Marathon Mom

After reading so many others post their answers I decided to take part myself, so here are mine. 10 things about me: The running version 1. Best Run Ever: I honestly don't know that I can decide on just one. There are many for various reasons. Last Saturday's 22.5 miler reaffirmed to me mentally that I could run well, I finished feeling the best I have in quite awhile. Other runs refresh my head and are just such great stress relief or are wonderful times to be social and run with friends and yet others prove my physical strength. 2. Three words that describe my running : Energizing, stress-relieving, me time 3. My go-to running outfit: Nike Tempo shorts and Adidas long tank in summer, UnderArmour tights and long shirt with jacket in winter. And on long runs I always have my compression socks or calf sleeves. I always wear a hat. 4. Quirky habit while running: This is a tough one, I'm sure I have some, but it is hard to come up with. I have to lace my shoes a c...

View from the run Saturday: The start of my early morning stretch and the last 20+ mile run before the taper begins. Matt and I were helping pace groups for a 20 Mile training run hosted by the gym I work for. It was the perfect morning to run and a great course to be running, 20 Mile out and back following the final 10 Miles of TCM. I agreed to pace a 9:00 mile forcing myself to take it easy on my final long run. As someone who is notorious for going out too fast I was not sure how this would go, but it was great! The run started a little messy and groups were spread all over so I ran with just a small group, allowing me to meet some great runners. I am always amazed how you can carry on a 3 hour conversation with someone you just met while running. I managed to stay pretty close averaging 8:50 miles. I headed back for an extra 2.5 miles and was happy to see I had enough left to push the hills at a 8:15 pace! Best part, I felt great, best run in a few weeks. Sunday: We had ...

Week 2 of school and my new crazy life is almost done and I am feeling a little more settled. Part of the issue is my week in very heavy early but is completely open at the end. I spend 3 days overwhelmed and then crash. Although after some extra sleep yesterday I am feeling refreshed. Thursday was finally a productive day... 7 mile run with speed intervals 1 hour strength with my trainer and my first real bench press workout Papers read and corrected My own paper started Time "cooking" with my favorite baking helper- Apple pie and coffee in her house Anybody want some coffee? And a little real kitchen experimenting with this new recipe... Banana Nut Granola Bars 2 ripe bananas ½ cup almond butter ½ cup dates (optional) 1 tsp vanilla ½ cup almond milk 2 tbsp honey or maple syrup 2 cups oats 1 cup brown rice cereal 1 cup buckwheat flour (could sub whole wheat or sub part with protein powder) 2 tsp cinnamon 1 tsp nutmeg 1 tsp ginger ½ cup chopped a...

   Have I reached my tipping point? Is there a place where you get to with physical (and mental) toughness and your body decides enough and backs down? If there is I have hit that point. Some call it over training, some say burnout. This is one of those weeks where you question everything. Since the never ending migraine of last Thursday my training is lacking. Maybe that is all coincidence with the changes in my schedule last week: less sleep, more early mornings at work, no more boot camp, maybe not eating well enough and busier work days. Maybe I have reached my training limit and ready for a break; I have been in this training cycle since December 2011. Gordon Bakolis (1993) lists many reason for burnout: over training, over racing, mental letdown or unchanging training habits. A huge sign of this burnout is sudden decrease in performance, that is me! Jeff Galloway has a short quiz to help determine if this is an issue you might be suffering. According to many so...

As I procrastinate writing yet another paper this weekend, 1 is a enough right?! I found a great article talking about something we as athletes already know but is so important... Not only does exercise benefit us physically but also mentally . The graphic below pretty much sums up the article with some statistics that are awful to see, look at the amount of kids who actually exercise, yikes! I know for me exercise is much more then physical, I am a mental wreck if I miss too many workouts, especially when I can't run! This gets so bad that Matt has nearly kicked me out of the house making me run on bad days! I have seen the other positive benefits during my most recent job interview when, although completely unrelated, my background as a marathon runner and coach was brought up as a reason for thinking I was a great person for the job. I was later told that my commitment to the training and ability to motivate others to run would be a great asset to the organization. How has e...

Not here yet, but a reminder not to get to this point! Not the week I had hoped for, but I am dealing and surviving. I made it through day 1 & 2 of classes and now prepare for next week that becomes even busier. My trainer is back and had a great workout planned yesterday that I needed to make him change due to my hamstring (and the lingering migraine). Instead of a fun mix of running intervals and strength outside we opted for  functional lower extremity movement and upper body/core strength. We have now changed the focus to strengthen and recovery in hopes of fully running and racing TC in just over 4 weeks. The good news is my hamstring is feeling better at least at easy running and I am being smart, have actually take time off running, a big thing for me. I ran few easy 200m, 400m, 800m repeats on Wednesday and it was fine, yeah! Heading to spin class today and maybe an easy run (or save it for tomorrow). I actually just saw an article suggesting that running b...

  Yesterday marked the start of another school year for many including myself. August 20th actually marked the start of the school year for both Matt and I in the true sense as a student as we each began yet another year of graduate school, taking one more small step to finishing a grad degree in biology for him and a DNP (doctorate of nursing practice) for me. Tuesday began another milestone in my school life; I started my first day in front of the classroom! The job I took last month after my short stint as a stay at home mom was a full time faculty position in a small bachelors nursing program. I have always been a procrastinator and that part tuck even as the teacher as I sat awake at 10pm on Monday reading part of a novel for the class in order to give the students discussion topics for the following week. This was followed by a 4am wake to get rest in place before hitting Boot Camp at 5am. And only continued when I was making last minute copies 15 minutes before cl...