More of the Same

I have nothing exciting to report in my running. I've been doing it, my times are getting a little better each time and that's about it. I do have my first 8-miler of 2011 on tap for this weekend, which will probably end up being Monday because nothing says Happy Fourth like sweating your butt off on some hills in the 'Burgh. Also mostly because I am attending 2 weddings in 2 days, which won't leave me any time for runs.

Hope everyone's running is going well!

Running Machine

Just after I told you last week that I was getting ready to renounce running as my preferred method of exercise, last week happened. Every run was good. Seriously, all four of them didn’t make me want to die, I enjoyed portions of them and I ran well! This never happens. It’s like running overheard me getting ready to cut it from my life and decided to rope me back in.

I can attribute this stellar week to two things:

• Every run was a morning run. Waking up early is not my thing, but I hauled myself out of bed around 6 on the weekdays and at 8 for my weekend run. I could definitely feel a temperature difference, so I think that was helpful. Interestingly, I don’t eat when I run in the morning—I just go. So I would have thought my runs would have been poor since my energy levels were quite low, but I surprised myself.
• I have stopped my warm-up walk. I would usually walk a few blocks/minutes to get warmed up. Now I just start running. 

This week I continue with four runs, all of them are pretty easy, I guess because last week was tougher. But I saw the following week my first 8-miler of the training will be on tap. Kinda odd because at no point have I done 7 miles. A bunch of 6-ers and 5-ers, but now we’re just moving into 8. But I can blow worrying about that off for a little less than 2 weeks.

On a totally unrelated note, today is exactly 2 months until my wedding!

In Love

I can’t decide if I can fully embrace morning runs. I had no choice but to wake up at 6:30 this morning to bang out a quick 3 miles before work. As I hauled myself out of bed and into running clothes, I counted the ways in which this run would suck.

BUT IT DIDN’T! The weather was cool and the sun was just starting to fully take over the sky and I ran the entire time.  No easing in with a walk for a block or two. Just full-on running and no stops (except at a light where traffic was steadily moving). I thoroughly had a good time!

Ironically, just last night I was asking my fiancé (who is a marathoner) if he’s having an awesome time while he’s running. He told me at some point in the run he always likes it. Sometimes not until halfway through, sometimes not until it’s over. I told him that maybe running isn’t for me—that maybe I would run this half-marathon in September and then switch to a different workout—like dancing, yoga or even a go at P90X or Insanity. Something I like more. Then today happened and I am in love with running again!

I may indeed try Insanity or P90X at some point, but perhaps when life is a little less hectic.

My First Race Recap!

For someone who has been trying to be a runner for quite some time, I don't race very often. So this will be my very first race recap!

My fiance and two friends ran the Warrior Dash in northern Pennsylvania on Saturday. It was one of the most fun things I have ever done!

Our wave of runners wasn't taking off until 12:30 p.m., so we took our time leaving Philly and stopped for McDonald's breakfast for the ride up (breakfast of champions? I actually ate fruit and a croissant from Whole Foods to make everyone else in the car feel guilty.) I was in one of my cutest outfits: a free shirt I received on spring break in 2003 that dubs me "official keg stand coordinator 69" and a pair of shorts circa 2002 with "Outer Banks" plastered across the butt.

We took our place at the start and some fire blasts signaled our start. The first mile was pretty uneventful. We ran through some mud and mostly just followed a trail. (Side note--I need to work at trail running. My vision feels off because I'm looking down but also ahead and I think it messes with my brain.) But then the mud got deeper and stickier. One of our friends lost his shoe and had to tug it out. A guy in the group behind us popped his ankle out of place and had to leave the course.

Then we hit a tunnel we had to crawl through in the dark. No biggie. The next obstacle freaked me out a bit. We had to walk across wooden beams that were angled up and down. I don't have an image of this, so I'll send you to another blog to check it out.

Next three obstacles were also not totally insane. We had to scale some hurdles and then slide under some others, crawl through a tube and make our way through a bunch of ropes strung like a giant spider web. The cool thing about this race was the sense of camaraderie. People were holding ropes for each other and just laughing and talking along the way.

We then made our way through waist-deep water, which was also surprisingly easy. But don't think I'm a stellar athlete yet. We then came to the great warrior wall. I couldn't do it. So I had to skip it. I didn't feel too bad because a good chunk of other people weren't making it either. 

The next set of obstacles were my favorite part. We had a cargo net to scale. Some guy behind me was apparently a little too close because he was able to tell me he liked my underwear (it was pretty cute). Stupid Outer Banks shorts.

Once you drop down the other side of the net, the finish was in sight. Between me and the finish was a set of tires--I don't know what this is called, but it looks like those drills football players do where you hop through tires--and then scale a bunch of junked-up cars.

Following this was fire to jump over--super cool! Then a giant mud pit you bust through and then eventually crawl through because there is barbed wire over you. My knees are still thanking me for that one--there were a lot of stones under the mud, so my knees are cut and bruised (warrior wounds).

Then you slither out of the mud and run to the finish! I was kind of a jerk once we hit the cargo net and beyond because I just got excited and completely ditched my group and finished without them.

We then got hosed down by a firetruck and openly stripped down in a field. It was that kinda weekend.
I officially retired as the keg stand coordinator (I was not taking that beat on shirt home, and those shorts, they can't even hide my underwear, so they also stayed at the dash.)

This is after we were hosed off:

 Andrew and me. A couple who gets muddy together stays together.

The rest of our race crew.

After this, we promptly got the free beers we were promised and set out to see what northern Pa. has to offer. We found the World's Largest General Store, which was indeed huge and full of odd things. Like these ducklings to pet:

And a dinosaur in the middle of the furniture section:

We capped the night off by seeing X-Men at the drive-in. I love drive-ins even though you have to worry about draining your car's battery, usually drop popcorn all over your car and end up kinda crammed into a weird position.

Not a Morning Person (or Runner)

I had high hopes last night of getting to bed early so I could wake up at 6 and do a 5-miler while it wasn't hot out. Well, the alarm went off, and I instantly thought, "This is stupid," and then I slept until 7ish. Now with the weather heating up (86 degrees or so) I am dreading this run after work. I'm going to push it til about 6:45 so I can get a little heat relief. Thursday promises to be 95+ degrees, so hopefully that will be my motivation for that wake-up call.

How do you manage in the heat? Do your drag yourselves out of bed in the morning or sweat it out later in the day? My sister points out I could run inside, but more than 3 miles on the treadmill is endless to me. Plus my work gym is weird.

Am I a Warrior?

I'll have the opportunity to find out if I am in just 9 days. A million years ago (or maybe January), my fiance signed us both up for Warrior Dash Pa. If you haven't heard of Warrior Dash, they do a series of runs all around the country. It's only a 3.5 mile run, but there are obstacles. Like fire to jump over, walls to scale, waist-deep water to wade through, etc.

After checking out some photos on Facebook, I wonder if I have bitten off more than I can chew.