Catch Up!

Friday

AM - 10 Miles 1:20:19 8:01/mi

PM -  6.11 Miles 47:21 7:45/mi

Saturday

5.11 Miles  41:20 8:05/mi

Body Flow

My running has been out of wack this week!! I blame it on my schedule. After Thanksgiving I had to work on Friday and Saturday which means I had to be at work in the mall madness by 9 am. Since it is a Holiday weekend I felt I should be able to sleep in, but running before work and sleeping in do not go together! On top of that I have been feeling TIGHT and like I need a really good stretching! Now, I think this is a mixture of racing, not taking great care of myself in regards to sleep and health, and not taking days off. Lately I have been going out more than usual and I can feel a direct effect on the body. So, I am cutting back... way back!!

After yesterdays 5 Miler and feeling my body's screams for stretching I jumped in my car and went to Body Flow at the gym. The class incorporates Yoga, Pilates and Tai Chi. It felt GREAT to do the stretches and moves. Lengthening the legs and torso made my body happy. It is really funny to watch me do this class, my balance is horrible and I am sure it is something that I just have to figure out. When we have to stand on one leg and then extend the arms and other leg out I ALWAYS lose my balance. I end up laughing, and I am sure it disrupts peoples concentration but I can't help it!! When you are the only one in the class falling over what else are you going to do, but laugh? Anyways, today my shoulders are pretty sore - so I guess that means I got a good workout in!! 

I am going to try and start writing about my diet and how I feel with running. I bought the book "Racing Weight" and just getting a couple pages into it I can tell that my diet is not helping my running as of lately. The book promotes you weighing yourself a lot and tracking how you feel... so maybe I can use this as my outlet. Unfortunately, some of you know how bad I am at being consistent with this blog!! So, Jaime & Stephanie your job is to make me stay on this thing!!!!!!

For some reason, yesterday I was craving Mexican food, but I didn't want the tortillas, chips and cheese mess... so I went to Publix to create my own ...

Black Beans, Corn, black olives, and Peppers (red, yellow and green). I mixed this confetti together and topped it on a bed of spinach and added some pepper jack cheese. Then I topped it with the FAGE 0 Greek Yogurt and Salsa. It was amazing and I am currently obsessed with it!!! It was my lunch and dinner. Between the beans, cheese and Greek Yogurt there was no need for animal protein and I felt great all cay... not stuffed or gross. 

Well, I hope everyone has had a great Holiday Weekend! Now it is time to prep for the week!!!

Happy Thanksgiving!!

6.2 Miles 49:54 8:07/mi

Well, I did not Turkey Trot this morning and I am a-ok with my decision! Last night we went over to a friends family pre Thanksgiving dinner. Great food and lots of wine. Since I was riding over with everyone I knew that it was going to be a late night and I would not be rested for the race. I did not want to be disappointed in my time and go through the whole let down thing again, so I just said no!! We had a fun evening and it was all worth it.

I attempted to wake up this morning and run but that didn't go as well as planned. My first mile was over 9:00 and my head was throbbing - waay to much wine. After the first mile I stopped and walked it back home. The weather was great so I enjoyed the walk.

My family went out of town this year (again) for Thanksgiving so I stayed in Tampa. I was invited over to a friends house for their yummy dinner and had a nice relaxing afternoon. Turkey and Stuffing my two favorites of the day. I always forget about stuffing until this day and I always wonder why I don' t eat it more. They even had mushrooms in it - I was in heaven. For dessert we had a Thanksgiving Cobbler which had peaches, cranberries cinnamon, cake and more topped with vanilla ice cream - my mouth is watering just thinking about it right now!!! They had Eat, Pray, Love playing and I tried to watch it. I loved the book and have been anxious to watch the movie... however - I do not think that Julia Roberts is the right actress for the movie! I am a huge fan of hers - Pretty Woman is my favorite movie - but she looks TERRIBLE! Seriously I couldn't get past her. She resembles a skeleton, you can see her veins on her forehead, and her mouth is just scary. I don't know what happened but it was ruining the movie for me. I walked away and decided I would have to watch it at a later time on my own. 

Once I came back home I was going to head over to my next Turkey Dinner but decided to attempt my run again - cha ching! Success :) 6.2 fabulous miles and now I am feeling great. I am kind of sad that I don't have any turkey and stuffing because I am hungry and there are no leftovers.... I am going to have a long talk with my parents about leaving for Holidays - it is unacceptable and sad.

Well I hope everyone had a great day... and please head to Dillard's tomorrow for some shopping. I will be slaving away working all day so enjoy your day off!!!!

OMG Pilates

Ran 9 Miles

Pilates Class

Lets just say that I am not good at Pilates... yet. Recently I have been trying a bunch of classes out at the gym. I figured I pay for it every month, might as well use it! Tonights class was Pilates. It was tough. The instructor wanted to use rings. Rings are resistance circles that you use between your legs, feet and arms and press together in sets. I don't know if it was because of my 9 mile shake out run I did this morning, or if I am just overly fatigued from the weekend and race.... but I found this class to be so hard. Anytime I had to use muscles my whole body would just start shaking.... and I mean uncontrollably... like spassing out. I had to put the rings down and do everything without them! It was quite embarrassing and it is going to take a lot of self persuasion to get me back in there. I may just stick with the spinning, body flow and yoga classes!!! The core work and stretching felt great tonight. I have this feeling I am going to wake up with a sore core tomorrow!!!

This morning I ended up doing a 9 mile run. It was an easy 8:34 pace. I was able to run a few miles with my running buddies I found out on Bayshore so it was nice to chat with them for a while. Tomorrow I am supposed to do track, but I don't think I am going to get to it in time. My other new group H-PAC is meeting at 7 for some miles, so I may try them out if I can't leave work in time. I will explain HPAC in a later post..

The Turkey Trot is Thursday and I think my goal is going to be 41:00 or under. Hopefully if I rest myself enough between now and then it should be achievable. I will just have to stay away from the night clubs and make sure I get at least 7-8 hours of sleep each night!!!!

I promise a race recap tomorrow!!!!

A reason to Race

I have been asking myself this entire week "Why do I race" and I even blogged about it. Today I have done a lot of thinking about it and I still do not have an answer. Now, when I ask myself this question, it is not implying that I do not want to race, it is simply trying to find the reason I do it... what motivates me? I am having problems as of lately trying to find this within me. The past year has been an amazing running year for me because I found out I could run, and race with descent times. Now I have hit a spot in my "running career" where I have found a plateau and if I want to get past it I am going to have to work for it. The motivation/reason question regarding running is because I need to find why I want to do it so that I can have reason!!

I did not take this race as serious as I should have, in fact I truly disrespected  it. I did not have a goal. I went out like a crazy person until 4:30 am on Friday night, and then woke up at 6:30 am on Saturday and then only had about 7 hours of sleep on Saturday night. I did not have any desire to run this race. Most of the girls I run with did. And they wanted to run well, and there I was not caring at all. A lot of people really believe in me, and want to see me do well and here I am not taking things serious. This is the part that really bothered me today. Maybe I had a realization as to how selfish that is. It is selfish of me to not care while everyone else around me does. It is selfish to not get excited, and it is selfish not to be happy with my times when I am the one that goes into the races without a care. OBVIOUSLY I DO CARE! So, with that said from here on out I promise to myself and all of my amazing supporters out there that I will treat my races with respect, I will take my training seriously, and I will be happy with every result. I still do not know why I race, but I do know that the people that are in my life because of running mean so much to me and I value their friendships more than they would ever or could ever realize. Their support and confidence in me is extremely amazing and appreciated, I could not ever come close to explaining how it feels to have that love. It isn't about a time, its not about having a great race every time, it isn't about always feeling good. It is about great friends and sometimes having a great race to be excited about.... in that order.

Stephanie, Jaime, Nicole and Jen.... you guys are the best. I had an amazing day and am so proud of each and everyone of you fabulous ladies. Thank you for always believing in me.

Oh, and if a studdly man by the name of Todd is reading this... you mean just as much to me :)

Happy Whinesday

Today was just one of those days where you want to stay in bed all day and not get up for anything!

I should not complain so much because it really was not that bad. After the first 4 hours things got better.Once I downed my coffee at home with my Pumpkin Spice Creamer and then my Venti Misto on the way to work, my life turned around quickly...

 Track did start my day out, and anyone that knows me knows that track is my least favorite part of running. 

Sometimes I think about why I dislike track so much...- fast running that is not comfortable.

Then I think about how much I don't like tempo runs... and it is actually the same thing - fast running that is not comfortable.

then I think about how much I don't like the 5k.... and again it is the same thing - fast running that is not comfortable.

Then I think about my loves...Tuesday and Thursdays and my loooooong, looooong runs... oh and my Friday runs and my Sunday runs :) this just makes me happy.  My two a days make me a happy runner too! 

Knowing that tomorrow is Thursday puts a peaceful smile on my face and makes me want to go to bed now so I can wake up and RUN.

So after writing this, it brings me to my next thought... if I don't like running fast why in the heck do I race?!?! What is the point??? I mean its not like it is FREE!

8 Miles of way too fast

Tuesdays are my easy days, but sometimes this runner just can not seem to get an easy pace down. People have different opinions on this subject. As for me, I think easy is whatever your body pumps out. Today my body pumped out a 7:45 average for 8.5 miles.  It felt great. I didn't start until 6:30 so the sun was out for the run. Usually on work mornings it is dark, so when I was running I kept thinking it was the weekend... but then I had to continue to bring myself back to reality.

I finally registered for the half marathon this weekend. I think I am going to push myself to find a 7:00 pace for this race. Whether or not I am ready for that... I don't know, but I am ready to find out!!

Tomorrow is dreadful track day.... oh how I wish I naturally had fast twitch fibers in my body, then I wouldn't have to force myself to be a gerbil and run around circles every Wednesday morning!

Tempo Monday

Happy Monday.

After a fun filled weekend I woke up at 5 am to Tempo. I had my doubts on how my performance would be, but I was in bed at a descent hour yesterday so I was able to catch up on the rest!!

I had 3 miles at 6:45 on the schedule... that is 6:45 miles not 6:45 am :)

I decided to do 2 miles for warm up and then hit the paces.

Mile 1 - 6:39
Mile 2 - 6:45
Mile 3 - 6:42

Of course I decided to make it an even 5K...

Total time was 20:45 for running a 5k solo on a Monday Morning. This gives me a little self confidence that I may be able to break 20:00 when I actually decided to race a 5k next time.

After the tempos, I waited on the rest of the group and ran 3.5 easy to make it a total of 8.5 for the day.

The rest of the week is going to be tappered a little. I want to be rested for my half marathon on Sunday! After the last couple of weeks of no rest days, I need to be smart this week and take it super easy otherwise Sunday will just be a disaster.