There's a chocolate moose, on the loose...12 miles.

This morning I was scheduled to run with my friend Holly, but when she had to cancel last minute due to a sick child, I decided to do the same route we had planned anyway.  Chris drove me up to the top of Buckskin Rd. and I ran the first 12 miles of the Pocatello Marathon route.  This is my happy place, especially on a day like today.  It was absolutely gorgeous running out there.  I wish I could bottle the images, sounds and smells and share them with all of you.  The air was warm and breezy, it smelled like wild grass and pine, and there were a hundred different kinds of birds making all kinds of sounds.  Gorgeous.  On the drive up to the top of the hill, we spotted a moose lying in the trees...

And some deer on a hill...

I had a fabulous time, running without any music playing today, just listening to the peace and quiet of country.

And not a bad pace, either.  I did my 4:1 run/walk/run ratio and finished 12.05 miles in 2:09, an average pace of 10:44 min./mile.

This is why I run. :)

12.5 miles, on my own.

Between running with my husband and my friend, Holly, it's been a while since I've done a long run by myself.  This morning, there was a thin layer of fresh, light snow on the ground, but since it wasn't too cold, I decided to go ahead and go for it.  After I took all of the kids to school, I ventured out and did a 12.5 mile loop from the house.  It was actually quite peaceful and therapeutic for me to be out there on my own.  I felt pretty good, for the most part.  I've been fighting a mild head cold for the past couple of days, and my legs did start to get a little tired and "twitchy" after about 10 miles, but I'm just really happy with how strong I've been feeling lately.  My pace wasn't quite as fast as it is when I run with Holly, but it was decent for me and I finished the 12.5 miles in about 2 hours and 20 minutes.

When I got home, the house was so quiet and empty.  I put last night's episode of The Bachelor on Hulu, and got on the recumbent bike, working my legs for another 90 minutes.

Yesterday I had the chance to speak on the phone with my friend and running mentor, who will be running the Ogden Marathon with Chris and myself, along with a couple of other people.  After talking with him, I felt a resurgence of excitement about the marathon, and the fact that we're just planning a fun time takes the pressure off.  There will be at least two in our group for whom this will be their first marathon (including my very own husband), so we all agreed that we will try to stay together and not worry about our individual times.  This concept is fine with me.  As much as I love to improve and reach my own personal goals, I really just want to enjoy each marathon experience.  Last week I signed up for the Pocatello Marathon ~ my second time running this one ~ and I plan to focus on that one to work towards my own PR.  It's in September, so I can use the Ogden Marathon in May as an opportunity to gain more marathon experience, without too much stress, then work hard through the summer, and run Pocatello and see how much I've improved.

14.5 miles!

This morning my friend, Holly and I set out for a long run starting at around 8:30am.  My husband drove us up to the top of the Pocatello Marathon route, where the temperature was 11 degrees ~ almost 10 degrees colder than it was down by our house!  I love running this route, though, because the first 6 miles are mostly downhill.  It's an exhilarating feeling to run through the mountains, and as the sun rose higher, the trees and ground were glistening and sparkling from the ice and snow.  It was so beautiful.

So, when I run with Holly, I get in my tough workout for the week.  We ran 14.5 miles in 2 hours and 34 minutes, and that was including walking breaks.  That's an average pace of 10:37min./mile.  As tired as I was when we finished, it felt great knowing I had pushed through the rough spots and forced my body completely out of it's comfort zone.  That's where we grow, right?  So Holly was able to get in a long run before she leaves later this week with her sweet family for a trip to Disney World in Florida, thanks to the Make-a-Wish foundation and their son, 5 year old Cooper beating cancer!  I'm so happy for them!

Thoughts on the marathon.

I have been thinking a lot this week about this whole marathon thing.  I'm a slow runner, it's a fact.  I know that speed is all relative, but generally speaking, for a race of average to small size, such as the Pocatello Marathon is, I fall into the bottom third of the pack.  I would say that the "average" runner falls into the sub-four category, and ooohhhh...I am ever so close to being able to say that I run a "four - (something) - hour" marathon.  Despite the fact that I had a PR at 5:12, I was feeling pretty discouraged the couple of days following the race.  As I perused the race results, which were also published in our local newspaper, thank you so much, and I recognized several other women who are acquaintances and I saw how they fared, I felt like a snail.  Granted, all three of the women I'm thinking of ran the half marathon, not the full, but they did it a lot faster than I probably could have, and they are women of similar circumstance - mothers, similar age group, etc.

I assuaged my ego by going to a quote by Frank Shorter: "You can actually suffer a little bit more by going slowly than when you're going really fast.  A faster marathon might even be easier than a slow one, in terms of what it takes out of you mentally."  If you think about, it's probably a lot harder on the body to be on your feet, pounding the pavement, regardless of speed, for 5 hours versus 3 hours, right?  Besides physically, just think about the mental fatigue differences a slower runner experiences during the additional hour or two they're out on the road, working hard to get to the finish line.  I mean, I have to believe some people are just genetically and physiologically predisposed to be faster runners.  I spend so many flippin' hours each week during training running my butt off, though ironically my butt does not seem to be getting any smaller, and my speed has improved only minimally.

I'm also discovering that my motivation to run is largely inspired by other people.  During the last few weeks of my training I did a lot of research on runner Jeff Galloway.  I've written of him in other posts.  He has said, "The more you frame the marathon as a stressful experience, the more negative messages you'll receive.  It's just as easy to frame it as a positively challenging journey."  I like this idea and attitude so much.  I have always said that the whole purpose of training for and running a marathon is to feel good, to feel the sense of accomplishment after hard work and consistency.  If you're not having fun, even when it's painful or tiring, why do it?  There are other ways to exercise that are far less trying.  There are other ways to lose or maintain weight.  I have found that I am drawn to this unique niche by the intrigue of the unknown.  You never know how your body will react.  You never know exactly what the long run will feel like that training day, or on race day.  You never know what the weather will be like, or the landscape, or the people you'll meet.  It's all so alluring to me.

With all of these thoughts floating around in my mind, I also feel drawn to Jeff Galloway's train of thought, so I've ordered a couple of his books, which should be arriving this week.  His training method using a run/walk/run ratio for the long runs, which also, by the way, includes training runs up to and beyond the race distance, is supposed to minimize or eliminate injury and post-run recovery time.  You will be hearing more from me on his training method after I've read the books and as I start to implement his suggestions for training.

I will always strive for improvement, but I have come to terms with the idea that I may never be as fast as I'd like to be.  I will just keep on keepin' on...

Pocatello Marathon 2011, Race Recap! ♥

Okay, folks.  Here goes the latest race recap!  Let's start with how things went last night...pretty smoothly, actually.  The kids all went to bed well for me, and Chris and I were able to take some Tylenol PM and were in bed by 8.  We planned to watch a show or two to help us relax before going to sleep.  Right after I had settled into bed, I heard a knock on the front door.  It was a delivery of flowers for me from my beloved friends, my running (and life) mentor and his wife, wishing me luck on my race.  So thoughtful and sweet ~ thank you!!

After that the house was quiet and I fell asleep pretty quickly, probably by 9 or so.  Unfortunately, I'm not used to getting a lot of sleep.  I'm usually functioning on about 6 hours on average, so throw in the pre-race jitters and I was awake at 1:45am.  And I could not go back to sleep.  I had set the alarm for 4, but I just laid in bed until around 3 when my 5 year old came to get in bed with us, then I just went ahead and got up and started getting ready.  After getting dressed, I used the foam roller for a bit, ate a Clif Bar, drank some water, got all my stuff ready, then woke up my husband.  He drove me to the shuttle at 4:45.  I was on the first bus to go to the starting line area.  It was freezing cold (in the 30's) and pitch dark.  We waited around until the start, a little late, at 6:25.

We were off!  I had my Garmin set to do my 3:1 minute run/walk intervals.  Of course, things started out great.  I felt good, I was happy, the scenery was breathtaking as the sun rose over the mountains.  I started to sip on water at aid stations starting around mile 6, I think, and then from there I started to fuel with some Shot Bloks and Energy Beans.  I was hoping to preempt the fatigue by fueling early and often, without overdoing things.  I actually felt really decent up until about mile 10 or so.  Then, even with the walking breaks, my feet were killing me.  I think I may have tied my shoes a little too tight or something, because I was having pain that I hadn't experienced before.  I just kept on pushing, though.  I made it to the half-way point without too much hurrah, and just kept at it, keeping with my 3:1 intervals.  After mile 15 or 16, even though I was continuing the intervals, I also walked through all the aid stations and just had a few sips of water at each one.  I was really hurting at that point.  By the time mile 18 arrived, I seriously wanted to quit.  My legs were aching like never before.  Unfortunately for them (my legs), my heart and head don't quit, so on I went, focusing on one mile at a time.

At some point after 20 miles, I had resigned myself to the idea that it was highly unlikely I would break 5 hours as I had hoped, but I just changed my goal to finish and told myself it was okay to take extra walking breaks whenever I needed, but just walk fast!  I was thinking to myself, "Oh, crap.  I'm probably going to be like 6 hours!"  This is the point when I realized it would have been nice to have been running with a friend or something.  I was all up in my own head for mile after painful mile, with no one to talk to!  As I was getting near the last turn before the road to the finish, my Garmin beeped at me, and when I looked down at it I saw that I had  just barely hit the 5 hour mark and I only had about 1.2 miles to go ~ WHAT?!!  I kicked it into high gear (sort of) at that point and ran (almost) all the way in to the finish, and after seeing and hugging my husband (who had finished his 1/2 marathon in 2:18), I stopped my Garmin:

Okay, so I didn't break 5 hours, but that's still a PR for me and by more than 10 minutes, so I'm pretty stoked.

 The medals are beautiful this year.  The full marathon medal (top) lists the names of the roads we run on the route along the outer edge of the ribbon, which means it has the name of the road we live on, because it's part of the route.  How cool is that?

So far my recovery seems like a tough one.  In other words, right now I feel like crap. :)  My legs are still aching bad, I have a headache, and I have a mess of black, throbbing toenails and blisters in very weird places on my feet.  At least the weather was perfect and though it was sunny, it never got too hot and I didn't get sunburned this time.  I'm really looking forward to some much needed rest tonight, and maybe for the next few days...then to start planning the next race...☺