100 Mile Month & Inspiration

First one ever, 101 miles with a few days to spare! That's with a low mileage vacation week thrown in the middle. I came close with a 92 mile month back in March. I remember when my friend Jen had a 100 mile month during the training for our spring half and thinking holy crap, that's insane and awesome for her. Occasionally I read an article in Runner's World that refers to people that run 50+ miles per week. How in the heck do they do that? I suppose they could run 6 minute miles and knock out the miles way faster than I, but still. Do they work full time? Do they have a kid or two? Or a really, really understanding spouse? Maybe they love the treadmill, have endless daylight or can operate on minimal sleep, who knows. Kudos to them because the last two weeks at 30 and 29 miles only occurred due to an understanding family (thanks C&M), flexible schedule and encouragement from my running friends. No more 15 mile Saturday runs on my schedule...I think I'll call that the start of my taper for FCM. Bring.It.On.

The inspiration I refer to above? Two things.
Yesterday's run was hard. After two breakthrough runs in one week, I'm not really surprised. The schedule called for 16, I did 15 and felt no shame for not doing the last loop around the park. I ran with a couple of the coaches and two other brave souls doing the long route. Jen decided it'd be a 12 or 13 mile day for her so she caught up with Amy, I was a little envious and impressed at the same time. Envious because I'd be chugging out the last few and she'd be done. Impressed that she knows her body enough to know when to say when. For me, the last 3 or 4 miles were a total gut check, thank goodness Jeff (one of the volunteer coaches and ToughMudder teammate) was along for the run. I wanted to take the back way into Plamann Park SO bad, but knew that would go over like a lead balloon. I felt like I could only talk in bursts so I reserved my energy to position skipping the last loop around the park and settle on 15. Solid and successful plan. Inspiration thing 1: Jeff is training for IRONMAN Madison taking place in three weeks. I am pumped to go cheer him on and think its pretty cool that I get to train along side him and pimp him for training advice. Quite certain Jeff's participation and the whole IRONMAN cheering/spectating experience will be a source of inspiration for some time to come.

Inspiration thing 2: my little brother. Just over a week ago he made a really tough decision. Huge props to him for having the courage and taking a risk. Sort of reminds me of The Game of Life. One thing The Game of Life leaves out though...a supportive family. My family? Uber supportive. Its pretty awesome and makes my world a better place.

pja

Is it really that easy to set a goal?

This is Megan, she's 7 and she's my kid. She's opinionated, smart, intuitive, and indepedent. I know, a stretch, right? I'm still trying to figure out how one question from her has me questioning my goal for Fox Cities Half Marathon.

I had what I'd call a breakthrough run on Saturday and then another yesterday. About damn time too! Saturday was a 15 mile training run and never, ever have I run longer than 13.1 miles. I'm quite fond of my toenails and have no aspirations of running a full marathon. I was nervous for the 15 miler and really hoping one of the training coaches would run with me since my regular running partner was rocking the Madision Mini. During our warmup I strategically planted my butt right next to a coach and said I need you today. Yes - I can and do ask for help sometimes, I guess that wasn't really a question though. He was suppose to go with the 12 milers, but stuck it out with me. There was one other person going long, everyone else was going 12, so it was Deanna, Sam and I. We were at mile 6 before I knew it (not really, I mean it was challenging) then I specifically remember 7, 10 and 13. We hit 13.1 just over 2:21 - that's all the proof I needed to know that I'm in the ballpark with my previously set goal of 2:20 for Fox Cities. The last two miles sucked, but I finished and pace didn't drop off that much. Totally excited, I could not wait to get home to talk about it. I hit up Megan, tell her about my run and she says well Mom, why don't you go for 2:15 at Fox Cities? REALLY? Could it be that simple? Her question really got me thinking.

If I had a more aggressive goal for the Oshkosh Half would I have finished in a little less time? Oshkosh Half was my second half, first half last fall I just wanted to survive, finished in 2:38 and change. My Oshkosh goal was to finish in 2:30 or less, I came in with a 2:25.38. So wanted to kill Jeff who was pacing me through the half. Literally wanted to grab his jacket and say I CANNOT run anymore, need to walk. I can totally remember my thought process. Went out at around a 10:30 pace for the first 6.5. I remember feeling way freaked out that I went out too fast and couldn't sustain. Guess what? I didn't. I even had the 2:20 pacer in my sight between miles 10 and 11, didn't catch him either. Mind you, the conditions sucked, worse I have ever run in. 35 and rain, sleet and snow - wind too. Fun times I tell you. Jeff got me through that one, I would have been walking off and on after mile 10. Overall I was happy with my effort and my PR, but can't shake the thought that I could have done a little better.

I'm a numbers girl, wear my heart rate monitor and footpod for all my workouts. Love watching my heart rate while I'm running, can guesstimate pace based on what my HR is telling me. Yesterday I had a 7 miler on the schedule. Decided to use mapmyrun.com and map out my 7 ahead of time rather than keep looking at my watch to see how far I've gone. The only landmark I had was the Y, at about mile 5. I ran based on how I felt and had another breakthrough run with an overall pace of 10:19 per mile. For 7 miles, what the heck is going on?

I'm not going to question it too much. Hopefully I'm reaping the rewards of this endurance base I've been building for the last 14 months or so. I've also concluded that its beneficial to get out of my comfort zone every now and then. Duh, right? Seems easier to say than actually do. Anyone else out there reap the benefits of operating outside your comfort zone?

My goal for Fox Cities? Right now, I'm holding steady with 2:20 - it would be a pretty decent PR for me and still feel like its a healthy stretch.

Mostly I'm thankful that I'm healthy enough and can make the choice to put myself out there. 2:15 would effing rock though, thanks Megan for putting that in my outer realm of possibility!

pja

So I've been thinking...

about blogging for quite some time. For some reason it scares the crap out of me. I've never been much of a writer or journal keeper, more of a spoken word (lots of them, some vulgar) type person. Then I wonder if I really want to put personal thoughts out for free consumption. Suppose it might just be my family, specifically my mom (she better!) that reads it anyway. Plus sometimes it feels like overkill with facebook, dailymile, twitter and the rest of life that goes on. Three main things have provided enough motivation to give it a try.

1. I'm training for my fourth half marathon - whoa - I typed third and had to delete. Probably because I did two in a row this spring, so its really only my third training stint. See? Digression! Anyway, somewhere between 1/2 and 2/3 of the way through training I start to feel like quitting. So far I haven't and I won't, but this seems like a great forum for a training journal. No doubt, I will feel my arse dragging again and think it will be pretty cool to have something to reflect back on.



2. I am inspired by reading my friend and running partner, Jennifer Woldt's blog. We are fairly new friends that met via a training program for our spring half marathon. Following her blog allows me to get to know her a little differently than training side by side. And side by side we are, I was intimidated to do the 15 miler without her this past weekend. Meeting her and a few other new friends is, has been, and will continue to be an amazing part of my training journey. And to think I was scared of joining a training group!



3. Work...so while not necessarily a work related blog I was accepted into our corporate mentoring pilot earlier this spring. I submitted my application to be a mentee and was paired up with a Sr. VP, he wondered why I wasn't a mentor. Totally love and appreciated that, but wasn't sure what to expect from the program so decided to apply as a mentee. Only 8 people were chosen to participate in the program so I was and am still determined to make the most of it. Early on in the process we had to loosely determine what we both would like to get out of the program. One of my goals was to figure out my voice and start a blog before the end of the pilot. YEAH! Can now cross it off the list and keep working on the other "stuff."

That was actually pretty fun working through my thoughts. Oh yeah! The title of this thing? That's my running mantra. I can't tell you how many hills I've chugged up saying that to myself and sometimes out loud all the while picturing the little blue engine. And the profile picture? Tough Mudder finisher badge! If you are curious about Tough Mudder you can check it out here.

Now I'm off to figure out how to use this blogger application to its full potential. If you can offer any advice on that front, please hit me up in the comments!

pja