More #3 Marathon Deets

Race day morning, I woke up at 4am and did everything right.  Everything that relates to fueling and well all that other fun stuff you do before a big race.  The one thing I didn’t do so well was waking my hubs up on time.  What?!  I gave him roughly 20 minutes to get himself together. haha!  Whoops!  I thought he was a big boy and he had set his own alarm.  Then I just lost track of time.  Doesn’t matter.  We still made it there with plenty of time to find a free parking spot, walk six blocks to our corral, stand in a long line for the porta potty, and even then, he still had time to walk all the way back to the care for our sunglasses and chapstick.  We had already started the race and he’s like, “Hey, I grabbed your cherry lip balm too, btw.”  Greatest husband of the year contender right there!

Uh so…I take really crappy awesome pictures right?  Here’s the start line…

and here’s a pirate or two…

  And here’s what we got at the finish.  The end.

Isn’t the shirt cool?  I kind of feel like a distant relative of an Olympian when I wear it! I mean, Kara Goucher and I both have brown hair, right?

Haha!  JK!  I know you wanted to hear a mile by mile break down of the marathon, right?  Hmm, well let me summarize…

• We started out great.  It was a little chilly and my fingers finally started warming up around mile 3.  My nose didn’t stop running until around mile 18.  At the start, it was in the low 50s maybe?  Perfect weather.
• The first half of the marathon, we felt great…stopped to pee twice.  My hubs added on a few seconds to our time because he went around a spot and wouldn’t go through a grassy area that looked muddy.  He didn’t want to get his shoes wet.  Our splits were good, not too fast and feeling great.
• Mile 13 my calves started to cramp a little and it was a long stretch to the next aid station for water.  Mile 15 I stopped to stretch while the hubs pit stopped.  I didn’t have to go….very unlike me.  Up the bridge, but not like last year where I ran the whole thing.  I made it though yet didn’t feel the elation on the other side.  It was warm, my nose was still running like crazy…was I seriously getting a cold on marathon day?!  Magically, it stopped running around mile 19…right about the time my quads started to crazy cramp up and I thought my legs could fall off.
• Then I stopped sweating.  I didn’t realize it at the time but I was suffering from moderate dehydration.  I’m never dehydrated, and yet I chose to run without liquid, like I had done the previous two years. BUT I failed to calculate the 20 degree spike in the temperature.  Normally, I take in a couple of ounces of water each mile, race day….it was down to every 1.5 to two miles and it was too late for me.  I was dumping water on myself now at each station to cool myself down.  The down hills were nice because even though it hurt, it didn’t hurt as much.  In the last 6 miles we passed 141 people (Race stats….no, I wasn’t counting) and only 11 people passed us.
• The last 6 miles were the worst and my confidence in my training wasn’t there.  I knew I hadn’t trained like I wanted to.  I also had the guilt of running with my husband in his first marathon and I was worried he would be disappointed in me and it would affect his race negatively.  At one time, I started to tear up and he barked at me that there was no crying yet.  Later we laughed because a lack of tears is a sign of dehydration…I claimed that’s why I was able to keep it together.  He just wanted to run a marathon with his wife and he didn’t care about the time except that it would be really cool to beat my time from last year. Awwwwww….

A couple of other weird things:

I completely forgot all my running mantras.  I realized it on the course yet it still did me no good. 

I might have broken my iPod too with all the water splashing.  I’m too scared to test it out.  It’s not the battery.  Maybe I just confused it? 

The state of one of my toenails is also in a precarious situation.  It may or may not make it.  I will be sure to keep you informed.

Afterwards, on our trip home, I drank and drank and drank…which thrilled the hubs with all the potty stops.  My appetite didn’t return until about 7 hours later which made my annual Yogurtland tradition kind of a disappointment and also our first trip to 5 Guys a little sad.

I warned you that I wouldn’t stop talking about the marathon for a whole year, so I bet you can’t wait for my next blog!

For you runnerds:

Split	Time
1	11:35.6
2	11:27.0
3	11:37.7
4	10:14.5
5	11:37.0
6	10:48.3
7	11:01.3
8	10:58.8
9	11:26.9
10	11:13.4
11	12:09.3
12	11:35.7
13	11:06.9
14	11:41.5
15	11:59.5
16	15:40.1
17	12:21.2
18	11:55.3
19	14:10.6
20	13:14.4
21	13:15.6
22	12:58.8
23	11:29.2
24	13:34.5
25	12:37.3
26	13:18.6
27	04:50.2
Summary	19:58.9

20 Mile Fun Run

Wowzers, what a weekend!  Mind you, I wouldn’t say wowzers unless I was making fun of you and/or being sarcastic, which I am never, but this really was one of those weekends.  Just very busy and productive, with nothing too fancy going on.  It started with a girls’ night on Friday playing with makeup.  Saturday morning I tried to sleep in since we switched our long run to Sunday….so I could catch up on my sleep.  But 7:30am just doesn’t seem like sleeping in much…especially when you wake up with a headache.  Coffeeeeeee.  I’m calling for youuuuuuu.  To take my mind off my headache, I decided to reorganize some cupboards in my kitchen.  Talk about feeling proud!  We should take bets to see how long they stay that way.  Anyone want to take a week?  One month? Uh, three days?
Next up was to paint my writer’s desk, aka the “kitchen catch-all.”  I’m soo SO SOOOOO excited to show you the finished piece but I have some finishing touches to, well, finish up.  Hopefully I’ll get to reveal it later this week.  For now, please note that I am absolutely in LOVE with glaze.  And also, the below conversation I had with two different family members, two different times….I wanted to punch them.
Them, “Are you going to leave it white?”
Me, “It’s not white, it’s “Antique Beige”.  The primer was white, this is cream colored PEOPLE!!!”

That pretty much sums it up!

Maybe I’m a little high strung, but it’s irritating to spend a lot of time on something and have someone breeze through and tell you you’ve done nothing.  Yes, that’s pretty much what it felt like.
I also did the requisite laundry, and dropping and picking up of kiddos at various locations….fell asleep during the rented “What to expect” movie…shocking.  Watch a movie in just one evening?  Nooo, I’m old.  Let’s spread it out over the month.  I can stay awake at a movie theater, most of the time, but watch a movie at home with both eyes open through the whole thing?  Not a chance!
Sunday morning was fun run day.  We switched it up to Sunday to give me one more day of rest since I was going to need it for a 20 miler.  Whelp, The fun run ended up being only 19 miles.  Considering that not too many people “only just run” 19 miles on a Sunday morning, I will be proud.  Still kinda kicking myself that I didn’t go the full 20.  Again, I gave up and said, “Screw it!”  I don’t know what’s gotten into me except that maybe I’m tired?
Lastly…since I have no pictures for you….I stumbled across this picture last night and I nearly laughed for a minute straight each time I looked at it….which was roughly 32 times.

My calf is/was trying to kill me.

I’m trying not to fret.  If you’ve read any of my panic attack on Facebook, then you know that I have a really bad cramp in my calf.  I refuse to believe it’s anything worse and I’m just being a big baby about it.  We’ll see if the sports doc says anything different on Thursday. I’m a little worried that he will agree I’m being a big baby AND he’ll tell me I can’t run the marathon on October 7th.  He’s not going to tell me that though.  He can’t!  It doesn’t hurt that bad so it can’t be that bad.  Don’t anyone tell me otherwise or I will stop talking to you until I’ve come to grip with whatever this is.  All in all, I’m praying that I’m going to go to the doc, get to pay a hefty little co pay, get told I’m a big baby, and maybe they will through in a little ice massage?  I would be perfectly happy with that.
Wednesday morning update…the calf is feeling much better and I haven’t run since Sunday.  I could at least ride my spin bike but this 8 hour of sleep thing is pretty chill.  I have an appointment tomorrow just to rule out that I’m a go-getter and a major workhorse.

Long Runs and Nesting

I ran: 18.09 miles in 3 hours and 37 minutes.

This morning was my very last (Thank you Jesus!) long run of this training season for my October 9th, 2011 Portland Marathon. I was NOT looking forward to this run one bit.

5:00am - Mother BEAR! - hit the snooze - TWICE!
Forced down a PB&J
Whined a bit to myself
Told myself to just shut up and do it

And out the door I went. My consolation prize was that this was my long last run of the year and my training season and I wouldn't see these views or my special friends for almost another year. In all the brilliance that I possess at 5:30am, I told myself in an almost audible whisper, "YOU CAN TAKE PEEEKKKKSHHHURRREESSS of all of these things and share them on your blog!! Whoooppeeeee!" It sounded great at the time. I did snap a few on my rather crappy IamthankfulIhaveacellphonewithagreatinternetplanbutcan'twaittogetmynewphoneformybirthday Blackberry and so without further ado:



My minivan taunts me. No?

I drove out and placed an extra water bottle...marveling at the eerie looking and weird mist that was floating over the land. As I drove by this one field, I checked to see if Cow in the Corner was there. Yup! I could make out the shadow of his head. I would snap his picture at around mile six. Cow in the Corner, you ask?



Why hellllooooo Cow in the Corner. Nice to make your acquaintance!

CitC was in his corner every time last year and this year that I ran by. I tried not to dwell on this too much because I got depressed for CitC when I started wondering if he ever left his corner. I thought about knocking on the farmhouse door to ask the question. Honestly? I don't think I want to know the answer.



New runners!

In a petite size eleven. A full stinkin' shoe size up so no, they really aren't that huge, and no, I'm not sensitive about my big feet. Kinda. These puppies should have been a little more motivating along the lines of, "Hey new shoes! Run like the weeeendd." But. No. They are Asics Gel-Nimbus 12 in case you were curious. I don't pronate or supinate. (Did I spell those right?) My running feet are very Swiss-like. Neutral.

And lastly, what is contained inside the blue portal of umm...well what's inside kindof sums up my run. And to boot? When I walked inside, the thing SHOOK! It nearly scared the crap out of me. Had it literally, I was at least in the right place.



The opposite of Disneyland, happiest place on earth.

This foul commode has seriously not been emptied or serviced since last year. And it's in one of the weirdest locations...out in the middle of nowhere, well obviously somewhere because power walking girl's car is parked next to it...it's out by this swamping little fishing hole. I seriously wonder who the heck fishes out there?! Judging by the broken beer bottles and the used condom that I discovered inside one time, I don't think a lot of fishing goes on there. But ewwww!! How romantically nasty is that! "Hey babe, your crapper or mine?"

Parts of this long run were ok. Very few, if any, were great. It's done, that's great! There was crying and hobbling and more walking at the end than planned on. The good part was that I told myself and actually BELIEVED myself that I know I'm ready and can run the marathon. This was by far the worst yet ONLY run that was overall DISMAL. And looking back at it now? It really wasn't that bad.

More deets on the run since I'm a numbers gal: I did have to stop a few times to stretch...and cry. Calve cramps something fierce. I know I won't be able to stop my Garmin for the marathon. Cool if I could! At one point, for about 7 minutes, I had forgotten to start my G back up. Sucky! So my distance is not accurate, nor is my time. Mile 18 was a combo of run/walk/hobble/run/walk. The hobbling was from a blister on my left foot, ring toe. (Don't wear toe rings but if my feet were hands...you get the idea.) The blister? DO NOT moisturize your feet the night before a long run! I've been using this fabulous emu oil stuff (thanks Danielle) due to my awesome moisture wicking running socks that caused me to get a crack in my heel. Well this stuff is great so I put it on other tootsie spots. Bad idea for the run. I knew better than that. It was really cool in the grossest of ways when I popped the blister though. And COME ON! I know I'm not the only Grossy Josie that thinks that way! (Please no offense if your name is Josie.)

Oh and the nesting part? It could be because I just got a new carpet shampooer, but the last two weekends in a row, I've ran 17/18 miles and then I've come home and gone on a huge cleaning spree. The naps that I've promised to myself never happened. I seriously don't know what my problem is. Does anyone else do that? Of course, this last hour I've been more than content to sit on my butt, be on my computer, and munch away on Sweet Maui Onion chips. I will miss my long runs for the simple fact of not really feeling an ounce of guilt for eating those things.