: 9:20

this is awesome!

At this point I was totally on pace to crush my PR and easily get my sub-2:10 goal. I felt awesome. I made the decision that I'd walk again twice - at my planned gu breaks (beginning of miles 7 and 10) - and through the water stops.

You should be very happy with this part of the race. HOLY moly you were flying!

But during mile 7, everything went to crap. Out of nowhere, my left hip starting KILLING me. It was so bad that I was forced to walk and then eventually stop completely to stretch it out.

Mile 7: 10:10 (took my gu and started to panic)

Again “oh, no!”

The pain was also on the outside part of my knee - it was unmistakably IT Band pain.

The freaking IT Band:

This band extends from the hip to the outside of the knee. I knew exactly what had happened - while I'd done a good job of running the tangets, what I'd failed to notice was that not only were the roads curvy and winding, they were also incredibly sloped.

Yeah, that is the trouble with some courses... they can be heavily banked. As I mentioned, I normally am naturally inclined to cut the distance like that...but on the ToT course, there was (waa... I just said was) a very sloped section that I had to rise up onto rather than run on the inner part because it hurt a bit.... and then when I went days later to run on the beach I absolutely couldn’t do it it was so sore.

"Some runners make the mistake of only running on one side of the road. Most roads are higher in the center and slope off on either side. The foot that is on the outside part of the road is therefore lower than the other. This causes the pelvis to tilt to one side and stresses the IT band."

That makes sense. I never thought of it.. I knew that I was harder on shoes because of it. (one shoe is worn more heavily) I am lucky that I haven’t done more damage to myself. OR maybe having that one leg slightly longer has finally helped me.

Running was suddenly incredibly painful and I found myself locked in a cycle where I'd run until the pain was too much, then walk for a bit, and then stop completely to stretch my hip - and voila, the pain was gone, and I was able to run a few minutes feeling totally normal. Then it would come back, I'd walk a bit, stop and stretch, and start the whole cycle over again.

Mile 8: 9:51
Mile 9: 10:09

Way to push through!

I almost started to cry at this point. It was so incredibly frustrating that after weeks of working toward this one goal, it was being totally derailed because I didn't pay attention to the road sloping. Apparently the best way to combat this is to run near the top of the road, where it's flatter, but I'd been focusing more on running the tangents...meaning I'd been running on a slope almost the entire time.

It was almost sickening to look at my watch and see my average pace creep up. First it was in the low 9:40s...then the mid-9:40s...9:50s...9:55...

When the pain first started I thought I could still make my sub-2:10 goal. But in between mentally dropping f-bombs in my head (okay, a few of those may have escaped aloud at points) I also started repeating, "Dopey...Wine & Dine..." and knew I just had to let go of whatever time goals I had for this half. If I really injured myself running this stupid race and couldn't do Wine & Dine or Dopey, I'd hate myself.

So I finally gave myself permission to take more walk breaks and to stop and stretch as much as I needed to.

Mile 10: 10:29 (took my final gu here)
Mile 11: 10:47

I am so sorry to hear that you experience this. I am sure it was frustrating and I can imagine that fbombs would have come out.

As I was walking an older guy ran by me and tried to get me to pick up the pace..."only 1.5 miles left!" I know he was trying to encourage me but I pretty much wanted to punch him. I mean...if I could, yes, I'd love to be running right now. Shut up.

I am sure he meant well. Yes, I may often be that crazy person who means well.... trying to encourage others who are struggling...probably who are thinking they want to punch me.

Sub-2:10 went away...new PR went away...I walked and stopped more.

Mile 12: 13:29
Mile 13: 13:26

And finally, it was over.

Mile 13.0 - 13.26: 2:30

I am sure that was not a fun thing... watching the pr go away..the sub 2:10...

Official time: 2:18:42, 10:35/mile pace...I'd missed my ultimate goal time by about 10 minutes and a new PR by 5.

But OMG! look at that time! 2:18 is awesome!!!

I collected my finisher medal and got in line for the bonus medal...the one for completing the 10-miler in the spring along with this race. They handed me a metal disc that looked like the sun - it didn't even have a ribbon. So I can't hang it up with my other medals. Um...thanks?

It looks like a token...

, the sun medal (Will calls it a "token" since there's no ribbon) doesn't even interlock into the 10-miler and half marathon medals. You can see the notches where it's supposed to go...but do you lay the three of them on a table together or something? WTH?!

I agree with Will And that is just weird... maybe you get them mounted together?

I stayed long enough to get a banana and water before getting in line for the shuttle back to my car. These shuttles were smaller than the ones we'd been on earlier and I had to wait for 4 of them to pick people up before mine came (about 20 minutes - there were 30ish seats per shuttle). And TONS of people were in line behind me. Thankfully the ride to my car was shorter than the one I'd had earlier that morning.

That is a long wait! Yuck!

I made my way home feeling utterly defeated. I stopped for a pumpkin spice latte and a big (7-pound) bag of ice from a gas station...got home and put the ice in the tub along with some cold water and took a 15-minute ice bath before showering and heading to brunch with Will. Limped around for the rest of the day and was on a steady diet of rest, ice and ibuprofen. UGGHHHHH.

I hope that both the latte and ice helped.

Let me just say, I am not ashamed of my time at all...it just wasn't what I was training and hoping for, and I am so, so disappointed. The good things I can take away from this are that I had a fantastic first half of the race, and the race itself seemed to go by quickly. I didn't find myself thinking, "OMG so many miles when will this end?!"...even when the pain was really bad. That gives me a lot of confidence for my loooong runs that I have coming up. And once I was done running I barely even felt like I'd run 13.1 (er, 13.26) miles. Except for the knee soreness. To me that means that I DID train well for this race which is both comforting and frustrating. Comforting because I did what I could and worked hard, frustrating because something unforeseen messed it all up. I just wasn't expecting this to happen - I almost never deal with IT Band pain anymore and I hadn't been having any during any of my recent runs.

You should be proud of your time. You finished in a time that so so SO many people would only dream of and yet did it with an injury. YOU ROCK! And..while yes it is frustrating that you trained well and were not able to fully live up to that training... in a way..you did. I mean think of how it would have gone had you not trained like you did. I am sure your time would not have been 2:18.

So, in summary...between the shuttle stuff (I spent an hour of my day on shuttles...bleh), lack of porta-potties at the start and the fact that I'm now hobbling around, I am NEVER running this race again. I've mostly made my peace with what happened, but I know that the only way to get this issue to go away is to rest...which means I'll need to miss some runs this week. Week 1 of Dopey training. Not exactly the way I wanted to start out!

I don’t blame you... that would be a race I would probably never do again either!

 

[annmarieda]

Dopey Challenge Training

ETA: Had to abandon this plan due to injury, see revision here.

That is a SERIOUS plan!

This is an 18-week training plan that alternates harder weeks with easier weeks. The first week, for example, has 5 days of running (!) with a double-digit long run of 13 miles...27 miles for the week. The next week is the easier week - there are 4 days of running, the longest run is about half of the previous week's long run at 7 miles, and the total weekly mileage is lower (18 miles). Then the next week jumps back up to 5 days of running, then a 4-day week, etc. It's sort of a 2 steps forward, 1 step back approach - I think stepping back every other week is what is going to keep me from totally freaking out about this. There are goal race pace runs, but I don't have a goal pace at all - I'm just aiming to finish without wanting to die. So I probably won't focus on my pace very much.

I know this is going to sound odd/crazy.. but the 2 steps forward and then 1 back sounds kinda fun.

I'm going to try to stick to the scheduled days and follow the plan almost exactly as written, rather than shuffle things around like I have in the past. I know I'll have to move runs around a bit, but for this plan, more than any other training plan I've followed, I feel like sticking to the prescribed days as much as possible is going to be really important. That means doing some of my long runs on Sundays (which I don't love) and moving my rest day to Monday instead of Sunday, which is going to be REALLY weird for me.

I wasn’t a fan of my mondays being a rest day either.

More than anything, I'm pretty nervous about the Wednesday runs. These runs range from 5-8 miles, and while I've done 5-mile treadmill runs on weekday mornings, the runs go up to 6 miles starting in October...I'm not sure I can handle the treadmill for 6-8 miles without going totally insane. So I'm not sure how I'll get these done. Either in the morning before work (meaning I'd need to wake up earlier) - around my town or attempting it on the treadmill (outside around the area where I work is an option, but I wouldn't feel totally safe, so I'm almost 100% sure I won't do that) - or (most likely) outside right when I get home from work. I'd rather move these runs to Fridays, but running longer distances Friday - Sunday every week, rather than slowly building up to that, seems like a recipe for injury, which must be why HH wrote the plan this way...in fact, he says:

Long mid week runs are tough. I am struggling a tad myself to get them done. I think once I accept the dark and cold and wet... I will get back into it. Mostly I find I dread getting out and cant imagine doing 6 or 8 miles mid week. Only yesterday did I not follow through. (it was a record for rain and just south had a tornado... I think I can accept that I only ran 4.5)

"The key to Dopey is in the weekend runs, not merely increasing the miles weekly, but gradually introducing you to running on more consecutive days than you might otherwise run: two days, three days, inevitably four consecutive days. After a gradual mileage build-up, the fun begins in Week 9, where I ask you to run on Friday, Saturday and Sunday...the Dopey pattern has been established. Every other weekend I will ask you to do consecutive-day training...the key to this Dopey program is within Weeks 9, 11, 13 and 15..."

He also mentions not wanting Dopey runners to overtrain...fine by me. Hal hasn't steered me wrong yet.

It is good you have a plan that you feel confident in. I know I struggle to figure out anything at this point

The peak week is going to come the week before Christmas with a Dopey dress rehearsal - 4 days in a row of running (2.5 miles / 5 miles / 10 miles / 20 miles - 42.5-mile week) - after a 5-miler early in the week, followed by a glorious 3-week] (running less and resting more). In 2012 my Goofy dress rehearsal got messed up thanks to a blizzard[/URL]. Pleeeeease let the weather be nice that week!!

Crossing fingers

then it's Marathon Weekend!!!

We really need to set aside a If we don’t plan ahead I am sure to get lost in what I am doing and totally miss out on meeting up. That is of course if you want to... if you don’t... that is totally ok :

With some weeks having 5 days of running, there's no way I'm going to stick to two days per week of strength training - so I guess I'll do 1 day of strength training on the 5-day running weeks and 2 days of strength training on the 4-day running weeks (still sticking with ChaLEAN Extreme)...if possible.

You are awesome! I wish I could train like you!!!

I've got 3 races scheduled over the next few months: the Akron Half Marathon on 9/27 (14-mile run planned for that day) and the Jingle Jungle 5K and the Wine & Dine Half Marathon (both on 11/8, 17-mile long run planned on that day). I have a couple of others I'm looking at but am not 100% decided on them yet...so I will be shuffling my schedule a bit during the weeks of those races. Since the half marathon I just completed was my goal half marathon (ugh), I'm going to treat these other races as training runs because I don’t want to get injured. Dopey is the main priority now.

It is good you are serious about the dopey. I fear there are some who sign up and think that they will just get by with little training or who don’t allow themselves to train correctly and injure themselves.

So I'm glad it's finally time to really start training...but I'm nervous. I don't know why - the weekly mileage is similar to what I did when I was preparing for the marathon in 2012 and Goofy in 2013. And the taper - 3 days per week of running - should be pretty awesome after all of those 4- and 5-day running weeks. I'm probably not going to know what to do with myself. Just gotta take it one week at a time I guess. Eyes on the prize!

EXACTLY!!! eyes on the prize!!!

HERE WE GOOOOO!

Great pic!!

 

[annmarieda]

Week 1 (9/8 - 9/10): 3 miles completed/27 miles planned (recovery from IT Band strain/weird foot strain)
Monday: Rest Day
Tuesday: 3-mile run planned, unscheduled rest day taken
Wednesday: 5-mile run planned, unscheduled rest day taken
Thursday: 3-mile run planned, unscheduled rest day taken
Friday: Strength Training (ChaLEAN Extreme Push 3) + Warm Yoga Flow
Saturday: 3-mile run
Sunday: 13-mile run planned, unscheduled rest day taken

Week 2 (9/15 - 9/21): 0 miles completed (recovery from weird foot strain)
Monday: Rest Day
Tuesday: 3-mile run planned, unscheduled rest day taken
Wednesday: 5-mile run planned, IronStrength completed
Thursday: 3-mile run, unscheduled rest day taken
Friday: Strength Training + yoga, unscheduled rest day taken
Saturday: 7-mile run, unscheduled rest day taken
Sunday: Strength Training + yoga, unscheduled rest day taken

Week 3 (9/22 - 9/28): 3 miles completed, DNS AKRON HALF MARATHON
Monday: Strength training (IronStrength) completed
Tuesday: Yoga Flow For All Levels completed
Wednesday: Strength training (IronStrength) completed
Thursday: rest day
Friday: Warm Yoga Flow, 1-mile run
Saturday: DNS Akron Half Marathon (DNS), rest day
Sunday: 2-mile run

Oh no! I have to catch up! I hope all is well... a DNS? Lots of rest days. I really hope the IT band issue was not worse than it sounded

I am taking one page at a time... with of course needing to make multiple posts. I am slowly getting caught up on your thread.....

 

[annmarieda]

Bad news: I am sore from yesterday's half marathon. SORE. All day yesterday (in between feeling sorry for myself with the IT Band pain) I was patting myself on the back for being so awesome because I had literally zero soreness anywhere else. Well, this morning I got up and I am sore almost everywhere - quads, hamstrings, back, shoulders...the normal soreness that I've had after pretty much every race I've done this year. I mean, DUH...I'm not sure why I thought it was different this time. I guess it had time to settle in overnight. Not so awesome after all, are we?!

It is funny how some times, some races can just leave us much more sore. After the DLH, I was REALLY sore. Course, I wonder how much of that had to do with post race activities. I can’t tell you how many stairs I climbed up and down that day, but it was not insignificant.

Good news: My IT Band feels MUCH better today. It's still sore, for sure, but not like it was yesterday. I'm still trying to figure out the best way to sit at my desk so as not to aggravate it (it's on my left side - I have learned that crossing my left leg over my right is no bueno...and crossing my right leg over my left is also not good. So no leg crossing. Learning! ) but there are times where, when walking, it feels completely normal. I have a roll of KT Tape that I bought at the Wine & Dine expo last year so I used some of that to tape my knee this morning and have taken one dose of ibuprofen so far. I'm planning on icing and foam rolling when I get home...and avoiding taking the stairs as much as possible. That hurts the most. I think that's really all I can do at this point. I did get a little overambitious and run a few steps across the street - it didn't feel nearly as bad as yesterday but it didn't feel great, either.

I really hope that your IT band has continued to improve.

On that note...I'm going to have to miss some runs this week. Right now my goal is to hopefully be recovered enough to do yoga on Friday and my scheduled runs on Saturday (3 miles) and Sunday (13 miles). I think a few days of total rest is the only thing that's going to make this go away. It's unfortunate, and not the way I wanted to start out Dopey training, but I think it’s what has to be done.

I am impressed. It is so hard to know when to push through and when to recognize that a rest to recover and heal is necessary. I am so bad about not knowing when to push and when not to.

More than anything I am incredibly relieved that 1. I haven't actually injured myself (at least I don't THINK this is an injury, just soreness) and 2. That I don't have to deal with IT Band pain on a regular basis. I have a whole new appreciation and batch of sympathy for those of you that do. It sucks.

I always feel bad for those who battle it too. That and PF... oh and shin splints... Ok, so I feel bad for anyone with any injury... injuries suck!

First skipped running day. Sadness! I am definitely making progress though - my knee felt really good last night and so far this morning I have had zero pain. In fact I have been forgetting about it a lot! Such a relief.

In happier news, last week I ordered two more skirts and they arrived yesterday!

The red skirt is supposed to be Lilo-inspired (I think). The purple skirt is, of course, the wallpaper from the Haunted Mansion!!

skirts!!! I have the haunted mansion one... but not the LeiLei. They are pretty cool skirts!

So now I have two red skirts - the new one (LeiLei) and my Red MiniTech. I'm thinking I probably don’t need two red ones so I may sell the Minnie skirt after I wear it in January. We shall see.

It is good to know that you can sell them if you need/want, isn’t it?

Non-training day #2! I would say my knee feels 99% normal and the rest of my body is totally recovered from Sunday’s race. The knee doesn't hurt at all anymore, just the occasional "tight" feeling sometimes. The foot pain seems to be completely gone as well...in fact, I even ran a few steps across the street again this morning. Unlike Monday, I ran those steps with zero pain!

I'm still sticking with my plan of no activity until yoga on Friday (this whole thing is making me want to get to yoga classes regularly more than ever). Normally I'd do a round of ChaLEAN Extreme on this day too, but the scheduled workout has a lot of leg stuff using pretty heavy-for-me weights, and I’m not sure my knee is ready for that just yet. Maybe I'll feel different come Friday though? Then Saturday’s 3-miler.

Good for you! I really hope it has been just the thing you needed. I bet it has been.

I'm planning on taking the runs this weekend super, super easy - maybe doing run 1 minute/walk 1 minute intervals and building back up slowly from there. It's really nice not to have the pressure of making some goal pace at a race anymore so that I can just come back from this IT Band thing at my own pace...literally and figuratively.

That is good. I think this is one way to push through... just take it easy. And... there is no “too” easy.

It's been a weird week for me - this morning marks my third missed run, and no strength training for 2 weeks (between tapering for Sunday's race and resting after the ITB madness), so obviously my activity level has been way down recently. I (admittedly) had a bit of emotional eating at the beginning of the week, but have settled that down since then and have been really good about tracking what I've been eating. With the decrease in activity my appetite has definitely gone back down and I've been having less snacks as a result.

This brings me to my weigh-in this morning - down 1.2 pounds. : I really was not expecting a result like that and am not sure how I feel about it - my fear is that I may have lost some muscle already. Is that possible?! I feel like it's too soon because Google tells me that muscle loss after inactivity doesn't start for 2 weeks, but still...it has been 2 weeks since CLX, so maybe that would explain some of it? Ugh, who knows.

I wonder if it is not water loss...like you have been resting and you are swollen. I know there are days where my feet are swollen more than others from long runs...so I figure there could be times when all of me is retaining more water. So... maybe the rest is causing you to not be as swollen as you normally are?

Speaking of CLX - I did ab burner this morning. First workout since the race! It was only 10 minutes, and I could definitely feel that I've lost a bit of core strength, but it was SOMETHING. The weirdest part was when I was doing reverse crunches (where you lay on your back with your legs up at 90 degrees, and lift your butt off the floor) and I could feel how tight my hamstrings were. That made me really anxious to get back into my routine. I think I am almost there.

How exciting it must have been to get back to it a bit!

The other thing I'm planning on for tomorrow is trying to pre-order two iPhones - one for me, one for my mom. Yep, I'm one of those crazies that'll be awake at 3AM, cursing my computer. I did the same thing in 2012 and was successful, so hopefully I'll have the same luck this year (times 2).

So you got a 6? I am having trouble with my phone. I have a 4s. I really need to upgrade. I will have to get an iphone...that much I know. But there are just a few models out since I got mine. Also..mine is a strange 4s that has a ton more memory than what a lot of the current models come with...so 8gb would NOT work for me.

lastly...my last Raw Threads tanks finally sold yesterday!! So glad to be rid of those things and have recouped some of my money.

[

Before that, though, my alarm went off bright and early at 2:45AM. (The exact same time I wake up for Disney races, coincidentally enough). I was wide awake almost immediately and started refreshing the Verizon website a bit before 3AM and it WOULD. NOT. WORK. I refreshed and refreshed (my account on the desktop, my mom's account on Will's laptop). Finally my order went through at about 3:45 - for whatever reason the desktop was going faster than the laptop. Once my order was done I switched operations for my mom's phone to the desktop and that went through as well.

So do you think I'm a crazy person now?!

So how do you like your new phone???

After yoga I came home and fit in some CLX! This went better than I expected for having been away from strength training for almost 2 weeks. I didn't have to drop any of my weight down and I was able to complete almost all of the reps. Woohoo!

Well...it started out well.

Oh no...

I was incredibly nervous for this run. At this point my knee had been feeling totally fine for the past few days, but I still wanted to be extra cautious. I planned on heading to the park in our neighborhood - it's about 0.5 miles away from my house and has a 0.5-mile loop. So i could go there, do a few laps, and then head home - if my knee exploded I wouldn't have to drag myself too far to get back.

I started off with run 1 minute/walk 1 minute intervals (again, being super cautious) but found that I was feeling really good, so I switch to running 2 minutes/walk 1 minute intervals.

Except.

I had a teeny bit of soreness in my right foot...on the inside hear the arch. But I figured that would work itself out...

The first two miles felt pretty good. My pace was slower than usual but hey, I was out there and I was doing it!

Around 2.25 I made my way out of the park, took a turn back toward my house, and felt a pop in my right foot. I thought maybe the pop was just stiffness finally working itself out or something - NOPE. The pain got worse and was spreading up toward my toe. I could still run on it a bit, but it got worse and worse until eventually I just had to walk until I got home.

Total time for 3 miles: about 36 minutes, close to 12:00/mile pace

Oh no!!!

After the run I iced and then soaked my foot in hot water, which seemed to help. After resting it, it felt better and I decided I wanted to try walking on it...so we took the dog for a walk around the neighborhood (0.6ish miles). About halfway through my foot totally seized up - SO painful. It did it twice more before we got back home.

I am so so sorry!! I was hoping that rest was doing the trick...

. And alarming because this feels like the injury I had a Wine & Dine, except on the other foot. Which means I'm looking at more rest and missed runs for a bit.

So needless to say, no 13-miler for me today. Will was awesome and totally took care of me this weekend - I pretty much just sat on the couch all day today. It was sort of nice, but I was also incredibly groggy from just not doing anything. In fact, I've been feeling that way all week - apparently regular exercise really IS energizing.

I did attempt another dog walk this evening and this one was much more successful. I made it all the way around the block without any awful pain...the area of my foot just felt tired, I guess.

At this point I'm not totally sure what I'm going to do this coming week. Right now I'm hoping I'll be okay enough to run the Akron Half marathon, which is two weeks from yesterday (and stands as my only DNS for a race, from last year). I'd really like to not waste my entry fee two years in a row...but if I'm injured, I'm injured. Blech.

Well, I already know how this went.. I am so sorry!

My foot felt really good yesterday evening - so good that I was forgetting about the pain a lot. Will suggested I wear the most supportive shoes I have in to work today, so right now I'm in a pair of Brooks Adrenalines that I use for CLX workouts.

I think good shoes are important when you are battling an injury or just when soreness creeps in. I know there are days I break out a pair of retired shoes because they are better for my feet and legs than my “fancy” work shoes. I never use to wear athletic shoes around..but now I do when I need to.

I'm getting more and more anxious to get back to running - not because I feel like I'm missing out on a ton of training, but because I just don't feel normal right now. Over the past few days I've just started to feel incredibly stiff, especially in my legs, feet and back. All last week and this week I've felt pretty sluggish, even though I've been sleeping more than usual since I haven't been waking up early to go to the gym.

My foot feels really good so far today...still thinking maybe I'll try again on Thursday.

I can’t believe how much you went through with this. I had no idea. I am so sorry! I was off in my own world and had no clue.

Well, things are sort of looking up over here...I think.

Yesterday after work was definitely a low point. I had been feeling good pretty much all day, and was eyeing Thursday for an attempt at a short run. Then I got home and took the dog for a walk around the block. I'm not sure what happened, but by the time we were back home I was limping and sore again. It was like any and all progress I'd made over the past few days was just completely erased. I made an appointment with a specific sports medicine doctor - she is a marathon runner who "fixed" my knee in 2009 (see below) and is the medical director for the Cleveland Marathon. Unfortunately she doesn't have any availability until the 29th...I'm hoping I'll heal and won't actually need the appointment but at least I'm on the calendar.

As I have been reading this I was beginning to wonder if you were going to reach a point where you made an appointment. I hope it did not come to you keeping the appointment..but if you did then I hope it helped.

RICE: As in Rest, Ice, Compress, Elevate. I Iced and Elevated the first day of the strain, but haven't since then. I've only been Resting. So when I got home from the dog walk I dug out the one pair of compression socks I own (purchased when I was fighting this similar issue, on the same foot, the week before Wine & Dine last year), pulled on the right one, and plopped my butt on the couch with my foot elevated. From there I dutifully iced 20 minutes on/20 minutes off, 3-4 times. And took ibuprofen. And cried (apparently this was my breaking point). About an hour later my foot felt much better - almost normal - so I felt much better.

RICE is important!!!

Adios, Chalene...hello IronStrength and Powersteps:

I am excited to find out if this was the turning point. It is odd reading your saga after it has really past. I know I could jump ahead.....

You know what’s NOT bothering me? My foot. Progress!

Yay for progress!!!

I cannot explain how much better I feel just from having done this one workout. I have definitely been pretty down in the dumps since last Sunday, and admittedly dramatic about it. Mostly, I CANNOT believe how upset this whole thing has made me. It's shocking to me how just...off I feel.
How much I don't feel like myself. After this morning I feel a little more normal though.

I can only imagine! I mean you are so devoted and so committed... to miss so many workouts must have been very mentally challenging...not to mention physically!

.

That'll be DNS (Did Not Start) #2 for me. DNS #1? Last year's Akron Half Marathon (due to complete and utter running burnout). I'm starting to think I'm cursed when it comes to that race. Note to self - STOP signing up for it!!

While I am sure that it was necessary it must not have been fun to DNS. AND for a second time. I think you should not sign up again. I think it is a jinxed race for you.

Also, I signed up for a new race! Feeling optimistic today, I guess - it's a replacement race for the now-canceled Rock & Roll Cleveland 5K. The race is the Bernie Shuffle, named for one of Cleveland's most famous and beloved football players, former Cleveland Brown Bernie Kosar. So the race is very heavily football-themed...I myself am really not a huge football fan but I still think it'll be fun. With race entry comes a shirt (there was an option to get a gender-specific tech shirt for an extra $5...I googled around and found a $5-off discount code, so I went ahead and upgraded my shirt for free!), a brown, orange and white headband (Browns colors), a beer at the finish and a medal. For a 5K!

I think a 5k will be a perfect race to get back into things!

. Also pretty expensive for a 5K (after fees and whatnot my registration cost about $45!), but it should be a good time. I also think it's a little weird that such an expensive race doesn't have chip timing, but whatever - at least they indicated that VERY clearly on the race info page. I think it's just their way of emphasizing how casual this race is. Whatever. The race is scheduled for November 1.

I bet the cost is also related to the cool medal.

I was hoping to try to run again Tuesday but I'm going to give it at least another week. I also decided I need to use a completely different training plan...at this point it'll just be too hard to catch up after missing the first 3 weeks. But I don't even want to post it yet because who really freaking knows when I can run again. I'm almost scared to try, just because I don't want this to happen again.

I am so sorry! I am sure that frustrating is an understatement! I really hope you have been able to run... I have to keep reading and getting caught up. I really want to read a happy ending!!!

 

[annmarieda]

After 4 days of nothing, I wanted to do SOMETHING this morning.

Man, I bet you were wanting to do something. For someone who normally is very active in their workouts and training it must have been horribly hard to not be as active.

I decided that even if I feel 100% recovered from this by next week, I'm keeping that doctor's appointment. I can't have this happen to me again before January (and preferably ever). So I ran that by my boss and am set there. Depending on how that goes and how I feel I may try running again a week from tomorrow (unless I feel super great and try a short run this weekend).

I think that was a good decision. I realize the appointment has come and gone (haven’t gotten to how it went) but I think it was important to find out what exactly the trouble was to avoid it in the future.

So I was really ready for and really looking forward to this relaxation, and then suddenly the yoga teacher starts to SING. Like, really loudly. She's a good singer and everything - really good - but it wasn't very relaxing. It was sort or jarring and in a way kind of like, "hey, listen to me and how good of a singer I am." I could have done without that.

That is weird!

Definitely making progress over here. I think I'm finally turning the corner on this thing.

I hope so!

Foot is feeling really, really good today. Still not 100%, but closer. The alarming thing is that I am occasionally feeling pain in the same area on the OTHER side.

Oh no!

Not as bad as I had when I initially injured my right foot, but still. This makes me think there's definitely some sort of issue with either my shoes, my running form (well, walking form now) or both. I'm really hoping the doctor I'm seeing on Monday will have some ideas.

I tend to think most injuries can be tracked back to shoes... so I am definitely a bad judge but makes you wonder if it is now in the other foot too.

I had to give my presentation for next week's work conference to my team this afternoon, and beyond having a typo on the VERY FIRST SLIDE in the title of my presentation (SO FREAKING EMBARRASSING ) it went well. I always get WAY more nervous for the practice presentation than I do for the real thing, so I’m glad this is over.

Glad it went well!

My foot was feeling good after yoga, and has been for a few days. The weather here has been so nice lately...I couldn't resist. Had to throw on my shoes for a run!

a run!

I told myself I’d go one mile - no more, hopefully no less. I set my watch for run 2 minutes/walk 1 minute intervals and before I could change my mind, I was off. I had the Powerstep inserts that I bought last week in my shoes, so I was hoping they would help.

And it felt great. The first half-mile was awesome. I could feel my legs wanting to go faster and forced myself to rein it in. But I was just so happy to be back out there again!

I reached the turn-around point, briefly considered going further, but talked myself out of it. Good thing I did - around 0.75 miles my foot was feeling a little sore again. ARG!

But I did it!!! I ran again! (1 mile in 11:15.)

That was certainly progress!!!

NRR (Not Running Related): Today we took on our most ambitious DIY project to date - tiling! I'm sure it doesn't sound like a big deal to some, but this was our first time attempting it. It went pretty well.

This is a huge project! I am very impressed it looks awesome!

We had (I think) 15 stairs to tackle...plus running to the hardware store to buy/exchange stuff we needed, plus, lunch break, etc. All this to say that I was busy enough all day that I forgot that I was originally supposed to run the Akron half this morning. I know it was the right decision to DNS in light of what’s been going on with my foot, but it still doesn't feel good.

I am glad you had something to occupy your time because I am sure it did not feel good.

Oh yes! On a roll over here!

I am so happy to see that things improved!!!

I’m not going to lie...the pace is a little discouraging, but I know it'll come back. If it were me talking to someone else in my position, I'd tell that person to not worry about pace and just be happy to be able to run again. So that's what I will try to do!

As much as we know that is the best way to look at it and approach it... I know first hand how hard it is to accept a pace that isn’t quite what you are use to. Yes... ultimately the miles. THAT is the goal and the fact you are putting foot to pavement is awesome!!

No Abnormalities!

I am so glad the appointment went well and was encouraging! That is AWESOME!

Instead I am going to take this one Disney race weekend at a time (keeping the overall goal - Dopey - in mind) and focus on the Jingle Jungle 5K/Wine & Dine for now.

That sounds like a good plan!

Right now I'm just hoping to get back to running 4 days per week, and to get up to at least a 10-mile long run (ideally 12) before getting on that plane to WDW. I think those are both reasonable goals.

Those are both reasonable goals and I think ultimately there are those who don’t even meet those before embarking on a disney half.

first week I'm hoping to run tomorrow, Thursday and Saturday. Wednesday will be a rest day. I'm going to start out with running 2 minutes/walking 1 minute like I did last week, and if that goes well for me this week, I'll add 30 seconds to my run intervals each week. If I can get up to running 4 minutes/walking 1 minute comfortably by race weekend I will be more than happy with that.

I am actually thinking I may try an interval similar to that for avengers. So I think that interval would be something to be proud of!

Mostly I am just so relieved to have the all-clear to start up again. Hopefully this was just an ugly warning sign and not something that will happen again! I vow to be a model cross-training runner!

I really hope so too. I have felt horrible for you that your training got so derailed due to this. I am glad you are back on track!

So here it is...part 1 - the Wine & Dine part - of my revised training plan. Color-coded and everything!

I LOVE it!!!

CURRENT

Week 4 (10/20 - 10/26): 20 miles planned
Monday: 3-mile run + planks/push-ups
Tuesday: 4-mile run
Wednesday: 3-mile run + planks/push-ups
Thursday: Rest Day
Friday: Warm Yoga Flow
Saturday: 10-mile run
Sunday: Hot Yoga Flow

UPCOMING

Week 5 (10/27 - 11/2): 23.1 miles planned
Monday: Core60
Tuesday: 5-mile run
Wednesday: 3-mile run
Thursday: Rest Day
Friday: Core45/12-mile run
Saturday: Bernie Shuffle 5K
Sunday: Hot Yoga Flow

Week 6 (11/3 - 11/9): 22.2 miles planned **WDW!!!!!**
Monday: Core60/3-mile run
Tuesday: 3-mile run
Wednesday: travel to WDW!!!
Thursday: WDW!!!
Friday: WDW!!!
Saturday: Jingle Jungle 5K /Wine & Dine Half Marathon!!!
Sunday: WDW!!!

COMPLETE

Week 1 (9/29 - 10/5): 10 miles completed ** TRAVEL FOR WORK THIS WEEK**
Monday: Rest Day
Tuesday: 3-mile run + Extreme Abs
Wednesday: Rest Day
Thursday: 3-mile run + Ab Burner
Friday: Core 45
Saturday: 4-mile run
Sunday: Rest Day (travel to Chicago for work)

Week 2 (10/6 - 10/12): 14 miles planned ** TRAVEL FOR WORK THIS WEEK**
Monday: 3-mile run around Chicago!
Tuesday: Rest Day (travel home from Chicago)
Wednesday: 2-mile run/Ab Burner
Thursday: 3-mile run/Extreme Abs
Friday: Core 45
Saturday: 6-mile run
Sunday: Hot Yoga Flow

Week 3 (10/13 - 10/19): 17 miles completed
Monday: Core60/3-mile run
Tuesday: 3-mile run
Wednesday: 3-mile run/Extreme Abs
Thursday: Rest Day
Friday: Hot Yoga Flow
Saturday: 8-mile run
Sunday: Rest Day

For someone who has spent some time sidelined this is a very impressive schedule! You ROCK!

month from Sunday, I'll be flying to WDW...!!! A few days later (God willing) I'll be running the Jingle Jungle 5K and the Wine & Dine Half Marathon. So it's time to get some outfits together.

for the fun stuff!!!

2011 Princess Half Marathon - wearing the above with Nike Track Tempo shorts. HORRIBLE chafing thanks to these shorts! They went right into the trash as soon as I got back to our room after the race, and I will never buy that style of shorts again! Also wearing an Amphipod fuel belt...camera case attached to the fuel belt. Some kind of Saucony shoes…

2012 WDW Marathon - longer Brooks shorts this time = less chafing! Switch to Brooks Adrenalines (still running in that same shoe now - LOVE!)

Great and fun pics!!

After the 2012 Marathon I made a very momentous, very expensive, very awesome discovery - SPARKLESKIRTS!!!!! Life-changing and addicting. Seriously. These allowed me to ditch the fuel belt and I haven't looked back since.

Though I did still wear shorts for the WDW 5K in 2013…at this point I only owned 2 skirts. I also tried out a shoe wallet!

2013 WDW Half Marathon...skirts!!! Never looking back, these things rock!

2013 WDW Marathon

I love all the pics from prior years!

Let’s start with the next one...the 2014 Mickey's Jingle Jungle 5K.

I kept the idea to myself for a bit. I'm running the race with a friend, and we'd both sort of agreed on the Christmas thing, so I didn't want to be the one to change it up. But then my friend scored a Raw Threads top on the RT resale Facebook group - the "Believe in Yetis" top! That got the wheels turning in HER head, and we both agreed that her running in a Yeti-inspired outfit, and me running in a rainforest/jungle-themed one, could be pretty cool. So that’s what we're doing!

The skirt is the main piece of my outfit. Unless I find something better, I'm pairing it with a plain old, tried and true, Nike dri-fit top.

I LOVE it!!

And lastly...the ears. I impulsively bought a pair of Christmas Minnie ears last year during our Wine & Dine trip], but never wore them. They've just been sitting in our guest room. My friend happens to be super, super creative, crafty and talented, and she really has a knack for doctoring up Minnie ears by making personalized bows that can be easily switched out. So I (very carefully) removed the red bow and my awesome friend will be constructing a new bow for me just for the JJ5K. I left the little holly leaf with the Hidden Mickey, though...still a little bit Christmas-y!

How awesome will that be??!!

I haven't worn ears during a race yet, but I am pretty sure I won't like it - I don’t even like wearing hats while I run, but I think I can stick it out for a fun, relaxed 3.1 miles. I fully predict I will start the race with the ears on and make it about two steps before taking them off and carrying them with me until I come across photo stops where I can throw them back on, but hey, at least it will (hopefully) make for cute pictures. And darn it, I WILL wear those ears for pictures, especially my friend is making a bow for me (in some sort of animal print, I think - zebra maybe?).

I don’t like hats either... but I can run with sunglasses on the top of my head. I wonder if a head band would not be similar. Maybe it will be that way for you?

 

[annmarieda]

Ok, I am so close...I am going to do it. I will be caught up! I will!!!

[First of all...I opened my countdown app for the first time in awhile this morning. 36 days until the Wine & Dine trip, 99 days until the Dopey trip.

Time is definitely going by very fast. You will be at Wine and Dine very very soon.

Anyway...it's been a health-focused day here. First up I got my annual flu shot - everyone that works here has to get them (I work in research at a hospital - definitely some controversy surrounding the flu shot program, but I don't mind it even though I never work with patients) so I normally just get mine done on the first possible day to get it over with. That day was today. It didn't hurt that badly at the time but now that it has been a few hours my arm is SORE.

I have not got the flu shot in years. I didn’t realize it made your arm sore. OUCH!

The appointment went well though![/URL] Such a relief...and now I feel like I can get excited for my upcoming Disney races.

Tuesday, September 30: 3-mile treadmill run!! + Extreme Abs

Woohoo! I ran today!

That is awesome!

Apparently the lack of stabilization is really helpful for strengthening the ankles/feet. This went okay - I did each foot for about 30 seconds at a time (needed a hand on the wall for stability) twice, and then stood on each foot on the ground for 30 seconds, also twice. I did all of these things without my shoes on (sorry for the stank, fellow gym-goers). My feet and ankles were sort of sore afterward, which was a bit of a wake-up call as to how weak they really are. Just 4 minutes of these "exercises" and I'm sore. Hmm...

That is a very strange looking device. I am glad it will help with your ankle strength.

(source)

That is a very helpful...easy to understand diagram!

Disney news: Finally! Some Disney stuff to talk about!

Our 60-day mark for Wine & Dine came and went about a month ago, so clearly I'm late on that one. One of my friends set up some FP+ for us, so that's done. The only one we missed out on was an Anna & Elsa FP+ from Magic Kingdom. Sadness.

Have you kept checking? I initially was unable to get them for my ToT trip...but ended up with them.

Then today, another friend remembered that we still need to personalize Magic Bands! I'll have two coming for this trip - one for my one-night stay at Pop, and a second one for the rest of the trip. Seems sort of silly to have two, but whatever. (Actually I have 3 since I also have an AP holder Magic Band...oy!) The AP band is green, the Pop band is orange, the other band is yellow. I also checked in online for the Pop night. And that's all my news! Really not that much at all. Oops!

I kinda both love and hate that you get so many bands. Hate because what a pain to have so many to deal with...but love because you can use them interchangably. Depending on what I was wearing I wore any of my bands that had been activated. So once your stay at Pop...you will be able to use that one the rest of the trip. I even used one from a previous trip. scratchin can’t remember if it was my first band or one from January)

Anyway - another successful run this morning! This time I did intervals of running 2:30/walking 1 minute. During the walking intervals I had the treadmill at 3.3 MPH. For the first 2 miles I did 5.8 MPH (10:20/mile pace) for the running portions...for the last mile I bumped it up to 5.9 MPH (10:10) and threw in a few 30-second bursts at 6.0 MPH (10:00/mile) and 6.1 MPH (9:50/mile). Total time for the run was 35:12, 11:44/mile pace.

That sounds like it went pretty well!

Here’s something annoying - September 30 was supposed to be the day that refunds would be processed for the canceled Rock & Roll Cleveland races. I checked our credit card statements - Will’s refund was there, mine was not. I dug deeper into my email and realized that we actually don’t have the credit card that I used to purchase my registration any more - that card was canceled because we happened to use it at Target when that big data breach happened last year. So I don’t have my refund! I emailed Rock & Roll Cleveland and they made it sound like it’s the “bank’s” probably, so I’m probably going to make to make some calls to get my money back. And I really want that money - since I originally signed up for the half marathon I should be getting at least $60 back. I could buy a new SparkleSkirt with that money!!

But seriously. Give me my freaking money back!

I don’t blame you! I hope you get it back soon. Then you can buy that skirt

I kind of loved it. We did stuff with the BOSU balls (so now I'm more interested in buying one), we used body bars, medicine balls, discs (like frisbees...one foot on each disc, get in plank position and slide your feet around), did push-ups and lunges...I modified a lot of stuff and wasn't great at it, but the time flew by and it was so different from any other workout I have done. I will definitely be back!

Yay! I am glad to hear you liked it!!! Core is such a challenge. I have always given up... I just can’t get into it. (and it shows)

WOOHOO! First week of post-injury week of running, complete!

I am relieved to find that things are returning to normal for you!

Anyway, beyond having to pull my stupid pants up the entire time, the run was pretty good! I can definitely feel that I’ve lost some speed and endurance, but I felt zero pain in my foot - that’s the important thing. I stuck to the run 2:30/walk 1 minute intervals, and I think I’ll do that again for another week. Then maybe bump it up to run 3/walk 1. Total time for this run was 45:06, 11:15/mile pace (faster than my treadmill runs this week!).

Yay for no foot pain and look...pace is improving!

Originally I was signed up for a yoga class this morning, but I canceled it last night. I felt run-down all day yesterday, and I thought it was my body really not being used to running...but then my throat was sore. So I was afraid I'd caught Will's cold (he missed two days of work this week). I think I'm right because I fell asleep at 8:30 and slept for almost 12 hours!! Like a rock. Hopefully that helped prevent serious sickness.

I hope you are feeling better.

 

[annmarieda]

Monday, October 6: Run #1: 3-mile out-and-back in Chicago
Weather: 48 degrees and overcast, occasional rain

Today was the first full day of my conference for work. Originally I was planning on sleeping in today and running tomorrow, but I switched it up - tomorrow is my presentation and my travel day, so the extra sleep will probably be more beneficial to me tomorrow. Plus, it gives my sweaty clothes time to dry before I stuff them into a suitcase euuuuuwwwwww.

Last night the hotel concierge very kindly mapped out a nice route through downtown Chicago for me. The hotel has a nice-looking gym, but a change of scenery is always good!

I packed my running shoes, a long-sleeved shirt, my crops, my Road ID and my Garmin for this run. I forgot my running sunglasses, but it was overcast this morning so I didn’t need them. And I stuck to running 2:30/walking 1:00 intervals.

I left my room at about 7:30 (Central Time) but didn't actually start the run until almost 7:45. My stupid watch took FOREVER to find satellites.

But the run itself was great! I had my phone with me (for safety and pictures) but told myself I'd sort of scope out any photo-ops on the "out" part of the run and not actually take any pictures until I was coming back.

What a fun run! And such a great way to recap it!

So I decided to try out some Nikes for cross training/everyday wear. I ended up going with the Pegasus model and got the teal shoes (first row, 4th down).

How fun to get new shoes on the trip!

I ran into a struggle here - my credit card got declined, even though I'd been using it at other places during the day. Apparently I need to be better about telling them when I'm traveling out of state, even though that's never been an issue before.

While that can be such a pain... really it is so nice when someone randomly gets your card number at makes a counterfeit of it...then tries to use it somewhere else in the country at a place you normally would shop in your home town. Nice to know they “know” when you are not in your usual place.

I ended up donating my old Brooks to Nike's recycling program - they use the old shoes to make that soft, rubbery surface that you find in playgrounds. Very cool.

That is super cool!

I also ended up getting a shirt from the Gap, a pair of boots from Nordstrom that I have been coveting FOREVER (!! ) and a Chicago Starbucks mug. Most touristy thing EVER - but it was something I wanted when Will and I came to Chicago 2 summers ago and we could never find it. Finally got that stupid mug!

Sounds like a successful shopping trip.

I covered over 8 miles on foot today, including this morning's run! Almost like when I'm at Disney! I wish Cleveland was walkable like this.

I have never tracked my distance walking in disney. Maybe I should. I had heard that it was significant. I didn’t realize it was quite that much!

The first one is Cherries Jubilee (or something) - no pic

The second is a new peacock skirt:

The Wine one they teased a few months back (WineALittle):

And this beer one...I forget what it's called:

The wine one is the only one that'll be in swing, slim and hiker. The rest are swing only.

I think I'll need to see all of them in person to really decide. The wine one is the only one that is really jumping out at me, of the 3 new ones that have pictures. But I'm not totally 100% convinced on it yet. I think we talked about this but I also want to see SweetSkulls in person. Right now I'm thinking that at the expo I'll possibly get the wine skirt and PeacockEarth:

Possibly SweetSkulls if I love it (which I think is pretty unlikely, but I'm curious). Still...I wasn't planning on buying any at the expo, but they'll be RIGHT THERE...goodbye money!

OH, Skirts!!! I think I like the wine one. I guess Iw ill have to see. Since the ToT has been suspended for next year and my inlaws are itching to do another RD event... guess what we are considering for 2015? Yes, I may need to get the wine a little.

 

[annmarieda]

Or...don't. Today I work up feeling terrible! I had such a pounding headache. Not sure if I just ran myself ragged yesterday or if that bug I thought I was catching on Sunday has come back with a vengeance...either way, poor timing since my presentation was today!

You really cant catch a break!

The presentation was funny. In looking at the schedule I saw that only my paper and one other paper were scheduled in my time slot. This practically gave me a heart attack - would there be, like, 60 people there to see my talk?!

Oh my! I think that would give me a heart attack!

Nope - there were five. FIVE. Turns out lots of people consider 11:30AM to be lunch time. DUH. My boss was a little annoyed about it, I think because he thought I'd feel bad, like no one cared about my topic, and because I put the work in or whatever. I didn't care! It's so much less intimidating talking in front of less people. I think it went okay.

Ok so that is a more manageable size!

My slow build-up with running continues. Last week I ran 10 miles total over 3 days. This week I'm planning on 14 miles total over 4 days with 2 days in a row of running (today and tomorrow). Next week will be 17 miles over 4 days, with 3 days in a row of running. Slow and steady.

And slow and stead... yup it wins the race. :

And I wore my new Haunted skirt for the first time - finally! It arrived in the mail right in the midst of all that injury nonsense, and has been sitting in my closet just taunting me.

Mine is one of my absolute favorites! I had a freak out moment. (you may have seen) when I first washed it. It bleed out the purple a lot and those “ghost” parts of the fabric freaked me out because I thought it was faded unevenly.

Not good for me today. I know I ate a bunch of crappy food at that conference...drank tons of coffee and almost no water...yet I was surprised to see that I was up almost 2 pounds this morning. OUCH. Hopefully it’ll go away very, very soon.

Just as I mentioned before that I wondered if your loss had to do with muscles letting go of water... I wonder if now that you have began to run and do all your other workouts if you are now retaining that water again.

Post-run outfit picture...orange Nike tank and PeacockOrchid SparkleSkirt. Love these Peacock skirts...I feel like they look good with lots of tops because they are so colorful.

That is a super cute outfit! It is because of you that I paid more attention to the pecocks and guess what? Yup... I now own a peacock.

Jingle Jungle 5K/Wine & Dine Half Marathon Weekend update: Waivers and corrals were released today! So exciting, because we are one step closer to race weekend!

When those come out it almost seems too real, know what I mean? Avengers came out too... it is real now.

For the 5K, my bib number is WEIRDLY low at 641. Last year I was 1085 or something and that put me in Corral A, so I’m almost surely there again. This makes me think that they just assign the bib numbers for the 5K based on sign-up times, because come on...Corral A? Moi? Not so much. My friend that is running the race with me is in the 650s and I know she signed up right around the same time that I did, so this would sort of help to confirm my theory.

I think so too. I haven’t done a 5k or 10k for that matter in Disney. However my inlaws had corrals that were more upfront that I would have guessed they would get...but I had them register fairly early.

for Wine & Dine, I’m #2680, Corral E...very close to where I was last year (2808, Corral E). My other friends are in F and I, so we’ll be starting in I so that we can run together!

Not a bad corral at all...

2015 Disneyland Half Marathon Weekend update: I’ve been wanting to rent points at the Grand Californian for next year’s Disneyland Half Marathon weekend. Only problem is that point rentals are non-refundable (at least with the place where I rent from) and I wasn’t about to plunk the cash down when runDisney hadn’t announced the dates of the race yet. It’ll be me and two, possibly three, of my friends going down for the race weekend (the same friends I’ll be staying with in Disney ONE MONTH FROM TODAY NO BIG DEAL OR ANYTHING AHHHHH), and we all agreed that we want to stay on property. Yes I know there are cheaper options that are technically off-property, yet are really close by...but darn it, we want that Disney magic. Plus the price is a lot easier to swallow when it’s split 3 or 4 ways.

I really hope you are able to get a room. However... as you are finding it isn’t easy. there are not many studios there and even to get one as an owner there is tough. At 7 months..near impossible...and during race weekend? We tried and tried to get ours booked for this last year and finally gave up. Both myself and who I ran with are members (just neither are owners at VGC) so we can see when things are open. I would be happy to look any time you like... I know that sometimes the companies that work with you to rent can take a bit of time to “research”.

The other thing to consider is how many points it takes. I think approx. 27 or 30 per night... (or somewhere in there... I am just going off the top of my head but could look for sure) If you rent for $15 a point...that comes out to be as much as just booking paradise pier through Disney with a discount. (I think) AND there is always booking through GET travel..and that would put you on property for probably the cheapest.

So this is basically exactly what happened when I tried to rent points at Villas at Grand Floridian/Bay Lake Tower waaaaay back in February for Marathon Weekend. In that case I stayed on the waiting list and the rooms I wanted ended up filling, so I made a new reservation (which I am happy with!). I have a feeling those Grand Californian Studios will go away over the next few days/weeks, especially since the DLH Weekend dates are now official...we’ll see. If we can secure a studio, it’ll only cost $150 more total than our current Paradise Pier set-up (I would have put a second and third choice, but my second choice - a 1-bedroom - would have been almost $3000!!! No thank you!!!) and we are all definitely willing to pay an extra $50-$75 apiece to upgrade to the deluxe resort. If it doesn’t work out, we still have our Paradise Pier room ready to go. We’ll be happy either way.

Keep in mind that while GC is definitely a bit more upscale than the DL hotel or PP, all three are more “deluxe” than what you would find in WDW. There are no mods or values on property at DLR

*The calendar is interesting - no ToT for 2015? No EE Challenge for 2016? HMMM

I really am so sad over this...but it makes sense. If they gut DHS...ya can’t really have a race that is centered there. Plus.. as I mentioned this gives us the opportunity to do Wine and Dine.

Other random news: I forget if I said this earlier, but in case I didn’t, my refund for the now-canceled Rock & Roll Cleveland Half Marathon (which would have been this weekend) finally showed up on my credit card this week. Yay! AND...I sold those awful Raw Threads crops on the Facebook group. I paid $58 for them with free shipping and they actually sold for $55 (I will cover the shipping). I thought that was pretty good! Get out of my house, stupid crops!

That is great news!!!

I think that bug that I had earlier this week came back with a vengeance today - that or I'm just continuing to recover from my little trip. I slept almost 12 hours last night! Yikes.

You must have needed it!

Well, I failed to see that the ball I grabbed was right by a pile of other stuff - I’d grabbed someone’s ball on accident. I gave it back of course, but meanwhile this lady that was there for the class (NOT the one whose ball I took) was like, “Oh, look at the new girl! Stealing your ball!”

“Haha, yep, sorry about that!” I said as I returned the ball. But the other lady just sort of kept saying how I was the new girl and went on about it for a good 30-45 seconds. Ooooookay. Meanwhile the lady whose ball I’d taken was super nice and took me to where the rest of the balls were and helped me pick out what she deemed was a “good one” (it was). I was pretty rattled from what had happened with the other lady so I totally appreciated her doing this.

That does not sound like the first lady was very nice. Why did she have to be such a pill about it?

I’m sure the lady that was pointing out that I was new was joking, but it was still weird. As Will said, it’s different if someone comes up to me like, “Hey, I haven’t met you yet! My name is Jenny!” or something. The teacher chatted with me a bit at the end of last week’s class, saying that I’d done the right thing by modifying and would catch up soon, so obviously that was fine. Versus someone else shouting about how the new girl stupidly took someone’s ball. There’s a difference!

Agreed! There is a difference and I think that some people just have to make others feel “less” in order to make themselves feel better.

Will also thinks that the lady this morning was a witch (except, you know, not with a “w”). I’d have to agree with that.

I agree with Will!

In Disney planning news, my friend who is the lead guest on our “main” reservation for Wine & Dine (where we’ll be Thursday - Monday) texted us to ask what Magical Express info she needed to add to our reservation. This made me remember that I hadn’t added Magical Express stuff to the 1-night stay at Pop that is booked for me and one of my 4 friends. So I did that. Gimme my yellow luggage tags!!

Yellow tags!!!

Woohoo! Two weeks in a row of completing all of my runs! [/qoute]

Sounds like you are back on track!

The weather today was perfect, and I dressed like a pretty purple peacock:

I love that one!

with a neon yellow long-sleeved top...yellow and purple are complimentary colors (so I learned in elementary school art class)...it totally goes, right? Maybe? Nah.

Yes!

I decided to up my intervals so that I was running 3 minutes and walking 1 minute. Total time for this run was 1:05:43, 10:57/mile pace. Woohoo, in the 10s!!!! And in looking at my splits, of my 17 running intervals, all but 3 were at sub-10:00/mile pace - with my fastest at an 8:51/mile pace (toward the end I decided I reeeeally wanted to finish with my pace under 11:00/mile, so I started to really move). Which explains why I was huffing and puffing so much. But still, yay! Maybe the speed is coming back...it’s definitely there in the numbers but I don’t totally feel it yet.

Just as I was impressed with you pre injury... I really am impressed by you now. Your commitment and perseverance are amazing!

YAY - Magic Bands for the one night at Pop arrived today! Yeehaw!

Yay!!!

Eventually I figured out that the best way to make this work with my current schedule was to double up on something. Fridays are Core45 and yoga, so now Mondays are going to be Core60 and a run (whatever my shortest scheduled run of the week is). Unless I die. This means giving up IronStrength - when I told my doctor about the routine she didn't see too impressed with it, so I'm hoping that Core class will be a good replacement...especially since that is what she recommended, along with yoga.

With that in mind...new training schedule:

How do you do it? Barely any rest days in there and add in work?

More 3:00/1:00 intervals. For the first 3-minute run, I ran at 5.8MPH (10:20/mile)...then I bumped it up to 5.9MPH (10:10/mile) until I got to 1.5 miles. I did the last half of the run at a 10-minute pace and upped the speed a bit for the last quarter-mile. Total time for this run was 33:42, 11:14/mile pace. The pace is slooooowly inching downward.

I hate how quickly we can “lose” our pace but how slowly we regain it. It isn’t fair.

Great weigh-in this morning for me - down 2.8 pounds! I'm just 0.4 pounds away from getting rid of what I gained during my injury lay-off/work trip. Awesome. I'm really hoping to string together a couple of good weeks in a row here, because it is BEYOND old to have been gaining and losing the same 1-2 pounds over the last few weeks. Of course, I probably could try to eat better to rectify that...

Again.. maybe it isn’t so bad. At least you are overall maintaining your weight. :

Not a lot of news otherwise, except that there are more and more signs that Wine & Dine weekend is getting closer. I signed up for runner tracking yesterday (any time a race has tracking I always have the alerts emailed to me, as a keepsake) as well as the commemorative Wine & Dine bookmark today. The bookmark is an...interesting choice (last year it was a 5" x 7" "art card") but hey, it's something from the race that is free, so I'm not complaining.

I got the book mark at ToT and really like it better than anything else they have offered in the past. It is far easier to transport back home.

Well, as we drove home, my stomach really started to bother me. It got worse and worse, and I ended up quite sick that evening. I'm thinking it was my body not used to running for so long (since I had some stomach cramps at the end of the run) plus the rich food I had for dinner. Blech! DEFINITELY something to keep in mind with the Wine & Dine after-party!!

That stinks! Nothing worse than going out for a nice meal and having it really not agree with you.

And with that... oh my!!! I am caught up

 

[Ariel484]

Oh the pre-race paranoia! I know what you mean! Lol, use your anti microbial supplies with great flourishes at work.

All somebody did today at work was say the words "sore throat" and I felt myself take a defensive stance aka Darryl from the Walking Dead.

BUT REALLY THOUGH. Can I just say, "use your microbial supplies with great flourishes at work" made me LOL a little.

Sore throat?! No thank you! Defend away!!

We're so close! I can't wait!!!

I KNOOOWWWW AHHHH!! So excited!

Ok, I am going to try and get caught up on your thread... try being the key word here.

Yay!

I totally agree! I sometimes wonder if I would have the skirts I do if I didn’t impulse buy them.. I mean I see one go up for sale on one of the fb groups and I think I need it. Course, maybe I do. I wore so many on my trip at the beginning of this month...and with running... it seems as though I don’t have enough of them clean at one time to run and just wear. (although I don’t “just wear” as often at home since I don't wear them to work)

So it's not just me then. I feel like I used to think the purchases through a little more, but lately I've been just sort of going for it. I've said this before, but with some skirts all it takes is for me to see a picture or two of a "real" person wearing it, and suddenly I WANT it.

I don't wear mine to work either. I certainly don't begrudge anyone that does (have you noticed that this is becoming a weirdly devisive topic in the Facebook groups?!). If I felt like I *could* wear them to work I sure as heck would! I DO plan on wearing them during my trip.

I hate that feeling. I really shouldn’t care what people who are online who I probably never ever would meet think of me...but I do. I like to think of myself as not shady....so the idea that someone out there might? Well, that will give me an ulcer just thinking about it.

Exactly. Part of it was a learning process for me (I just didn't inspect the skirt as carefully as I should have before selling it), but it was really embarrassing. I felt so bad about it!

I am glad it worked out. I think sometimes it is all in expectation. I bought a skirt from someone and it is very very VERY far from perfect. She let me know ahead of time and I am happy...very happy with that skirt.

Yes, exactly! I'll know better going forward - I'd want the same when I buy a skirt.

Oh my gosh! Can you believe it has been that long since I have been on dis? The month between the DLH and the ToT flew by...and since the ToT time also has flown by.

You sure have been busy with some AWESOME things!!!

That is crazy early. Maybe you were in pre disney race mode?

Maybe so! Ugh, I'm trying not to think about waking up that early (even earlier, I guess) 4 times in a row in January!

I am sure it does...he is very cute.

I think so! I could be biased though since I am his momma!

Oh my! That was quite the morning!

Yay!!! Adding a day is always the best way to turn around a day. I have to post to my TR..but lets just say I may have had to do that to two of the remaining three trips I have planned.

Definitely not the best start to that day! But you're right, adding a day to my trip totally made it better!

Ooooh, and you get to add days too! That is awesome!! Yay Ann!

I do feel your pain with this. Funny thing is... I have had them work absolutely fine and then absolutely not. In fact the black minnie bow tank I wore in January without incident. Yet it is one that now will totally give me trouble at anything over 4 miles. Maybe they wear out quickly? I am keeping mine... I did wear that exact tank last night over a long sleeve tee. So that is probably how I will use them as they “go bad”

Oh man, that is annoying! I wonder if you're right about them wearing out quickly? That's a pain because they are WAY too expensive to do that! I have a SparkleSkirt that I bought sometime in 2012 and except for a small flaw or two, it's still almost perfect. So it's possible to have quality running gear that stays in good shape!!

I am glad they are selling and very smart to purchase a 5 pack of envies!

I think they make me so sad because they are probably among the cutest and best “disney race” shirts around. I know I planned a lot of my race outfits around them too.

I knooooow. Right now I have 3 of my January race outfits planned around RawThreads street vs...I'm hoping I don't regret it.

Obviously I am horribly behind... but did you try this? Did it work? I am hoping that you can salvage some of the shirts since they are cute and perfect for Disney races.

I haven't tried it for a longer run yet - unfortunately I'll end up breaking the cardinal rule of running and trying something new on race day, since one of them will be my shirt for Wine & Dine. I hope it doesn't suck!

I think it is also frustrating that what works one day may not on another.

Agree! So annoying!

I hate that little voice!

It stinks!! But it's so hard to ignore!

yay for sticking it out!

Yay indeed! Completing a tough workout is such a great feeling!

That is a wise boy!

I know! Maybe he's destined to be some sort of life coach one day!

Don’t you hate that? I have so many shirts that I just am not a fan of. I guess though that they can’t all be shirts that would get worn over and over.

Yes! I was disappointed. The one good thing I can say about it is that it's a women's cut shirt, so at least it fits!

Yay for the two... hopefully the others have gone by now too.

They are GONE!

Oh that increase in hunger! It doesn’t seem fair... I mean why does our bodies go into “stock up” mode so easily????

I know! It's frustrating. It's really hard to strike the balance, because I know I *need* to eat more to an extent but at the same time I don't want to gain weight.

I am sorry that you had drama... drama is never fun

It's better now, thankfully. I just really felt like my friend was being attacked and that is not cool!

Good for you to not let it ruin more of your time!

I can never maintain for an entire half... that would be an awesome pace if you could! Even for just the three...that is an GREAT time!

Thank you! I am pleased with the progress I made this year on pace, for sure.

So glad the crises was averted.

Me too! I really was not having great luck with running shirts there for awhile!

Yay!!!

Bye-bye RT tanks!!

 

[Ariel484]

That sounds completely miserable!

I think those make for the worst runs...the ones where you are not in it from the very start.

Sometimes... I think it is just better to allow yourself the occasional (emphasis on occasional because it can become way to easy to make it habit and habit is not what is good) a break.

That was a TERRIBLE run! Luckily it was one of a very few I have had like that over the summer. We had such awesomely mild weather this year.

Yay! Rest days are great aren’t they? This was not a rest day for me... DLH day!!

They absolutely are! I would have traded places with you in a second though.

That is such a cool idea!!

I really loved how it turned out!

I have that same trouble... only not quite as bad since my running carreer is far shorter. I do know what you mean though... lots of shirts that just NEVER are worn. I have a neon mustard yellow shirt (yes...it is like glowing yellow mustard color) with emerald green writing on it from a st. paddy’s day race. OMG - so hideous I have never worn it (along with many others) This would be a great way to remember the races...and still put to good use those shirts. Cause... I wouldn’t just toss them or give them away. They do “mean something” to me... just can’t wear them.

That shirt sounds hideous! I know what you mean though...I just can't bear to part with any of them.

Not entirely cheap... but definitely I think worth it!

Yeah, and when you factor in the race fees that got me some of those shirts...that is an expensive quilt!

I agree..the white at the top didn’t quite work. However putting the marathon weekend ones in center was perfect!

Perfect!

I'm really happy with the final layout!

I know it is weird..but the cutting would have made me nervous. Did it make you at all?

At first, yes...and then as I went on I was just like, "woohoo! Cut 'em all!!"

I wonder if they could be put in some sort of shadow box? I agree they are super cool!

That's a good idea!! Currently they are still sitting in the bottom portion of a nightstand so I need to figure out something!

I love it!

You have me beat! I just had/have 5

Well you definitely have me beat on Disneyland races...by a long shot!

they are important life decisions!

Glad you understand!!

I agree..that is weird. Why have it on the mannequin if it isn’t in store to purchase?

I went to that store again this weekend - the mannequin is STILL there wearing that same top!

Good plan.

Finally being a little smarter!

I wondered what made them “hypercool” and to get them at the end of the season is a great idea!

Yes!! I ended up liking them so much that I now have 6 of them (which is good because my other running tanks are at least 6 years old and this point and probably need to be retired soon). And I was able to find them in other colors for cheap.

It could be that you are just maintaining...and while I am sure it is frustrating to not lose...at least you are maintaining and that is not an easy task

I definitely think that is what is happening - maintaining or (the dreaded) plateau. But I've been within 1-2 pounds of the same number for awhile now.

I can understand why this would cause you stress and so I am glad they are selling!

Me too!! So glad they are gone and that I recouped some of that money.

Good to not flip out.

I am proud to say that I did NOT flip out!

If it were me... I would be fixated on just the same thing. I would feel like kicking myself for buying so many... then mad that they didn’t work... the frustrated that I had to sell them... then worried they wouldn’t sell. Believe me... I get how this took up some space on your thread. It would have mine as well. and for the record... yes, everything will be okay... and no you are not ridiculous.

Thank you. It really did stress me out a lot. Going back and re-reading it, it's just so weird how down I felt about it! So I'm glad that's done.

I think it is odd when races get cancelled after registration has began...of even before. (have you heard that ToT will not be back in 2015?)

Yeah, they did not give us a lot of notice for this one! They also made it sound like they're hoping to try it again next year...not sure I'd sign up again at this point.

I did see that about ToT! I actually thought of you when I saw that, aren't you a legacy runner for that race? That stinks. I was hoping to run that race eventually so I hope it comes back. At the same time, I'm really curious to see what a gut of DHS will bring.

 

[Ariel484]

That is awesome! You get to have more family time for thanksgiving AND get to run a race.

Yes! I am excited for that...hoping to get my brother to run the Turkey Trot with me.

I normally love recaps... this one just made me sad. Started off good though. Sounds like great weather.

I know. It really was a beautiful day, and a beautiful course.

And how cute is your outfit! I LOVE the skirt!

Me too! I'm not sure I have a single favorite skirt, but I do really like this one!

I am not sure how much I like that. I guess though it isn’t too different from Disney. We start in different places than we finish.. I must just forget about it though since I don’t drive myself to the start of from the finish.

Somehow I am more okay with it at Disney races...probably because I am still at Disney World. This was just a pain.

Ok, so speaking from recent experience...that is VERY stressful.

But really! I could not believe how long it took!

I normally am inclined to do that. My dh not so much. I had to really try and get him to move from his “comfort” spot on the course to cross over...even when I knew we had an outright turn coming up.

In this case I think it came back to bite me...just because I was focusing so much on that and not so much on the slope of the road.

And this is where I started to think “oh no”.

Right?! The pre-race bathroom stop MUST be completed!

That is always my least favorite part of any race.

Yeah, it was frustrating! Especially since I had a really specific goal time I was going for!

this is awesome!

I know!! I still can't believe those splits came from me!

You should be very happy with this part of the race. HOLY moly you were flying!

I absolutely am. Looking back on this race the bad parts definitely stand out in my mind more than the good ones, so I need to reverse that.

Again “oh, no!”

Yeah, that is the trouble with some courses... they can be heavily banked. As I mentioned, I normally am naturally inclined to cut the distance like that...but on the ToT course, there was (waa... I just said was) a very sloped section that I had to rise up onto rather than run on the inner part because it hurt a bit.... and then when I went days later to run on the beach I absolutely couldn’t do it it was so sore.

Yep, that happened to me on the Princess course in 2011. So I'm really aware of it on Disney courses but not so much at home. Obviously that was a mistake!

That makes sense. I never thought of it.. I knew that I was harder on shoes because of it. (one shoe is worn more heavily) I am lucky that I haven’t done more damage to myself. OR maybe having that one leg slightly longer has finally helped me.

I have had that exact thing happen to me and I KNOW it's what happened this time. Boo!

Way to push through!

I am so sorry to hear that you experience this. I am sure it was frustrating and I can imagine that fbombs would have come out.

They were coming out fast and furious! Not good!!

I am sure he meant well. Yes, I may often be that crazy person who means well.... trying to encourage others who are struggling...probably who are thinking they want to punch me.

I'm sure he did too, and I've done it as well. It just wasn't what I wanted to hear right at that moment!

I am sure that was not a fun thing... watching the pr go away..the sub 2:10...

No, it wasn't. But what can ya do?

But OMG! look at that time! 2:18 is awesome!!!

I really am happy with the time in light of the knee issues, even though it's not what I ultimately was hoping for.

It looks like a token...

...right???

I agree with Will And that is just weird... maybe you get them mounted together?

Haha, I have no idea. Right now I still have it in the plastic bag and sort of put a small hole in it to hang on my medal hanger. It looks weird.

That is a long wait! Yuck!

Yuck indeed! I just wanted to get the heck outta there!

I hope that both the latte and ice helped.

They did. It was a healing latte.

You should be proud of your time. You finished in a time that so so SO many people would only dream of and yet did it with an injury. YOU ROCK! And..while yes it is frustrating that you trained well and were not able to fully live up to that training... in a way..you did. I mean think of how it would have gone had you not trained like you did. I am sure your time would not have been 2:18.

Thank you. I definitely am, and I recognize that it's a good time...just disappointed because I know I had trained well enough to hit that goal time.

I don’t blame you... that would be a race I would probably never do again either!

Yes, it is OFF the list, that's for sure!!!

 

[Ariel484]

That is a SERIOUS plan!

It is! And not for me this year, in light of the injuries I had last month.

I know this is going to sound odd/crazy.. but the 2 steps forward and then 1 back sounds kinda fun.

It definitely works for me! I need a little break once in awhile.

I wasn’t a fan of my mondays being a rest day either.

Yeah, it was odd. Currently I have Thursdays as my rest days, which is a little weird after being used to Sundays for so long, but I do kind of like that mid-week break.

Long mid week runs are tough. I am struggling a tad myself to get them done. I think once I accept the dark and cold and wet... I will get back into it. Mostly I find I dread getting out and cant imagine doing 6 or 8 miles mid week. Only yesterday did I not follow through. (it was a record for rain and just south had a tornado... I think I can accept that I only ran 4.5)

I'm not looking forward to those longer mid-week runs! And I am with you that the crappier weather makes it so much harder.

I'm glad the tornado didn't come to your area!!

It is good you have a plan that you feel confident in. I know I struggle to figure out anything at this point

I THINK I do now.

Crossing fingers

Me too...if the snow could just hold off completely until mid-January, that would be perfect.

We really need to set aside a If we don’t plan ahead I am sure to get lost in what I am doing and totally miss out on meeting up. That is of course if you want to... if you don’t... that is totally ok

We should! You know how busy those race weekends are but I'm sure we can think of something!

You are awesome! I wish I could train like you!!!

Well by now you read that I'm not doing that plan anymore...but thank you.

It is good you are serious about the dopey. I fear there are some who sign up and think that they will just get by with little training or who don’t allow themselves to train correctly and injure themselves.

YEP. It's hard for me to keep my mouth shut when I hear/read about that from other people. I mean, just because it's in Disney...it's still going to be tough!

EXACTLY!!! eyes on the prize!!!

You know it!!

Great pic!!

Thanks! I can't pass up a photo-op with my girl.

Oh no! I have to catch up! I hope all is well... a DNS? Lots of rest days. I really hope the IT band issue was not worse than it sounded

Yes ma'am.

I am taking one page at a time... with of course needing to make multiple posts. I am slowly getting caught up on your thread.....

And you did! I so appreciate that you read it all.

 

[Ariel484]

It is funny how some times, some races can just leave us much more sore. After the DLH, I was REALLY sore. Course, I wonder how much of that had to do with post race activities. I can’t tell you how many stairs I climbed up and down that day, but it was not insignificant.

Yeah, I'm not sure why that is! I guess I was running faster but boy, what a difference!

I'm ALWAYS sore after the Disney races, and stairs are the worst. I have to hop down them, can't step like a normal person.

I really hope that your IT band has continued to improve.

It's totally fine now! It didn't both me all year until that race, and since the days after it hasn't bothered me.

I am impressed. It is so hard to know when to push through and when to recognize that a rest to recover and heal is necessary. I am so bad about not knowing when to push and when not to.

I think just having the knowledge that I have completed these distances before is huge for me. Knowing that I can miss some runs and I'll still be okay. That has been key.

I always feel bad for those who battle it too. That and PF... oh and shin splints... Ok, so I feel bad for anyone with any injury... injuries suck!

I know! I'm definitely coming off of a bad period but in general I don't consider myself to be injury-prone and I am so glad for that!!

skirts!!! I have the haunted mansion one... but not the LeiLei. They are pretty cool skirts!

SKIRTS!!! I'm getting SweetSkulls and ComicRelief delievered today! Was going to get them at the expo but then I saw ComicRelief was not on the list, so I jumped on that $5-off Facebook group code! It's an addiction for sure.

It is good to know that you can sell them if you need/want, isn’t it?

Yes! It is shocking how quickly they sell and how well they hold their value!

Good for you! I really hope it has been just the thing you needed. I bet it has been.

I think it was...I think I was very lucky in this instance.

That is good. I think this is one way to push through... just take it easy. And... there is no “too” easy.

I agree! Not feeling like I have to make a goal pace (besides Disney's 16:00/mile sweep pace) has been really helpful in taking the pressure off. Just gotta get some miles in.

I wonder if it is not water loss...like you have been resting and you are swollen. I know there are days where my feet are swollen more than others from long runs...so I figure there could be times when all of me is retaining more water. So... maybe the rest is causing you to not be as swollen as you normally are?

That very well may have been. I have no idea! Some weeks I think I have this weight loss thing figured out and then the next week I realize I have no idea what I'm doing.

How exciting it must have been to get back to it a bit!

Yes! It felt so good to get the blood flowing again!

So you got a 6? I am having trouble with my phone. I have a 4s. I really need to upgrade. I will have to get an iphone...that much I know. But there are just a few models out since I got mine. Also..mine is a strange 4s that has a ton more memory than what a lot of the current models come with...so 8gb would NOT work for me.

No, a 6 Plus. The big one! My mom got a 6 Plus, where before she had an iPhone 4. So that was quite the upgrade!!

So how do you like your new phone???

I like it a lot. I have had it for a little over a month and I feel like I'm still getting used to the size a bit...but then I look at my husband's iPhone 5 (which is what I had) and it just seems weirdly tiny now. I think I would have been happy with the 6, too. It's a really nice size.

The camera is really fantastic, and the screen looks amazing. Those things, along with an increase in storage size (64GB! Way more than I need, 32 would have been fine) are what I like about it the most. I wish Lifeproof would come out with cases, because I had one for my 5 and liked to use it when I would run...so lately I have been carrying my phone in a Ziploc baggy.

Oh no...

Oh no!!!

I am so so sorry!! I was hoping that rest was doing the trick...

Oh, yeah. This was the big one, injury-wise

Well, I already know how this went.. I am so sorry!

Yeah, me too. I'm really hoping this was just a one-time, freak occurrence.

I think good shoes are important when you are battling an injury or just when soreness creeps in. I know there are days I break out a pair of retired shoes because they are better for my feet and legs than my “fancy” work shoes. I never use to wear athletic shoes around..but now I do when I need to.

That is something I'm struggling with as I'm starting to think about what to pack for Disney - what NON-running shoes to take. Haven't quite figured it out yet.

I can’t believe how much you went through with this. I had no idea. I am so sorry! I was off in my own world and had no clue.

It was not a very happy period for me, as you can see! I'm glad it's over!

As I have been reading this I was beginning to wonder if you were going to reach a point where you made an appointment. I hope it did not come to you keeping the appointment..but if you did then I hope it helped.

I did keep it, though I had thought about canceling. I'm glad I kept it though!

RICE is important!!!

RICE fixed me!!

I am excited to find out if this was the turning point. It is odd reading your saga after it has really past. I know I could jump ahead.....

But then you would miss all of my injury-related whining!!

Yay for progress!!!

I can only imagine! I mean you are so devoted and so committed... to miss so many workouts must have been very mentally challenging...not to mention physically!

It was not great. I was really sad and upset for awhile there.

While I am sure that it was necessary it must not have been fun to DNS. AND for a second time. I think you should not sign up again. I think it is a jinxed race for you.

IT IS. Another one that is off my list!!!

I think a 5k will be a perfect race to get back into things!

I think so too! And it's coming right up this weekend!

I bet the cost is also related to the cool medal.

I think you are right!! I hope it looks as cool in person.

I am so sorry! I am sure that frustrating is an understatement! I really hope you have been able to run... I have to keep reading and getting caught up. I really want to read a happy ending!!!

 

[Ariel484]

Man, I bet you were wanting to do something. For someone who normally is very active in their workouts and training it must have been horribly hard to not be as active.

It was. At the same time I didn't want to get used to it since I still want to train for Dopey!

I think that was a good decision. I realize the appointment has come and gone (haven’t gotten to how it went) but I think it was important to find out what exactly the trouble was to avoid it in the future.

I am definitely glad I ended up going!!

That is weird!

It was!! So strange!

I hope so!

Oh no!

Thankfully that did not turn into another injury!!

I tend to think most injuries can be tracked back to shoes... so I am definitely a bad judge but makes you wonder if it is now in the other foot too.

It ended up not being the shoes, I guess. I think I was (without realizing it) changing my gait to compensate for whatever pain I was having.

Glad it went well!

I'm glad it's over!!!!!!!!!

a run!

A very short run, but a run nonetheless!

That was certainly progress!!!

That was such a relief, to get that first one done.

This is a huge project! I am very impressed it looks awesome!

Thank you! Since then we have sealed the tiles but still need to grout them. I was hoping to get that done before Wine & Dine but I'm not sure that will happen.

I am glad you had something to occupy your time because I am sure it did not feel good.

I didn't. Stupid jinx race!!!

I am so happy to see that things improved!!!

Me too. I was really worried for awhile there!

As much as we know that is the best way to look at it and approach it... I know first hand how hard it is to accept a pace that isn’t quite what you are use to. Yes... ultimately the miles. THAT is the goal and the fact you are putting foot to pavement is awesome!!

I think I am becoming more okay with it as time goes on...probably because Wine & Dine is so close and I really was afraid I wouldn't get to do it. So now I'm just happy that I'm almost there!

I am so glad the appointment went well and was encouraging! That is AWESOME!

YES!!!

That sounds like a good plan!

I think it has been really helpful mentally - a lot less overwhelming this way.

Those are both reasonable goals and I think ultimately there are those who don’t even meet those before embarking on a disney half.

I agree. Glad I could get to this point, at least.

I am actually thinking I may try an interval similar to that for avengers. So I think that interval would be something to be proud of!

I just got up to it this week and it's been working well for me! I am liking it so far!

I really hope so too. I have felt horrible for you that your training got so derailed due to this. I am glad you are back on track!

Me too! Have I said how relieved I am?! Because I AM!!

I LOVE it!!!

Pretty colors make everything better.

For someone who has spent some time sidelined this is a very impressive schedule! You ROCK!

Thanks! Trying to walk a fine line between getting the mileage I need but not doing too much, too quickly.

for the fun stuff!!!

Yes! I agree, yay clothes!!

Great and fun pics!!

Thanks!

I love all the pics from prior years!

I like seeing them too. Always fun to look back on those races.

I LOVE it!!

Me too! I love the vented slim cut! I wish they sold more of them.

How awesome will that be??!!

So my friend texted me a picture of fabric last week - zebra print with some sparkles. I'm so excited to see what she comes up with!!

I don’t like hats either... but I can run with sunglasses on the top of my head. I wonder if a head band would not be similar. Maybe it will be that way for you?

I hope so! I think you're right that it won't be as bad as a hat.