Oh hey there. Maybe one day I'll be good at posting consistently for an extended period of time, but until then I'll just continue to apologize.
I always end up coming back here when I decide to do something crazy. However, this crazy is REALLY crazy. I had this bright idea and now two of my poor girlfriends will be suffering through this with me, so at least I have them :)
Basically, a new half-marathon was announced in the area for 2015. It is taking place in January, which means that there will be a half-marathon every season that a local running club sponsors. Because of that they decided to host this "Four Season Challenge" where you register for all four half-marathons up front and then as you complete each race, you get two medals; one for the race and one for the challenge. The four challenge medals then fit together to make one super medal. In retrospect, it sounded pretty cool! Now that January approaches, I am wondering what I was thinking!!!
Training started out great. It was a perfect fall for running, not too hot, not too cold and plenty of daylight. I ran a 5k in October and then two races in November the week of Thanksgiving (one 5 miles and one 4 miles). And then it got brutally cold and started getting dark at like 4pm and the last thing I want to do when I get home and it's cold and dark is run outside. I take it back. The last thing I want to do is leave my house to go to the gym. The second last thing is run outside. So then I choose not to at least do something active in my own home, but kids jeopardy has been on so me and the husband have been in fierce competition. He's the worst at motivation too. I say "tell me to go run" and he says "I don't understand why you think that is fun" and then we eat dinner. Happens almost daily! And then it's bedtime and I'm mad at myself for parking in front of the tv for the night and then he'll say "well why didn't you run today" and I pretty much could strangle him.
So we're about 5 weeks out at this point, and since I know I can at least run 5 miles (or at least could two weeks ago) I feel like I'm entering this half-marathon more prepared than some I've done in the past. Not proud of that fact, just stating a fact. Things I fear though are that it is a 4pm start time, so definitely going to be cold and dark. And it's on a college campus and is like 3.5 loops or something like that... so pretty much I am going to get lapped my fast people and that is not very good for morale. Finally, I am writing this sentence more so that I remember, but also because maybe you'll laugh like my mother when I told her, but I need to buy a headlamp. It's required for the race since we're running in the dark.
So goal here is there is more to report before race day, but I make no promises. My original posts were for each day of training, but Monday is my off day so maybe tomorrow?!?
xo
Monday, December 8, 2014
Thursday, February 13, 2014
Motivation
Wow! Even with my husband's help, I still couldn't regularly keep the blog updated with our (read: my) healthy choices. Blame it on Christmas, New Years and our 12 day honeymoon, but most importantly, blame it on us.
We have conversations, almost daily, about how we should walk the dog more, eat healthier dinners, etc. but when it's negative degrees, that dog is certainly not going for a longer walk. Poor thing only weighs 22 pounds, he can barely stand to be outside 10 minutes. It would be nice if my mile pace was still under 10 minutes and we could get a quick run in, but that would mean we would also need the sidewalks to be shoveled or the streets to be plowed, and no offense Rochester, but you have not been so great in those areas in my neighborhood this winter.
But I have new found motivation. I need to beat my sister. There is no ifs, ands or buts about it. I turned her onto running and now she can run faster. It's like when we joined the swim team all over again. We joined a swim team together and then the little brat was good at it and winning all the races in her age group. And then she started getting as fast as the older kids. And then I spent the entire off-season perfecting my strokes and next season we were pretty neck and neck. Though our age difference forever kept us from competing against each other, we obviously still compared times after our races. Let it be known, my 50-free was faster when both of us retired from the sport. It's no Olympic pace, but 27.08 for a 50-yard swim is pretty good in my book!
So, yeah. That's really it. I don't care if she excels in things I don't like, but not this. Sorry.
Buttt she's the same way, so if I tell her this, she'll make it her wish to beat me and we'll both end up killing ourselves to try and beat each other and we'll probably both have a bad race. So this is my secret, but I'm taking her down. Or actually, I wouldn't mind if we ran and finished together. I would be okay with that (read: I'm going to sprint past her at the last second).
Race - TBD. But my resolution (that she stole) was run 1 race a month, so you'll be hearing from me soon.
xoxo
PS - this all started because I was reading an article about motivation. It says: In short, ask yourself, “Am I doing everything I can on a daily basis to get better, so that when my ‘A’ race is over, I’ll know I did absolutely everything I could have to have my best day ever?” If the answer is no, then there’s work to be done! And my answer was NO.
We have conversations, almost daily, about how we should walk the dog more, eat healthier dinners, etc. but when it's negative degrees, that dog is certainly not going for a longer walk. Poor thing only weighs 22 pounds, he can barely stand to be outside 10 minutes. It would be nice if my mile pace was still under 10 minutes and we could get a quick run in, but that would mean we would also need the sidewalks to be shoveled or the streets to be plowed, and no offense Rochester, but you have not been so great in those areas in my neighborhood this winter.
But I have new found motivation. I need to beat my sister. There is no ifs, ands or buts about it. I turned her onto running and now she can run faster. It's like when we joined the swim team all over again. We joined a swim team together and then the little brat was good at it and winning all the races in her age group. And then she started getting as fast as the older kids. And then I spent the entire off-season perfecting my strokes and next season we were pretty neck and neck. Though our age difference forever kept us from competing against each other, we obviously still compared times after our races. Let it be known, my 50-free was faster when both of us retired from the sport. It's no Olympic pace, but 27.08 for a 50-yard swim is pretty good in my book!
So, yeah. That's really it. I don't care if she excels in things I don't like, but not this. Sorry.
Buttt she's the same way, so if I tell her this, she'll make it her wish to beat me and we'll both end up killing ourselves to try and beat each other and we'll probably both have a bad race. So this is my secret, but I'm taking her down. Or actually, I wouldn't mind if we ran and finished together. I would be okay with that (read: I'm going to sprint past her at the last second).
Race - TBD. But my resolution (that she stole) was run 1 race a month, so you'll be hearing from me soon.
xoxo
PS - this all started because I was reading an article about motivation. It says: In short, ask yourself, “Am I doing everything I can on a daily basis to get better, so that when my ‘A’ race is over, I’ll know I did absolutely everything I could have to have my best day ever?” If the answer is no, then there’s work to be done! And my answer was NO.
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