Team 'Ohana--No One Left Behind: The Continuing Adventures

[jbucci]

Debra: Sorry the marathon was so rough for you and DOOD. Remind me to scratch Pittsburgh off my list of races to do. You need to come to Philadelphia and hang with us I hope the DL trip works out for you too.

Nicole: Great job on getting back out there

Jackie: Have fun this weekend.

We are now recovered from Broad Street and looking for our next event. At the Broad Street expo there was an ad for a new half in Philia. After some debate, we are now officially signed up for the ODDyssey half in Philia on Memorial Day weekend. (Although I still sort of want to do the superhero one Lisa is doing) The new race sounds interesting with costumes encouraged and "optional obstacles and challenges" along the course. We figure we can gauge the weather-- if it is another hot, nasty day we will do the optional strange stuff and just have fun with it. If the weather and conditions look good for a PR then we take the race more seriously.

 

[IASW Rider]

Thank you (mahalo! ) for the warm welcome, Jackie, Richard, Debra, Nicole, and John! Hi Everyone!

Hi Jen! Please let me know if you decide to do Super Hero, and I will look out for you! If not....... I just registered for the Philly Half in November (would love to have done Rock 'N' Roll in September, but it's Yom Kippur weekend and I wouldn't have been able to make it to packet pick-up or to stay overnight) and A.C. in October (2 weeks after W&D )........maybe I will see you at one of those! Would love to have tried the Memorial Day race that you mentioned, but we already have plans!

Hope that your FIL is continuing to feel well, Richard, and that his surgery will go quickly and smoothly so that he may put it behind him and concentrate on a full and swift recovery!

Congratulations on your first run since Princess, Nicole! Hope that you are feeling well and are not experiencing any pain! I wish that I could provide some remotely knowledgeable sounding input with regard to your training plans........but since I sort of "make up my own" (and "train for" (such as it is! ) half marathons and 5K's simultaneously......and have no idea what I'm doing.......you and everyone else here probably know way better than I! It sounds like you're doing great and I'll bet that you'll be pleasantly surprised when you find how little of your conditioning is gone, as you continue to train!

So sorry to hear that DOOD and his team had a difficult time with their recent race and that one of their partners was unable to join them, Debra! I hope that they are already moving forward and looking ahead to their next race! And sending lots of positive vibes your way in the hopes that you will be headed to DL!

It sounds like you're going to have a great and fun weekend in Indianapolis, Jackie! So neat that you're running with your DD - and that you'll be seeing so many WISHers, out there!

Love hearing about all of your various race and training plans! I wish that I had something of interest to add, but there are very few longer races scheduled in this area - just billions of 5K's.........so I tend to do 2-3 per month. I have a tiny little local 5K on Saturday morning, before DH and I blast off for South Jersey to celebrate Mother's Day with his family. And I'll be doing my 10-miler (my version of a LR! ) in anticipation of Super Hero (on the 16th), tomorrow morning!

Hope that all is well with all of you and hope that you're all having a great week! Talk to you, soon!

 

[IASW Rider]

Hello!

Just wanted to wish everyone who is racing in Indianapolis - and anywhere else (!) - this weekend, lots of good luck!

Have a great weekend, Cousins! And Happy Mother's Day!

 

[zakismom]

Good morning Team! Sorry I have been VERY MIA. Last month was a crazy month for me! I upped my moon in the Half Fanatics by running back-to-back half marathons, Ocean City 1/2 on 4/25 and Blossoms of Hope on 4/25, started the month with the Frederick 1/2 on 5/2. Luckily this weekend is just some nice slooooow miles since next weekend brings me the Marine Corps Historic Half.

Some other great - but also bittersweet news - is that I got into the New York Marathon on November 7th. Why is this bittersweet when I should be swinging from the rooftops??? Especially since a very close friend and RP got in also? On our first try at the lottery? Well, I also managed to sign up for the MCM the weekend before since I had an early entry code, and being the 35th anniversary I have been super excited about it. I have decided to let that race go (VERY hard for me to let go of the beautiful bling, but reality is reality and I don't think I will ever be in THAT kind of shape) and I signed up for the 10k with my son instead. NOW, for fun news. I will be on the bridge - around mile 21.5 with goodies for anyone that will be runnning. If you, or anyone you know is running let me know what you want I will have it for you on the bridge (if your wish is a filet mignon with side a mashed tators you MIGHT be out of luck, lol - but if frozen orange slices, water, a soda, pretzels, etc... are your thing then I'm there for you!).

Hopefully today will continue to be a slow day at work so that I can get the chance to read back through this thread and get to know all of you better.

 

[jbucci]

Just wanted to wish all of my cousins a happy Mothers Day

Not much going on here other than spring cleaning and opening our pool. Of course the weekend we open the pool the temps go from the mid to high 80's to the low 60's but what can you do?

I wish this nice cool weather had been here last weekend for Broad Street. We did sign up for the ODDyssey run- a new half in Philadelphia. We are thinking of having fun with this one and going in costume as a group from the game plants vs zombies (there are 4 of us). Not sure exactly how this will work, but we have a few weeks to plan.

 

[MouseDogMom]

Erica - I may take you up on your offer. I wasn't even sure I was going to do a full this year, and suddenly found myself hitting the "register" button on the MCM page. So now I have an entry, and a hotel room, for Marine Corps, along with my best running buddy. At Richmond a Peppermint Patty saved my life at mile 19, followed by a beer at mile 23, so I may ask for some strange things!

Lisa - We've been discussing the difficulty of training for half marathons and 5K's at the same time. It really can't be done easily! I finally reached my 5K goal, so I've moved back to marathon training, but I had to take a month and concentrate on the shorter distance to get the 5K goal. My body has been very confused this spring!

Jen - Cold(er) weather seems to have struck everywhere this weekend. Those of us in Indy could have sworn we were back in Orlando in January. (Well, maybe not quite, but at times we had flashbacks!)

Debra - Scary to hear that from DOOD. Didn't respect the distance, huh? I will NOT be adding Pittsburgh to my list of races. DMIL has told us they're going there this fall, and asked us to join them. I told her we'd consider a non-running visit, since we knew people there!

So... the Indy report. This will be separate from the "official" race report that I may post on other threads, due to DD reading it elsewhere! It was a great weekend. We left Thursday morning and took our time driving up. Spent the night in Frankfort, KY, and arrived in Indy around 10:00 Friday. Went straight to the speedway so we could take the tour and get DD off our backs - otherwise she would have driven us crazy at the expo. Then did the expo - ran into Anne/Maherae there, along with a friend from our local running group. Checked into the hotel and it was time to meet everyone for dinner. 16 WISHers! Fabulous time.

Saturday morning - 37 degrees and 30mph winds. It's cold, folks. REALLY cold. And the wind is forecast to last all day. We're scrambling to get enough clothes for the three of us, since DD doesn't own enough running gear yet. Meet for a group photo in the lobby, then off to the start. Met up with Lily, Karen, and dislvr74 in the corral.

DH decided to do an extended run at the start to get us past some of the crowd. May have been a bad idea for DD, but it felt good to us. Then we went to R2/W1. I'll spare you the details, but by mile 3 DD was whining. We'd have good spells and bad ones, but she perked up at mile 5.5 when she saw the track and she took off. We slowed down for the 2.5 miles inside the speedway so she could take pictures and kiss the bricks.

Once we left the track, the whining began again. DH thinks she's making a big deal of it; I'm trying to keep her going. SOMEHOW we make it to mile 12.5 and see the sign that says "3/4 mile to go," and she decides she can run. We do run across the finish line, and finish in 2:50:42. DH thinks it's quite possibly the slowest race ever run, but I'm thrilled that we did that well for her first time out. (She had delusions of beating my PR on her first race, but quickly surrendered those when she realized just how long 13.1 miles really is!)

She has, however, already picked her next race! She saw the medal for the Princess at the expo, and has decided we can skip the January races as long as she can go in March. And she wants to run her own race - no parental assistance. I think that's a great idea.

If you haven't run Indy, it's a wonderful course for a PR. Flat. Lots of bands. Wasn't real impressed with the volunteer support - plenty of water stops, just not a lot of personality. The people we thanked looked at us like we were aliens. But I'd do it again...

Jackie

 

[FFigawi]

First, Jackie, congrats on your finish at Indy! Sounds like you and your whole family really enjoyed the experience.

We've been discussing the difficulty of training for half marathons and 5K's at the same time. It really can't be done easily! I finally reached my 5K goal, so I've moved back to marathon training, but I had to take a month and concentrate on the shorter distance to get the 5K goal. My body has been very confused this spring!

No, it's definitely not easy. Our training group added a 5K-focused program this spring to help all of the distance runners shoot for PRs in 5Ks and other short mileage events for just that reason. It was three months of track work, short hill work, core work, and pick-ups during short runs. I didn't participate in much of it, but what little I did seems to have paid off. I ran my leg of the Bayou Bash relay (4 people, 2 miles each) in 15 minutes. That's a whole lot faster than I thought I'd go. Said our coach, "just imagine how fast your marathons would be if you did speed work on a regular basis." Lots of people in the program have been hitting new PRs in the 5K, so I think he's going to continue it throughout our marathon training. Normally, we do hills for 6-8 weeks and then speed work for 6-8 weeks, but given the success of the program, I think we're going to end up with 4 months of this schedule.

 

[IASW Rider]

Hey Everyone!

Hope that you all had a great weekend!

Congratulations on all of your recent race victories and upping your Half Fanatics moon, Erica! That is fantastic!! And lots of good luck with the MCM (MCHH?)!!

And congratulations to you, Jackie - AND your family - on your great successes at Indy! I'm sure that your DD did a wonderful job - and it's so neat that she wants to do Princess, now, on her own! It sounds like it was a fun weekend and so cool that you met up with so many WISHers, there! It sounds like you and DH did a great job, as well! Thanks for sharing your photos - they are great!

And thanks to you and John for sharing your thoughts and experiences concerning training for half marathons and 5K's at the same time! Of course, I'm sort of "making up my training on my own" - mainly concentrating on my distance running. So I suppose that (given the fact that I'm not practicing any formal drills or exercises of any sort) it's natural that my 5K pace has slowed down. I finished the 5K that I ran on Saturday a full 2 minutes slower than my PR (which happened to be on the exact same course!). I was pleased, though, as I assumed that my slower performance implied that my "makeshift" half marathon "training" is "working" (........I ask all of you kind experts: is that logical........or am I just fooling myself? )! And I managed to place in the top 10 in my age group, anyway, so I was happy. Thank you both for sharing your thoughts!

I know what you mean about this crazy weather, Jen! It's gone from being like the middle of Summer back to Fall, in a matter of days! I hope that you are able to use your pool, very soon! Lots of good luck with the ODDyssey Run! I'm sure that you'll all have a great time and do wonderful jobs!

I wish that there were a few more halfs scheduled in this area, at this time of year.......I'm so close to qualifying for an initial Half Fanatic moon ( ).....I guess I will have to wait until the Fall, when I'll have 3 halfs in 3 different states in 6 weeks!

Hope that all is well with all of you and hope that you're all having a nice week, so far! Talk to you soon!

 

[zakismom]

Jackie - thanks for the great race report. Looks like y'all had a great finish and I'm glad she is looking ahead to another race. Princess is such a fun weekend.

IASW Rider - Congrats on your percent finish! Good job!

Weird things for the bridge is probably the norm for runners, there will be about 10 of us (probably more the way the list is growing) from WISH & ROTE chEARing everyone on so plenty of coolers and loud voices. Last year they had frozen orange slices for me, water, sodas, beer, candy of all types, pretzels - I think a bit of everything, lol! Knowing they would be there for me really kept me moving.

Had a sinus infection and strep the past 5 days so no running, but I have the Marine Corp Historic Half this weekend so I'll have to get my legs moving at some point.

I hope everyone is having a great day!

 

[tiberius]

Hi Everyone!

I've been remiss in posting of late due to my various time demands, mostly trying to keep up with my training while keeping up with helping out at my FIL's business. Hopefully, it won't be too much longer before I do a proper catch-up post.
I wanted to thank you all for the prayers and well wishes for my FIL, he had his hip repair/partial replacement surgery yeaterday afternoon. All went as expected and he spent a (relatively) quiet night recovering. We'll likely go see him today after Amanda's (DD, 21) graduation this afternoon.

 

[IMGONNABE40!]

Hi all!! Welcome to Lisa!! Always nice to see the family expanding!!

RIchard, glad to hear that your FIL is coming along in his recovery. How fortunate for him to have you to help keep his business going while he recuperates.

I want to do Indy next year. I found out about it too late this year to get registered. Do they have a full as well? I'd like to do a full in every state-but am off to a slow start. So far only Ohio and Florida.

I skipped the Flying Pig this year and worked a water stop instead. We finished our 107 mile walk to Columbus on Monday 4/26, and the Pig was 6 days later... Since I wanted a "rematch" at the pig so I could improve on m,y horrible showing last year, I figured 6 days wasn't enough recovery time and I could possibly do worse!! Still, handing out gatorade had me jonesing for a race... Only a 5k on the horizon...

 

[Worfiedoodles]

Richard -- Congratulations on your DD's graduation, that is an accomplishment for the entire family!

I'm registering myself for the WDW Half and Dennis for the Full later this week. It's going to be his first Full, I'm not ready to move up yet!

I think I last posted so long ago I missed some new cousins, so Welcome!

I've up my LRs to 9M, and I'm doing 90 minute runs during the week, but at a slower pace so it's been averaging about 7.5M, which is plenty for me. I don't know how long I'll be able to keep this up, it's really just a push so I can finish the BL contests strong!

Maria

 

[tiberius]

Hi Team!! I know I have been effectively gone for a while, but I have tried to peek in now and then. Thanks for al the well wishes and prayers for my FIL, who started physical therapy yesterday following his hip replacement, and for my DD also. Amanda's graduation was wonderful. We were not sure where to sit in the basketball arena, so we picked a spot on the far side from the entrance 4 rows up. As it turned out, Amanda was seated in almost the same spot 3 chairs from the end, so we were very close to her. Darcy was definitely impressed with my seat-selection abilities.

Maria - Good luck with finishing BL strong and good luck at WDW with the half, no pressure to move up to the full.

Christine - I only have done fulls in 2 states also. Not sure that I want to take on the 50 state challenge though.

Debra - I'm amazed at how you turn out so many good written pieces on WDW. I hope that is not the source of some of your side job "issues".

Erica - How was the Marine Corps Historic Half?

Even though my schedule is hectic (times 2!!) I am still trying to find the time to train and race. This Saturday I will be doing the El Chupacabra 10K Nighttime Trail Run. Pitch dark, on trails, with friends and BBQ and beer. Sounds like fun!! Also May 29 I'll be doing the Combat Sprint Triathlon.

 

[chimera]

Christine - I only have done fulls in 2 states also. Not sure that I want to take on the 50 state challenge though.

I'm up to 3 states for halfs. I was working with an old school orthopedist today. He said he believes people should do no more than 20 to 25 marathons in their lifetime due to the wear and tear on their knees. I'm not entirely sure I believe, but he did say something else that was interesting. You shouldn't run marathons with an artificial knee because it doesn't repair itself. Wear and tear just continues with the high mileage.

Richard...night time trail run sounds fun!

Things are a bit crazy, as usual. We had a little GI bug last week, now my mom's in the hospital with angina. She's having a heart cath tomorrow. My mom (and the rest of my family history) are the reasons I run. She's diabetic with high cholesterol and blood pressure...started having heart problems at 50. Her father died of a stroke at my age, but had heart attacks in his late 30s. It's basically the shallow end of the gene pool

 

[tiberius]

Mel - I hardly think that you are in the shallow end of the gene pool. However, my thoughts and prayers will be with your family tomorrow. You're setting a great example for your family to take an active role in your health. BTW, congrats on having 50% more states done than me.

 

[MouseDogMom]

Richard - Continued good wishes for your FIL's recovery. Belated congratulations to Amanda (and her parents!) And good luck on your trail run this weekend. Sounds like LOTS of fun! I don't know why you can't find something to keep you occupied... When are you sleeping these days?

Christine - The May Indy race is a half only - the largest half marathon in the country. It usually fills by mid-December. They have a couple of other races in the fall, and there may be a full then, but the May one is the only one that includes the racetrack. I'd like to do the Flying Pig one day - maybe next year I'll be able to work it into the schedule.

Mel - Good luck to your mom tomorrow. And good for you for trying to reverse genetics! My mom basically died from severe osteoporosis, so I'm using running as a weight-bearing exercise to help fend that off.

Erica - I told my friend who's running MCM with me about you being at the bridge with a cooler and taking requests. She was very excited! Now my local running buddies may begin to understand why my WISH running buddies are so wonderful! It pays to have friends around the country! And I'm waiting to hear about the Historic Half as well - had a lot of friends from here running it - if it hadn't been right on the heels of Indy I would like to have tried it.

As of tonight, I have been accepted into the Half Fanatics! I only have 3 states too (NC, FL, IN) - darn that Myrtle Beach canceled race. I'll have marathons in NC, FL, VA, and DC by the end of the year if all goes as planned.

Jackie

 

[tiberius]

Richard I don't know why you can't find something to keep you occupied... When are you sleeping these days?

Umm, so that's my problem!!!

 

[zakismom]

Good morning!

Jackie and Richard, thanks for asking about the Historic Half. I would like to have gone into it feeling better, but it was what it was. Due to being sick and some testing I had done I my TN was forced out of remission so my migraines were out of control (causing vomiting, before-during-and after, sorry if TMI). I started walking more at mile 3 and pretty much was entirely walking by mile 5-6 (nothing wrong with walking I just usually do a 3:1 run/walk). At mile 11 I actually considered quitting, this is the 1st time I have ever thought about it this far into a race - trust me, I think about it often up to mile 3 of a lot of races/runs, lol. The hill that started at mile 10 was literally 1 mile long and STEEP. I have never seen a hill like that and I run hilly races all the time. I didn't think it would ever end. I power walked it as hard as I could and was afraid to slow down because I didn't think that I would get my momentum up again! I realized that I would have to get back to the the start/finish (same place) somehow so I might as well get a medal for it. Almost at the very end I managed to catch up to 2 of my friends, one of which was doing her very first half, and we all crossed together. It was my second worst time - of course I wasn't spending that time taking photos with characters so..... , but I finished. Would I do this race again? In a heartbeat! I am going back next year in hopes of kicking that hills butt! My husband actually PR'd on the course and I am very proud of him for that. I met some great folks along the way and for me the participants can make or break a race, in this case it definitely helped make it.

This weekend is the Maryland 1/2 Marathon and then I don't have any more half's until DL. My body is glad, lol. I do have some smaller races but mainly I am going to focus on training for New York and also on just getting healthy.

Jackie - congrats on become a Half Fanatic! I become one in November and my moon rose to Jupiter this March when I completed back to back half's on 4/24 and 2/25. The things we won't do for fun, lol!

Mel - Sending lots of PD for your mom today.

 

[princessbride6205]

I'm still around - just nothing exciting to report. No races on the horizon at the moment - still deciding about WDW Half in Jan and if I am going to do any local ones this summer. I finally got back into training a few weeks ago (after my extended post-Princess hiatus), but it has been slow going. I've been getting in my workouts but only a few runs. DH and I have been traveling for work, so it's been hard to do formal workouts. Lots of walking and some strength & cross training. Just need to find a way to get in more runs.

I did finally get a GPS watch - well, I ordered it and it shipped 2 days ago. Can't wait to try it out!

Erica - Sorry to hear the Historic was so rough on you. But it's great that you're ready to sign up for next year's!

Maria - Way to finish our BL challenge strong! Wow, I'm impressed with your time and miles logged during the week.

 

[corinnak]

Aloha Cousins! Late though it is, I wanted to also say:

Welcome to Lisa!!!

It's been a busy spring and I have a half in another 2 weeks - coming up so quickly! Also, the Brain Damage 5K....uh, I mean Challenge Hearts and Minds 5K on Memorial Day. They make a big deal of those of us recovering from damage or other neurological challenges at this one, so thats....nice, I guess. I hope to rock that Lake Como course once more. Barring any wardrobe malfunctions. I hope I can do better than I did in April on this course, the day after the school closed.

Speaking of school, the kids have been in their new school a month now. It's going OK, though my older son is still adjusting. Everyone keeps saying that with my younger son, it's like he's been there all along. I'm finally getting used to the new schedule, uniforms and all the other stuff we've figured out along the way.

A few weeks ago, we went to DH's high school reunion. There was a small "memorial" cross-country 5K fun walk/run for a member of the class of '75, and of course I ran it. In spite of the thunderstorm. Holy fright, what is it with the weather at races this year??? It was wet, and there were probably fewer than 20 of us participating, 8 of us actually ran the course. I was pushing it pretty well (something about driving rain makes me want to get it finished) except on the steep, grassy downhills, when I would slow down and get passed every time. I always caught up with them on the flat and/or uphill, though.

There was one woman that I leap-frogged with a few times in this way - she was from the class of 75, and we chatted a bit. Things like she had been up late the previous 2 nights, drinking and reminiscing, so wasn't feeling her best. She wasn't a runner - she jogs, but doesn't run. Blah, blah, blah. So we approach the finish, and it's an uphill, so I pour it on(given that I knew I could, for the first and possibly only time ever be the first woman across the finish line) and pass her one last time, finishing a fair bit ahead of her. She comes along and finishes, and I say to her "Nice run!" And she goes on and on about how she's not fast, she doesn't race, she's not a runner, AND how she said she thought at first she'd pace with me but then that it was too much (which is silly since we ran roughly the same pace overall) and then she said "at the end, I though I really should push - I have the energy, but then I figured no, it's just for fun." So, basically not only is she not a runner, not fast, nearly hung over, and 17 years my senior, but she GAVE me the race????? Ugh. What a stunning display of poor sportsmanship. Yes, the race wasn't timed or anything, but I'm still proud to have run well in challenging conditions AND being the first female to finish. She can't actually take that away from me.

Here's a picture DH took from the upper parking lot - I bet you can spot me AND get an idea of the lovely conditions. The slow non-runner is the one in red. DH and the kids had waited in the car during the race.

Brrr.