Catching up

Wow, time flies......

I've felt a little dis shelved, disorganized recently; my running has been o.k.; work has been o.k. but nothing has been great. Quite honestly, I think I was just plain old burnt out. I just got back from 4 nights in Sunriver (Central Oregon); no kids, no dogs, and nothing that we had to do - IT WAS AWESOME. We lingered over the newspaper with coffee; watched movies; I read and my husband watched basketball; we rode bikes; we sat in the hot tub and I got one short run in.

We spent all say Saturday doing the tourist thing and ended up putting almost 450 miles on the car - we ended up in California, it was wild! I'll post some photos in the next day or so. I feel energized and ready to take on the world.

I'm excited I'm going to have my first "bloggy meet up" tomorrow evening; I'm going to meet Alisa and hopefully Marya for a run down at the Portland Waterfront. It's so exciting to meet new people!

And for more good news.......I won Marcia's RunningSkirt Giveway over the weekend; I'll be traveling to Chicago for work in mid April and I am really hoping I can get together with Marcia for a run or glass of wine :-)

I did get a refund check from the failed coach experience and it seems to have cleared my bank so I can move on. It's funny how things happen; I had originally wanted to do some strength training and was hoping to participate in a Fitness Challenge at my gym. The Fitness Challenge never happened and so I went looking for other options to improve my general fitness and running & found the coach that didn't work out. I was browsing the gym web site the other day and was reading the bio's for their trainers; lo and behold, one of them is a gal who is a 2:48 marathoner who placed 50th in the 2000 Olympic trials! She was eligible to compete in 2004 as well, but choose to not participate in the trials. It could be fate, destiny or whatever you believe in - I'm going to call her this week, talk to her, see what her philsophy is & maybe give her program a try.

Life is good......

TGIF

It is Friday and it is warm & sunny in Portland - yippee! I am one happy gal.

I had a great hill run last night; 7 miles and it felt really good. I haven't had the best running week in terms of number of days; I need to get my rear in gear, Eugene is in 6 weeks.

I am without a running coach; I am really bummed as I was just getting in the swing of his workouts, my schedule, etc. I got an email from him about a week ago and he stated that he had a family issue and had to move out of town (back home) unexpectedly. He was sorry and would be refunding my money......I haven't gotten my money back yet and when I first hired him he indicated that he could coach anyone, anywhere and didn't need to be in the same city. It really doesn't all add up and I sure hope that I get a refund check in the mail soon.

I do intend to follow part of his advice; more hill runs and more miles at a slower pace, but past this I'm not sure where my training is going. I need to figure it out soon, I have three marathons coming up. I dug out an old training schedule that I have followed in the past for long runs and my first 20 miler is this weekend; Sunday to be exact. I will do about 6-7 miles on my own & then meet two friends for the rest. As always, Starbucks at the finish.

Have a great weekend, whatever you do or wherever you go.

Monster PR

I am so stoked; I ran the Shamrock 15k this morning and finished in 1:20:29 - this is a 9-1/2 minute PR for me at this event. I am feeling so good; my splits are here. I need to say that my pod tracked the course at 9.5 miles so this data is based on that distance:

9:02
8:50
8:56
8:40
8:34
8:22
7:54
7:40
8:16
4:12 (for the last .5)

Regardless, this is an awesome pace for me over this distance. The course is about 4-1/2 miles UP and 4-1/2 miles DOWN; with maybe .3 of flat mixed in. I was amazed when I saw my splits going up the hill; I didn't pay any attention at all when I was running and thought I was going much slower.

I hope everyone had a great weekend!

I will take it any way I can get it

I am so stoked - I got my FIRST EVER Age Group award this past Saturday; at the Oregon Road Runners Club 30k, 3rd Place Women 45-49. I present this for evidence!


This was especially cool, because I really didn't race the event; it was a training run for me. I was also a little worried as my training has been off a bit recently and I really wasn't sure I was ready to cover the distance.

It was a perfect day for running in Oregon; Champoeg is a State Park about 45 minutes South of Portland. The low in the morning was in the high 30's but the afternoon high hit 65 - unheard of this time of year. I carpooled down with 4 of my running mates and all 5 of us placed in our age groups; two of my friends won their age group. If I ever get the gratuitous photo of all of us posing with our ribbons I will share it.

The race was supposed to start at 9:00 a.m. but didn't start until almost 9:15; really no biggie to me. There was also a 10k event and both races started at the same time; small demerit here. The bummer about this event was that it was actually 3 - 10k's; i.e. 3 loops :-( When we turned the corner to start the third 10k loop I let out an audible UGH; I really wasn't looking forward to doing another loop; oh well, I gutted it out and finished feeling strong.

How was your weekend?

Catching up

Wow, where has the time gone......It's been a heck of a few weeks. On a not so positive note my brother in law passed away recently. It's really a very sad story and I don't want to bore anyone or sadden them but I will say this; he was visiting from Montana for some surgery and was recovering at our home. We found him dead and think he had been dead about 5-6 hours; he was only 58 and while his health wasn't good, no one expected this. Needless to say this has occupied most of my life for the past few weeks. This is an experience I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy; there was a parade of people through our home, including the police who must "investigate" any deaths that are outside of a hospital or other care facility.

I am on Week 3 with my running coach; my running has suffered a bit because of my brother in law's passing. I've gotten in some of my runs, but have missed some as well. My coach wants me to run more miles, at a slower pace to build my stamina. I'm not sure yet how it's going. I am registered for a 30K this weekend so I guess that will give me an idea of how I am progressing. The plan is to run the first 10K nice and easy & open it up for the rest of the race. My BQ Goal race is going to be the Newport Marathon on June 5th, so I have plenty of time to get ready.

We did get up to Central Oregon for the weekend and to Mt. Bachelor for a day of skiing - we all really needed to get away.

Check out these really cool giveaways, but please don't enter either of them as I want to win ;-):

Marcia has a cool KettleWorx giveaway
Tricia has a nifty Running Skirts giveaway

I know there are tons more giveaways, but I am so far behind in my blog reading that I know I have missed some.

Happy Friday and have a great weekend - the sun is shining in Portland!