Bloomsday and May Day

This year Tim and I were back in route to finishing Bloomsday under 2 hours. We started off strong and thought we were going to do it until I had to make a pit stop! I was sooooo sad, but I couldn't make it any longer! Thankfully we finished it and we had a great time.
We also had an added guest...my mom! My dad and sis decided not to race, so she came with us. We all were in different color groups, so we waited for Tim's time group to start (it was in the middle) and then we were off.

While we were waiting to start, we ran into my sister and I got to meet her co-workers for the first time. It was a lot of fun.

Right before we started with the Start sign in the background.

The end!! 2 hours and 7 min. unofficially!  On top of the Monroe Street bridge from the last picture.

Dirty Dash 2015

Ran this year in Spokane. It was super hot and most of the dirt was flying in the air rather than on the ground mixed with water. We had a great time and ran into some awesome people as well.

 Dirty pictures to come soon!

Jingle Bell Race

Today I got the most amazing opportunity to continue my run/walking and participated in the Spokane Jingle Bell Run.  I was super worried about the weather, but thankfully the rain stopped in time for us to run!

My best friend from 4th grade and I met up and then we went downtown and got ready to run!  We've stayed in contact since I left Spokane through letters.  Yes! We were pen pals through the mail before the internet.

We had a great time and a did a pretty good job of pacing ourselves. We ran light post to light post, then walked the same distance.  When we were done, we had some chocolate milk and then headed over to Jenny's to have breakfast with my God sister.
I decided this year I would dress up as a reindeer.  I wanted a brown hooded sweatshirt, so I went to multiple thrift shops looking for one.  I found one and bought it although I didn't really like it.  Funny thing was when I got home I found a brown hooded sweatshirt right in my closet.  I used a red scarf  to make my harness type thing and then had a pair of antlers with bells already attached.

Dirty Time

It's June and time to get Dirty again and this time,

we both got super dirty.  

(Dirty Pics to come soon)

This year, we ran in a earlier time slot, so there was no traffic getting there, therefore; we got there so early we were able to run in an earlier heat, with less people.  It also meant less people had run it, so it was a little less muddy, yet somehow we found a bunch of it to be in.  This year the course was full of walls (which I don't climb), so we did a lot of going around.  I was totally fine with that, because I didn't want to be hurt.  One of my favorite obstacles was a blow up jumpy castle thing we had to climb up and slide down into a mud pit, which was super fun.  It made me kind of worried that the other water slide was not there, but around the next bend we saw it.  So up the hill we went and then I ran and jumped and went down head first down the water slide.  The scary part was towards the end I couldn't figure out how to stop, so face first into the mud I went.
Thankfully this year, I didn't do any slipping and falling, although I did end up falling twice in two of the mud pits.  And in one of the mud pits, that shoots mud out at you, I got mud shot into my mouth!
After showering off multiple times, I did end up with some scrapes on my leg and a pretty good goose egg on my knee, which I have no clue where I got it from, but it's there and needs ice.

 And then we went and got matching tattoos.  They were super inexpensive and I wanted to make sure I remembered my time being dirty.

Pictures from the Race

Usually race photos are something that need to be bought.  This year, Bloomsday is offering them for free! Yeah! So here are mine…well the good ones anyway.

This little girl tried to race me and I for sure gave her a run for her money.

Yet, if you notice she is no where in sight once I crossed the finish line.

And here are my parents finishing as well.

Bloomsday

This year Bloomsday seemed to be cake! Probably because it was about 1/4 of my marathon, that took place a month ago already- tomorrow.  It was mom, dad, and I participating this year.  My sis had to work till 10 and we were starting at 9:20 instead of 10ish like always and Bil and the kids stayed home to get ready for the party and because the littlest one would have needed much assistance to make it through the whole race.  Hopefully they will make it all back next year.
So the game plan was no stops, keep together as much as possible, and when in doubt meet at the wheelchair racer statue after you get your shirt.  The gun sounded and my dad took off (his first Bloomsday since his surgery) running. I thought, oh deer! Figured my mom and I could left him run and then we would catch up to him when he slowed down, but he kept running, so I ran a little to catch up.  But the next thing I knew, he had stopped and I was pretty far ahead, so I decided I would just run my own race and see them at the end.  I ran a fair amount and the miles seemed to tick by quickly.  I didn't hear from my parents (through text) until they were at the bottom of the first hill (bathroom stop) and I was at the 2 mile mark- which made me about 1/2 mile ahead.  I took in some water and kept going.  Then next text I got was when they were at the 3 mile mark and I was at the bottom of Doomsday hill (the only super big hill in the race) at about 4 3/4 miles.  I kept clipping along and soon I find myself at the top of the hill (mile 5) and then through the last 2.46 miles.  The last text I got from my parents was when I was crossing the finish line and they were at the bottom of Doomsday Hill. I was very proud of them for doing the race and so glad to be done, but then it meant that I would be waiting for an hourish before I was going to be able to go home, as they had the keys, and before I got to eat anything because I had no money.

Official race results:

Finish time:	01:56:36
Overall place:	23,638th
Time up Doomsday:	07:38
Pace per mile:	15:37
Average pace for 37-year-olds:	14:35

Top Results Placed 409th among 708 people the same age

Top Results Placed 60th among 80 people from Kent, WA

Top Results Placed 18,094th among 34,570 people from Washington

Top Results Placed 1st among 3 people with the same last name

Top Results Placed 12,641st among 26081 females

Top Results Placed 231st out of 449 among 37-year-old females

Top Results Placed 1,213th out of 2,335 people in your age group

My Feet

So 3 weeks after my marathon and my feet are we'll…not doing so well.  The right foot has this going on.

 And that blister I spoke of, that I got during the race that made me walk super funny for a bunch of miles, well it's done it's thing now too.

I tried to fix both.  Right foot is good.  Left foot, we'll it's hurting.  I must've done something when I was playing around with my toe, because now it's killing me.
Hopefully they will be good by the end of the week and I will have new shoes.

Inside the Marathon

If you've been here awhile, you may have checked out my "training" tab at the top of my blog and realized that I'm doing a lot of walking and running and you may have wondered what I may be training for…well, now you know. I was training for a marathon and on the 5th of April it was D day.  So much has added up to all this:

The Decision
I met up with the Tamblyns and Smiths for lunch in December and as we were leaving I was talking to Beth about her running and asked if she was training for anything and she said no, so I told her we should do a race together.  She said that would be fun and I suggested the Yakima Canyon, thinking it was a half-marathon.  She said, it was a full marathon and I thought, I can't do that…yet I told her I would think about it.  I thought and thought and figured if we were going to do this, we needed to get on this training and that's where it all started.

The Training
It started out slow and steady and kept going and going and going until all I was doing was work, sleep, and training.  Some days were easier than others.  Some days were harder.  I loved being out getting all the exercise.  And what I couldn't really believe was how close things really were when walking there.  It always seemed like Emerald Downs was super far away, yet from my house, it's only 5 miles and down to Pacific it's only 9.8miles.  It seemed like it would never end, but I'm so glad that I did it, cause it made the race seem not as bad.

I got this training plan from CoachJenny.com and stuck to it, well kind of.  When I actually tracked out how many weeks we had and how many weeks the training was, I was going to be short 6 weeks.  Yeah, that is right. I only had 14 weeks to train.

Also during training for the marathon, I was also doing T25 with the people at the gym, which I think was really good. I loved it and I think it really helped with my core muscles.



Telling Everyone
I was super slow to tell people, because I didn't know if I was really going to stick with it. I also was unsure if my running partner in all this was going to do the same.  So I didn't really tell many people, but as I got more and more into training and actually signed up (in Februrary), I would tell people.  People's reactions were interesting.  Some were amazed.  Some were impressed.  Some sad it was better me than them.

The Days Before the Race
I was pretty hyped and ready to go…well at lease that is what I was telling everyone. I was just ready to get it over with.  I did my last week of training.  I wore my tennis shoes to work, so nothing would happen to my feet (like blisters).  I stayed away from sick people and tried to get as much sleep as I could.
I took the day before the race to finish up last minute things, de-stressed (Yep, I played golf.), and drive over to the race.  Thankfully, only a few country songs played while I was driving over and my eyes only welled up a little.  There was no full blown tears, like before.  The drive was easy and check-in to the hotel was simple.
Then it was on to Selah to pick up my race partner.

Just What I've Been Up To...

Nothing big really?!?!?!?! Only 3 months of training.

Spring Break T minus 0 Hours

Yep, that is right. MY Spring Break started today and lucky for me it was gorgeous, so I started off with some of this

met a friend for lunch and then I got in the car and started my adventure...

Hot Chocolate 5k

This past Sunday a few friends (not all pictured below) and I did a little running, a little walking, and a little chocolate eating.  The day started off with a little sprinkle, but then started to rain harder and harder, but luckily as we ran a bit late (We planned to leave at 5:30, but no one was answering their phones or showing up at my house, so we didn't leave Kent till 6:20 am) the rain cleared up and we parked and walked super quickly to the starting corrals.
We started at 7:15am and ran up the hill, down the hill, up the hill, down the hill, up the hill, and then through a tunnel, down a hill, up a hill, and up the last hill.  We were done at 8am.  Officially our time was 15min 43 sec.  That is a 14:43 mile.  I was in 4376 place out of 5665 people.  I was 510 out of 670 in my age group.  I was the 3334 girl to pass out of 4436.

Then off to get our chocolate.  It was super yummy.

We headed down to Maggies for breakfast and met up with another friend.
In doing this race, I was really able to see how well my training was going for my marathon and what I needed to add, which is more hill work.  Beth and I were also able to check our paces against each others. (Mine slow and hers fast)  Guess I need to keep working. Only 5 weeks left till the "BIG" race.

Merry Christmas from Santa's Lap

Race Times

So I've always done Bloomsday 12k and have never really thought of doing any other sort of races, until one day when a friend of mine asked me to do the Bellingham Bay 5k with her. 

That was the beginning and since then I've been racing ever since.  Each time I try to improve my time and so far I've been doing a pretty good job.  I hit my PR at the Mock the Clock race

when I posted this time:

Time: 46:32
Pace: 15:01

I placed 261 out of 339 overall and was 52 out of 72 in my division.

This past weekend my mom and I did the Jingle Bell

and although I didn't PR, I'm still in the 40's which I'm okay with until my next race.  Next race I want to be in the early 40's (aka under 45min.) posted these

Time: 48:40
Pace: 15:40

I placed 958 out of 1022 and was 120 out of 131 in my division.

Jingle Bell 5K

Today I completed my 5th 5k of the year and 6th race of the year. (The other race was a 12K)  Pretty amazing considering I used to never used to do things like this.  This is the 3rd year, my mom and I have completed the Jingle Bell Dash (here and here) raising money for arthritis and having a good time. 

Each time we have run it, we have gotten faster and faster, although officially we don't know yet for this year.  (I had a race chip, so I didn't use my phone to pace us.)  The great thing about racing with my mom is that we go about the same pace and push each other.  She said she's just trying to keep up with me and I'm just trying to keep a fast pace passing crazy people in front of me.  We ran a block, walked a block, ran a block, walked a block pretty much for the first mile and then the second and third mile were a little more walk and a little less run.  I will say though, the last hill about killed me, but I caught my breath and we ran to the last corner, turned the corner walked the block and ran the last 2 blocks.  I know!! Crazy right!?!?!?!  We made it and then had our picture taken at the finish line.

My sweater was a big hit. It was fun to watch people's reactions to it.  Ladies loved it and men read it and then looked away really fast.  It was like I had caught them doing something they shouldn't be doing. Hee hee!  Luckily I only had one person take me up on my offer and it was little girl (maybe 2) she just touched the Christmas tree.  The mom was a bit mortified and said sorry, but then she said, "Well I guess you asked for it." Oh dear lady, it's a joke!

After the race we went to the Buttered Biscuit for breakfast and all the waiters and waitresses got a big kick out of it.  So much so, they were taking my picture to instagram it.  Too bad I don't have instagram to see how good I looked.  eAll I asked is that they didn't take a picture of my face.  Don't need it all over....oh wait, well no one reads this anyway...

Thankfulness Day 24

Today I'm thankful for crazy fun 5ks and all the loot you get from them! Oh yeah, and all the charities that benefit from them. So far, I've participated in a Mock the Clock 5k, Jingle Bell Run, Hot Chocolate 5k, Dirty Dash,

 
Firecracker 5000, and today we did the Ugly Sweater Run.
    We decorated sweaters, posed for pictures, did a little running, and some beer guzzling.