Wild Hair Up My...

Yeah so, I am officially signed up for the Wild West Relay team I was considering joining. My crazy, endurance-mad coworker (who I will not name, but if you know me and happen to know who he is, you know he is an awesome but crazy-ultra-man who does things like 24-hour ski-race UP mountains and such) talked me and a couple of others into it...and $133 later, I am officially running slot 12 of the 200-mile race from Ft. Collins to Steamboat Springs on August 7-8. WTF I am thinking, I don't know.

This is the little bucket of madness I have subscribed myself to filling.

Ultra running has always sounded so ridiculously ridiculous to me, yet by the time I got to the end of reading Born to Run, it had begun to sound completely and utterly natural. A measly 26.2 miles is chump change compared to 125 miles through Death Valley in the summer. Or running down a deer, you know, for dinner or a midday snack. So obviously, it was in the wake of finishing this book that I fell prey to my convincing coworker and decided that the Wild West race was small fries and that I was totally(!) up(!) for(!) it(!!).

Now after a week of 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 12th guessing my decision, I'm not so sure (too late, sister, you already paid and the team is counting on you)...I don't do well without out enough sleep...this is 24 hours in a van with 4 strangers...minimal sleep...no showers...sweaty feet...random food choices...limited bathroom facilities, and what if I don't like my van-mates? That's a lot of hours in a small metal box, with sweaty bodies, if they are annoying...

I'm sure they will be fine and it will turn out to be great fun; my slot is actually only about 13 miles total (3-5-5), it's rated a level "3" on a scale of 1-12, so it is well within my abilities. I bet I'll enjoy it in the end. And if not, hey at least I tried and I have a good excuse to get out of it next year.

Less Fun Than Bingo, More Fun Than Strep

I won't lie or sugarcoat, today's run was not that much fun. But let me start at the beginning.

I have OFFICIALLY started my Denver Marathon training plan. Like, an actual plan, on paper, where I do the workouts it tells me to, rather than just running willy-nilly and changing my schedule every week.

And of course, in true M2 fashion, I promptly changed the schedule during both weeks 1 and 2. But I only made minor adjustments, like swapping days a couple times--I still did the appropriate workouts for the week. That being said, for my week 2 swap, I took Sunday off (instead of monday) and was going to do Tuesday's workout on Monday. Except that I felt kinda crummy when I woke up to run Monday morning, so I decided I'd do it later. (Oh--did I mention Shortie2 came down with strep throat Friday, just in time for my return from Philly? Well yeah. So I've been on strep throat duty, monitoring the rest of the family for any signs or symptoms in order to mitigate the sick damage to our household.) Well, then Shortie1 had soccer camp and it was steamy hot so I never made it out Monday evening. So, schedule shot. Except that on the schedule I was supposed to take Tuesday as rest...great, I'll just do Monday's workout on Tuesday!

And then it poured just as I was heading out to take Shortie1 to soccer camp yesterday, where I was going to run around the path at the soccer park. So, we had to take it inside to the nasty 1/10 mile track. I was supposed to do 4 easy miles, but I think I actually only did about 3.5 as I was NOT feeling the track workout and 32 minutes was all I could stand. My throat was a little ouchie yesterday, so I made a doc appointment for today, just to make sure it's not the dreaded strep.

Which brings us to this morning's Not Fun Run. I got up at 5:20 and was out the door by 5:30. I didn't feel too bad, the throat actually felt better so I figured the 6-mile hill run would be a cinch. The first 2 miles were decent, and after that is usually when I settle in and start rolling...and I kept waiting...and I still just felt all awkward and stilted and my breathing was off and my stride felt weird and my arms felt too high...then too low...then I got hungry. Like tummy-growling hungry, and all i could think about was eating some cheerios (I had eaten a banana and that is usually all I can do before a morning run). And it went downhill from there. By the end, I was starving and wore out.

I knocked it out and finished up, but it was not a great run. Which means my next one will be awesome, right? Right??! RIGHT??!?! (Unless, of course I really DO have strep, in which case my next one will probably suck, too.)

Making time for the long & steady

My conundrum: tomorrow I am doing a nice little 5K in my neighborhood. However, I usually do my long run on Saturday morning, followed by rest on Sunday. Do I a) do the long run today instead and risk tired legs for the race tomorrow b) do a shorter 4-miler today, run the race tomorrow, and then run the course+some afterward to get my long run in?

It is important to note that I don't really race to win, or even necessarily place--I do it for fun, comeraderie, to see how I do and keep myself motivated on the road to the big M. And of course, like duh, for the shirt. I have been stewing over how to work in this long run plus the race all week...hubb-o's advice? "Just run. Don't worry about it." Ummmmmm, yeeeaaah thanks.

It's warm out today and so I think I'll do a long, easy trail run today and just the race tomorrow. I think that is my official decision. Unless I change my mind.

Update: I did a little over 8 miles in about 77 minutes...ish. I think. The tricky part was that I left my watch at the hotel on a trip last week and while I am waiting for it to arrive home safe and sound to me in the mail, I am forced to use my blackberry to keep track of time. NOT ideal. I don't recommend it.

Training Schedule: Not Quite There Yet

Tonight was the group run with my little band of helpful running peers. I am new to the group, and still getting a feel for exactly what we're doing, and how it fits into my overall running schedule...hell, who am I kidding? I'm still trying to really get my stepped-up running schedule down and working with the rest of my life. It has been subject to several adjustments, tweaks, re-tweaks, re-adjustments, and second-guesses as my work and family schedules have changed over the past couple of months and as I've added more miles.

I have yet to figure out exactly what will work the best and allow me to get in the miles that I want/need to and juggle everything else on top of it. I have deduced that I can definitely work in a long run on the weekend. This was happening on Sunday, with a nice 7am yoga class on Saturdays...until I joined the group, who meets for long runs on Saturday...so there was a tweak: yoga out, Saturday long run in. Ok, so Sundays are now REST, that's not a bad thing. But I'd like to also get in another longer run during the week...which I thought would happen on Wednesday, which is the other day the group meets.

However, apparently we do do track work on Wednesday and I'm not entirely sure what kind of a run it is classified as, but it involves a mile or so warmup then 2-3 min. running followed by 1-2 min. walking , repeat 6-10 times. I guess intervals or speedwork? We did run faster than my average mile pace...but I am certainly not sophisticated enough to know. And then last week the group gave me a super-handy little training calendar they'd created with what I ought to be doing on what days, to coincide with the rest of the group...which adds tempo runs and "cross training" (which I promplty swapped out for "more running" because there isn't any other activity I care to do except yoga and that is not quite going to get me to a half marathon in May) so that sort of shaped my Official Schedule. So far the weight training and yoga I was doing regularly have taken a backseat to running, as I am now really focused on getting my weekly mileage up and getting those long runs in. And of course work has been crazy-busy. And the kids have soccer. And we have oodles of trips coming up. Sigh.

But at least my running has been great! I guess the best I can do is keep whatever schedule I can and not stress too much about it. I've heard of pepole who train for marathons doing only 3 runs per week, so I know I can do whatever works out.

Tonight's run:
- 4 min warmup
- 2 min at race pace (we did between 6:30 and 7:45 mi pace)
- 1 min walk
Repeat 2-1 set 10 times
- 4 min cool down
-stretching/light core work