The Girl Who Cried Half-Marathon

Motivate Update...

2009-09-14T22:02:00.002-05:00

Found zero motivation last week...

Wait. I did run 5 miles in an hour and three minutes on Tuesday.

That is it.

It rained all weekend so I wasn't able to run outside. Instead of heading up to the gym, I stayed in bed... The weather matched my mood...I've been in a kind of bummed out mood lately. Hopefully this week will be different.

We shall see.

That is all she wrote.

Motivation...Come back to me!!!!!

2009-09-04T09:30:00.003-05:00

Saturday = LONG run. Luckily I am at the point in my training that it is just mileage and not minutes. I told Jenny and Tim I would meet them up at the trail around the community center at 6:45…I was a little late. The lady that hates lateness was late, uh-oh. I got there and they had already started so I stretched, put my headphones in and set off to catch up to them. I was running with my headphones in and took them out because I didn’t think it was very safe for a woman in her late 20s to be running with trees all around her without the use of ears. When I took them out it was amazing. I felt this peace calm my anxiety. I heard birds chirping and bugs doing their sounds and goodness gracious, it was amazing. Then I heard some people coming towards me, turned the corner and there was Tim and Jenny! So we all set off together. I was supposed to run for 3 miles, but I think I made it only 2 miles. I had to leave so I could meet at my sister to head up to McKinney so we could meet our grandparents for breakfast. My grandma is the sweetest; she bought me a stethoscope and blood pressure cuff for my class! I love her dearly! Also, Saturday night we had our Modern Junes thing. It is an ultra-exclusive, super secret ladies only club that meets once a month. My sister, Stefani, hosted the first one at her house and it was a wine and chocolate tasting…DELICIOUS! It was a lot of fun.

Sunday, I was supposed to run 4 miles. It didn’t happen.

Monday – REST DAY!

Tuesday – 4 miles. I did do this. I took my daughter to school and then headed to the gym. I ran 4 miles in a little over 50 min. I felt so great. Confession – I was at mile 3 and I don’t know if I hit my wall and got my second wind OR if it was the song. I hope it was the wall. But I was listening to my iPod on shuffle and Rehab by Amy Winehouse came on at mile 3. Please, oh, please let it be the wall! I haven’t been able to remove or upload any songs to my iPod in almost a year because my dock connector has burned out. So I guess that means I need to get a new iPod. I think I’ll start pricing nano’s.

Wednesday – 5 miles – didn’t make it to the gym.

Thursday – Cross-training day – didn’t make it to the gym.

Friday – REST DAY… Should I really be resting when I skipped 3 days of trainig this week?

Here’s the thing. This week I have had ZERO motivation. I’ll get up and get my daughter ready for school and put on my workout clothes and after I drop her off I’ll just head home. I feel so lame about this. I have seen results in my weight loss goals, so I really think that might have a lot to do with it. But crap, man, I’m almost 30; I need to keep this up so I don’t put on weight after my metabolism takes a steep downturn. I’ve also had very sporadic eating patterns this week. I was house-sitting and that might have a lot to do with it, but, this week has just kind of been like a two steps forward, one step back kind of week. Hopefully, next week will be better.

Also, very late Saturday/very early Sunday I had THREE soft tacos from Taco Bell...it tasted SO good and bad at the same time. Keep in mind this was AFTER 5 glasses of wine and TONS of chocolate and some cheese. No wonder, I feel so blah this week.

Hell Week

2009-09-01T20:44:00.003-05:00

Saturday was supposed to be my long run but I spent the whole day in bed watching movies. I was in a weird mood all day. Finally around 5 I decided to get out of my mood and went to the gym for a quick run. I liked running at 6 on a Saturday night – there was NO ONE at the gym. It was really nice. Until some chick got on the treadmill next to me during my last 10 minutes and was talking so loud I could hear her entire phone conversation over my music. I was listening to Kings of Leon. No pictures today, I was in all black. You wouldn’t be able to see my lovely sweat pattern – but I DID sweat…trust me.

Sunday I woke up at 7:15 to go up to the high school track for my long run. And long run it was geez…110 minutes. I had my ipod, water, Gatorade and phone. I put The Avett Brothers on again…this time I listened to them live at Merlefest. (This is not going on my playlist) There was an old man running at a faster pace than me…awesome. Then two adults began training a group of teenagers in track and field. I’ll admit it was actually kind of nice because although they weren’t cheering me on I liked hearing the “go, go, go” and “you’re making good time.” I started out at a good pace but started to feel a little tight so I did some more stretches…and it felt good. After the first 3 miles, I decided to not run a mile and then walk for a quarter of a mile, I did the run 10 minutes, walk 2 minutes. I think I’m going to do this for the marathon – or at least work my way up to maybe running 10 minutes, walk 1 minute. Hopefully I’ll get down to a 10 minute mile…we shall see. The last 20 minutes of my run I got a slight cramp in my ankle. I walked for 8 minutes then decided to run; I only made it 2 minutes before my ankle really hurt. I decided to walk the rest of the 10 minutes but then after about 5 minutes I wanted to finish it out by running, so I ran the last 5 minutes. The weirdest thing happened too, the last 5 minutes I had a faster pace than when I began and I felt energized. I know I could have gone longer but those 5 minutes were up and some maintenance guy was spraying the track for weeds. And he went by my water bottle…homeboy stopped spraying around my water…thankfully.

Me before my 110 min. run...

And after...imagine how gross I'm going to look running 13.1 miles.

Monday – REST DAY!!! And the first day of school for my daughter and me!

Tuesday – I ran 45 minutes at the gym after I picked my daughter up from school. It was awesome. A ton of eye candy…the only great thing about running at the gym.

Wednesday – I ran for 40 minutes before class. I felt great. In my Microbiology lab we got to play with staph and e.coli…gross but fun!

Thursday – Cross-training day…it started out great. I didn’t have to take my daughter to school because she goes to her grandmother’s on Wednesday nights. So I got to sleep in. I headed to the gym to cross-train around 11. I did the elliptical for 15 minutes, broke a little sweat and got the heart rate up. Then I headed downstairs to the weight machines. My worst nemesis as far as the gym goes. I started on the ab machines. Easy peasy. Next up was arms…those machines are awful. The whole figuring out how to use them and reading the crappy instructions is awful. You sit there trying to act like you know what you are doing when in fact you know nothing. And then you try one weight (40lbs.) and the thing doesn’t move…embarrassing! So I did bicep curls on 25lbs. and triceps on 30lbs. I decided to work my obliques and was on the machine when I looked up to the cardio area and who did I see? Delisio! And he saw me…on this ab machine with sweat pits galore. I. Was. Mortified. Luckily, my hour was up and I could go home to shower.

Friday – REST DAY!!!

Women, don't chase after a man...

2009-08-26T20:29:00.023-05:00

Unless you are running at White Rock...holy. crap.

Saturday -

The goal was to meet at 7:30 but we decided that morning that 8:00 would work best. However, we couldn’t find each other, we had parked on opposite sides of the lake. So it took me about 40 minutes to make my way over to where Mandy had parked because of the slower cyclist…so very annoying. We started out at 8:40, we stretched for 10 minutes and then started our run. I was following Mandy’s pace, we would run for two songs and walk for one. We did this for 3.5 miles. It was great…at my request in the middle we did a little stretching because my calves were tightening up. I also needed a bathroom break and White Rock bathrooms are kind of gross. I hope the marathon route will have clean port-a-potties…I have such a small bladder and a slight phobia of germs.

Is the belt a little...dorky?

Also, Saturday was my day to try out a new water bottle belt – the one I got was NOT for running. It had a huge 16 oz. water bottle and a pocket and iPod holder. It was designed to sit on the hip, however, I found that if it was in the back it was a little easier...but still very much annoying. SO…if any of my friends, like the one walking a marathon, would like to use it you may borrow it. So once we ran/walked for 45 min we turned around and headed back to the car. Can I just say that White Rock has some freaking hot guys running/cycling/walking their dogs? Sheesh. It was nice to have some eye candy during the run. Also, some freaking guy on a tractor mower killed me with pollen and crap while he was mowing…to him a big thank you…I wear glasses and my eyes were itching. It was lovely.

Here he is...scowl at him with me...

Some of the eye candy...he was a fast runner.

And they continued to itch all the way home. When I got home my sister from another mother – my brother’s fiancé – asked me to be her bridesmaid!! So I was crying because I was so touched that she wants Stefani and I to stand with her on this special day and I wiped the tears from my eyes and apparently dried salty sweat can burn eyes. I must have sensitive eyes or something. Then Mandy and I went swimming…a great way to cool off from a mid-morning run.

Before my run

After my run

Mandy and I after the run

Tuesday -

I skipped my Sunday run – it was only for 35 min. I might make that up at some point because running has surprisingly become something I enjoy. I woke up and made some eggs for Madi and me and then we headed to the gym. She went into the Kid’s Club and I headed up to the treadmill…for some reason I didn’t stretch - and it is something I always do. So I took it easy on the treadmill…started it out at 5mph and ran for a mile. I slowed it down to a fast pace walk and walked for a quarter of a mile. Then I ran for another ¾ of a mile…walked for 10 min and then ran for 10 min and walked 5 minutes. It was a good run – especially without stretching. I didn’t take a pic of me before or after (bummer, huh?) But I can tell you I was disgusting afterwards and I had to go to Wal-Mart to get my daughter some school supplies. It was easy to maneuver around the aisles because my wonderful stench cleared them. So I think I just learned a new shopping at Wal-Mart technique. I hate Wal-Mart – and avoid it at all cost. I’ll pay more at Target so I don’t have to shop there.

I ran/walked 3.5 miles in 45 min – not too bad. I really need to work on running longer than a mile before walking…my longest has been 1.5 miles.

When I'm at the gym I have a few "regulars" that I watch. One is a delicious man that I shall call Delisio and the other is a woman that motivates and terrifies me, she shall be named, Runner Girl. Delisio was there…can I just say that I LOVE watching him workout when I’m running…he is so dreamy.

Thursday was a milestone for me. I ran 2 miles STRAIGHT! It was awesome. It only took me 7 songs which came out to be about 25 minutes. I checked my heartbeat and it was a little out of the normal range for endurance training – from what the treadmill chart told me. I walked for 5 minutes then ran for 5 minutes and walked again for my last 5 minutes. I tried to run the full rest of the 10 minutes in my 40 minute training time but couldn’t do it. I ate only a banana before, I probably should’ve remembered that peanut butter toast sitting on the counter. I didn’t see Delisio at the gym…probably best from how I looked in my post run state. My sweat had formed a heart on my tank! But Runner Girl was there…and she was there running full speed when I got there and continued to do so when I left. How in the heck does this woman do that? I noticed today that she was talking to the person next to her…like a full on conversation. I think I could talk while I’m running – but I think it would be difficult.

Before the run

After the run. So incredibly attractive.

I skipped my Wednesday training (the 40 minute run) so I made that up Thursday morning. I did some strength training at home – some pushups, squats and lunges. I have to say Women’s Health Magazine’s website is so great for that stuff. In about 4 weeks I plan on being able to do 15 guy pushups. Jealous?

I listened to The Avett Brother’s Carolina Jubilee…that album has a few songs I’m going to put on my running playlist.

And so it begins...

2009-08-13T21:13:00.002-05:00

A little over a year ago I got the itch to run…I bought a Timex Ironman running watch with the heart rate band and two books - a marathon running guide book and the Runner’s World guide book…and they sat on my night stand only to collect dust. Not too long ago I reconnected with my only friend from my semester away at college. I told her of my books and my goal of someday running in a half-marathon. She told me she was training for a full marathon. We talked and talked about how we should train together…I thought it was all talk until one day she told me that she was serious. So I dusted off one of my books and began my training.

Reading the book is a hell of a lot easier than the training. I don’t run outside because of this August Texas heat, I run on a treadmill. It is so boring. I’ve been training for about four weeks. I haven’t ran in over a week *head held down in shame*. The hope of this blog is to hold me accountable for my training. I haven’t registered yet, so until then my motivation for getting off my butt and to the gym to run is that I keep my promises...and we promised each other. We’re doing it as a tool to lose weight and get fit. We’re 28 and single – we should also be tight and toned, right?

When I first felt my itch to run I was studying muscles in my Anatomy and Physiology class, I would flex and try to identify them on my own body, they were hard to find. I do not want to be a nurse that is overweight. I want to be respected and I just don’t see how an overweight nurse can be taken seriously. Nurses spent years studying the human body and they see on a daily basis what a sedentary lifestyle can lead to. I’m determined to actually practice what I’m preaching to the patients I come in contact with.

I’m doing the walk/run version of the marathon training. At first I was walking more than running. The more I push myself the more I find myself running. Huh!?! Funny concept, right? So stay tuned to see a girl that was never really athletic run her little ass off – literally…

Pain is just weakness leaving your body.