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July, 2009:

Training Goals: 7/20 – 7/26

Jul 20th, 2009
by gazelle.
8 comments

7/13 – 7/19, 2009 Recap

Monday: Weights + Elliptical. – Partial Success. Due to school constraints, I only got about 30 minutes of strength in & no cardio.

Tuesday: Either hill repeats or track. – Partial Success - I did a 3 mile track workout + 2 mile walk

Wednesday: PM bike ride + short weight circuit. – Complete Fail. Due to traffic + school, I did not have time for a workout on Wednesday.

Thursday: Optional AM 3 mile run + PM yoga – Complete Success – I did a 4 mile run + PM yoga

Friday: swim (1200+ yds) + trail run – Complete Success - 1200 yd swim + 8.7 mile trail run

Saturday: swim/bike brick – potentially an open water swim. – Complete Success: 15ish minute open water swim followed by 6.2 mile bike followed by 0.3 mile run.

Sunday: long run – 14 miles  - Complete Success - 14 miles in 2:19 or so.  My garmin got turned off at some point, and I lost some miles/time so am piecing together the first 10.25 miles from JM’s records (10.25 miles in 1:39 or so – FAST!) and the last 3.75 miles from my own records (39:55 – not as fast). Overall pace of approximately 9:56. I would just like to point out that Sunday’s long training run of 14 miles was more than 6 minutes faster than my first half marathon RACE. Am suddenly feeling like a rock star. A rock star that ate too much pizza Sunday afternoon. :)

This week was a fantastic week for me. For the first time EVER, I had a 30 mile week. I also completed my first open water swim, and had a great brick on Saturday. Although I have one failed workout day, most days were better than planned, and I’m feeling really strong and fast.

I just want to throw some major props to my workout friends who not only run further than they planned but also to those that are major inspirations! I love you guys and wouldn’t be nearly as dedicated if it wasn’t for you. Love you PBRs!

July 20 – July 26, 2009 (edited a bit Monday afternoon)

Monday: strength/elliptical – same old, same old

Tuesday: AM tempo run (5 miles) + PM bike

Wednesday: AM swim (*fingers crossed*) + PM yoga in the park (North Park blocks, 6:30, by the elephants – be there or be sucktastic)

Thursday: AM easy run (3 miles) + PM regular yoga

Friday: swim (1300 yds) + trail run (8 miles)

Saturday: open water swim + bike

Sunday: long run (15 miles)

Yay! I Didn’t Drown!

Jul 18th, 2009
by gazelle.
5 comments

After a morning of failed garage saling with my kick-ass neighbor, I suited up in my fancy tri-suit for my first open water swim. I met the Ambitious One & Mr. Pi at Blue Lake, and after a bit of chatting, we got in. We swam 3 “laps” along the back swim area boundary, and practiced sighting & navigating around children. :) I felt a lot more comfortable in the water than I had anticipated, and that makes me happy. It felt harder than laps in the pool, but I really had a good time – which just goes to show me that I’m definitely an outdoor person. I hate the gym, and have decided that I will be doing more lake swimming now!

After the swim, I hopped on my road bike (I’d rather ride that during the tri, but it has issues – so I was giving it a go) and road 6.2 miles. I averaged 13 mph on my ride, even including the 3 miles into the Marine Drive headwind. After I got my bike back in my car, I went out for a quick run. Since I took an unscheduled detour yesterday during my run, and since I have 14 miles planned for tomorrow, that would have left me at 29.7 miles for the week – and I really want that 30! So I went out for a .3 mile run! My legs felt dead, and I felt like I was running through molasses, I was so slow! I was starting to feel a bit warmer by the time I quit (I’m not a super overachiever – I went exactly 0.3 miles!), and my pace was a not-too-shabby 9:20 for that very, very brief run.

I was super thirsty after all this – it’s still pretty warm here in Portland (although not as bad as it has been), and we got started about 1:30 this afternoon.

Overall, I’m feeling a LOT better about my upcoming triathlon (in two weeks!) and even starting to think about next year – and longer tris….

I hope you’re have as good a weekend as I am! I’m off to do some homework now, and then head down to the Jazz Festival.

Corn Chronicles! Friday Update!

Jul 17th, 2009
by gazelle.
7 comments

First – the corn. I was concerned for a while during the past week, because the corn children were starting to look like a bunch of unwashed hippy women who don’t share their ‘pits, but things are starting to work themselves out, and instead of just silk protruding, there are actual ears of corn showing now!

Ulysses is still the the tallest, although Carrie & Amy are right up there, too!

The tallest corns are too tall for me to measure accurately anymore, but I think they’re right around 7 feet tall now – about 14-15 inches taller than last week! They are still growing!

James is tasseling, finally, but still not growing very tall. He is 40 inches now – which is 9″ more than last week, so maybe I shouldn’t criticize!

The corns are getting all crazy, starting to have ‘real relationships’ and are less moody than before. Many of them are filling out college applications, although a couple are eying trade school instead, and a couple (Kelly & Meredith, notably) have talked about moving to Hollywood to become film stars. Although that isn’t the path I would’ve chosen for them, I certainly don’t want to squash their dreams!

ha ha ha – see what I did there? squash? ha? I slay me!

In other garden news, we’ve been eating well: green beans, zucchini, summer squash, onions, garlic, potatoes and one pepper.

The black beans are nearly ready for harvest – which is pretty exciting! The broccoli is done for now, I think, but I’m getting ready to plant for fall harvest soon, and may put in some more.

We have a lot of tomatoes. I am so excited!

There are also quite a few pumpkins & squashes! Including this monster:

The mustard is just starting to go to seed – which is great. I need to get a mortar & pestle so that I can grind the seeds up!

I have such grand plans for next year – I can hardly wait :) Here are some more pictures of this year’s though!

And now for my Friday workout report (I know that’s the most interesting EVER, right?)

So – I got going pretty early this morning and was proud of myself! I left home shortly after 8 and hit the pool. I swam 1200 yds, but wasn’t paying attention to time today. I wasn’t going hard at all, since I am planning an open water swim tomorrow with her & her.

After I finished up at the pool, I struggled into my running gear (it takes forever to wrangle a couple of sports bras when I’m still damp from the pool) and headed out to the trails.

I had a 7.4 mile loop planned. I started up Saltzman from the gate, and turned right on Maple Trail. After a while, Maple runs into Leif Erickson, and I ran back to Saltzman from there, and then turned right on Saltzman again & ran up to Wildwood. I went left on Wildwood for about 3 miles or so to the Maple Trail connector, and then Maple Trail down to Leif Erickson again. I was supposed to continue on Maple back to Saltzman & then back to the car, but I just couldn’t do it! The trails were super webby today, and I was about 3 spiders away from a meltdown. I turned and ran back on Leif Erickson to Saltzman & back to my car.

Total miles: 8.7

Total time: 1:45 (12 minute miles, more or less…as per usual)

And – to the spiders of Forest Park. I am sincerely sorry about destroying 8 million homes and pantries today. I am sorry for the death of a couple dozen of your family members, and I regret taking some of your dinners. however, might I suggest not building homes, pantries, etc. across the trails? I’m sure they’re great places to hang out, catch food, shoot the shit, etc., but no one will believe your “the one that got away” story anyway, and I don’t like washing you out of my hair when I get home. THANKS so much.

Ahem….tomorrow I am garage saling with my kick-ass neighbor, and then hitting Blue Lake for my swim and a bike.

I also have a shit-ton of homework to do this weekend, so will spend the rest of the day on that.

Sunday I’m doing my long run in Beaverton – 14 miles. It will be my longest intentional mileage ever (JM & I did end up doing 15 a few months ago, but that was an accident…)

In about an hour, I’ll be at Laurelwood for my Brew Review – hope to see you there!

AND – don’t forget. Wednesday July 22 – yoga in the park! North Park Blocks by the elephants – 6:30 PM!

Tuesday Night Speedwork

Jul 15th, 2009
by gazelle.
17 comments

First – the (obvious) good news. I did not die during my public speaking engagement this morning. Nor did I pass out or vomit on anyone. So win! And apparently I did a decent job (and would’ve done better without interrupters….).

Now – on to the Tuesday night speed work report. I need help deciding if this is a WIN or FAIL.

I spent some time yesterday blog-stalking Will Run For Wine & pulling as many of her track Tuesday workouts as I could. And then I picked the easiest looking one.

The plan:

Track Workout #1
warm-up: 2 miles (10 min/mile)
plyometrics
circuit w/ 400 repeats (@2:00) between
1 mile:9:00
400 recovery
4×400 @ 2:00
1 minute recovery
Cool down: 1 mile

Circuit:
3 x 10 pushups, 400m
3 x 10 tricep dips, 400m
2 x 10 single hamstring bridge, 400 m
30-50 crunches, 400 m
2 x 10 superman, 400 m

Plyometrics:
30 meters of skipping
10 meters of two-footed hopping
30 meters of bounding: Take a very long running stride with exaggerated knee lifts
10 to 15 jumping butt-kicks
Grapevine/Carioca

I walked from work to the nearest track as part of a warm-up. It was pretty warm already (80s), but the walk was down-hill & shady. I started out for my 2 mile warm-up, and then remembered how much I hate running more than 1 mile on a track.

I started following the plan, but skipped the plyos, because there were a shit-ton of people on the track, and although I’ve done plyos in a group before, I didn’t feel confident to do them alone in front of eleventy-billion others.

It was hot.

The first half of the workout went like this:

Track Workout #1
warm-up: 1.7 miles (9:42 min/mile)
3 x 10 pushups, 400m
3 x 10 tricep dips, 400m
3 x 10 single hamstring bridge, 400 m
30 crunches, 400 m

All my 400s were coming in at under 8:00 pace, which is not really what I was going for.

And then I was done. Seriously. I was getting weird stomach cramps. The track was filling up. I was feeling light headed. I decided to do a cool down mile & pack it in.

I did a cool-down 400 instead – at a 9:30 pace (way to cool down, Amy).

I ended up with exactly 3 miles in 27:22 (9:07 pace)….which isn’t bad at all, really.  Then I walked 3/4 of a mile to my car (total walk = 2 miles on top of 3 mile run).

I obviously was going out too fast in my warm-up, and really need to do the track workouts on a less crowded track, possibly in the AM. There is a track in my neighborhood that I’ll check out for my next speed work – hopefully it’s empty at 6 AM.

So – I didn’t complete the workout, so that part is a fail. But, I did complete some of the workout, which is better than nothing. Also, the 1.7 mile warm-up I did at 9:42 felt slow & comfortable – so that’s good, too, right? The first time (January 2008) I did a mile time trial (which last night’s warm-up certainly was not), I was thrilled to come in at 9:46. The second (and last) time I did a time trial (March 2008), I was at 8:59.  Last night’s warm-up was 1.7 miles at 9:42, and I’ve run a 5K at at 9:07 pace. In the last 18 months, I have gone from an average comfortable run pace of 11-12 minute miles to 10ish minute miles, and two years ago, I was excited when I was hitting 11-12 minute miles in races! I know I’m never going to be as fast as your Emilys or Jens of the world, and I really don’t care. I’m just excited that since taking up running about three years ago, I have gone from not being able to run three miles in a row & finishing a 5K in over 40 minutes to busting out three miles in under 28.

I’m also kinda wanting to do another 5K this fall to see if I can get in under 9 minute miles for the whole race. Hmmmm…..I think maybe I’ll have to look for one!

And, in addition to my question about the workout being a WIN or a FAIL, another question. Would it be unreasonable to do a 6.5 mile race two weeks before my marathon? 6.5 miles that I would have to commit to being under 10 minute miles, so no half-assed racing. Thoughts? Advice? A stern talking-to? Also, how soon after running a marathon could I have a goal race 5K? So many questions – so many wise friends!

ANXIETY!!!!

Jul 15th, 2009
by gazelle.
11 comments

Today, I have to talk in front of a group of faculty members where I work. I am not a faculty member. I am a lowly peon with nothing more than a BA in English. These are PhDs in medical fields.

I do not like public speaking.

And to make things worse, I woke up this morning with the first gigantic zit I’ve had since I was about 13 years old. Yes, I am blessed with great skin. So glad that my face chose today to remind me how blessed I usually am.

My boss laughed at me when I suggested I might need a shot before going into the (only 15 minutes why am I freaking out) presentation, but I was serious. Mostly.

I am wearing my confidence shoes, though:

Wish me luck – and if I make it through I will tell you a story about my track workout yesterday, and then you can help me decide if the workout was a WIN or a FAIL.

Off to vomit from nerves now!

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