Rock'N'Roll Seattle

Hey All,

Here are a few pictures of the route from this weekend!

Seward Park

A beautiful day for a run, with a beautiful view

I-90 bridge

With cars on either Side we ran and were likely a bit of a distraction ;)

Coming up on the Home Stretch, with views of my 2 favorite places

Safeco Field

CenturyLink :)

Upside down of the Ferris wheel

What a fantastic day, a bit warm but better then torrential downpour like the Run for Water was.
I will do a full race recap later, but for now here are some pics for it and a forewarning, I hit the wall, crazy hard! and for some reason wasn't expecting to and was completely thrown off... yea...

Anyways! Happy Wednesday, Summer is official here but on the Wet West Coast you can't tell.

Last week of training? or a week of avoiding injury?

Anyone who trains for an event will tell you, injuries are a huge set back. They throw off your training, alter your movement and cause you to overcompensate, even when you are not doing the activity you are training for. Typically getting injured isn't something that plagues my mind, I wear my heels to work, race up stairs and walk with a purpose when necessary (aka, when something is wrong and needs to be fixed... they hear me coming, the shoes you hear first, then you know by the look.. or so I've been told). I promise, I am a nice person; however, I do expect things to function at an acceptable rate or pace.

Anyways, with less than one week to go before the marathon, the idea of sprained/rolled ankles and falling down stairs is plaguing my mind. This was fueled on Sunday, when I was out for a 13 mile run I went along a road with no sidewalk or shoulder. It was in farming area and I was waving to a farmer who was out painting his fence... and then my left foot had a little misstep and found itself in between the road and the dirt/grass. After a very unflattering recovering, full with arm swings and stumbling (I'm lucky I didn't throw my back out! and that there was no cars or video camera's to witness this), I pulled myself together and concluded no more waving! Stay with it Melissa!

Now, instead of wearing heels to work, I'm walking around the office in runners, and today I've even gone as far as to match my runners with my dress... Hey, their my Nike Women's Marathon Runners that are Tiffany Blue... they're fancy see:

 

So this week, is minimum running and minimizing the likelihood of injury... no tempting of fate over here. Stairs- one at a time, no need for running. Running- focus on where my legs are going and not pushing it to the point of fatigue. Biking- none this week... Ya, little bit sad about that but my quads are going to have enough to handle with the hills in Seattle. Swimming- same note as biking... although I might hit up the pool solo tomorrow morning to just stretch things out. 

Anyways, Happy Wednesday, I am half way through the work week and on the home stretch now. Happy Running, Cycling, Swimming or whatever else you do and be leery of being too energetic when saying hello to passerby's. (oh and Go Blackhawks!! Please... show up tonight not like Monday night... you do know this is the Stanley Cup Finals right?)

7 more sleeps...

Alright,

So I have not fallen off the face of the earth, more like I have been bombarded with work, school and attempting to train and cross train. Pretty much I need to put myself in a time out, which is what I am planning on doing this weekend because.... 7 more sleeps until I'm driving down to one of my favorite places in the whole world! Seattle... more specifically Centurylink field (where my beloved Seahawks play) to pick up a race day package for my 2nd full marathon. Seriously, is this only my second because mentally I feel like I've done this rodeo before... but maybe it is just because I spend so much time preparing for this thing that once it comes, I'm baffled by the fact that it hasn't taken place yet!

Anyways, this weeks training hasn't been superb, but on the flip side I have realized how tired my legs are and am trying to rest them for next week. While I did bike to work this week, I didn't go to swim practice and I think this upcoming week will be the opposite. Swim practice but no biking, in hopes of keeping my quads somewhat fresh in order to handle the hills of Seattle. In going into next weekend and evaluating my training, and trying to be realistic with my goals I'm shooting for 4:15 - 4:30. Mentally, I'm hoping that I will be stronger as I know what to expect in having experienced it before. While I may not know the route, I do know that I love Seattle, the pristine views and am looking forward to participating in a Rock'N'Roll Marathon series.

So here's to hoping for a low key weekend, and a hopefully strong longish run on Saturday that can carry me forward to next weekend. Happy Friday and Happy Fathers day Sunday to those who are fathers or are able to celebrate what awesome fathers they do have. :)

Biking to Work

Alright, super lame title for the post, but I couldn't come up with anything catchy... and, lets face it. None of my Post Titles are catchy or insightful. Heck, if they are informative of what the blog is going to be about, I figure that is a win!

Anyways, the weather in the lower mainland is finally begining to resemble Summer. Meaning wake-up = sun is shinning, heading home = sparse wispy clouds blown in by the breeze, blue skies and sunshine. So after discussing riding my bike to and from work with a co-worker, I finally took the plunge and did it. Now, funny story... this was my first ride of the season! And to make this a tad bit more ridiculous, I never took my bike out last summer! So after sitting in my basement collecting dust, this beauty finally got to see the Great Outdoors.

Oh my, I forgot how nice it is to go for a bike ride before most of the world is awake. Although this meant an earlier wake up call, I do not struggle with going to bed when it is light out. So a early bed time on Monday, and an early wake up call Tuesday made my hour plus bike ride to work possible. The feeling of accomplishment, and responses of awe/your nuts from  co-workers made it all the more enjoyable.

Now one thing that I will say, is that I did forget how sore sitting in the saddle for that long can be... Also, my gears weren't quite shifting right, and I only corrected those/verbalized my confusion, on the way home. So those were the few downsides, oh and the ridiculous appetite I had all day resulted in a bag of chips being bought at lunch. Although the weather was in the mid 20's (Celsius), I did not find the bike ride home too hot. I think this is because of the constant breeze one has when they are biking, be it because of an actual breeze or just the feeling you get when you coast for a bit.

Upon arriving home I was still smiles, even though I did walk my bike up one hill and thought my legs were going to fall off on the last uphill before home. 

See, still all smiles and looking oh so cool! Upon prying myself off my bike (practically falling off) I proceeded out back to the pool that isn't heated right now. Yepp, my own personal ice bath...

My weary, tired legs were so happy to be submerged in cold, unheated pool water. And my parents were happy as they figured that if the chemicals were way off, based off the high sensitivity of my skin they would soon know. Win Win! (again, my mom and her eternal optimism). After riding for over 2 1/2 hours, I put myself to bed at 8 pm. That's correct, didn't even make it till 9 pm (an arguably 'reasonable' bed time as far as I'm concerned).

With all these training hours I have been putting in, my appetite has gone through the roof. I've had to be more conscious about how much liquid I'm consuming, the types of liquids I'm consuming and what activity I have planned for the next 24 hours. So that was my Tuesday in a nut shell... but I must say, I liked sandwiching my work day with an activity, and the route that I biked to work makes me think that Friday's before long weekends, when it takes me well over an hour to get home anyways, I'd rather be out on my bike, moving forward, burning calories, enjoying the glorious day.

The Almost 20 miler...

This past weekend I went for a long run with my co-worker who is doing the Rock'n'Roll Seattle Marathon as well. He had found a route for us and we agreed to meet at a mutual location that wasn't too far from where either of us lived, and would set us on a good starting point to run a route without many traffic lights, and minimal traffic.

So Saturday morning, I woke up, filled up my water belt and did a warm-up around my favorite go to place and headed out to meet up with him. I had beat him there but just had to wait for a few minutes before we took of.

By the time we hooked up I had run 4 miles at about a 9:15-9:20 pace, a bit too fast but I was feeling good and it wasn't hurting so I didn't think I was in trouble (insert foreshadowing of what was to come!).

As we started off down the road, headed toward a rolling hill, I had taken my head phones out and was casually talking with my co-worker. Unconsciously we had dropped the pace for miles 5- 8 so they looked a little like this: mile 5- 9:12, mile 6 - 9:04, mile 7 - 9:10, mile 8 - 9:22... now, seeing as I wasn't even half way through my run, and was throwing down miles like it was no big deal I should have known that the worse was yet to come...

Ignorance is truly bliss, those first 8 miles were fantastic, now the rest of the run fell apart in a big way! The hills came, walking took place, I attempted to have my running buddy leave me (he refused, thank goodness otherwise I likely would have sat on the side of the road and called to get picked up... or just laid there spread out waiting for my imminent death, likely the later of those two). So the mileage pace took a beating:

Mile 9- 10:14, Mile 11- 10:04, Mile 12 - 12:03 (pretty sure this was a hill that I walked up!), Mile 13 - 10:46, Mile 14 - 11:10, Mile 15 - 9:38 (probably running downhill), Mile 16 - 10:27, Mile 17 - 12:43, Mile 18 - 10:02, Mile 19 - 13:03 (was walking while on the Phone) and then .24 of a Mile at a 11:52 pace..

Yes a common theme these days, the wheels came off! 19.24 miles in 3:17:23... now in looking back and thinking of how I felt during it, it was awful. However, there are some positive notes, first of all I did manage to do a long run. Yes, I did walk, but I did manage to get myself to run again. Mentally I was getting owned, and that was I think my biggest issue, but the thing is, that I'm glad it happened while I was running with someone, on the back roads and I forced myself to finish (was refused to be abandoned lol).

While I was running this, I had serious doubts about whether or not I want to do the Marathon at the end of the month. Do I do it and risk having it suck and hate my life, or do I switch to the Half and try to own it... these were my thoughts and fears while I was running. Upon getting home though and sharing my time and mileage with my Mom, she was tremendously excited for me claiming that I could do this Marathon in under 4:30... well then. Myself at that moment, oh gosh I need fluid vs Mom- complete optimism... Thankfully positive thinking > negative thinking, so I consumed multiple liquids (oh ya, another problem, I was tremendously thirsty on this run, what is up with my body and over heating these days!) and as the Gatorade, water and carbonated water was consumed, optimism crept in.

4 days later, I'm actaully looking forward to attempting the full. I can't thrown down low 9 min miles, I'm not going to run a sub 4 hour marathon, but I may, just may be able to pull out a time between 4:15- 4:30 and while in the world of bloggers that may not be that good, in my world, that would be awesome!

So here's to optimism and a great training week (that is half over). Happy running, and Happy RUNNING DAY!