Marathon Mom

I ran my 3rd half of the year yesterday and they are only getting worse. Two of the past three that I have run have been frustrating and uncomfortable and all I wanted was to be done. The half I ran 4 weeks ago was the only one that felt good and was enjoyable. I think it is time to step back and reassess my training, racing, and fueling. I decided not to experiment with this race and went back to my old standbys of a PB bagel and banana for breakfast and a Gu before and during the race. To prevent myself for going out too fast I lined up with the 1:45 pace group to keep an 8:01 pace. This backfired too! I'm not huge on running with pacers and this only reinforced that. I tried not to look at my Garmin since I figured the pacer was on, but when the pace felt faster I looked to see the first 2 miles were around 7:30. I slowed to my own pace and ran for awhile with the 3:30 pacer for the full who was actually running the right pace. This lasted until mile 4 when the race was o...

In the beginning the time went slow, but now it is flying by and I can't believe it has been 4 months already! We survived another round of shots and had another perfect check-up. I was reading last week that babies double their brith weight at 4 months and thought, no way she was going be 15 1/2 lbs. I was right, Ophelia is not 12lb 2oz (30th percentile) and 25" (70th percentile). I was a little nervous since she dropped from 50th to 30th and we have friends whose 6 month old did this and they were told to start waking her up at night to eat, no way I was going to do this! I was happy when the pediatrician looked at the numbers, my healthy, happy girl, and then to me and said "she takes after you, tall and thin, everything looks great." We got the okay to start adding in foods anytime between now and 6 months, now to figure out when to start. I knew from before her birth that she would be a mover and she is. Whether it is just lying on her back kicking (or running ...

When I decided to start racing after baby I thought this would be my first race and be my goal race. Prior to the race I had 3 goals 1) Beat the 1:52 I ran 3 weeks ago 2) Beat the 1:48 from last year when I ran this race 2 days after finding out I was pregnant 3) sub 1:45. Well I only acomplished one of the goals and prior to starting decided to make the race an experiment since things were not looking favorable. For some reason the night was not a good night of sleep, baby was up to eat twice and I was in need of a few more hours of sleep when my alarm went off. After the last half I knew I needed to work on my eating before and fueling during the race to avoid the energy crash again. I started by switich up breakfast and ate a massive bowl of cereal with soy milk, a banana, and coffee. I then laced up brand new shoes and had a debate with myself until I finally came to my senses and decided to stick with my old pair. I continued to experiment as I took a Hammer gel before the race...

After a week of grey, cloudy skies with rain and temps in the 40s Spring is back! The sun is shining, the rain is gone and the temps are in the upper 70s with 80s on the way. I love this weather, but yikes my body needs a little time adjusting to running in the heat again. Saturday's run (if you can call it that) was the toughest I've had in almost a year. It probably wasn't the smartest idea to run hills at 4pm with a temp of 80 after working all day and probably being dehydrated. It may be time to start some early morning running before work, I’m up at 5am anyways what’s another hour awake? Yesterday’s run was much better; 5.5 hilly miles with the BOB but cooler temps was actually easier and faster than Saturday and we saw two deer along the path. I have the week to adapt or this Saturday's half will be interesting, luckily it starts early and should only be in the 60s in the morning. Not sure what is worse running in 80 and heat or the gusty winds and freezing tem...

How I enjoyed my first Mother's Day -Starting the day with a happy baby who slept through the night and took a 3 1/2 hour nap -10 mile run -Drinking coffee and reading the newspaper -Dinner of grilled shrimp and asparagus -Saturday night dinner out with my parent's, Matt, and Ophelia (her first dinner out) at a wonderful Indian restaraunt -My first Mother's Day gift from Ophelia was a new Garmin 405 since my old 305 decided to go on maternity leave along with me and never return to working. Matt knows me too well, I don't need flowers or jewelry, just running gear to make me happy. Here is a great mother's day article for all the running moms.

As of yesterday I am officially a working mom. At first the maternity leave was going so slow and I even told Matt I was ready to go back to work at 6 weeks in exchange for time off later. The Ophelia became her own person and started doing more than just eating and sleeping and the rest of the time flew by. Luckily for me the end of the semester was last week, so I have a month to transition back into working before needing to think about classes again. Somehow my child knew that something was going on when we attempted to go to sleep on Sunday night. She finally decided to fall asleep at 10pm, only to be awake to eat at 11pm and again at 3:30am. This was a huge change since she has been sleeping through the night or only waking up between 4-5am for about a month. Thanks to her eratic sleep I was awake for the day at 3:30, it was a good thing work for busy and I didn't have time to think about my lack of sleep and need for coffee. Ophelia had a great day with grandma and even ma...

A few weeks ago I decided that I wanted to get back to racing, even if it was just for fun. It was perfect timing, a half marathon to complete my 13 miles at 13 weeks. I was going into the race without a time goal and planned to have fun and run comfortably. The weather was nearly perfect, 50s at the start with sun, but a pretty good wind on most of the course. Everyone decided to walk to the start with me, Matt was pushing Ophelia in the stroller, and my parents were behind us. As we were walking a man and woman were looking at Ophelia and me, the woman said to the man “Is that her baby? Is she running?” Kind of made me smile. The race had wave starts and due to long port-a-potty lines I missed the 1st wave and ended up in Wave 2, the 2-2:15 group. It wasn’t too tough to get myself out of the group and get on a good pace. I was hoping to catch the 1:50 pace group, but then I remember that the 1st wave started 3 minutes before I did and that doing so probably wasn’t the best idea ...