pat's run Archives - Ari's Menu

Work It Out 4/16-4/22

April 23, 2012 · by Ari ·

First of all, perhaps you notice something different about the way the blog looks today?? For all like 4 of you who read this through google reader, you should head on over to the site and see what the amazing Liz of Sweet Simplicity Designs set up for me! There’s still a few things I need to do, but I have lots of new pages and fun things for you guys to look at. It’s not all ready just yet, but soon…! I’m so excited to have a custom design that is so me!

Anyway, in work out land, lots of great things happened last week!

I set a new record for miles I’ve run in one week. Last week I ran 25 miles, which may not sound like a lot to you marathoners, but as a 3x a week trying not to avoid injury at all costs runner, it was a new milestone, with my previous highest mileage at 22.

I ran the fastest mile I have ever run without stopping. I used to stop a lot to “stretch” during hard miles when I wanted to run faster. I didn’t really get speed work, I just knew that I wanted times like I saw on other blogs. It wasn’t helpful, and I felt like a big cheater. This week I ran a mile in 8:23, and it was the 3rd mile of my speed work session. I feel great about that. My 7:59 is on the horizon.

I got all of my workouts in. It wasn’t easy. Sometimes it’s hard to juggle things like races, and spin class that aren’t exactly a part of my training plan, but I made it work.

Some not so great things happened, but I’ll get to that.

Monday: 4 miles with Jason. Fun friend running time. Love.
Tuesday: Linda’s Spin. Sweaty love.
Wednesday: 3x1600s @ 8:35 with 800 recovery jogs. I ran with Speedy Ashley. 1 mile warm up, then I ran the 1600s in 8:32, 8:30, 8:23, then cool down to total 6 miles. I kind of thought I was going to die, but every time I go into speed work, I doubt myself and think I can’t do it, then end up exceeding my expectations. It’s difficult to get used to being that uncomfortable, but it’s helping, and it’s probably my favorite type of training run right now.
Thursday: 13 mile bike ride with Steve. Rode to coffee, nice and easy.
Friday: Long Run. 11 super not fun miles. If you want the details, you can link back, but really I was just proud of myself for finishing with some pretty crappy circumstances.
Saturday: Pat’s Run. Way more unpleasant than Friday. Miserable, stomach flu feeling filled race. But I didn’t give up, and that’s what I need to focus on. This weekend taught me a lot about how persistent I am. Sometimes making it through a bad race is so much harder than setting a PR or having a great race.
Sunday: Total rest. Like actual rest. I called in sick. To my own rehearsal. Ummm, I don’t do that. But I was so sick on Saturday, and I knew that if I wanted to actually get better, rest was not only a good idea, but necessary. It’s amazing, if you actually do rest and take care of yourself, that you feel mostly better pretty quickly! Who knew, right? So even though today I still don’t feel 100%, I feel a whole lot better than Friday and Saturday, and I don’t regret taking the time to myself one bit. I came back today feeling refreshed and ready to tackle the week.

How did you work it out last week?? Learn anything life changing? How did you take care of yourself?

Pat’s Run 4.2 Race Recap

April 21, 2012 · by Ari ·

If I never talk about it, then it’s like it never happened, right?

source

Today was not a good day. Well, it’s only 1:44pm, so I will say that the first 8 hours of today have not been good. Remember yesterday’s craptastic run? Well today, I woke up feeling worse than when I woke up yesterday. Even though by yesterday afternoon I thought I felt better? Or maybe with how busy I was, I just didn’t notice that my body was still off? I’m not sure. But I woke up, my achilles were so sore that it hurt to flex my feet in bed, and used the bathroom 5 times in the 45 minutes before Nicole came to pick me up. Not a great start.

We got to the race and I was trying to meet up with Jason, and we had planned to meet up with several ladies from the AZ Bloggers Network, but we forgot Jason’s bib in the car, had to run back and were scrambling for time at the last minute. And when I say run back to the car, that’s literally what we did and I can tell you, it did not feel good. I felt nauseous and totally out of breath and I knew I was going to have a rough race, but I was determined to try to keep up with Nicole anyway. We barely found Jason, and scrambled to our corrals.

The National Anthem was played so beautifully, and as I stood there in a crowd filled with energy, I never really found any of my own. I wanted to run fast purely for the satisfaction of seeing a number on my garmin at the end of the race, but really emotionally and physically, I just felt tapped out. I tried to stick with Nicole and Julie as we went through the starting line, but I looked down at my Garmin as they were getting further away around a quarter of a mile in and it said 7:17. I waved Nicole ahead and tried my best to keep trucking along.

I finished mile 1 in 8:40 (my only decent mile in the entire race), grabbed water at the first water station, and within a minute, my stomach began to feel like someone was sticking a knife into it. I tried to keep going, but I felt absolutely miserable and shortly into mile 2, I stopped to walk and contemplating dropping out of the race all together. I have never thought about. Walking was less painful than running, so I told myself that worst case scenario, I could keep walking and still finish.

I kept trying to start running again, and it seemed like every time I picked up my pace, I got a sharp pain digging in my stomach and an urgent need to find the closest restroom, which of course there were none of along the course. Where are all the porta potties, huh Pat??? That was rude. I should be honoring him, not yelling at him about porta potties. Anyway, eventually after walking for what felt like forever, I was able to at least get back to a walk/run combo.

I spent a lot of the next 2 miles beating myself up, and trying to figure out ways to make up time. I was frustrated and not enjoying myself in the least, but I just wanted to finish so I could be done. Mile 2 was 10:41, and somehow with my walk/run combo, I managed to keep miles 3 and 4 just under 10 min. As soon as I saw the finish, I still wanted to finish strong. I mustered up everything I had left and sprinted like I don’t think I’ve ever sprinted before. My legs had a surprising amount still left in them (hey stomach, try as you might, you can’t bring my legs down!!) and at one point (probably for like a milisecond) hit a 5:10 pace according to Garmi!

I finished with an official time of 40:02. I was surrounded my swarms of people, I felt awful, I needed to get to a bathroom stat, I couldn’t see the way to get out and I was starting to panic. I struggled not to just start crying in the middle of the stadium. And did I mention that it was HOT?? Like in the 80s with a high today of over 100.

I finally made it out, and luckily Nicole spotted me really quickly. She rocked the race and finished in something ridiculous like 35 minutes!! But I’m a really awesome running friend and didn’t even asked. I just started crying about how I felt awful. I’m a real gem. You can fill out applications to be my friend, but be warned, there are so many of them because of my winning personality. I’m pickier than the moderators on Taste Spotting.

Everyone else I knew at the race today totally rocked it. Jason did it without taking a single walk break and much faster than we ran the distance just on Monday! Stacey kicked butt, and Emily even came over and said hi in the middle of her last mile! I’m so proud of my friends for their successful races!! And I know that things happen, and I will have better races.

Honestly, right now I’m running a fever and very clearly have something wrong that I’m guessing is the stomach flu, so I truly am proud that I made it through and finished. It doesn’t change that it’s frustrating, but I’m trying to stay positive. I tend to get overly emotional and sensetive when I’m sick, so it’s proving to be a challenge right now, but I’m sure I will wake up tomorrow with some renewed positivity. Or you all are going to have to slap some into me. Sound like a plan?

PLEASE TELL ME HAPPY THINGS!!!! Good race? Good things at work? Pictures of puppies being cute? You bought me my own fro yo machine and are having it delivered immediately?? I need some sunshine today!

I Think I May Have a Problem

March 20, 2012 · by Ari ·

Hi, my name is Ari and I have a running problem. That’s step 1, right?

Okay, let me tell you a little bit about how today went down. I woke up, got out of bed and was immediately in pain. Stumbling, struggling to walk across the room kind of pain. It was super fun, let me tell you. Both of my achilles were on fire, and the outside of my right knee that had been hurting, then gone mostly away, was back with a vengeance. I started to really think about at what point running was still worth it, and at what point it started being harmful to my body rather than helpful. I seriously contemplated taking a break. A real one. Not like that time I didn’t run for a week and called it a break.

Then I went to the gym for spin class, missed the last sign up spot by one minute, said some 4 letter words, and set out on a 15 mile bike ride outside. It was lovely. The only thing that would have made it better is if Linda and the woman that always yells during class had come with me. I love that woman that yells. She cracks me up. By the end of my ride, I was feeling a little better. First thing in the morning is always the worst. Once I get moving and stretched out a little, the pain is still there, but manageable.

I started to think about what constitutes an injury. I can run. It hurts, and it’s not easy right now, but I am not in enough pain that I can’t do it. And to be honest, it’s always hurt. It just used to hurt slightly less, and while my knee pain is fairly new, it’s not like it’s bad enough to make anything impossible. This may be ridiculously bad logic, but it’s my logic, so instead of taking a break, I decided to say F you to my injuries and sign up for 4 races.

You can judge me. You can think I’m crazy, or stupid, but I refuse to let some pain tell me I can’t do what I want to be doing. Have you ever tried to tell me I can’t do something? It’s the fastest way to get me to do it. In fact, if Steve were to tell me he didn’t think I could clean the house, he would all the sudden find himself living with an obsessive neat freak. Please don’t try that. I really hate cleaning!

Anyway, here is my calendar for the next couple of months

March 24: South Mountain Classic 5K
Impulse decision when I realized I hadn’t run a March race, and I’d really like a shiny new 5K PR. But I haven’t been running fast at all lately, so we’ll see how that goes.

April 14: Firefly Run 5K
I’d been planning on registering for this, but just hadn’t yet. You wear pretty lights! How fun! Plus I will be running this with my best friend! It will be her first 5K and I plan on running the whole thing by her side.

April 21: Pat’s Run
Again, I’d been planning on this one, and even though I am super annoyed by their registration process (Ummm, listen Pat Tillman Foundation, I am NOT a jogger), all my real life running friends and blog running friends are doing it, and I give in to peer pressure 😉

May 5: Whiskey Row Half Marathon
Let’s talk about Whiskey Row. Specifically the elevation.

Yeah, that’s over a 1,500 ft difference in elevation, and the entire first half goes straight up. I honestly am not 100% sure I can even finish this course, but I feel like I am ready for a challenge. I am ready to be training for something again. The last month has been pretty lack luster in the training department, and I miss feeling awesome and strong after long runs, and excited after speed sessions. This is what I’m doing, and my body is just going to have to keep up. Got it body? Okay, good.

And last, but not least, I have my eye on a half marathon PR race.

That would be RnR Seattle. I’ll be in the north west at that time anyhow, and if I can make it happen, I would absolutely love to do this race! I have my heart set on a sub 2:00 half in 2012, and I am pretty sure it’s not going to happen at Whiskey Row…let’s be honest. I know I could find a goal race in the fall, but I also don’t want to wait until then. This isn’t a flat course (and it has an awful looking uphill finish–I mean seriously?!?!), but I actually don’t mind a little rolling hill variety, and I really love Seattle. Fingers crossed that life works out, and I’m able to do it!

What’s on your race calendar?

Work It Out 4/16-4/22

Pat’s Run 4.2 Race Recap

I Think I May Have a Problem

Featured Here

Member Of…

Archives