Just Plodding Along

a zumba stick and muscle pump stick over and over and over again. It hurts so good. Taking a fitness class outside of my comfort zone makes is pretty obvious that my overall fitness may be lacking. My arms hurt so bad yesterday after muscle pump I had a hard time driving the car. You want me to turn the wheel......I just don't have it in me. My little t-rex arms hurt so bad the D had to make dinner and did a mighty fine job. Which is sad for him because now I will expect dinner perfection every night of the week from now on. Now get in the kitchen and cook for me (see what you get for being good at something around here). Got some new running supplies superfeet and shoes. Maybe this will help with the hip issue which is slowly getting better (stretching, icing, varied workouts and funny enough doing drills where I shuffle sideways, run backwards and skipping seem to be helping). It would appear I need new inserts every three to four months. Which sucks because they run abo...

Catching the shuttle buses between 4am and 5am for the Mount Lemmon Half means an early wake up. The night before I laid out my stuff since I knew my brain would be dead at 3:30 in the morning.  I also remembered that last time coming down the mountain roads in a bus made me almost puke on the poor lady next to me so I popped one of these bad boys in my pocket to take after the race but before the bus ride down. No one deserves to be vomited on after trudging up Mount Lemmon. D got up to wish me luck and take the traditional pre-race double thumbs up picture and then went back to bed. Logistically having spectators at this race is kind of a nightmare. The only good place to park and hang out is at the finish but that means driving up 26 miles of switchback mountain roads behind a pilot car to get there. I gave D the morning off and headed out on my own to once again tackle the mountain.   The start was just like last time, just a timing pad. It seemed l...

Unofficial  Mount Lemmon time 2:47:40. Ten minutes faster than last time. Now must lay on floor in full compression gear and nap.  Full race review to come. I remember why I wasn't going to do this one again. Because it is flippin hard. Gosh dang my legs hurt.

Yesterday I headed over to Fleet Feet to pick up my race packet for the Mount Lemmon Half . It was a quick pick-up, there were no expo booths unless you count the entire running store as an expo. Which I did. Shirt: I think an improvement over last year They also gave us water bottles. My guess is that they were left over from last year since it is last year's logo.  My powers of deduction are incredible I know.  I had a $25 voucher to use at Fleet Feet (if you sign-up to be a member for every gazillion you spend (all right $200) you get $25 to use in the store. Getting to the $200 limit is pretty easy if you buy running shoes there and geriatric flip flops . My goal was to buy some Nuun. I have been wanting to try it. I also want to be on their hood to coast relay team next year if they once again sponsor female bloggers. Some of my favorite bloggers are on their teams this year and I think it would be so much fun. I figure the first step is to invest ...

So I am once again dragging my butt up Mount Lemmon. I am pretty sure after I did it the last time I wasn't going to do it again. It is completely uphill. Well there is a little bit of a downhill or as one guy last time described it: an eight mile hike with a 5 mile run at the end. Pretty much.  But the lure of the cheap half (registered for this one for $55) and proximity to my house (near Tucson) made it irresistible. Apparently they are cracking down and no music is allowed for real this time. Last year they said that and everyone and their mom had music except for me cause I am a rule follower. So ethical dilemma of my time: to bring the Ipod or not. It would be very helpful to have Beyonce, Katy and Lady Gaga pacing me up the mountain. There is some nice symmetry with doing this half as number 15. I am half way through my goal of running 30 half marathons before turning 30. This half kicked of the half madness for me last fall and was the first one ...

Saturday is the so I need some goals besides stay upright and don't die (though these goals may reappear when I run the Horsetooth 1/2 and the Mount Lemmon 1/2 ). As always drinking while trying to run or move forward at a rapid pace without drowning, choking or soaking anyone but myself seems like a good goal to keep. I have conquered taking a gel while running pretty well so at least I can feed myself in motion I guess. The weather currently forecasts a low of 57 and a high of 72, so potential for perfect running weather for the 7:30 a.m. though I guess it will be a little on the warmer side but I have been running around that time while training (on purpose of course not because I am too lazy to get out of bed earlier or the fact that I refuse to leave the house without sipping my cup of coffee).  I have been training hard and even doing speed work once a week the last two weeks (though today's 5 mile speed work turned into a regular run after my shines were...

Okay so there wasn't really much madness going on this month. Actually pretty tame. Monthly mileage equaled 64.5 miles, a little on the low side but I did take some time to rest after running a gazillion (3) 1/2s in February. I have started incorporating speedwork once a week (I have done it twice but still think it deserves a round of applause). I have run 212.6 miles since January 1st. I have also tried to incorporate more days of running and slowly up my weekly mileage. I would eventually like to be in the 30 miles per week range but want to take it slow since increasing intensity with speedwork (okay quicker plodding) with more miles seems like a recipe for injury and me being stuck spinning. I am also teaching myself to not hate the treadmill. That is slow going. I ran one half this past month the Arizona Distance Classic  in 2:14 and obtained one medal. On the agenda for April: Lake Havasu Half, Horsetooth Half, and Mount Lemmon Half in that order...

This morning the alarm went off at 5a.m. and I again had anger issues with the early hour but managed to roll myself out of bed, down ice coffee and be ready to go by 5:30. New Razzy Roo headband for the win. Apparently at 5:30a.m. I look slightly deranged but am loving my outfit D got up to take me to the race. That was a nice surprise since he hadn't been feeling well the night before and no one feels good at 5a.m. There was only a 30 minute drive to the start/finish line in Oro Valley which was next to Ventana Medical Center. There were real bathrooms and porto potties for everyone. They also had a VIP area where if you paid extra you got to eat a bagel in a roped off area and a zip up jacket plus your own porto potty to share. There was probably more involved but I only saw bagels and toilets. They had pacers for every 15 minutes that had yellow balloons with the estimated finish time attached to them. For a brief minute I thought I should ru...

This weekend my Mom & Step dad came to town to visit so D and I got to be tourists and it was super fun. Friday morning I did a three mile run with 10:30 miles. Almost ready for the Olympics. After suffering through three hours of statistics class on hierarchical linear modeling (gross) I scooped up the parental units from their campus touring and we went to the San Xavier Mission south of Tucson. San Xavier Mission  Besides the usual kind of creepy factor that comes from the dark and Gothic nature of Catholic religious art it was really beautiful. Snake door handle to get into the mission Inside the Mission This appeared to be a tomb and was filled with status of Jesus. And their eyes followed you. I didn't stick around. San Xavier Mission  I didn't let D go, instead I made him stay at work. One of us has to be a functioning member of society. So while he brought home the bacon I spent some of it shopping...