17 miles- Holy SH*IT!

Ran the furthest I've ever ran last Saturday morning. Two weeks ago I completed the same feat at 14 miles, last week it was 17!!

                      

The morning started off CRAZY. I couldn't find my hydration belt, when I did I realized I only had 1 clean bottle for it; the others must have been buried underneath the dishes in the sink (most hated chore). I grabbed 1 GU- espresso flavored (the only flavor I really like),1 Vanilla yogurt NuGo bar, and some Juicy Fruit gum.

I was so tired when I got up I really debated not going but then decided I didn’t have enough time to back out on Tabatha on facebook; if she never saw it and waited for me at the park I would have felt terrible. Tabatha is a new running friend I just made on the Just Us Girls and Guys forum on FB, it’s a local group that means every Saturday morning rain or shine. Some of those ladies are just straight up AMAZING! I’m normally one of the youngest every time I go but those ladies bring it, and I can only hope I’m as hardcore as they are when I reach my 40’s, 50’s and 60’s! Anyway so I sucked it up and met Tabatha at the waterfront park. She had this crazy route planned where we were literally running from one town to another and back. The way the route looked on a map actually intimated me more than the fact that it was 20 miles and going to cost me over 3 hours of my life. I totally want to blab all about the cool thing we talked about and about how she just ran her first marathon, has 6 kids, and can run crazy distances without water, but I don’t want to tell someone else’s’ story so I’ll stick to the details of the run :P

Bremerton. Running over the further bridge was part of my route.

The first couple miles were really good, the pace was comfortable and the route fairly flat. I was introducing her to intervals though, so it was kind of weird because I live and die by my watch and I know not everyone likes taking “breaks” but it really has in all honesty increased my stamina and speed. Before intervals I would NEVER have thought of running further than a half! Probably about 6 miles into the run we starting hitting some hills and I started to just not feel it. some days I feel really powerful and kill my run, other days I drag through complaining the entire time. Three miles later I mentally was in a rut. We stopped at a mini mart for me to refill my water and the asshole behind the counter turned us away. He gave us some shit because we didn’t say “please” but I wasn’t rude, I just simply walked in and said “Hi. We’ve just run almost 10 miles; do you have a fountain we can refill my water bottle with?” If he had said yes then of course I would have thanked him. Instead I walked out of the store saying I would never stop there for anything EVER. We then ran down to a Chevron? I don’t remember it was some chain gas station and the lady there let me refill even though she gave me the stink eye. I don’t get it, what’s wrong with free water…my bottle was like 6 oz! Tabatha really had to use the restroom but they had a big huge sign no public restrooms so we just moved on to our next stop, The Tracyton tavern. They were super sweet and let us use the bathroom no problem. I noticed they have $1 taco Thursdays so I will be trying that out sometime as my own little way to say thank you, support a local business (even if it is a bar), and satiate my constant appetite for Mexican food.

Route and Elevation Profile

                                                        

After that I’d like to say I felt better but motivation was still a little in the dumps. We were getting closer to my neighborhood but were still several miles from where the car was parked. I remember looking at mywatch at 14.25 miles and having a mini celebration that I had beat my previous distance, and then at 15.25 I was less than 1/2 a mile from my house with almost 2 miles to go. I just kept thinking the last mile is almost all downhill or flat, "I can do that!" and I did! At exactly 17 miles I told Tabatha I wanted to do a cooldown walk. Whew, COMPLETE!

Then in true Marissa fashion I couldn't find my keys and had to call James to come get me. And in true James fashion he pulled my keys right out of my hydration pack, oops :)  

2012 Racing Collage

I'm looking ahead at all the races I will be running in 2013 and looking back at all the amazing races I experienced in 2012. I say "experienced" instead of "ran" because it really is an experience. There is so much energy, excitement, and friendship at these events that it becomes so much more than putting one foot in front of the other. Running really is a community just as much as it is a sport. I didn't learn that until I stopped worrying about the fact that I wasn't the fastest person out there, and just embraced my own personal victories and opened up to those around me for advice, companionship and an ass-kickin'!

This is just a little collage that includes some of my favorite races from the past year. I loved running Rock N Roll HM with my sister, meeting so many new friends when I joined a Ragnar team full of strangers, watching my husband run a local 5k, seeing the joy on my daughters face when she ran a kids dash, crossing the Poulsbo finish line with my oldest daughter running across the track to finish by my side, and finally PR'ing by 9 minutes at the Yukon Do It HM on NYE.

I look forward to creating my 2013 collage....I promise you it will be much bigger!

First 14 miler

Knocked my first long run out of the way for marathon training, woohooo! It's funny how "long" a long run is these days. A few years ago anything over 3 miles was a long run. Now that I've ran 5 half marathons and am training for the big 26.2 I tend to think of long runs as further than 9 miles. So yesterdays run was 14 miles, furthest I've ever run at one single time. When I did Ragnar Relay I ran 16 miles in one day but it was split between 3 different legs. I was extremely happy with my run. I kept a pretty even pace, stuck with my 3/1 intervals (Run 3, Walk 1) and finished with a 10:55 average pace. When you factor in the walk breaks that means I was running just a little over 10 min miles on average (10:10ish?) Not too shabby for my first 14 miler!! I was lucky enough to have company for 10 of those miles, my friend Sara, came out to join me. I had run a little before she had met up with me and then we finished together at 12.9 miles so I had a little over 1 more to go. I was really proud of myself for finishing that mile and not calling it "close enough." It was hard though, it was 26 degrees out, and the Seahawks were in the playoffs and the game had started while I was out running so I wanted to get home as fast as possible but I knew I would regret it if my watch didn't read 14 so I pushed on.

Today I feel REALLY good. My legs have just enough soreness that I know I ran yesterday but feel good enough to run again today if I had time. Unfortunately my oldest daughter is sick so I'm playing nurse now. She woke up last night at 10 pm and puked ALL OVER, from that point on it was an hourly occurance but she seems better now. She's keeping some liquids down at least. It's so hard to watch her laying here so miserable. On a happier parenting note my almost 2 year old just went peepee on the potty twice in a row tonight! Victories!

Getting ready to watch The Biggest Loser in a bit....any TBL fans? I love watching people change their lives! Plus this season is so cute with the kids. I find myself already looking forward to make-over week and this is only the third episode :P

AquaFit

Forgive the dis-jointedness of this blog. I'm sitting down to right it while watching "Ted" with the husband, and it's pretty darn distracting! lol.

My new bondibands <3

Tonight I did my first aquafit class and I figured it was blog worthy. First of all I don't like the whole pool environment; the humid locker rooms, sticky floors, creepy men or nosey old ladies walking around with their waterwings on, kids splashing and screaming while their parents gossip on their cell phones. I walked into the Y tonight and the first person to see me was this little old man with a sweatband on his head and a towel wrapped around his shoulders. He tried to sell me on the working out with weights class, which I would love to try, however Brittany and I had plans to do water aerobics. We signed up for the Lazy Ironman which started Jan 5th. It requires us to complete an ironman (26.2 mile run, 112 mile bike ride, 2.4 mile swim (or 5 aqua classes), however we have 5 weeks to complete it instead of just one day. That brings me to the swimming. Anyway back to Mike, the old man at the Y, when I told him that I was going to water aerobics he laughed and told me I was too young for that. EEeek, wondered what I was in for, water ballet with ladies bused over from the retirement home? Yeah it pretty much was.....BUT it was a decent workout too. My arms started to feel it after using those water weights. Lots of water running and kicking and squats, it's funny how uncoordinated I felt doing them in the pool compared to on land. After the class I had a hard time getting my lock to open so I was standing wrapped in a towel contemplating asking the front desk for bolt cutters. Even Brittany tried the lock, no luck. Finally realized I switched the first two numbers, whooopsies!

Got home and my wonderful husband had dinner all done and the girls' plates dished up. I found a new box of Lia Sophia jewelry (always fun) and my bondibands. Can't wait to use them a few times and write a review. I've heard only good things and I love that they are affordable and have so many design options.

Yukon Do It Race Recap

I ended the year in an amazing way- I ran my 5^th Half Marathon!

I woke up at 6:45 to eat breakfast, slip into my clothes and actually let myself wake up before the 9 am start. I left the house at 7:30 to arrive in Port Orchard (race location) by 8 am. Luckily I got there when I did because parking was nearly non-existent. Someone must have just left because I found the only spot let in the strip mall lot. The race started behind a strip mall/brewery. I heard after the race that several people got their cars spit on by the owners of a local store because he was pissed that the runners took up all his customer parking. Oops. Lines were short to get race bibs. The marathon runners took off at 8 am, half marathoners at 9am so I think that cut back on the congestion of the check in a little. Porta pottie lines were a different story entirely though. I had gone back to wait in my car for my friends to arrive, Rosanna and Krissy were both running the half as well, when they arrived we all piled into my car to keep warm, the temperature outside was in the low to mid 30’s. About 15 minutes before race time we decided to get in line to empty our bladders, what we thought were just people milling around were really porta potty lines. Going to the bathroom before a race is a tricky thing. When you get nervous you want to use the bathroom, go too early and you might have to go again when the gun goes off, or wait too late and risk missing the start of the race. I made it into the porta potty when I hear the announcer say “30 seconds” OMG!! People outside started yelling at us to “hurry up” I dashed out  and headed right to the start line. I found Krissy right away but Rosanna had disappeared and we had agreed to run the race together. Rosanna is a little faster than me, her PR was 2:08 something, mine was 2:17:03, but she had been slacking on training so wanted to take it a little easy. I found her at the last minute, whew. Our watches were still locating when we took off, missed about 20 seconds of the start. This was a BEAUTIFUL race, a lot of it along the water. The parts that didn’t have a waterfront view were on back roads with horses and camels, yes camels, to entertain us as we ran by. I was expecting a nearly completely flat route but there were a few surprise hills thrown in. One hill in particular going down into the state park looked long and depressing, but I found that on the way back up it wasn’t as bad as I had expected so it didn’t slow me down much. The shoulders were the only other thing that surprised me. The shoulders to the road were very narrow, and policemen kept driving up and down the roads yelling “single file.” I ran in the road when they weren’t looking. There is nothing worse than being stuck behind someone whose pace makes yours all awkward as you trip over your own feet.

 

I felt really strong coming into the last couple miles. I told Rosanna at the start of the race my goal was to PR and to hit 2:15:00. To do that I had to keep my pace under a 10:30 mile. At mile 7 we knew we were golden, Rosanna went so far as to tell me I might finish under 2:10:00. I didn’t want to get my hopes up too much and struggle at the last minute so we just kept a steady pace.  She asked me if I wanted to pick it up but that last mile I was still running 9:45’s which is good for me so I told her no, lol. The finish line came into  view and I looked down at my watch which said 2:06, I told Rosanna, cause I knew if she took off then she could PR. She gave me a half way sympathetic look and said “see ya!” She finished in 2:08:08 and PR’d! I wasn’t far behind though, I heard a running buddy (Jill) cheering for me, which was an unexpected surprise, I didn’t know she’d be there, and I quickened my pace a little flying through the finish line at 2:08:23!  I PR’d by almost 9 (count that 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9)  minutes!!! My average pace was 9:48, unheard of for me over such a long distance.

I finished feeling great, I was so excited I didn’t even get a medal for a few minutes. I just stood there blabbering to Rosanna about how I wanted to cry but wasn’t going to, lol. I stuck around to watch our other friend Krissy finish, she PR’d too 2:56 I believe. PR’s all around, nice!

The next day I knew I wanted to do a shakeout run. Ran 5 miles with some friends, including Jill who cheered me on at the finish. Our route was pretty hilly too…not the best for recovery but I was so psyched that I felt good enough to do it the day after a half.

Can’t wait for Yukon Do It 2013- see ya there!