Weekly Workout Recap!

Happy Weekend! I hope you had some great workouts this week! My week was a little strange since I decided to run a race on Sunday! (That's tomorrow!) So there was lots of resting for me this week.

Saturday- I was supposed to do a long run, but I was just not feeling it! I even got all dressed and ready to go. Then I changed my mind. I was freezing, tired, and not looking forward to it at all. I took the day as a complete rest day and planned to do my long run on Sunday when I would be more likely to enjoy it.

All dressed up with nowhere to go!

Sunday- After sleeping for 11 hours, I was totally recharged and tackled my long run! I did 10 miles and was disappointed with my pace... even though there was no particular pace I was trying to hit. My own fault. I was getting all caught up in my thoughts.

Monday- 5 lazy morning miles.

Tuesday- Lifting upper body at home, then 3 miles so I could VOTE!

Chest Press- 4x10x25lb

Bicycles- 4x40

Asst. Wide Grip Pull Ups- 4x15

Push Ups- 4x10

Row- 4x10x25lb

Asst. Neutral Girl Pull Ups- 4x6

Shoulder Press- 4x10x20lb

Wednesday- 5 neighborhood miles. Last run before my RACE on Sunday!

Thursday- Lifting upper body at home... lower body REST.

Chest Press- 5x10x25lb

Bicycles- 4x40

Push Ups- 4x10

Stability Ball Pass- 4x8

Shoulder Press- 5x10x20lb

Chest Press (neutral grip)- 5x15x15lb

Friday- Lifting upper body at home... lower body REST.

Band Asst. Wide Grip Pull Ups- 4x6

Bicycles- 4x40

Row- 4x10x25lb

Band Asst. Neutral Girl Pull Ups- 4x6
Planks- 4x45 seconds

And here is my upcoming plan... Saturday = REST, Sunday = RACE! I like to rest for 3 days before a race. 3 rest days is my lucky number! I learned that from my friend Jennifer. She says if you have the balls to rest for 3 days, do it!

Do you have the balls to take 3 days off before a race?

Walking

When Paul was recovering from his first brain surgery, his doctors urged him to go for short walks. We got into the habit of going for evening walks together and it lasted for several months... until it got cold out. I'm not a fair weather runner, but back then I was definitely a fair weather walker!

Now, two years later, we are committing to evening walks again. This will be a good opportunity to to get some fresh air and keep our bodies moving. Paul is unable to work or do a lot of strenuous activity, so most of his days are spent inside. He needs to get out more! Walking together will help him do this. He is totally on board with my idea. I hope it brings us closer! Not that we need to be any closer... we spend quite a lot of time together. But going for walks and just shooting the shit with each other can only make our relationship even better.

I am not sure how long Paul will feel like walking. He started radiation and chemo a little over a week ago. So far, he has not experienced many side effects, but as the weeks go on, we are told the side effects will gradually present themselves. To what degree, we don't know! As slowly as the symptoms creep up, they will slowly go away after his six weeks weeks of treatment are over. So it is definitely possible that he will begin to feel too tired or sick to walk. Maybe then we could still get some fresh air by chilling on the back porch and watching our cats scream at us through the windows. (They get very indignant when we are outside without them.)

It is going to be a crazy couple weeks as we are traveling to Baltimore for Paul's treatments. Luckily we have some wonderful family who is going to help give him rides so I don't have to take many days off work. Walking could be a great way to relieve some of the stress and enjoy the beautiful fall weather together.

Do you enjoy walking with your family?

How do you like to relieve stress? Besides running, of course!

Throwback Thursday: High School

I am pretty sure I wrote about high school before, but I have been thinking about those years a lot lately. Sadly, a classmate of mine passed away unexpectantly a few weeks ago. It was quite shocking to hear of my classmate's passing, and I know it really hit a lot of my high school friends pretty hard.

Naturally, this sad occasion had me reflecting on a lot of memories from high school. I even pulled out my senior yearbook and combed through it one evening. I am not sure I even looked at the thing since graduation. Boy was I glad to have that yearbook because looking through it and reading messages from my high school classmates stirred up some memories I never would have been able to unearth on my own!

I graduated in June, 2000. I wasn't “cool”, but I was popular in the sense that I had a lot of friends. Unfortunately, I was often made to feel like I wasn't cool enough to join my friends in certain activities. My friends were never outright mean to be, but I did feel excluded sometimes. I am sure I am not innocent and did things to make other people feel bad. It's just part of high school! I'm over it.

The interesting thing was that as I was reading messages that people signed in my yearbook, most of them mentioned something along the lines of, “You are never afraid to be yourself and don't care what other people think of you.” Well, I actually did care what other people thought of me, but not enough to try to act like something I was not. I was in band, chorus, and all the musicals. I dressed weird. I said silly things. Another thing people signed in my yearbook was that I was the only person they could be themselves around. I guess I put out the vibe that if I could be my weird and strange self, they could definitely let their freak flag fly around me and I wouldn't think it was odd!

My graduating class was quite small- only 51 students! Looking at our senior pictures, I was shocked at how young we all looked and how out of style our clothes and hair were! It's funny, you never think that your look would ever be out of style... until it is!

I guess I have to show the obligatory yearbook pictures now!

Senior Portrait

My friends Ashley and Jared. 
We were great friends and were in a bunch of musicals together.

We all got to write a little blurb about ourselves.

I forgot I was class president my freshman year! (I had zero responsibilities.)

FYI: Dinkles were our marching band shoes.

I think I nailed my aspirations, except for the spontaneous part. I am NOT spontaneous!

We were asked what our favorite memory from high school was. Lots of people enjoyed my orange tights. I had a pair of BRIGHT NEON orange tights I would wear about once of year, even after they got a big hole in them.

My friend Jared and I were voted "Most Likely To Star On Broadway".

Neither of us are on Broadway, but we are both music teachers, which is probably most Broadway stars' back up plans...

Hey, we are TOTALLY ROCKING OUR BACK UP PLANS!

The senior members of marching band. I'm not sure what Bryan (top) and Chris (right) are up to, but Justin (left) is a member of the popular Christian band Sidewalk Prophets!

Ashley, me, Sherrie, a girl who's name I forget, and Mandy.

Our school held a lip sync contest our senior year. Ashley and I choreographed a dance to "Hey Mickey" and we won first place! $100 split 5 ways was a BIG DEAL when you were 17!

When was the last time you looked at your senior yearbook?
What were you like in high school?

Were you in marching band?

Squeezing in some races before 2015 comes to a close! (I signed up for TWO RACES!)

You read that correctly. Ms. “I Don't Ever Race” has signed up for two more races! I'm going from running ZERO races in 2015 to running THREE during the last two months of the year! Actually now that I am doing the math, all three of my races are within 36 days of each other! Don't worry, there is a method to my madness.

I found a 10 miler in Dover that is part of the York Road Runners Club Winter series. It falls on the same weekend I am supposed to run 10 miles @ half marathon race pace. I thought it would be more exciting to run in a race than run a million loops around my neighborhood like I normally do. The coolest part is that the race doesn't start until 1:30pm! HOT DANG, late starts are my SHIT!

The weekend after that is the HYP 5 miler in Harrisburg. On that particular weekend, I have speed work scheduled, so I am counting the 5 miles as my speed work. This race came to my attention because some of my friends signed up for it. Peer pressure at it's finest, people.

I think 10 miles and 5 miles are going to be interesting race distances. I have never raced these distances before, so it looks like no matter what I am going to score a shiny PR! But obviously, you all know I have to set real goals for these races. After much thought and reviews of my runs over this past month, I have landed on some goals that are challenging, yet attainable.

These are my "pie-in-the-sky-everything-falls-into-place-weather-is-perfect-I-don't-have-to-stop-and-poop" goals!

11/8 Dover 10 miler GOAL: < 1:11:40 (7:10 pace or faster)

11/14 HYP 5 miler GOAL: < 35:00 (6:59 pace or faster)

Aren't you proud of me for putting my goals out there and risking FAILURE and having to tell all of my readers that I tried something and FAILED? You all know I struggle with that fear!

I haven't thought of a race plan for the 5 miler yet, but I do have a place for the 10 miler. I am going to run it similar to my last race pace run- focus on my average speed being anywhere between 7:10-7:20 per mile and assume I will negative split as my legs warm up- which is what usually happens. I feel like if I try to stay at a 7:10 the whole time, it may be harder than just allowing myself that ten second buffer and speed up a bit as I go along.

I'm super anxious and have to poop just thinking about these races, which probably means this will be good for me!

Are you squeezing in any races before 2015 comes to an end?

Have you ever raced the 10 mile or 5 mile distances?

Exercising... my right to vote!

This morning, I will make my biannual detour at the end of my run and swing by the Lower Allen Township Fire Company building to VOTE!

Rolling up to the polls sweaty and high on endorphins makes voting even more exciting than it already is!

Can you believe it hasn't even been 100 years since women have been allowed to vote? Now they say women voters are the ones who decide the election!

Ladies, your vote is important!

Hey PA voters! Three out of seven of the PA Supreme Court seats are up for election today! Check out this site for some more info.

Whether you're a man, woman, republican, democrat, or independent, get your butt to the polls today and VOTE! Polls in PA are open from 7am-8pm!

Weekend Wrap Up!

Happy Monday! I hope you all enjoyed and extra hour of sleep on Saturday night! I know I did. Turning the clocks always messes me up. I have to think really hard to figure out whether it will be light out on my morning runs or not and what time it will start getting dark at night. So after about five minutes of very careful thinking (and then Googling), I have deduced that it will start to get light out a little after 6:00am here in Central PA... which is good for this morning runner! Then it will begin to get dark a little after 5:00pm... which is the most depressing thing in the WORLD!!!!


Christmas had a rough morning on Sunday with the time change.

Friday started with the dreaded speed work! I got the scare of my life during my warm up mile! I cut onto the sidewalk since it was pitch dark and I had to run on a semi busy road for about a block. I was looking down because the sidewalk was uneven and I didn't want to fall. Well, I looked up right as a dude was walking toward me. He was dressed all in black with his hood pulled up over his head. His face was painted white and he had the most demented looking CLOWN MAKE UP on. I am not afraid of clowns, but I am afraid of dudes in hoods dressed like clowns! Boy did I pick up my step for a minute and I kept glancing over my shoulder to make sure the guy didn't turn around and follow me or something. Where the hell was that scary dude walking at 6:15 in the morning??? I know some people dress in costume for work but I can't imagine any workplace that would be okay with a costume like that!

At school, the Reese's started rolling in. A couple 4th graders didn't think I could do 15 push ups, so they bet me some Reese's Cups. I did 30, so they had to PAY UP!

That evening, we went to Randy and Michael's Halloween party!

Paul as Jeff Probst and me as Vanessa, the girl I hate from Big Brother

"Dude, game theoretically speaking, I did it all for Mel!"

Michael as Elf on the Shelf and Randy as Buddy from Elf

Maren was Amy Poehler's character from Mean Girls (the cool mom) but in zombie form. Max was just a zombie!

Doug and Jen as Daddy Warbucks and Annie

Randy and Mar, my besties!

Paul and Max. Max looks very similar to the dude I saw on my run that morning, except Max looks a little more "mass shooter-y" and the other dude looked more "mass shooter clown-y".

I was supposed to do a long run on Saturday but I was just not feeling it. Usually I look forward to a long run, but today I was tired and freezing. I just could not get warm. I tried to psych myself up. I downloaded my podcasts, ate some shredded wheat, charged my Garmin, and even got suited up! In the end, I decided not to go. Why go if I wasn't looking forward to it? I could always do the run on Sunday when I would hopefully have more energy!

All dressed up with nowhere to go!

We vowed not to turn our heat on until November 1st, but we cracked with just 10 hours to go! It really hadn't been that bad, but for some reason on Saturday, the shit hit the fan and we could just not get warm.

It turned out to be a "homey" type of day. We ran errands and then cuddled up at home watching TV, playing Xbox (Paul) and doing puzzles (me). We topped off "homey" type of day with the most homey meal I can think of... a rotisserrie chicken and cream of broccoli soup! YUM!

 

I went to bed at 9:30pm on Saturday night and slept until 7:30am Sunday morning. With the time change, that's 11 hours of quality sleep! Yeah, no wonder I wasn't feeling my run on Saturday- I was clearly exhausted! I spent the morning sipping coffee and blogging. I was much more in the mood for a run today than yesterday!

I'm not going to lie... this run was tough. The plan was to just RUN and not care what my pace was. I didn't look down at my Garmin until mile 7 and was disappointed. It just seemed like with the effort I was running, my pace should have been faster. I was spent from the run. I guess it just wasn't my weekend! Or rather, I was supposed to just run 10 EASY miles, and I didn't. So I didn't run the workout I planned, and I have no one to blame but myself!

  

Splits: 7:50, 7:48, 7:50, 8:04, 8:01. 8:00, 7:56, 7:47, 7:43, 7:26

I had a turkey and cheese sandwich and dill pickle chips after my run. It hit the spot! But I have determined dill pickle chips are the same as salt and vinegar chips. Does anyone disagree?

The shit hit the fan this weekend as far as my hair was concerned. I was just so sick of it! It was longer than ever. So I got out the scissors and marched over to Paul. "Cut my hair," I told him. And he did.

"Don't get my whole outfit in the picture," I told him.

It is 90% even!

Paul went to a friend's house to watch football so I was on my own. I had Jelly, wine, a puzzle, and old Jodi Arias trial footage on Youtube.

This is 750 pieces! I am going for a puzzle PR!

Have you ever put off a long run because you were tired and not feeling it?
What did you dress up as for Halloween?
Have you ever let your S.O. cut your hair?

Half Marathon Training: Speed Work

On Friday morning, I was scheduled to do speed work. I really did not feel like getting out of bed! Why are my rest days always scheduled on weekends when it is gorgeous outside, and my speed work is scheduled for dark and early when I don't want to get out of bed!? (That's a rhetorical question, you don't have to answer it!)

But get out of bed a did, because it had been two weeks since I had really pushed myself in the area of speed, so I was due to run some paces that has a “6” in the beginning of them.

I didn't decide what I was actually going to do until three quarters of the way into my warm up mile. I would do 800s. I thought about Yasso 800s, but that would require me having to know exactly how long it took me to run each interval. That sounded like it was going to be a pain in the butt, so I just sprinted an 800 and then recovered for the same distance. For my first two 800s, the recovery period seemed too long, but by the third, I was happy for the 4(ish) minutes of easy running in between each sprint!

I don't really look down out my Garmin during speed work since it is so dark out. Of course I have to know when each 800 begins and ends, but as far as pace is concerned, I'll glance down once or twice per workout just to see what's going on! It appeared that I was running the 800s around my 5k pace (6:15-6:45). I was out of breath. My chest was hot. I felt pukey. It was basically a typical speed workout. Nothing notable. I just got 'er done.

Maybe I will try real Yasso 800s someday! From what I understand, you are only supposed to recover for the amount of time it takes you to run the 800? That sounds like torture, but I am sure it's a great workout!

I only have 2-3 more speed sessions before my half marathon, and one of them is going to be a RACE! I know I am really dangling the carrot in front of you dropping that bomb on you at the end of this blog post, but don't worry, I am posting about the races (yes I said RACES!!!!) in a couple days...

How do you do 800s?

When you do mile repeats, how long do you recover in between?