3 weeks to go!

YES! We did our last 20 miler this weekend, running 7 miles to Central Park then running Grete's Great Gallop Half Marathon. I was so tired toward the end of the race and Coach Danny reminded me, "You're coming up on mile 19." Right...Disregard the sign that says "Mile 12." I was only a minute off my PR for the half, so I'm feeling pretty good.

The half honored Grete Waitz, who won the New York City Marathon 9 times and has been a pioneer and fierce advocate in the field of women's running. She was there high-fiving the crowd as we ran by, and just being all amazing and inspiring. It was a good day.

Training Update:

with pictures and everything:

• 3 weeks ago: 18 miles on the always impeccably maintained Delaware Canal Towpath


• 2 weeks ago: 22 miles from Prospect Park over the Brooklyn Bridge up the Westside Highway to 125th...and back.
• lots of pacing work with some hills thrown in for good measure.
• last week: successfully avoided running the Queens Half Marathon :), partly because:

• this week: I've been laid up for a couple days with a killer cold, and my body seems to think I'm tapering because I'm getting all these weird aches and pains in my legs.
  
• Next up:
• next week: NYRR 18 mile Marathon Tune-Up Run. As much as I want to shun NYRR, I will run this event and...
• in 2 weeks: Grete's Great Gallop. That makes a total of 31 miles in Central Park over the next 2 weeks. I'm really looking forward to aquainting myself with every crack, crevice, bump, ditch, and pile of horse poo.
• in 3 weeks: The Staten Island Half - a decent course that starts at a decent time, with lots of parking!
• in 4 weeks - a Cape Cod wedding! Margaret and I ran our first marathon together, and now she's tying the knot. She's one of my favorite people in the world, and we couldn't be happier for her and her lucky fiance.


• in 5 weeks: MARINE CORPS MARATHON 2009!

and finally, we will get our weekends back!

The Bionic Woman

That's mom's new hip! Well, not actually mom's, but she now has one just like it. Mom pulled through surgery like a pro yesterday and was up and about today. It's a long road to recovery, but she'll be out there pounding the pavement with me soon enough! Go mom!

So I'm in Yardley with my parents for a week missing Luis and Sister a lot, but this morning I went for a great run. It was the best I've felt in a few weeks. Cool and drizzly, quiet and peaceful - hill repeats were actually enjoyable. It was a very, very much needed break from all the commotion.

Party's over, or has it just begun?

Back to work this week, and it's busier than ever. How is that a teacher works more in the summer than during the school year???

Anyway, I also officially kicked off training yesterday with an easy loop around the park. 16 weeks until Marine Corp Marathon 2009. The hotel is already booked! I hope to be posting fundraising information soon too. We're making it a family affair this year - with Luis joining in the Team Reeve fun! Here's last year's video (from the NYC marathon) in case you've forgotten what all the excitement is about:
(I'm at 1:23, 1:55, 3:44)

It's settled.

Rollerbladers, please stay in the BIKE lanes. (see scientifically validated poll results on the right)

Pace For Success

I'm back! And I can't believe I haven't posted this already! Friend, coach, and all around super-lady, Jasmine Graham has been kicking my butt with her core/strength training class for runners on Monday nights. She even kicked Luis's butt last night!

Jazzi left a very long-standing, well-established career in the fashion industry (where she actually met Jay and B.) to follow her passion. Courageous, huh? Jaz started Pace for Success, her very own company that works toward creating F.I.N.E human beings through Fitness, Involvement, Nutrition, and Empowerment. She has partnered with non-profits, schools, and community organizations, and is doing amazing work on so many levels.

Check her out:

Check out the schedule of classes and programs on the P4S website. Think you're tough? Try 5:30 a.m. Super Bootcamp class next Monday.

Running into the Wind

I looked for some articles about how to approach this difficulty, but they all sucked. Basically you just have to go slower and suck it up. I couldn't even find any good pictures.

P90X - Part 3 - BRINGIN' IT.

I'm sore. The workouts are definitely working. And I'm still feeling Tony Horton's cheesiness. BRING IT.



Yes, he was actually singing "Over the river and through the woods."

There have been some requests for before and after pics. The problem with this is that I'm not following the P90X "nutrition plan" - aka diet. I gotta eat what I want when I want it. It's a blood sugar thing. Or something. So anyway, I'm pretty sure my newly toned muscles will remain hidden under a layer of cushioning.

Agility Course

I was feeling pretty bad-ass with all my P90X-ing, but I saw the following video and suddenly felt like a total wuss because I really don't think I could do what you are about to see:


Incredible. But it does make me feel a little bad about this:

Nature's a bitch.

P90X - Part 2

Part 1 is here. Now onto Part 2. Luis and I were a little frightened by how quickly we went from feeling fit to feeling like slobs after the marathon. So we took the plunge and purchased P90X. The most exciting part of the program so far has been the following:

TONY HORTON of P90X______ EQUALS______MICHAEL SCOTT of The Office

It's true! Tony Horton's energy, tone and mannerisms are hysterical. Way too cool for school. He's so over the top with his enthusiasm and intensity that he totally bypasses annoying and goes straight to hilarious! It's so bad, it's good - in that Michael Scott kind of way.

I think this 4 second clip sums it up pretty well:

As for the actual workouts - HOLY HARD. Especially if you're not good at push-ups (that would be me). I did the "Core Synergy" workout yesterday, and it was exhausting. But I think I must have done something wrong because I'm not sore today.

Stay tuned for Part 3.

Can I just say...

The whole color-coding of the NYC Marathon start area really gets on my nerves. The race has 3 different colored routes (green, blue, orange), and each route is divided into 5 lettered corrals. Then they throw in 3 different wave starts this year and really mix us all up. As you can see:

So I and others have emailed New York Road Runners (NYRR) asking if there is any way we can change colored routes. Each time the response is, "you may move to slower wave or a slower corral." No mention of colored route. Clearly, NYRR does not care about running partners we may have trained with for the last 6 months. Hmph.

Well I do!!! So here's to you Christina G. (on the right)!! And Cathy (on the left)!!

We ran countless miles together - from those cheery first runs in May, through the stifling humidity of summer, to these final crisp fall days. Christina G. has been able to motivate me to get up for 6:30 am runs every Thursday for the past 2 months!!! You may remember it was awful in the beginning, but we stuck it out and have been going strong all this time. Even when it started staying dark in the morning.

We talked about our lives, gossiped, and even played 20 questions. We laughed and cried and almost pooped our pants (let's be real - it happens to runners all the time). Not even NYRR, with all its color-coding, alphabetizing and corralling, can break those bonds. We may not be physically together on Sunday, but we will be together in spirit, cheering each other on with every step.

Tempo

We've been working on tempo pace the past few weeks...and I like it! Much better than hills, intervals and repeats. They say tempo pace should feel "comfortably hard." It's that "comfortable" part I like so much. It's pace that lets me open up my stride and pick up the speed, but that doesn't burn and that I can maintain for a while. This Runner's World article is pretty interesting, and it explains all the science behind the tempo run. Something about getting your muscles used to lactic acid so they don't fatigue as easily. It turns out that lactic acid is actually fuel for your muscles, but the muscles need to be trained to burn that fuel more efficiently. This actually newer thinking about lactic acid - once, it was thought that lactic acid was just bad and inhibited oxygen use in the muscle, as this (2006 - not so new, I guess) NY Times article explains. Anyway, here's a cool picture of a mitochondrion - muscle's energy generator. So scientific of me, I know.

Don't know you're tempo pace? This is the BEST pace calculator. Just enter a time from a recent race, and presto - all your training paces appear!

Excuses, excuses...

I'm doing 18-20 mile runs on weekends, it's the beginning of the school year and that's always hectic when you are an early-childhood special ed teacher, Luis and I are making lots of big plans, and life is just busy...So...time for blogging? Not so much. Unfortunately.

I will say that training is going very well. I feel ready for this race. I ran 20 miles over the Brooklyn Bridge and up the West Side Highway last weekend and did 15 miles in Central Park yesterday. Upcoming plans are 20 miles on Saturday on the Raritan Canal towpath, and 20 next Saturday along the Delaware Canal towpath.

I'll be running the Nike Women's Half Marathon in San Francisco on October 19th. And yes, we each get a Tiffany necklace for finishing this race! The half also marks the official start to the dreaded taper. NOVEMBER 2nd - ING NYC MARATHON!!! My parents are planning to come to NYC to see me run (as long as the weather cooperates), and this will be my dad's first time seeing me run in a marathon!

Fundraising has also been going well...I've stalled a bit at $7300 (still double the minimum!) but I'm still waiting on a few donors. Special thanks to McCaffrey's - a local grocery store near my parents - who made a generous contribution!

P90X

I want it! Too many sleepless nights spent watching infomercials you ask? Not in this case. In this case, the infomercial makes NOT want to buy it. I really don't want to be "ripped" and I have no interest in the "diet" part of the whole thing.

Actually, Coach Michael has been raving about P90X for weeks. Supposedly it's amazing cross-training, very runner-friendly (or adaptable to be such), and uses limited non-house-cluttering equipment. Apparently, it's also really hard. Christina G. tried the ab workout and could barely stand up straight for a week.

But I still want it! As you may know, I do have a tendency to buy such things and...never use them. Which is why I'm trying to convince Luis it get it. Since he's a coach, it's a tax right-off. But Luis also has been known to make impulsive purchases then not use them as well (have I mentioned he bought the Perfect Pushup - and used it once?).

So what to do? Any feedback? Any reader reviews? Comments please!

P.S. I do have some self-restraint. I still haven't bought the new Garmin, even though I still reeaalllly want it.

Update

Today's run was a pain in the butt - not because of tropical wind-swept rain as I had feared - because of tropical humidity. ENOUGH ALREADY! Christina G. and I did stick it out for 19 miles though.

Today also marked my first ice bath of the season. Luis and I did it together. It was so cute, I wish I had a camera (we had our running clothes on!) But I was too cold to move. Lucky for you, there are surprisingly many pics of ice baths on the web. Here's one that doesn't involve nudity:

Why an ice bath you ask? It's supposed to reduce inflammation, aid muscle recovery, and relieve soreness. I'm too tired to explain it all, so you can just read this.

Long run tomorrow?

Hmm...This doesn't look promising:

But then there's this:

Looks like Hanna is still in NC tomorrow morning... Well, I'm carbo-loading tonight - that means I'm running tomorrow come hell or high water!

Who has time for running...

When this is what is waiting right outside your door:

When there are sunrises to watch:

Waves to be ridden:

Sandcastles to be built:

Storms to watch roll in:

And the largest natural sand dune on the east coast to climb up and run down!

I think 2 runs for a total of 9 miles for the week isn't bad considering...

Running + 6:30 am

= miserable.

It seems I am not the morning bird I once was. Today was my first attempt in 2 years probably to get up early and run. And it sucked, royally. Of course I had just run less than 12 hours before, I hadn't stretched, I hadn't slept well, no coffee, no food...Not a good strategy according to Runner's World, and according to Running Times, early morning is the most difficult time to run based on circadian rhythms.

Well, it was the first attempt to change a pretty well ingrained pattern, so I don't feel too bad about it. They say it takes 21 days to solidify a new habit. So 1 down, 20 to go. And soon enough, this will be me:

Summer Streets

It really was this fun:


video from streetfilms

Boy, when I tell you I love Bloomberg, I mean I LOVE him! I got 17 miles in, and I really could have kept going. Such a far cry from last week. Oh, and Christina G. is just as good a running partner when we feel good as she is when we feel like ass.

Un-freakin-believable

I have ANOTHER cold. This #4 for the year, #5 since October.

At first I thought it was a bad allergy attack, but yesterday morning I knew it was a cold. And guess what I decided to do...run 15 miles! Brilliant. I wanted to take advantage of the weather - no sun, a decent breeze, a nice flat route through lovely Bay Ridge all the way to the boardwalk in Coney Island. All was well for about 10 miles, then my head clogged up, my throat started to feel like sandpaper, and sinuses started throbbing. Needless to say, it wasn't my best run. Luckily, Christina G. was there to keep me company, and best of all, she was feeling equally crappy. Yes, misery truly does love company. We bitched and complained the miles away....so inspiring, I know.

Anyway, I know I have lots of catching up to do on this blog, but I can't really concentrate when I feel crappy. So, I'm going to get a good night's sleep tonight and hopefully feel much better this week. And EMVORB will resume...