Sunday Social and Week Recap

Posted by hellyontherun in Bloggers, Running and tagged with Blogging Buddies, Camelback Mountain, Echo Canyon Trail, Hiking, Marathon Training, Running July 21, 2014

Yay!!!! I finally got my internets back! Actually, about 30 minutes after I posted Friday’s post from my phone, it was back! You guys brought me luck ❤

Last week was a tough running week but the running I did do was pretty awesome.

On Monday, I headed to the treadmill and hit 7 miles at a 9:29 pace. I felt so good and could’ve kept going but reeled myself in 🙂

Sweat.

Tuesday, I was back on the gym and rode the bike 10.5 miles. But in my typical break-the-RLRF-rules, I met up with my run club in the evening for a 4 mile run that ended up being AWESOME.

Woohoo!!!

The reason this made me so happy is because I’ve been getting down on myself with my paces. I feel like I’ve hit a rut and have been struggling with every run it seems. I know the heat is a ~~big~~ huge factor, but not being able to get the times I “want” has been blowing my runner’s self esteem. Finally having a run that not only did I feel good but the times were what I liked was the pick-me-upper I needed!

That being said, I feel like this is something I need to work on–not putting so much focus on times and running for running. It’s hard for me to do this because I feel like there should be a purpose for every run and when I start to feel like there’s no improvement anywhere (pace, splits, distance, etc.) I start to get down on myself.

Anyway, Wednesday was supposed to be Christmas in July at track with my run club and I took my kids because my husband was out of town. I thought maybe my oldest would have fun running around the track. Yeah….no. As soon as we got there she threw a huge fit and we lasted all of 10 minutes before I packed both of them back in the car. On our way home, my daughter ended up throwing up all over herself and the car 😦 It turned out she had a stomach bug! I felt so bad for dragging her out in the heat and not realizing that her fussiness was due to her being sick. She had shown no signs earlier; but, after the car episode, the vomiting continued into the evening. I ended up taking her to the ER to get checked and I was so glad I did. She stayed home with me Thursday and Friday to recover and no running was done in those days.

Saturday, I met up with my run club for my long run. I had 9 miles on my plan and I was worried how I’d do considering I hadn’t slept well or run the past two days with my sick daughter. I ended up completing all 9 miles (yay!) and at a good pace– 9:52/mile.

Sunday, yesterday, I met up with the #RunEatTweetAZ crew for an early hike. My Arizona blogging buddy, Jeremy @ Confessions of an Amateur Athlete, created this group of local bloggers and once a month we meet up to run/hike and discuss all things running and blogging. There’s food afterwards of course 🙂 I missed the first meet-up but there was no way I was missing the second.

The alarm went off at 4:10 a.m. (<—-yes, crazy o’clock) and the plan was to meet at 5. I got there right on time only to find the trail CLOSED. What?!? Apparently, it didn’t open until sunrise and according to the ranger’s handy weather app, that wasn’t happening until 5:33…..

The line to park–

Once we got the parking situated, we all met up at the start and then headed on up. It was so fun to meet with bloggers whose stuff I’ve read and finally put the stories to a face. Like Zucchini Runner was late to the Phoenix Marathon this year (like, really, really late. Like they had already rolled up everything late.) but still ran it!! (<—Edited to add link to awesome story) And I also wanted to meet Shane @shootskdenaloha.com because he seriously has the best collection of compression socks ever.

At the top, Jeremy (aka-King of Selfies), took the necessary achievement pic and we all hung out enjoying the awesome weather that was happening.

The #RunEatTweetAZ crew (Photo Courtesy: Jeremy @ Confessions of an Amateur Athlete)

Our obligatory goofy pic (apparently, goofy means outstretched arms lol!) Photo Courtesy: Zucchini Runner

You know it’s a steep climb when they add a pole to help you up lol!

Hello elevation!

Photo Courtesy: Kristin @ Cook and Run With Kristin

It was a great Sunday and a great weekend. My daughter was back to her usual rambunctious self and mommy got to run and hike! 😀

How was your running weekend?

Have you climbed the Empire State Building? Or an elevation similar to it?

Plan shlam! My running weekend

Posted by hellyontherun in 5k, Running and tagged with Asics Kayano 20, Flying Ponytail, Marathon Training, New Shoes, Running, Shopping July 14, 2014

So you all know I’ve been very badly following the Run Less, Run Faster plan for my fall marathon. Yeah….I haven’t been doing a good job of running less or running faster.

Saturday was long run day and I set out and 5 in the morning for an 8 miler. I joined up with with my running club for this one and lo and behold, Running Schlub was there! I “met” Richard through one of my other fave bloggers, Piratebobcat. Richard visited my page when I wrote about my hate for the Heat (Miami, that is) and we’ve been blogging (and now real life!) buddies every since. Funny, because during our run, we never talked basketball lol! He was nice enough though to run at my pace that morning–I was struggling 😦

And in typical Helly fashion, I forgot to take a pic–I’m so bad at the picture taking…

Me and the Running Schlub

8 miles, 10:00/avg. mile

Sunday according to my plan is a cross training or rest day. I did neither.

Instead, my running club and a local Roadrunner Sports were hosting a Fun in the Sun 5k–nothing formal or timed, just a run to get us all together for a run and enjoy some sweet shopping discounts after.

Some of my friends wanted to get out there early for extra miles so of course I said yes. We got started at 6 and this was what awaited us:

at SIX in the morning!!!!

Needless to say, this was not the best of runs 😦 We I drudged along for 3 hot miles.

And after that, I did it all over again with the rest of my running group!

Double duty Sunday

That’s me on the right with my flying ponytail 😀

I mentioned sweet discounts–I got myself some new shoes!!!

My new beauties ❤

I’ve been currently rotating my Brooks Ravennas and Asics GT2000s but missed my Kayanos of old. I have the old 18s that I use just when I’m out and about because they’re way long over used on mileage. But I had been wanting to try out the new model for a while so I can’t wait to break them in!

I’m not overly brand loyal–I typically stick with Brooks and Asics for shoes. How about you? Are your brand loyal?

–How was your running weekend? Anyone race?

–Does your ponytail fly all over the place like mine does?

–Do you stick with your training plan verbatim or break the rules like I do?

Week(end) Recap

Posted by hellyontherun in Marathon, Running, Uncategorized and tagged with Fun Run, Humidity, Marathon Training, Marine Corps Marathon, Running, Weekend Recap July 7, 2014

I had written last week how I’d given myself a marathon training pre-season before I get down to business. Well, business has arrived and today is my first official day of training!! Woohoo!! I have 6 miles on the agenda and we’ll see how they go.

Last week was a busy week with preparation for the holiday on Friday (Independence Day here in the States) but I still managed to get quite a few runs in–

On Monday, my pre-season schedule had me running 4 miles, one warm-up, two tempo, and one cool down. Despite once again venturing out in 106 degree heat, it went far better than the previous Monday as my splits went like this:

Mile 1-9:21
Mile 2-8:44
Mile 3-8:41
Mile 4-8:53

The last cool down mile was a little too fast but I had begun Lebronning (cramping) and just wanted to get the run over with. I was happy to see that I was keeping my splits consistent again as it’s something I’ve been trying really hard to work on.

Tuesday according to my plan is a cross training day and I know this is where I might be cheating with Run Less, Run Faster. Tuesdays are group runs with my running group and I really like meeting up with them. It’ll be hard to give this day up to a day in the gym as I’d much rather hang out with them–I’m thinking if I did an easy-less than 4 miles-run followed up with the bike or something that it might work.

So the plan was to do some easy running but I ended up running and chatting with a girl who’s pretty fast. You can tell that I couldn’t keep up as my splits looked liked the hot mess that I was

Mile 1-9:06
Mile 2-9:17
Mile 3-9:27
Mile 4-9:47

Another what I was I thinking….

Wednesday was speed work at the track but like previous session, there wasn’t much speed happening. Unless you count me trying to eat my ice pop as fast as I could before it melted lol! Anyway, three miles done.

Cross training as planned for Thursday but because I knew I’d be running the following day for the holiday (Fridays are typically rest days) I made Thursday my day of rest.

Friday we were all up bright and early for a fun 5k with my run club. They had a splash mob-bish run planned so it was going to be some wet and wild fun!

Little did I know that the wet would really be sweat from the humidity going on that morning–holy cow!

This was at 6:50 in the morning!

The race itself was really fun as my running group always finds unique ways to make these get togethers interesting. We were told to arrive on time as the race would be chip timed and we needed to pick them up early before the race started.

My race chip 😀

We all do these in fun so it wasn’t a competitive 5k. I kept a decent pace (although difficult because I could really feel the humidity!) and finished in 28:45 (9:01/mile).

I had an 8 mile long run planned for Saturday and I was up at crazy 0’clock to get started. The humidity had carried over at at 5 in the morning and we were running in 82 degrees weather with 51% humidity. It was pretty awful and I could feel it the entire way. Luckily my plan’s long run pace was manageable and I stuck to it the entrée way: 8 miles (9:50/mile). I was actually really excited about this as I hadn’t run this far in a while (not counting the 27k trail run).

Working up some nice leg sweat.

Sunday was rest day with stretching and foam rolling.

Overall, a very productive week at just over 22 miles. I’m looking forward to the official first day of training today 🙂 16 weeks til Marine Corps Marathon!!

I’m Jesse Spano excited about this!!!

–How was your running week?

–Did you run/race this weekend?

–Get my Jesse Spano reference? 🙂