Sunday, May 11, 2014

It's Been Awhile


I guess it has been awhile since I have written here. There’s only so much that can be written about running before it becomes boring and repetitive. Maybe the same can be said about running itself which is why I have chosen to run a marathon this year. It is in October and I am very excited about running it.

I will start with a quick summary of my 2014 running season.

In January, I ran the January Winter Freeze series which is a 10K race held every Saturday in January. The first race was canceled because it was insanely cold. This was a really cold winter. The race was canceled for the volunteers who have to stand in the cold and not for the runners. I ran three out of the four races. My best time was 50:48. That’s better than last year.


January Freeze 10K. I'm the one in fluorescent green.

Running the very cold
Cupid's Chase.
I kind of 5K’d myself out the last two years and decided I was only going to run a few 5Ks this year. I picked the Cupid’s Chase 5K in February because I really enjoyed it last year. I didn’t enjoy it as much this year. I did get a first place age group win and a medal. My time was 24:something. The temperature was 8 degrees and I had a hard time breathing. It was colder than any of the January Freeze races.

In March, I ran a little four-miler and won overall female for that race. It was a really windy race an there were spots where it felt like I was going backwards. My time was 30:something. 

5K in Arkansas. I'm the one in black.
In April, I was in southern Missouri for work and would be there over the weekend. I found a race in Arkansas to run. It was on a small campus of Arkansas University. There were only 50 people, but it was a fun little race. The actual distance was 3.3 miles and my time was 25:something. I came in fourth overall which I thought was pretty good. I guess I’m fast in Arkansas.

My finisher medal.
My next race was the Binghamton Bridge Run Half Marathon which was last weekend. Last year, this was my big race for the year and I trained like crazy for it. This year, due to a lot of cold and snowy weather, I didn’t train as much and felt very unprepared for it. It was supposed to rain the day of the race, but it didn’t. Instead, the wind blew like crazy. This was a hard race. I have been battling hamstring injuries and at mile nine, the right hamstring started to hurt. At mile ten, the left hamstring and foot started to hurt. By mile 11, I really wanted to quit running, but that would have been really stupid with only a few miles to go. At mile 12, adrenaline kicked in and I was able to finish the race quiet strong. My time was 1:51:14. I wanted to beat my time of 1:53:03 from last year and I did. So I was quite happy and the ham string pain was quickly forgotten. My legs were a little sore the day after, but I was fine the next day. I guess I am in better shape than I think.


At the finish line of the Binghamton Bridge Run Half Marathon.
So now marathon training begins. I know I can run a half, but I have to start running smarter if I want to go 26.2 miles without dying at the end. I need to hydrate better, and run slower. I ran a nice steady pace for the first seven miles in the half, but then I started slowing down with each mile after that. Of course, running into the wind didn’t help.

It’s beautiful outside today and I’m going to try to go for a nice, leisurely ten-mile run. I need to find that perfect cruising speed where nothing hurts and I can just run forever.