Sometimes you just have to skip the plan! Leading my first indoor cycling and skipping my tempo run to SKI!

This past week was a great week.  I got in my trainer ride on Monday like planned, and didn't have to work on Friday, so I also planned to swim.  I nailed my track workout on Tuesday, and then after that, I checked my email and saw that there was a group from Oldham County Multisport doing an indoor spin on Wednesday night at the Buckner Y.  It wasn't an official spin class.  Wednesday night, indoors, at the Y...I could do that!  Usually I can't ever go to their activities because they are outside on Wed (Ryan's night to ride) or Thursdays (Keira's ballet).  And, to make it even more exciting, I volunteered myself to lead the class.  WHAT?  This is a new group of people and I'm not cycle class certified, but I am group exercise certified (and I disclosed that).  So, I taught my first indoor cycle class.  I was super paranoid about my music selections, because I thought they were great, but since this is a new group for me, what would they think?  I kept it mostly to adult alternative, because that is what we have, and kept it very clean since its the Y.  Some of the classes I have been to have not depending on their audience at other facilities.  Also, since I knew this was a bunch of triathletes and not "spinners" I knew that we would want to do intervals and climbs, none of the goofy "jumps" that while may give you variety and build some strength, don't really have any place in road riding.  I definitely asked everyone's opinions of what they wanted to do and tried to incorporate them, so it wasn't as structured as a real spin class, but it was fun to be up front!

I also was able to finally run outside for a long run on Thursday!  Yay!  It was still below freezing, but it was a step back week for me and I had to run 13 miles.  It would be tight, because it was the day of the mother/son father/daughter dance at Soren's school, and I needed to be there by 12.  I had 3 hours total to drop off Soren and pass out his valentines, come home, run 13 miles (at 8:04min/mi pace) cool down, shower, and get back to school by 12.  It was crazy, but I had everything ready to go before I left to take him to school, water, clothes, shoes, garmin, food, ect for running plus my whole outfit for the dance because I had to be dressed up for it.  I finished my run just 26 seconds over my goal, and I had an average of 8:06 min/mi.  I was very pleased with that because last year, I had a tough time with this run.  I really needed the step back, and with all my indoor running, I haven't dealt with wind or hills really.  It was a beautiful day for it too.  I took this at mile 4, not quite a third of the way in:

Hopefully I'll be back outside this week. Here's Soren and I at our dance:

I did my swim on Friday like I was supposed to, and then I was really dreading my Saturday workout.  The schools got out early because we had a snowstorm.  Ryan and I had reservations for a valentine dinner in Germantown, and thankfully the snow did not stop that from happening.  Since we did get so much snow, we opted to drive to Indiana to go skiing at the local "hill" in Paoli.  Its mostly to get the kids on skis again.  It is a small place and there were only a few easy runs that the kids could do.  Also, it meant that all the people who had no clue were also there skiing those same runs.  Towards the end, I was getting really stressed out for the kids because some of these newbies were so inconsiderate and out of control that I was afraid one of my kids was going to get mowed down.  I had someone snowboard over my skis and push off my body on one run, and I went nuts.  I screamed that they had better stay far away from me and my kids.  Really, when I ski, I am more afraid of dumb people causing me to crash than anything else.  I didn't fall because I am not a complete disaster on skis, but I know it would have sent my kids tumbling downwards in a second!  I think it was by God's grace that Keira wasn't knocked down on another run.  I told Ryan that it wasn't my day to beat someone over the head with one of my skis for hitting my kid.  Also, I got my poles "borrowed".  Ugh.  Skiing in Indiana!!!!  I went to the rental area at the end of our day to ask if anyone had turned in a set of non rental poles because mine had been stolen.  The attitude of the guy in rental return was just as infuriating to me.  He was just like "someone didn't steal them, they just borrowed them" and figured they would eventually turn up, and I could come back tomorrow.  Um, no thank you.  It was just annoying the lack of respect for others that everyone had here!  The worst part was that my poles were hanging with my skis and we had put a pin through the end of the hanger, so the person had to actually open up the door on it and make an effort to take mine over theirs.  Or someone else was equally disrespectful and took theirs first.  Soren finished up skiing before Keira, and we spent the final minutes waiting on them looking for my poles.  Amazingly, I found them in a pile of other gear in the locker room area where you weren't even really supposed to have gear anyway.  I was shocked they turned up, and part of me wanted to wait there to see if someone came back, but there were two other people there and they had said that the gear pile had been there at least 2 hours and they hadn't seen the people that left it.  I did ask them if it was their stuff before taking my poles, but they were clearly mine.  They are 12 years old and have a scratch down the entire side of one that I did at Snowbird on Little Cloud.  I showed the one guy a picture of me and my poles from Crystal Mountain and he agreed they were mine too.  Here is a picture of us (me with rental poles).

I know it sounds like I am complaining a lot about the skiing, but it was great for the kids, despite the fact that I was a nervous wreck that they were going to get hit.  They did great jobs and made a lot of improvements.  Soren really improved, and Keira had ended at Crystal with a huge crash, so it was important that she didn't have to wait another full year to ski to go out on a good note.  There is another resort not too much further from us in Ohio that we will probably go to next year.  Soren was free at this one due to his age this year, but next year, the other resort will be about the same price, maybe a tad cheaper even, and its better. 

Up this week, maintaining my swimming!  I also have another 20 miler, and I think it will be outside.  Yay!  We also need to get the kids healthy.  Keira was really sick after we finished skiing, I was ill yesterday, and I didn't take any chances with Soren today after an odd burp, and kept him home from work today.

Earthfare Earthlete, OSMO Nutrition and more indoor running!

2014 is shaping up to be incredibly cool, and I haven't even done a single race yet.  I am pleased to announce two more sponsors!  Earth Fare- The Healthy Supermarket and OSMO Nutrition.

I was able to get involved with Earth Fare mostly because of my friend Ginger.  She is a great friend and sometimes that voice of reason in my head when I am just being unreasonable due to the weather or other "act of God" type situations that threaten my workouts.  She is not an endurance athlete, but nutrition and healthy living is important to her as an aerobics instructor and mom of three active children.  She got me started going to Earth Fare once the opened near our homes.  It is a great grocery store, similar to Whole Foods, with an assortment of already prepared foods for immediate consumption, raw ingredients, and packaged foods.  They carry premium brands as well as their own line of items.  I really love Stonewall Kitchen products, and I am pleased that I can purchase them there.  One of my fellow Landsharks, Luke, is an Earthlete as well, and when I saw his advertisement on our club page for coupons, I jumped on it.  I got coupons for Ginger too, and then when it was time for Luke to refer athletes to their application, he chose me!  I will find out more information about the ambassadorship next month, but, I already know I love the store and the food there. 

My next announcement is with OSMO Nutrition.  I was fortunate to be able to attend a call in meeting with Stacy who is the founder and has been doing the research.  I took in so much information, and may completely redo my nutrition strategy for running.  With all my treadmill running lately, it gives me the perfect opportunity to really play around with my nutrition on the run without a sticky drippy camelback, with a drinking fountain, and bathrooms!  I have product on the way, and once I get to use it I will do more posting about it.  It really sounds that although my current nutrition on the run is fine, it could be great with OSMO, and I want to find out how I can make it that way.

Also, I left off my previous post that Ryan and I attended the Landshark social for our 11th wedding anniversary.  I know its a funny thing to do for a wedding anniversary, BUT, it is a great time.  We have a lot of friends there, and dinner is included so the cost of a babysitter is about a wash for the evening.  Plus, I have had pretty good luck with the door prizes.  Last year, I won a gift card for a restaurant, Rira Irish Pub (formerly at 4th Street Live).  Here we are enjoying the evening downtown at Louisville Slugger Field.

 

 Ryan and I

 Ryan, Me, Erin, and Dan

Erin and I

This year, I won a pair of shoes!!  Yay!  Also, my friend Lisa gave me a pair of shoes for Keira that her daughter didn't like.

Also, we had a huge ice storm this week.  It caused us to only have 2 days of school.  Kind of crazy.  I did another 20 miler on the treadmill.  It wasn't as bad as the first one, mostly because I knew I could do it.  Part of me was worried it would be worse than the first one, just because I did know what it felt like.  I had a lot of friends come in and run with me and support me.  Its kind of fun to do it inside and see how well I can hold my paces.  I varied it a tad ever half mile.  The ice was super dramatic outside.  It was pretty gray the first few days, but then on Friday, the sun came out and the world looked like it was covered in diamonds.  The trees looked all sparkly.  I was addicted to taking pictures, but they didn't capture it nearly as well as the eye saw it.  This one was my favorite picture at night:

Here are a couple daytime ones.

Hopefully everything will thaw out soon.  Its been so slippery that even short runs have been done inside.  I have yak tracks, but since I am really trying to hit particular splits, I just haven't wanted to risk it.  I feel lame.  I sort of miss running just to run.  This week is a shorter run, 13 miles, which should fit in nicely before I have a mother son dance with Soren at preschool.  I am looking forward to it.

Ski Trip and the first 20 Miler of the Year

I think I mentioned in my last post that due to a ski trip, I was taking a planned week off running to ski.  We went to Crystal Mountain with all of Ryan's family.  We had a large mountainside home for all 17 of us.  We got in two days of really good skiing, and had the kids in ski school the first day for 6 hours, and then a 2 hour lesson the second day.  It worked out well for us to get in some good skiing without the kids and then have them ready to ski with us as a family the final afternoon and evening.  Keira was fearless, and enjoyed night skiing with us too. 

Ryan and I also had the opportunity to rent fatbikes.  Those were super fun.  They had a ton of snow, so we were able to handle them well on the multiuse trail, but the fatbike specific trail was pretty deep and we struggled to stay afloat.  There were a couple times I had to put a foot down, and sunk up to my hip.

We also stopped into the NAIAS in Detroit while we were in MI.  Despite being out of the industry for almost 8 years, I still really get excited about this.  The kids got to make some fun models of the 2015 Ford Mustang

I also got to see the car that bears my initials.  I want one.  I won't be getting one though.  However, I do expect Ryan to get to bring them home from work from time to time so that will have to do.

Then, we got back to Kentucky and it was only sort of back to reality.  We had such unusually cold weather, that instead of the kids going back to school on Tuesday, they had an additional 3 days off due to snow and cold.  On Tuesday, we actually welcomed the snow day.  We knew with enough advance that I didn't wake the kids early, but we still got an relatively early start on our day.  I had a track workout planned, so I would go to the gym regardless.  We were one of the few crazies that made it to the gym.  The freeways were fine, so it really wasn't too bad at all to get there, though.  I was able to hit the workout no problem.  It was a challenge, though, after a week off.  I took this on the way to the gym.  It was pretty amazing looking. There were no cars around, so I wasn't going to cause an accident, and I'm probably better at taking pictures with my camera while driving than I am dealing with the kids while driving.

Wednesday was another snow day, due to cold.  However, I worked.  I was really freaking out though, because my 20miler was scheduled for Thursday, and it was supposed to be the coldest day of the year!  There was a wind chill advisory announced, which pretty much meant I would be indoors.  20 on a treadmill?  Yikes.  At least their was an indoor track if I needed it.  If there was school, I would have 4.5 hours to go to the gym, get it done, and get home.  That was going to be tight.  Then, they called off school.  I nearly lost it.  I am so OCD when it comes to my long runs.  Even though I have a ton of 20s planned, the idea of scrapping my first was not an option.  So, after sending out a barrage of texts, I was finally able to find someone to take the kids for me.  Really, I was just looking for someone to come to the gym with me and take them home when they were done with their  more sane workout than mine.  The running portion was supposed to be just under 3 hours, but I would need to check in the kids, refill water, gu up, and take breaks from the dreadmill, so it would take longer total.  Plus, who wants to step off the treadmill after being on it for that long and immediately pick up the kids?  Carolyn, a friend who has two children the same ages as mine, just said she would take them from the morning, and if she felt like leaving, she would bring them to me at the Y.  This was a better deal, because then the kids got to do something really fun (play at a friends' house) while I did my workout.  I decided I would break my workout into 4 5 mile runs.  Usually, when I run outside, I run out 5 miles, stop, gu up and turn around, and then run another 5, repeat, until I get home.  It would be the same on the treadmill.  I had my neighbor, Ande, running next to me for my first set of 5.  She's going to Boston too, but her working hours and kids' schedules are different.  Noelle stopped by to say hi, and Ron ran with me for a set.  The third set was the hardest.  I had been changing my pace up every half mile for the first two sets, and by the third, I felt like it was too hard to go any faster, so I just kept it the same.  I had Amy come by, and France.  Lisa was in the locker room before my last set.  I'm sure I'm leaving people out.  I felt like I was never really alone though, which was great.  Towards the end I really needed to just listen to music and zone out.  However, I had Joe come out and run me in for my last mile.  It was really great to have all the support. I was able to hit my goal pace, and had very close to even splits- 43:34, 43:33, 44:07, 44:06 for a total of 2:55:13, and avg pace of 8:45.  I felt pretty good afterwards too!  Here is a photo of it:

My final workout of the week was a tempo run.  It was my first tempo fail of the plan.  Last year, most of my temp runs were fails until I started doing them on the treadmill.  I felt tired going into it, and it was really hot in the gym.  The fans weren't on despite every piece of cardio equipment being in use.  I was supposed to do 1 mile warm up, 4 at 7:19, and 1 cool down.  I made it 2.5 at 7:19 when I had to pause the treadmill.  I was dying.  I got in another half mile, and as toast.  I struggled through 2 more miles at a cool down pace, and those were hard.  I'm sure it didn't help that Soren was up off and on last night with an ear ache, but I bet it was really taking a week off running and then hitting it hard like I hadn't that caused this. 

I have a few more things from this week that I am going to wait to post about because this is getting long.  Hopefully this next week will be better from a weather standpoint and I can get outside for my long run.  The only good thing about all these snow days is that Soren will have at least an extra week of school when it is nice out, post marathon, so that means more time to be able to ride with both kids in school.  Yes, I am sick in the head for looking at it like this.  Last year I didn't realize how much earlier his school ended before Keira's and was getting sitters left and right for just him trying to prepare for the century that I crashed during.

Cold Snap! Surviving the Polar Vortex

Louisville experienced some of the coldest temperatures in over twenty years this week.  I felt ready, being from Michigan, I'm used to the cold.  I'm used to snow.  The forecasts were making me a little nervous.  It was supposed to rain on Sunday and then freeze.  I was a little worried about ice, but as usual, it wasn't nearly as bad here as they thought.  It did get super cold, and the kids' Christmas break got extended by two days.  And of course, my husband and I worked for two of the very few companies that were actually still open, Ford and the YMCA.  Couple that with all the people that decided to make their resolution to go to the gym, and my work has been downright nutty.  On Monday, when it was super cold, there weren't a ton of people out and about.  In fact, at one point I swore we were the only customers in the grocery store.  This was really funny to the workers because over the weekend, they were selling out of things right and left, and the place was packed.  There were definitely more people restocking the shelves at the store than customers for the majority of the time we were there.

Tuesday is usually an indoor workout for me because I like to do my track workouts on the treadmill.  It just makes it easier for me to hit my splits and keep track of the times.  I write it on a post it and then stick it to the treadmill.  I was able to tolerate the shorter faster sprints than the longer ones which are still super fast.  It was packed at the gym.  It also seemed like the kids totally outnumbered the adults.  One lady brought her kids and her neighbor's kids (who were Y members).  A lot of people were going nuts with the additional days off from school.  I actually really liked the additional days off.  It was nice to just a few days more to relax with no commitments because everything was cancelled!  I love sleeping in, and my kids let me sleep in on Tuesday, so it was fantastic.  Hopefully our summer will go the same way, except I will want to run and bike outside instead of inside, so it will get interesting I'm sure. 

Wednesday was finally back to normal.  Just Soren came to work with me in the morning, we got our Chick Fil A (Wednesdays are our CFA days).I hit the trainer for the USAT club challenge, and I need two cross training workouts for the Run Less Run Faster program to work properly, and I can do this at home after I've used my childcare hours at work.

Today I had both kids back in school, and it was not crazy cold.  It was in the high twenties/low 30s for my 17 mile run.  I filled my camelback with hot tap water, which is nice.  It kind of warms my back at the start of a cold run and then keeps my water from freezing in the tube (usually).  I was able to hit my splits (8:19 actual, 8:34 goal), but I was worn out for the rest of the day.  I was initially worried about using the 3:25 plan since my last marathon was no where near that, and my half times are off, but so far I have been able to do the workouts no problem.  Hopefully this will continue.  I messed up my start date for training more than once, but it worked out in my favor.  Between being sick and an upcoming ski vacation, I'm perfectly on track without missing any workouts.  I just spaced some of them out a little more so hopefully I don't run into problems doing that.  It has to be better than just skipping, right?  I guess I'll see.

I also found out that I should get my Coeur gear in February.  Yay!  I can't wait.

And I made a fun Flipagram from last year's pics.  Check it out
http://flipagram.com/f/RGvW2PheEQ

2013 in Review plus Plans for 2014

I hope everyone's new year is starting off to a great start.  2013 was definitely an interesting year for me for sure.  I remembered thinking how 2012 was full of ups and downs, and it always amazes me how our trials, which sometimes seem huge and terrible, are there for a reason.  Our Heavenly Father is always preparing us for the future, and never gives us more than we can handle at a time, although sometimes it may feel like too much.  Going into 2013, I felt like I had learned in 2012 to let go and deal with things out of my control better.  I had more than my fair share of unusual race circumstances that affected my ability to meet a goal time I had set for myself, and it was frustrating to me.  These things got me prepared to deal with my full Ironman, which has so many scenarios you really have to be able to roll with it and deal with things as they come up.  2011 had been a year of PRs, and 2012 had been the year of the PW. 

So, looking to 2013, I had selected some events and felt like I could try to regain some speed and have a solid spring marathon, which I did at the Derby Festival.  I was pretty aggressive with my training and my time was 5 minutes off my PR.  I was stoked about that.  I had a PR in the Papa John's 10miler that while it felt amazing to achieve, it may have cost me my marathon PR.  Or not.  I just know I felt pretty tired the week after the PJ10, and never really bounced back.  The weather warmed slightly, and there were a lot of factors.  I can't say for sure it was the PJ10's fault, but I don't regret doing it.  I had to dig pretty deep and cut things pretty close.  I got my BQ and it held up to gain me entry into the 2014 Boston Marathon, so everything is all good.

Shortly after the marathon, I got a nasty infected ingrown toenail.  So gross!  It was not related  specifically to running, but it affected my swimming mostly.  It took a long time to heal and I just didn't want my funkified toe in the pool, and especially not in open water. 

I had two century rides planned to do with Ryan and friends from MI.  Kent, Valerie, and  Austin came down for the Horsey Hundred, and 54 miles in, I crashed.  Hard.  I lost control on a steep descent with a sharp turn while going 35 mph.  I slowed before hitting the ground, and slide across the road, and came to a stop by hitting a rock wall on the side of the road.  Had it not been there, I might have flipped over the guardrail and into the bushes.  I was blessed to come away with no head injury, no major bike damage, and no broken bones.  I did need several stitches in my left forearm, road rash on my knee and shoulder, and had two sprained wrists.  My knee was pretty painful, and Ryan urged me to get on the trainer to work out some of the swelling.  It was actually more comfortable to run than ride, and struggled with my wrists when I held myself up on the bike, and my forearms when I was in aero.  However, 2 weeks later, with stitches out and my Dr's OK, I went to MI to do the shortest route of the Michigan Mountain Mayhem.  It was very painful, but I made it through.  It was also a little scary for me to be back outside on the bike.  I was glad I did it, though.  Crashing really have me a new perspective on being out there.  Every event was a blessing to do.

I did a spring tri, and then Muncie.  I waited until the last minute to sign up for Muncie.  I wanted to make sure I was ready.  After missing swimming due to my toe, and then the crash, I was worried about the swim, but I was thankful for the wetsuit swim, and just to be there racing.  I was only a couple minutes slower than my 70.3 PR, so that was also amazing to me. 

I did the tree farm relay, and then I had a crazy fall, which recapped briefly in my last post.  Lots of events.  Most of them were more about the journey than the end result, but I did have some fabulous results too.  I had 2 very fast half marathons.  Neither a PR, but the Iron Horse Half Marathon was the second fastest half marathon I had ever run, and then a month later, I bettered that time at the LSC Half by almost 30 seconds.  I also did two completely different and unique cycling events, the Black Mountain Madness ride where I climbed to KY's highest peak with Ryan on the road, and then went back to MI again for the Iceman Cometh mountain bike race.  Both of those races were incredibly challenging, and I'm so glad I did them both.

So, after that, where will I go in 2014?  I'm super excited to be representing Coeur Sports, and I have added them to the sidebar.  I've started training for the 2014 Boston Marathon on my birthday, April 21st.  Austin has gotten really serious about triathlon, and as a result, I have a whole crew of friends going out to do Muncie, and I am signed up for that.  It is also my 10th anniversary of running my first marathon, Columbus, so I would like to go back there.  Ryan isn't entirely on board with that, just because I get really crabby and tired when I train for a full marathon, so I am working to make my Boston training as transparent to the family as possible.  For example, I ran 15 miles (yes, 15 miles) on the treadmill today so that I could do it while he was at work with the kids in the Y kids club and not take any time away from having all of us together as a family.  Or once it gets warmer, time away from his cycling.  Hopefully the past couple years of ups and downs have me well prepared to take most things 2014 can give me, but I am sure I have more to learn this year too.

Here is a tentative race schedule for 2014:

Papa John's 10miler, 3/22/14, Louisville, KY

Boston Marathon, 4/21/2014, Boston, MA

Horsey Hundred Cyling Event, 5/26/14 Georgetown, KY

Oldham Co Grand Slam 5K series (TBD)

Triceratops Triathlon, 6/18/14, Brighton, MI

Ironman Muncie 70.3, 7/12/14, Muncie, IN

Tree Farm Mountain Bike Relay, 7/26/14, Novi, MI

Columbus Marathon, 10/19/14, Columbus, OH

Big Hit Half Marathon TBD, Louisville, KY

Iceman Cometh 11/8

Coeur Sports Announcement!

I've been pretty quiet lately.  I finished up my season with an 8K Turkey Trot, ending my racing 5 out of 6 consecutive weekends or something odd like that (Black Mountain Madness, Iron Horse Half, off, Detroit Half, Iceman, LSC Half, and then Turkey Trot).  Ok, that is 6 out of 7 weekends.  You can see why I took a break from updates!   I took a break from about everything.  I even took some strength training classes at the Y, and got my YMCA Group Fitness Instructor certification.  However, I have a huge announcement to make!

See, my name is on there!  Wow!  I still can't believe it is real.  I LOVE what Coeur represents as a brand.  They represent the heart and courage that it takes for us as athletes to get out there and do what we do.  You can read about them here.  I am so amazed and grateful to be a part of this team.  Everyone is so amazing.  I am so inspired by everyone, and hope that I can do the same for others.  You will also notice that Amy is on there.  She was on one of my first active.com teams, Team Stayput.  She is still recovering, and working hard at her therapy.  I know one day she will be back at the level she was, but until then, she will inspire everyone around her to be better.  I know she has been an inspiration to me for a long time, and I am honored to be her teammate again.

Also, here is the elite team. 

I am so excited for 2014!!!!  It's going to be a great year.  The Boston Marathon is 16 weeks from tomorrow (Monday) and I got a jump start on my plan due to the holidays.  I expect I may need to miss a workout or two with all of our traveling.  I'm doing the Run Less Run Faster Plan again, except I'm attempting the 3:25 plan.  So far I completed the first 2 workouts, but I still have the tempo run left to try from the first week.  The tempo runs always seem to give me problems.  I may end up doing a combo of the 3:25 and the 3:30 plan, since the chart's barely have me at completing a 3:30 marathon based on my recent half marathon times. 

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Louisville Sports Commission Half Marathon 2013 Race Recap

Wow, what a great fall I have had.  I am beyond pleased with the way these past 6 weekends have gone.  On October 5th, I did the 70 mile Black Mountain Madness Ride to the Summit, followed by a stellar performance at Iron Horse, with my fastest time in over 2 years (1:40:45), Detroit International Half Marathon (1:42:28- course PR for me), a week off, then my first Iceman Cometh finish, followed by the Louisville Sports Commission Half.  It ended up being 3 half marathons in 30 days, plus one mountain bike race thrown in there.

I love running.  I was feeling pretty worked over after Iceman, and took Sunday and Monday off everything.  I did a light run on Tuesday, and still felt tired.  Wednesday was another day off, and then I had a much better run on Thursday.  Since the race was another Sunday race, I figured I could go ahead and have a short 1000y swim on Friday, and Saturday would be a rest day.

I went down to packet pick up on Friday after my swim to pick up my bib and shirt.  There really wasn't an expo.  I got my number, shirt, and a fall runathon poster.  I forgot pins.  Sheesh.  You'd think I'd never done this before.  Thankfully, I have a bag of pins at home.  The shirt was a really bright blue color.  I thought, hmm, maybe I will break my rule of not racing the "race shirt" on race day and use it as an undershirt with my Team Aquaphor tank.  It didn't look right, though, once I got it home and put them together.  Then, I had the dilemma of selecting an undershirt.  Usually I will wear my short sleeve Aquaphor tee with white removable sleeves, but if I am fully committed to long sleeves, then I wouldn't need to deal with add on sleeves.  I liked wearing a long sleeve tee in Detroit, and thought I could do it again.  The Detroit shirt was red this year, and I had a blue one from 2011, as well as my Boston shirt that was blue.  I had lots of choices.  I finally decided to wear the blue Detroit shirt, because I thought I might want to wear shorts, and red sleeves would look bad with pink tall socks.  You'd think after all this racing, it wouldn't be so complicated to figure out what to wear, but the temps were really different for each event. 

I like to be at races early, and with the race being on a Sunday, I knew that there would be free on street parking available.  I ended up parking on 3rd, between Main and Market, which was a great spot.  The start line was on Main, at 2nd, and the finish was also on Main, but at 5th.  I was glad I was between the start and finish.  It was funny, from my car at a meter, I could see a sign on a lot that said $10 event parking.  Street parking is such a score!!!  When I did the race in 2011, I parked further east of the staring line, and with the finish more to the west, I had a pretty decent walk back to the car (also, the start and finish with further apart that year).  I was so glad that I would be parked so close to the start, because I could easily put all of my things into my car fairly close to the start, and I wouldn't need to waste a mylar blanket by throwing one away before the start or deal with gear check.  I had a blanket that I had planned to donate to the Catholic Charities at the packet pick up, but I forgot to bring it with me.  I remembered it on race day, and although I had washed it in preparation to donate it, I thought I could potentially use it to wrap up if I needed to.  I walked over to the start, and I got this picture.  My ponytail was flat-ironed and sticking up a bit, but overall, I love this picture.  It was definitely one of the perks of being there super early.  Also, a photographer took it, which is how it was framed so nicely.  He actually asked me to move to a specific spot.

I met up with the Louisville Landsharks on the steps of the YUM Center.  Here I am with Rhonda (and my charity blanket)

Me and Sonja

Landshark Group Picture: 

Then, I realized I had to go the bathroom one last time.  Goodness!  How on earth do I arrive at a race over an hour early and then get 15 minutes or so away from the start time and NEED to go to the bathroom!  Ugh!  I ran over to the porto potty area and it was a mess.  Huge lines everywhere.  I could not wait in those lines.  I needed another option.  I ran off in search of something, but I wasn't exactly sure what.  I ran into one of the mom's from Soren's preschool, and explained my predicament.  She said that across one of the nearby parking lots, there was a lone construction site port o potty.  I didn't exactly know where it was, but I took off, and amazingly found it!  It was fenced off, but not locked, and I was able to slip between two parts of the fence.  Yay!  I ran back up to Main street and approached the start from the course side, which meant I was right in the front of the starting area.  I found my friend Lisa's husband, John because he is super fast.  We got a quick picture and I chatted with him for a couple minutes. 

I also ran into a friend Mike, who I met at the Derby Marathon earlier in the year, and met his girlfriend Carrie.  They had both just run a full in Indy, and none of us were sure how today was going to go.  This is not a flat course, so I was just hoping to be ahead of 1:45 and beat my 2011 time (1:44:55ish).  The unofficial 1:45 pacer was the same guy that did it in 2011. They had the bugler from Churchill Downs, and he played My Old Kentucky Home.  A previous time I had heard this song before a race, I was jumping into the Ohio River, so I got a bit emotional upon hearing it.  They played the National Anthem leading up to the start.  They played part of Avici's "Wake Me Up", which I first heard before Muncie, and we were off shortly after that.  Here's the map and elevation:

I started off feeling awesome.  We were running straight into the sun (which is why most of my pictures with my visor are completely obstructing my eyes), but had some shade from buildings.  I had studied the elevation profile of this race, and I knew that the middle third, miles 4-8ish, would have most of the hills.  It would be flattish until Mile 4, and hit Cherokee Park for 2 big hills, and then enter a cemetery for another 2 hills, and then at mile 9, things would flatten out.  Sort of like Detroit (bridge at 4, tunnel at 8, and then a non exciting yet painful 9-13).  I was going to fast, and I knew it for the first mile.  I slowed it down a bit for the second and third, but I still thought I was going too fast.  Just as I was starting mile 4, a guy running near me said we were on pace to go under 1:40.  Haha!  He was pacing off of me.  I told him that yes, we were, for now... I would hit the hills and need to slow down, so please, don't mind me.  Let me blow up in Cherokee and don't hold me responsible!  I have run those hills before and know they are hard.  I definitely slowed down a bit going up the two big hills, but similar to Iron Horse, I felt like I was able to recover well on the downhills.  I hit the halfway point with a slower time than Detroit, which was a good thing.  I was just over 50 minutes, which was still great.  I was wondering how much slower my second half would be.  We went into the cemetery.  It had some hills there too, but I hadn't ever been in it before.  I came upon Mike, who was struggling with a pulled muscle, but I kept plowing on.  It felt tough, but I kept up with my GU every 5 miles and by mile 9, we were on the flattish parts.  It was windy going into the city, and it felt like we should be done sooner, because of the course being two loops in opposite directions.  At mile 10, I was at 1:16:xx, and I still felt pretty good.  I though, wow, if I can get the last 5K done in 23 or 24 minutes, I just might be able to go under 1:40!  I can't remember what point I passed the man who I spoke with before the hills, but I did pass him.  He had said a couple things to me that I really believed, but it felt nice to have someone remind me- at 10 miles, you have just a 5K to go, and at 11 miles, you have about 15 minutes left to go.  I was keeping it under 8, but just barely according to my Garmin.  At mile 10.5, I thought about 20 minutes left.  I could keep this up for 20 more minutes.  There was an out and back section which was fun to be able to see faster people running towards me.  I just kept telling myself that this was a good day.  There was a lady in pink ahead of me.  I wasn't sure if she was in my age group or not.  She wasn't that far ahead.  I estimated that at mile 11.75, we would turn around and head back to the finish.  At this point, it was less mileage than running from 146 to my house, and flatter.  I was trying to just keep my pace up.  At mile 12.5, there were some police officers and a huge speaker BLARING Eminem's Berzerk.  "Life's to Short to Not Go for Broke!"  That picked up my spirits.  I knew I had to try to catch her.  I had .6 to go!  By mile 13, I had caught up, but I felt like I may have started sprinting to early.  I tried to keep pushing into the finish line, but that clock had a 1:40 on it!  Again!  My Garmin had me at 1:40:18!  This was even faster than my Iron Horse time!  I was thrilled.  I actually ran my first half and my second half pretty close to each other.  I congratulated the woman behind me.  I later learned that she was in fact, in my age group, and I had only finished 1 second ahead of her.  My time was 1:40:15.  I got this picture at the finish:

I couldn't stick around long.  I went through the food line and then circled back and found someone with a paper copy of the results.  I was 5th, so again, a fabulous time, and no podium.  However, I am still thrilled with how I did.  I was amazed that I had the strength to pull out such a fantastic run.  Here is my hardware from the last 30 days.  I can't decide which is my favorite.  I LOVED the Iron Horse because it was just so cool, and it was my second fastest time.  Well, I LOVE fleur de lis, and this one is NOW my second fastest time.  I don't know if I can decide!  I have thought for a couple years now that Detroit was ready for a refresh in their design.  They did update the ribbon, which was great, but now I have 3 almost identical medals from 2011-13, with the Mustang medal being my favorite of those.

I cannot believe how blessed I am that I was able to have such a strong race season.  I am very thankful for the Louisville Sports Commission allowing me to share my stories in exchange for running their race.  It was a great event, and I'm happy I could participate in it.  I did some amazing things over the last month.  I am very sore today, but I feel like I did a good job resting and cross training between my events that allowed me to perform as well as I did.  Plus, I might have a new pre-race meal.  I think I had Papa John's pizza before the Iron Horse race, and I did it again before this race.  I definitely feel more confident about my running and my desire to have a great marathon in April.  Two 1:40s show that it is not a fluke.  I still have no idea how to get back to a 1:38, but I'm just glad to be under 1:42, where I seemed to be stuck for a while.  I have an 8k turkey trot race to do, but then I am done with racing for a while.  I don't race much while training for a full marathon because I like to go all out for my races, and I just don't feel like that is helpful for me when marathon training.