Friday, July 30, 2010

Where did my week go?

Friday!!! 
Only the best day of the week!  Too bad I woke up so damn grouchy. BF wasn't too happy about that one.  My AC broke last night causing me to wake up frequently sweating and wondering how the large mound of BF next to me was sleeping so soundly. 
And so on my side of the bed. 

Between that and this...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZZ_n6WT-1Gs
I was a tad grumpy.  Luckily my coworker brought me a coffee this morning to go along with our key-sorting to cheer me up! 
Plus, it's Friday! And I get to have some delish home cooked food from the BF's family tonight. Which also means I get to run through the chickamauga battlefield park tomorrow morning (hopefully).  Ah sweet trail running. How I adore thee.

Speaking of running, I am supposed to be writing about that right?
After a horribly heavy, fattening, delish and totally worth it lunch at Tacomac yesterday I waited a while before attempting to go run.  This week is all messed up since I don't have class.  My schedule is out of wack.  

Went to the gym, ran 3.2 miles with some hill work.  I forgot my inhalor, so I sounded like I was trying to breath through a straw at times, and the CRC was out of towels, so I looked like a bucket of water was dropped on me.  
Ran the first 15 minutes normal at a 9:40 pace and then every minute I'd increase the grade on the treadmill.  Went up to five and back down and then another 5 minutes of flat running.  I have no bloody clue what I was thinking yesterday.  No game plan, no mile goal, I just wanted to run some.  I was out of whack and by the end of 30 minutes was so dun with the treadmill I just wanted to go home.

It's amazing to me how far I have come since I started running.  3 miles used to be quite a feat for me.  Now I feel lame for running anything less than 4.  It just doesn't sound as impressive.  It sounds like slacking to me.

Whatever it is, I'm up to 13.3 this week I believe! What a baller I am.  I'll be at 20 mile weeks soon enough.

My shoes will def be dead before then however.

I think my goal for this weekend is going to be at least 5 miles. Hopefully 6? Nice and slow maybe? Relaxing run with the BF?
Ew, Just realized I need to wash all my running clothes...This is a clear sign I need more.

Next week = finals week.
Well for me it's just final week.  I only have one on Thursday and then back to Arlington! To see my dogs.  Yes, there will be pictures. Plenty.

Thursday, July 29, 2010

The Craving

Tuesday I headed to the gym after my last class of the summer semester (booya) with the goal of a nice 4 mile run.  God I love treadmills. Who invented those anyway? They're of great value in Atlanta. It's so hot here during the day.  It's 93 here today, and lovingly humid.  Not only is it hot to run during the day, but it feels like you're breathing water.  It's not pleasant. 

Anyway, 4 miles turned into 4.5 because why have my week total at 9.5 when I could have it at 10? 4.5 miles and some ab routines later I shimmied my butt home with one thing in my head. 

Chocolate Milk.

Seriously, it was all I wanted.  I don't know why but it was.  I know it's a good recovery drink, everyone I swam with loved to point that out at least once a season.  Now generally I don't just drink milk. The BF finishes the milk in my cereal.  I hate drinking anything with calories in it unless it's alcoholic.  It seems like a waste to me.  But when I got home I headed straight for the fridge. Milk, chocolate syrup, heaven. Found some info on why it's so awesome for you online..
http://www.chocolatemilk.com/


Oh, and Dr. Robert Bruce and Wayne Quinton invented the Treadmill.  Thanks boys.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treadmill

Monday, July 26, 2010

My Pro/Con list

First, discussion of my run this morning. I woke up at 6:30 with my BF trying to shoo him off to work after which I prepped for a nice early morning pre-atlanta-heat-humidity-run. I discovered my ipod was dead and WAS starving so I didn't actually get out the door till 7:45. I knew the time addition was going to make it HOT on my way back.

As punishment for not running this weekend, and also pigging out most of the time in-between, I challenged myself to a long run on my own.  Meaning sans my favorite running partner: the BF.  The toughest route I have in my arsenal goes to Piedmont park via 10th street. 10th is hilly and traffic heavy. And when I say hilly I mean really hilly, and long hills nonetheless.  It's 2 miles to the park exactly and I had decided to run around and then run back. At first I thought I might be able to get a 10k in..but that just wasn't happenin.

Let's just run the totals:
Miles: 5.53
Time: 51:24.22
Avg Pace: 9:17 (UH? was I being chased??)
Avg BPM: 159
Max BPM: 194 (Near Death)

The 2 miles there were nice and easy, surprisingly. I also almost got lost in the park..failure. The heartrate strap of the BFs Garmin popped off my body (er?) which gave me a much needed little break to put it back on. I got extremely lucky on the way back as well with stoplights and traffic. It was like Atlanta was saying "no wait, take a break here!".  That was the only reason I probably held that absolutely ABSURD pace listed above.  I was on the way to crushin my 10k time.  The breaks make that null and void though.   Either way, I'm very happy with the run. My knees are a tad achy today but nothing a fantastic dinner of waffles and some IB profin cannot fix. 

Now time for my Pro/Con list of running. 

I grew up a swimmer. Recruited for Fort Belvior's Swim Team (FBST) when I was 7 I immediately immersed myself in the swimming world.  Even after moving off the military base I continued to swim till I was 13.  I then took a 3 year hiatus and restarted on my high school swim team my junior year.  Junior year, senior year, summer after...I just swam all the time. I loved it, I loved training for it, and I love the people.  I continued to swim in college on GT's swim club for two years.  Intense training lead me to even faster times than in high school and drove me deeper into my obsession with it.  After a horrible championship meet I had had enough though.  I had trained for months and months and suddenly none of it was worth it. No PRs, not even swims that felt good. I was extremely discouraged.  I decided to shy away from swimming.  Running was my next route. 

It has taken a long time to get used to it. It's completely different than swimming and is even worse for my asthma.  I don't know why, but I'd always wanted to be able to run.  Now I have been running on and off long enough (on now, off before this summer) that I can compile my proper Pro/Con List...

First the CONS
  1. Sweat. Holy crap do I sweat a LOT. Even with proper running clothes and non-coton shirts...and men's deodorant.  In the pool, I don't sweat. And if I do I sure as hell can't tell. 
  2. Atlanta is not flat. Anywhere. That's more of a location problem then a running problem, but it's going in here because it's true.
  3. When I first started, I was hungry all the time. I mean ALL the time. I now carry about 100 calories of snacks per hour I'm away from my apt if it's going to be a long day. Otherwise I go into heinous bitch mode.  No one likes that mode.
  4. This will sound strange, but my swim club nickname is muffins. It's for my boobs. I'll just say it outright, I've always had big boobs. Now that I run? Well my body fat percentage has gone down a lot. So have those. Only I would be so whiney.  
  5. Seriously, last whiney thing. My clothes don't fit. They're too big. I need belts. I need pins. I need a personal tailor. It's annoying. It's expensive. Sounds like a great problem. It's not. 
 Ok That's done. Not too long, but true. I now understand why all the runners I know are so skinny. You literally have to try to keep body fat on yourself. I think about eating fatty food. And I pray it goes all to my boobs and ass. Instead I continue to turn into the runner-stick-figure. Ballin. 

PROS
  1. I can eat whatever I want. Almost whenever I want. When you're running 15+ miles a week, that hunger every few hours may be annoying, but it's fantastic for food lovers. I happen to be a food lover. 
  2. I have finally lost the weight I've always wanted to. I am currently smaller and fitter than I've ever been in my life, even at peak of swimming. The lack of clothing choices I have right now (One pair of shorts, almost no skirts.) is worth how much healthier I am now compared to high school.
  3. The runners high is everything and more of what people see. There is nothing like getting up at 5:00, running, being showered and to work before 8:00AM and feel amazing.  It's better than coffee, it's better than chocolate (...maybe..) and It's worth having to go to bed early for. 
  4. I get to think, or not think. To organize my life, or not. My brain kind of floats wherever it wants when I'm going at a pace where I'm not dying up hills. It's think time. 
  5. It's something I can do with the BF. The love of my life, who coincidentally actually got me into running as well, is my favorite running partner.  I love getting up at 7 and running with him.  He may be a lot faster, and can run a lot further, but knowing he's there to help me and train me is the best support I've ever had. I may have yelled at him a few times during some training runs in the beginning but he obviously knew more than I did how far I could push myself. I'm glad someone knew. 
  6. Not-so-free-T-shirts. Unlike college where you really do get free T-shirts, there's an entry fee..but races are amazing and the T-shirt is a bonus. I love races because everyone is so happy. No matter how early the start, runners are some of the happiest people I've ever seen. 
  7. I'm out of my party phase. I hate feeling sluggish in the morning or on a day where I want to run. And I definitely hate ruining a day of a good run with too much beer. Consequentially I'm a lightweight and don't go out as much. Instead I cuddle up with the BF, watch a movie, cook some pasta, and get up with the sun to run around the trails. It's worth it.
So despite the fact that none of my clothes fit and I'm constantly hungry. Despite that I go to bed early to get up early for no apparent reason to outsides. Despite that I'm not the most social and party 21 year old college student, I'm absolutely in love and stuck on running.  And can't wait to keep going and get better. It's worth every con because every pro counts twice.  

Speaking of run, I'm thinking 4 miles tomorrow?

10$ Margarita Pitchers: AVOID

Friday marked a wonderful day of the beginning of a free weekend. Free of the robot I've been working on for a long time now.  My team and I, all suited up for success, only had a few more hours before we were done and I knew afterward I would most likely be finding somewhere to consume bountiful amounts of alcohol.  I also knew my usual Saturday morning long run was probably out of the question.
Murphy's Law was our name. Ultimately our downfall..
The Arenas.  They look silly right?
The colors made me feel kiddish.
I'll be the first to say I absolutely love this class but DAMN is it time consuming. It's finally a hands on ME class with coding, machining, tinkering, trash talking and presenting.
Jeeves prepared for battle

The trash talking was mostly done by the boys.  In a class with only 4 girls out of 35 of course any competitive atmosphere is going to turn into a "my-dick-is-bigger-than-yours".  Luckily I had four other teammates to let do that so I didn't have to.
My team left me to fix Jeeves.
Picture thanks to BF











Anyway, it was stressful.  Lots of technical difficulties. Lots of yelling.  No cussing though, that would be a DQ (Wow was this a hard one for me).  All in all it was good clean competitively mean fun.

Is there even is such a thing?

The BF and I went out for mexican and some margaritas at La Fonda and were pleasantly surprised by 10$ pitchers.

Oh buddy do I love margaritas.  I however 1) do not drink anymore and cannot hold my alcohol and 2) have very adverse effects to lots of sugar.  Two pitchers later I was stumbling around in my too-tall-heels and thinking "this is going to hurt tomorrow".  I didn't get out of bed until 11 and proceeded to live off of Powerade Zero and saltines for the first few hours of the day.
Obviously I didn't run that morning, or do much of anything that entire day.

My plan was to get up Sunday then and run with the BF for a long, slow, loving and recovering 6 miles. The alarm went off at 7 and we proceeded to wake up at 9. And I woke up with a headache and backache. I ended up relaxing by the pool for a few hours and read on BF's couch-ton (the couch-futon)...so this was an anti-running weekend.  Actually this was more of an anti-productivity weekend.

I ran this morning (oucchh) , I'll discuss it later after I mull over a post I've been thinking about for a while: my likes and dislikes of becoming a runner.

Friday, July 23, 2010

Goal Post

So in the spirit of competition, with myself, I've decided to list out some goals of mineNow they will be solidified in the in-tra-webs.


GOALS (running)
- 5k Time under 28 minitues (PR: 28:55)
-10k Time under 60 minitues (PR: 1:03:19)
-Long runs of 10 miles
-At least 15 miles a week (eventually bumped up to 20)
-Half marathon in the fall?


Ok so maybe not super intimidating but I like to keep my goals in the reachable zone.  The half marathon will be a stretch.  Right now I'm ok running at 10k and that's the furthest I've gone. I think once I perfect the slow paced never-ending-runs I'll be ok for a half. We shall see. 


I woke up feeling like a train hit me this morning, as well as someone was holding my eyelids shut.  It's been a rough morning and my coffee hasn't done much good.  Rest day today, Maybe run tomorrow. It's supposed to be my long day (maybe 6mi?) but I may or may not have a reason to go out and celebrate/drink tonight.


This means not getting up early. A hearty not-awesome-for-me breakfast and a day laying by the pool.  I need to work on my tan anyway, I have a horrible shorts/sock tan...


Alright, back to "work".







Thursday, July 22, 2010

Oh yeah, just like the wind.

So my 4 mile run this morning (yes I did complete the 4 miles I assigned myself) felt like it was going to kill me. I woke up with a slight headache, I'll blame the excess food and 2 mojitos from dinner last night, and just a bad feeling of tired that I couldn't shake. Now mind you, no one is happy about 5am. NO ONE should be happy about 5am unless you're getting paid boatloads of cash for it. Instead, I am paying for it in calories and hours of sleep. Good to know I've gone crazy.

Anyway, got up, stretched a bit, drank some powerade and popped a few of those new sport jelly beans (they're awesome) and headed out with the goal of 4 miles. By the time I hit .5 I knew I was in for a painful run. My body just did not want it this morning. I also think I was going a bit too fast. My pace turned out to be 9:30 min/mile. Which I'm super pumped about considering that about 8 weeks ago 4 miles would have been at about 11+ min/mile pace (I also would have been dying and had to stop many times) but I should have eased off. My pride definitely got in the way of training.

I've been on cloud 9 and feeling invincible after last week I ran 16 miles total and was starting to crank out 3 miles at a time without really thinking. This morning I've already got my weekly tally (since Monday morning) up to 12.66. Since I've realized I can run 4 miles I don't really like running anything less, unfortunately I don't think my body agrees with my logic.

I'm currently in the process of bumping up my weekly training to 15 or more miles a week. Last week felt pretty easy, it was a breakthrough week for me actually. I'm starting to see I can do a lot more than I think I can. Now I just need to know when I can't do everything.

I hurt, I'm exhausted, and I ran out of coffee this morning. Needless to say I lack my usual runners high this morning.

Wednesday, July 21, 2010

What Not to eat for dinner.


Dear roommate,

Please refrain from eating like this in the future, it makes me feel pretty ill.

Love, your fellow roomie.

Here is Thea, my close close friend, eating her dinner/craving/snack/5pm happy hour. Ice cream, dark chocolate syrup, dark chocolate chips, whip cream, peanut butter, and a spoon. No need for a bowl, that would be silly.

But it's totally ok, cause it's fat free.

I could not partake in this fun, I need to run 4 miles tomorrow.

After a few minutes of this and lots of giggling on both sides, she said she felt sick. This ill feeling in her stomach obviously meant she needed greens. So she brought out the broccoli. I am jealous of how simple this correlation is in her head.