where were we?

distracted could be my middle name right now.

okay so i did that whole "brooklyn 1/2 marathon" thing...and then i had bad shin-splints and didn't go to practice and oh yes, the next run would be the george washington bridge day.

so this past saturday our run was going to take us over the gw, into the wilds of new jersey. on the nj side of the hudson, there is a very very very hilly park that winds back under the bridge and a long the river. and there are some bad-ass hills, let me tell you. how do i know this? because a few jobs ago we had our company picnic there. and some of us biked. and i remembered the downhill to the picnic area...and thought, oh my christ we're gonna have to run *up* that thing. and then i thought i better stop thinking.

but i'm getting ahead of myself.

the night before i was meeting my friend L for one drink. one. i think i told her that about four times. we were going to a little irish pub where we had started getting friendly with the bartenders. i got there first and after a little chit-chatting turned around to find...the red sox - yankees game on the tele. i knew at that moment it was trouble because, being a die-hard sox fan, i was going to have to stay on that bar stool until the end of the game, regardless of whether we were winning or losing. i could only hope we would be winning.

L finally arrived, and ordered a beer and shortly after, over comes our bartender friend with two shots. not anything crazy, but in two swift seconds i was over my one drink limit. i blame it on that pansy a-rod hitting a three-run homer. my sister soon joined us, and the urge go home and cook pasta turned into craving a burger. we ordered food, and oh look! the sox decided to make a game out of it. another guiness please sir (if you can't beat 'em, right?). my cheers were annoying the hell out of a few particularly obnoxious yankee fans (i mean no offense but these guys were complete asses) sitting at the bar, which of course had the effect of making me cheer even louder.

one more round of shots (you know you're not allowed to turn down a free shot from a bartender, yes? well now you do.) and a red sox victory! the crowd goes wild! actually me, my sister and one other dude go wild but whatever. the poor widdle wankees fans a the bar...the best comment they could come up with was (in a "girlie" voice): yaaaay! we won a game!!

wonder how they were feeling on Sunday...i'm sorry boys, would you like me to pass you the broom, 'cause y'all just got SWEPT.

okay, trash talk done. my *real* point was that i ended up at the bar until 11:30 eating burgers and drinking guiness the night before i had to be out the door at 7:45 to go run 14+ very hilly miles.

and i'm tired now, so you're just going to have to wait for that story tomorrow...

g'night kiddies.

what's under yer kilt?

sorry for the hiatus guys. this week has been a little crazy between some visiting scottish friends and some other general life things.

where were we? i think i left you on saturday after our 10 mile run. saturday night there was an art exibition/party that i went to with some work friends and a pal i hadn't seen in forever! it was fun, and then we went to meet some other gals for a few more drinks. i was trying to behave, because the next morning i was running the scottish run, which is a 10k. at the bar though, i fell victim to an unusually strong margarita, and before i knew it i thought a bacon-wrapped hot dog sounded like a great idea.

not exactly what you'd call good running fuel.

i woke up around 5:30 am and did an emergency water guzzle and went back to bed for a bit. at 8 i got up, ate cereal and basically sat around trying to banish my hangover until the last possible second. the scottish run is one loop around central park and one of the tartan week festivities. a lot of scottish ex-pats come and run in their kilts, and since i was hungover anyway i figured why not don mine (yes, i have a real kilt). i wasn't going to be breaking any records that morning.

i met up with my friend and co-worker and we got a ride with rand up to the park. it was busy. we quickly checked bags and met up with one of tri's friends and squeezed our way into the starting line. despite being tired and less than 100%, the bag pipes and crowd perked me up, and before we knew it, it was time to run.

right after we started, the rookie flew by looking generally unhappy and mumbling something about 4:30 am and too many guiness. ha. i had my ipod on low so i could hear the spectators, and many of the scots that ran by commented on my kilt. around 102, i ran into a girl that ran phoenix with me - yay, running buddy! and about 5 minutes after that, ran into my friend annie from a few jobs ago. our little trio chatted and puffed and complained our way through the last 3/4 miles.

we crossed the finish line and the clock said 1:02 which meant that i had somehow completed the race in less than an hour because by time we had crossed the start line, the clock read over 4 minutes. i literally thought i was going to throw up right there, but after a few deep breaths and a glass of water it passed. i was definitely tired though - running 6 miles after 10 miles is hard work! especially when you've got a 2 pound wool handicap around your waist.

rand found me, we watched the awards, i found my scottish pal col who was pleased to see that i had run in my kilt and invited me to a whisky drinking event later in the week (yes!). back downtown, i checked my time, and found i had been averaging 9:38 minute miles - not freaking bad all things considered!

the rookie and i had brunch at one of my favorite spots, then had a chill sunday watching a movie and generally doing nothing but recovering. the post-running guilt-free laziness is quite divine i must say.

today's mileage: 6.2
season mileage to date: 91.9

and the worst mentor of the year award goes to...

i know, its been a while and i have no good excuse.

so lets go back to friday. when we had a disgusting blizzard. all day we were chattering...would practice be cancelled? snow day? it was so gross out. cold.
sleaty. icy. the tri-team had their practice cancelled....but their coach isn't crazy.

the rookie, sk8 and i were all debating. then i got a call from cap with what amounted to be the deciding factor: there was to be no ride in the morning. urg. mentor-guilt kicked in. what to do? what to do? if anyone of the three of us had insisted on us going to practice (and yes, i realize, that would be *my* job as resident captain), we would have gone. but the thought of having a crappy run on the icy, windy westside just seemed silly. plus the rookie doesn't have insurance and with his luck he'd probably break something. so we decided to skip. and it did hurt. last season i never skipped practice outright. i missed a few because of vacations and work events, but never ever skipped, even when it was pouring. so the guilt was at a record-high because of the "mentor factor" but we promised we'd make up for it on sunday...

...except the thing is that saturday was st. patrick's day.

no i'm not irish. not even close (i mean, i might have a speck on my dad's side, but i don't think so - and i'm kissable enough without it anyway). but i ended up playing ringleader to, when all was said and done, a random crew of about ten of us hitting the few non-cheesy irish bars in the 'hood. sk8 and the rookie were a part of the guinness-infused madness, which ended up being a...um...10 hour marathon of it's own when all was said and done.

i woke up a tired and cranky girl sunday morn - er, afternoon, and there was no way in hell i was running 10 miles. at first i thought, i'll do 4-5 at least. sk8 was a good runner and headed off to the park early. i nursed my hangover for most of the day, then watched a movie. uuurg. i felt like a useless slug.

the good news is that the debauchery has kicked me in the ass enough to do a few things:
- cut out some of the alcohol (good so far)
- cook more (good so far)
- stick to the schedule (less than good, but after i recover from last night's beating, i will be back on track)

gym skippin'

i'll confess right now. it doesn't take much for me to skip the gym.

i hate the gym - at least for running. it's hot. and crowded. the people are annoying. the tvs are at bad angle's to the treadmills which result in an awkward crook in my neck (ps - you can keep the short jokes to yourself thank you very much). and most of all, i hate the treadmill. the treadmill is my enemy, my nemesis. i'd *almost* rather be tickle tortured than run on the treadmill. and yet despite all of this i was going to go to into battle with the treadmill last night. i was whining about it. it was cold and i was all set to go...and then i got side tracked.

instead i ended up having a few magic hats with a pal. magic hat is a vermont beer. i thought at least if i was going to drink instead of run...the beers would be from bouv's vermont.

okay, i know that is TOTALLY lame and does not make it "okay" but...but...at least my heart's in the right place?

miles run: 0
magic hat's consumed: 4
level of guilt (1-10): 7*

*would be an 8 if it were not for the vt beer

breakfast skippin'

yesterday was yet another gts (group training session) and ride-less this week, the rookie, cap and i decided to split a cab up to the park. we are oh so decadent.

it was a gorgeous morning - one of those that smells like spring and makes you want to go shopping for sundresses. the spring season was there, heading out for a long run, and i ran into coach christine! we both yelped and gave each other a big hug. she's not coaching our season because her baby is due the same day as san diego and she couldn't bear to train all of us and not see us cross the finish line.

mileage options for this week were:
beginners 4-6
intermediates 6-8
advanced 8-10

it was at this point of debating mileage that i remembered i didn't eat breakfast. argh. i don't always eat breakfast before the smaller runs, but another thing 6 and above, i at least like to have a little something in my tummy.

sk8 & the rookie were both going to do 6, which would have been the full loop, so i couldn't run with them because i wanted to do two middles. another mentor was debating if she was going to run with the advanced, but they are very very fast, and i knew that there was no way i was keeping up with that crew.

so i decided to wing it, and headed out with a group that was doing the 6 but i figured i'd split off. i didn't have my ipod so i was not thrilled with the prospect of running all those miles alone but one must do what one must do.

i ended up joining up with a smaller group of gals and shortly after, ramon came by on his bike and yelled "has she shown you the tattoo on her butt yet?" i glared at him jokingly and said he was killing my credibility. he grinned and kept going on about how i had already reached my minimum when i auctioned my butt off and he "didn't want to get x-rated, so ask her about the picture!" i'm going down in tnt history for sure.

so the gal i was running with ended up being a track gal - she used to do the triple jump and she was a sprinter. it was good to run with someone who pushed my speed a bit, but i was also conscious of holding her back. on the flip side, she actually said it was good for her to hold back because she is used to the shorter distances and was trying to pace herself.

between the 5th & 6th mile or so, we started talking about why we were doing the run and so i talked about bouv. it was right around the time i was starting to feel a little tired and hungry (and in my own head, whiny), but talking again about how this whole running madness began...well, i've got a bit of an angel on my shoulder to keep me at it.

it was the rookie's official practice, and he and beck both ran six miles and were looking a.o.k. afterwards. i ran off to have brunch with a few mentor groups, and it was good to meet some more teammates. one gal is going for $50,000!! awesome.

saturday's mileage: 8.0
season mileage to date: 35.5

red wine is not a good carbo-load

last night, charlotte, my sister and i went to my favorite italian joint to carb-up. unfortunately, it is a lot of people's favorite italian joint, and by the time we got there, we had an hour and a half wait in front of us. fortunately, they have a wine bar next door where we could wait, keep warm and, of course, drink wine.

we polished off a bottle while we waited and then made the very-wise-decision to have another during dinner. thanks to everything we ate, we weren't very tipsy, however, the bottles made for two very tired little girls that had to run the next day.

we were going to try to meet at the park at 10...which moved to meeting at 10:00...and then to 10:30 thanks to yours truly. ~yawn~ i could *not* get out of bed. i finally got my act together, and met up with char and we groused all the way up to the gym near the park.

we also groused for the first 5 miles of the run. my foot hurts. i hate carrying my water bottle. i'm tired. i shouldn't have had coffee, cause i have to pee. there's too many tourists in the bathroom and there's no toilet paper. i'm cold. how many more miles?

i tried my first chocolate goo, and it tasted kind of like frosting. not bad, but slightly disturbing.

for all the complaining, it wasn't so bad. we were running 10, so we decided to run a full loop and then a middle. that way when we got back to where we started we'd be more than 1/2 way done. the strategy worked and the last 4 miles were practically breezy.

after our run, we had an afternoon of decadence. first, the steam room. then, brunch with a friend of ours complete with a shared dish of mac n cheese. yum. finally, a massage at the trusty massage place. aaaah. 'twas good my friends, 'twas very very good.

today's mileage: 10.0
total mileage: 338.4

and she goes for 20...

the day did not start as i would have liked, with a leisurely breakfast and time to actually think while packing my bag.

instead, i had accidentally fallen back asleep after shutting off my alarm...and woke up at 6:37 - 13 minutes before i had to be on the upper westside. [insert expletives of your choice here - i'm pretty sure i used them all.] i threw my clothes on, tossed a pile of stuff in my bag, put on my brand, spanking new sneakers, put some peanut butter on some almost-stale bread and tore out of my apartment to get a cab.

thankfully, i was not the only person that was late, so i didn't get left behind. at about 7:15 we packed into cars and headed out to jersey. the more we got into the suburbs...the colder it got. of course, i don't have running pants yet, and this made me a little nervous, but ramon reassured me i'd be fine once i started running.

i don't know if it's because i didn't have charlotte there, or because it was a few days of rest, it could have been the new shoes & great weather or just some peppy tunes on the ipod, but i was *cruising*. while this may seem good, it usually turns against you. the whole strategy behind running a marathon is to "save some for the end". now, i didn't feel like i was pushing all that hard. but when i got to the 6th mile and it had only been an hour, (holy crap! i'm running 10 minute miles!) i got a little nervous.

i typically *average* a 12-minute mile for a long run, and i know i usually start slower...so i was going way faster than a normal first-6-miles pace. i tried to turn it down, but i don't think i did that until about mile 12.5 - and that's when i really started to feel it.

my left quad was really mad at me and very crampy. and then my tummy turned against me and i basically ran the last 7.5 miles with a stomach ache (owe).

but...i still finished in less than 4 hours - 3hours and 50 minutes, which means the average was about an 11m30sec mile. and today, today i'm not that sore. i'm really happy with the run, although i didn't feel as great as the 18 miler when i finished, i learned a few things:

1. be careful about pacing. the coaches are right
2. i *can* be faster, and i'm probably stronger than i think
3. this is not something to experiment with now, but for the next marathon

so 26.2 is in sight. i know i can do it, i think it will just come down to how much i can enjoy it - and after that run, i think i've realized i'd rather have fun and cross the finish line with a smile rather than a wince.

yesterday's mileage: 20
mileage to date: 302.5

days to marathon: 26

ps - the neighbor i was "borrowing" my wireless connection from just put a password on, so connection is dicey - if i'm not posting as often, that is why...i'll try to get back on sooner than later!

shin-splint, defeated!

that might be a little too strong but hey, creative license right?

so as i've said, this was certainly not the most successful week as far as training goes. i don't know if it is getting used to the new job, general business, fall malaise, or what but day after day i could not get my butt outside/to the gym to train. the only good thing about not running this week was that my shin-split seems to have retreated. i noticed yesterday when i took the first tentative step down my stairs and for the first time in a month, it didn't hurt. i can't say that i'm sorry to see it go. i'm still icing just in case.

and then i managed to make today's run much harder than it needed to be with a series of Bad Decisions.

1. staying out until 3:45 am thursday morning, given it's my 2nd week of work at syrup. i had solid reasons to be out (the scots were in town, gt treated me to dinner, abbi's b-day/i'm-going-to-mexico-farewell party), but it was still dumb because...
2. no nap on friday. after strugging through the day on 4 hours of sleep, i couldn't leave work at a reasonable hour on friday because syrup had some peeps over to the office. i didn't want to skip the first social event of course, and then there was a necessary trip to brooklyn for my friend lauren's birthday party. skipping was not an option, esp. since she slaved away on my birthday helping me bbq prep.
3. 3 beers, no dinner. we had snacks at the party, and i had maybe 3 mouthfulls of whatever. the beers made me more sleepy than drunk, but duh not eating the night before a long run? plain old dumb.
4. no music because i forgot to charge my ipod.

i was ridiculously tired this morning when i woke up to eat - i did my typical have-some-cereal-at-6-and-then-go-back-to-bed. did i mention too that we are now starting at 8 instead of 8:30 because the new season has begun? gosh, i've been running for a long time. i woke up the 2nd time with time to get the train to the park...and then opted for another 30 minutes of sleep and taking a cab. laZY. it was *so* very worth it though. i even debated skipping practice, but knew the guilt would be overwhelming and it eventually got me out of bed.

i was a little late, and it was cold, but once i was kind of awake i was looking forward to running sans shin splint. we had to do anywhere from 16-18 miles. ramon said if you're not feeling it, you could even do less but that it was now really important to listen to what's going on with our bodies because we could always go long tomorrow. charlotte was going to have to run a race in the middle of our run (so she can qualify for the 07 nyc marathon) so i was extra sad i didn't have my ipod. we were going to have to split up after 5 miles or so, and the thought of running 11 on my own made me want to throw up.

fortunately for me (although not for him) handsome is battling the same it band issue that drew is. he's not as bad off, and can run, but it's very painful and so ended up running with us today. now send *him* some good vibes, because being injured completely sucks. so the three of us ran for 5 miles, char split off back at 72 to go run the race, and handsome & i ran 12 together. i think even though we were going slower than handsome's usual pace, the starting pace (where i'm usually extra extra slow) was a little faster than where i usually am. i was nervous about this at first but figured it wasn't a bad time to see since i didn't have high hopes for the run anyway given how tired i was.

it was good to catch up and handsome is funny so he's an entertaining running partner for sure. he decided to call it at 12 and go talk to our coach, which was very very smart, given what i know about it bands. so then i only had to do 4 with no music and no company, which was feasable.

except i totally ran out of gas. it's really what it felt like. by the time i got to the top of the hill after demps turned at 72nd st, i was exhausted. i wasn't sore, or out of breath, i just had next to no energy. those 4 miles were *so* slow. i really felt like i was never going to get to the end at points, but i just tried to people watch and deal with it. one more goo and some water leftover from the race, and i was feeling okay but not great.

i ended up finishing right on track for time, which probably meant the first 12 were faster than the last 4 but that's okay by me. the only thing that hurt on me were my feet because i still need new shoes and we were doing big distances on pavement for the first time in a while. and despite the last 4 miles, considering the Bad Decisions, i felt like i did okay. but i'm considering all this "lessons learned" and i'm determined to be very strict for the rest of the month.

because that's all there is to go. one. month. of. training.

i'll save that freakout for another post.

today's mileage: 16.0
total mileage: 266.5