testing...testing...testing

I'm finally sitting down to write about my date with the Exercise Physiology and Human Performance Laboratory. I can't believe it's been a week and a half. Cripes.  Fair warning, this is a long one. If you're interested, (all four of you), click through after the jump break.  It's a long post, so if you don't want to read the whole thing, the short version is: I need to go slower, if I want to get faster. And I need to lay off the M&Ms (actually, that one's all me. We didn't talk about nutrition.). But I will get there, eventually, on the M&Ms.

the reminder

It's Sunday night. And for me, every week begins on Monday morning. So I'm going to try again tomorrow, to do better, to be healthier, and to lose some weight.

There are many, many times when I need this reminder. And not just about running. About dieting. About taking risks. About life.  Tonight is one of them.

Suck it, negative self-talk.

some things are better left unsaid

And unfortunately for all three of you, those are all the things I've got on my mind. It's late, and I've got to go run tomorrow with a big ol' mask on my face (more on this tomorrow). So I'll just show you some pretty shiny things and leave it at that.

I know you're not supposed to play favorites, and truthfully all my medals have their place on my wall of racing, but I do have a few favorites.

up next down the pike

You probably aren't asking yourself any of these questions this morning, but I have, so I thought I'd share my answers.

Marathon again? I'm still chasing that sub 5 hour marathon. Honestly, I'm so keyed up about it right now I wish I could run one tomorrow to try again. I'm not sure that would be helpful or successful, but that's how I feel. I'm itching to go again.  But the reality is that I absolutely need to lose some weight if I want to get faster. The speedwork and tempo runs I tried to use to get faster injured me. And that's likely because I'm carrying 15-20 pounds more than I should. (Before you object to that number, please re-visit horror show photos  the race.) If 10 pounds can give me nine minutes off my marathon finish time, then I should try very hard to lose 10 pounds.  But next time I think I'll be doing a spring marathon again. Training in the winter has its flaws, but I think I'm better with cold weather running that hot. I just seem to fall apart in the heat. 

Sea level marathon? Most definitely. Of all the things that were a struggle, breathing wasn't among them. It was nice. It didn't give me a huge advantage time-wise, but it makes running feel so much easier. I went for a "shake out" run on Thursday before the marathon, and it was the best run I think I've ever had. Just 3 miles but I felt like I was floating rather than running. It was a beautiful thing.  Having said that, never underestimate the course profile. I knew there was a hill from mile 16-17, but until we drove the course on Saturday I failed to grasp the steepness of that hill.  It was on par with parts of the Leadville Heavy Half. It wasn't steepish. It was STEEP.  And it was the beginning of the end, because that's where I started walking. And once I start walking, it's walk/run from then on.

Larger marathon?  I absolutely loved all of the spectators and support for this race, and even all of the company along the way with other runners. I didn't chat a lot with other runners other than to bitch about the weather a couple of times, but it's nice just being out there with other people at your relative pace. It's a trade off because it was nearly impossible for David to figure out where to meet me, and apparently there was a long of cursing and u-turning the car to get to mile 19. Would I rather see lots of people with great signs yelling my name and ringing cowbells for complete strangers, or would I rather see my husband three or four times along the course?  Of course I would prefer both, but he can't be with me all the time. He goes by in a couple of seconds, whereas in a big race you are never really alone.  

What now? I always get the post-race-no-training-plan blues. This time, however, I'm implementing Operation Swimsuit in preparation for our trip to Belize. (Did I tell you that we're going to Belize in January? We're going to Belize in January.) What that means is that I need to be jiggling that thigh until it jiggles off. I've given myself this week to come down off the marathon, not exercising one single little bit. Then we're back to counting calories, and burning 400-600 calories per day in cardio for the next three months.  I'm also going to be doing a whole lot of lunges and squats, based on those race photos, I'll tell you that. I'm hoping to planning on losing 10 pounds by January 11th. That's 90 days, almost precisely.  Twelve-ish weeks. That's less than a pound a week. I can do this. The other goal of this is obviously to lose weight so that I can speed up, and hurt less.

I've run one race each month for the last 12 months. I was planning on racing once a month this year for a 12 in 12 thing, but I'm not sure if I'll do any more races this year.  Maybe a couple of 5Ks, but honestly I'm not even sure I want to do those. I love racing, but I'm tired of the interruption it adds to my training for a longer race. I've run six half-marathons this year. That's crazy. But also what's crazy is that my times haven't gotten significantly better. Which tells me that racing isn't the same as training, and I need to be working more on the latter.  It's hard, though. I get emails for races and I get the itch to register. It's difficult to resist, especially when a medal is involved.

The other thing I want to do is volunteer for a race or two. I always feel so grateful to the volunteers, but in the last year I've raced 12 different events, and 12 different times complete strangers supported me, cheered for me, congratulated me just because I had entered a race. They don't get paid for it, and the certainly don't get thanked adequately for it. It's a wonderful thing to do and I want to pay that forward. I also hear stories from Mr. Bump or other people who've come out to watch me race about seeing the whole race, rather than just the bit I'm in, and I would love to see that. It's hard to appreciate it as a great feat when you're in it--you're just slogging through. But I think it will be obvious from the sidelines.

I actually emailed the people who run the Winter Distance Series, which I ran last year. If you volunteer, they give you free entry into one of their races, so that's kind of awesome. I'm excited, even if it means standing out in the cold all morning on a Saturday in December, January, or February.

I'm thinking about some yoga classes, and maybe joining a running group. Just to mix things up. I've never been a social runner, or for that matter a exercise class person, but maybe both will help. Neither is like a blood oath, so I think I'll live even if I hate them. I'm kind of awkward in group settings, and my last attempt at a running group resulted in me taking off on my own at about mile 3, so yeah. Not so good at that. But I do like running with a friend, being able to chat and therefore ignore that self-defeating voice in my head and also whatever body part is cranky.

My main focus right now is dropping some weight, which began on Monday and let me tell you, I forgot how much this sucks. The first week is always the worst, and after that your body stops screaming "FEED ME WOMAN!" And the other part is that you sort of get consumed by it. You're constantly calculating when and what you can eat. That gets easier eventually, too after you've been at it a bit and your routine gets settled.  I have chosen the hardest three months of the year to attempt weight loss, but I've done it before, and I know I can do it again.

Blogging
I'm going to start chronicling all this a little closer here, for my benefit if no one else's. Dieting can be such a struggle and a slog, so I'm sure you'll be interested in it's minutiae.  See you soon.

What's the hardest part of the day when you're dieting?  Any tips/tricks?

The hardest part for me is the afternoon at work. I bring my breakfast and lunch most days, so the gremlins don't generally come out until 1:30, and then they start shouting "FEED ME WOMAN! I'm bored! I'm stuck in this chair. Reward, please. Gimme gimme gimme." Also going out to dinner can be a disaster. It's so easy to blow it without knowing it. But I try to look online and figure out what I can eat before we leave the house.

My tricks/tips are peppermint tea, gum, and evening exercise. If I exercise after dinner, I've got to take it easy or I'll vomit. Built in governor.

share and compare

I promise, I promise, I will stop talking about the marathon soon. Soon is not yet, however.  I was curious to see how my stats compared from this marathon versus the Colorado Marathon. As luck would have it, Garmin has a comparison widget.  You can click on the images to make them bigger if you actually want to look at the data.

God bless statistics.  While in no way shape or form do they demonstrate a dramatic improvement, they do show improvement.  I would also like to note that the first 14 miles of the Colorado Marathon were mostly downhill, while there was a 200 foot elevation climb in the first 4 miles of the Portland marathon. And I'm pretty proud of my miles 25 split in Portland. It's just nice to see that the improvement is consistent.

In other news, I finally managed to drag my ass out for a run today. It wasn't pretty, but it happened. Now I just need to figure out what I'm doing next.

portland marathon race recap

*Warning--this may be my longest blog post ever, but I wanted to get this down before I forgot some of it. If you've heard enough about the Portland Marathon from me, come back tomorrow.*  The race photos went up this morning, a bit ahead of schedule. But the quality is kind of horrible. However, I'm not purchasing them for the exorbitant fees they charge, even for the jpegs.  So they'll give you some brushstrokes, but probably not much else.

Pre-race
The race started at 7:00, so I woke up at 5, had some bread and chocolate almond butter, a cup of coffee. The forecast seemed to settle on an hour of rain/showers between 6-7, and just cloudy after that. It didn't start raining until about 8:00, and then it rained off and until about noon. So that was spot on, Weatherman! Thanks!  I opted for compression socks and a skirt, although after having seen the race photos I probably should have gone with capri tights or compression shorts. Green was a good choice for visibility, I think. I'm also glad I wore a hat because the rain/sweat dripped off it pretty continuously after about mile 8 or so.

Mr. Bump walked me to the starting line, which was about 12 blocks from our hotel, snapped a couple of photos and then wandered off to the starting line in hopes of seeing me there.  Luckily, he did.




Starting line - Mile 1 10:35.2



Mile 2 - 10:58.6/Mile 3 - 11:12:1
These first few miles start off a gradual uphill. You go through Portland's pretty Chinatown gate, down to the waterfront (where I saw Mr. Bump again, but I was so far ahead of where he thought I'd be that he didn't have a chance to get a picture of me). Then the course climbs through about Mile 3. I managed to spot my cousin and her family at around Mile 3, just outside their hotel.  Though I was heading uphill, and you can see it in my mile 3 split, I was just cruising. Mile 1 seemed a bit fast, but I was on target for 2-3, feeling good.  At this point in the race you have so far to go, it's best to just soak up what's going on around you ignore the fact that you're running. There will be time enough for that later.

Mile 4 - 10:22:0/Mile 5 - 10:38:1/Mile 6 - 10:34:5

At mile 4.5 you turn around and head back toward downtown. This was where it started to spit, then rain for the first time. We saw a couple of bands along here (there were supposedly something like 84 bands on the course), including a marimba group playing above us on a pedestrian walkway. Lots of people in the neighborhood were out with their coffee cheering us on and watching the, as we saw on several signs, such as: "Most Boring Parade Ever."  This part is back along the waterfront and heading toward the industrial area. I picked up some speed on the downhills but it didn't feel like I was pushing too hard. In retrospect, I was.  I never should have had a 10:22 split.  In this section we passed by a homeless tent camp under a bridge and the smell was horrible.

Mile 7 - 10:38.6/Mile 8 - 10:39.4
I was around the 4:45 pace group at this point, so I thought I'd just hang with them, which I managed more or less until mile 15.  I was pushing pretty hard in the first half, and I could feel it in my legs. But I reasoned that I was supposed to be pushing the pace, this was the race, after all. But I knew I wouldn't be able to maintain it. That should have been my clue to pull back.  I saw a couple in camp chairs who had laid a raincoat down on the ground for their pit bull to curl up on, then draped it over his back to keep him warm. 

Mile 9 - 10:55.4/Mile 10 - 10:46.2
The first (second?) turnaround. It was at this point that I could finally see if anyone was still behind me. The next two miles allowed me to feel a little better about my pace, given the amount of runners, and eventually walkers, still coming toward us.  It rained all along here, but thankfully we didn't get stopped for any trains. We cross probably 10 sets of tracks along here, and it happens frequently that runners get stopped, but we didn't. Someone I saw at breakfast the next morning said they got stopped for 15 minutes, but they were run/walking and didn't particularly care about their time. I think they said they clocked in around 6:30.  I remember actual cheerleaders along this point. Tiny little middle school cheerleaders.

Mile 11 - 10:47:2/Mile 12 - 11:01.9/Mile 13 (halfway!) - 10:40.8
My memory of these miles was that there were lots of spectators, but knowing probably none of them would be for me. I always hold out a little hope that I'll be surprised, but no dice. Lots of great signs along this section. "I'm proud of you, complete stranger!" and "Your feet hurt because you're kicking so much asphalt/butt/etc."  My feet weren't hurting yet but I was feeling it in my calf muscles and my quads.  You run through some neighborhoods in mile 10-12, there were a few bands along the course, aid stations, all a rainy smeary blur. I realized it was probably going to be just this wet the rest of the way (which was almost true).  My spectators never got rained on, but then they were parked at Sugar Mama's inhaling a crazy-good breakfast. The didn't believe me when I said it rained almost the whole time when I saw them at the finish line.

Mile 14 - 11:01:1/Mile 15 - 11:02.8/Mile 16 - Checkpoint Charlie/The Hill - 11:37.5
Even though you realize at this point you're halfway, what you're feeling physically is that you can't possibly do this many miles all over again. For me I knew the hardest part of the course was coming up, that crazy steep hill you have to run up before going across St. John's bridge. I spent these miles trying to run under the cover of the trees to get out of the rain, and eyeing the bridge when I could see it in the distance, thinking how impossibly far away it seemed, and knowing I still had 9 miles yet to run after I got there.

For whatever reason, there are no race photos between the starting line and mile 17. Which I find just bizarre. Also my family was still leisurely consuming their from all accounts very delicious breakfast, with pancakes and homemade sausages. It was all very cruel now that I think about it.  I was trying to keep my body temperature up and eating Gus every 4-5 miles. What is wrong with me? I kept thinking.

There was also a guy dressed in drag like a 20s flapper girl along here. He/she must have been racing, however, because this was just after what they call "Checkpoint Charlie" where they make sure you have a timing chip and race bib on or you can't continue on the course.

Mile 17 - The Bridge - 12:59.4




This was a really tough mile, one of the slowest, too. It was rainy, there was a wet breeze coming off the river as we went over it, and I was out of Gatorade. You can actually see me trying to locate Mr. Bump and my folks as I came off the bridge in that second picture. But they, much like a water/aid station, were not to be found until mile 19. When you get up that hill and onto the bridge, you think that it's going to be downhill soon, but that damned bridge is very long and half of it is still climbing.  The weatherman was burned in effigy by us 5 hour marathoners on the bridge.


Mile 18 - 11:46.5  Frantically searching for something to drink, or someone I knew on this section. There were neither. The course profile appears to be all downhill from the end of the bridge to the very last half mile, but there was an uncharted hill after the initial downhill from the bridge. There was cursing involved. Also some walking. All I wanted was something to drink and to see my spectators in their Team Bump shirts. (Oh yes, I had shirts made. They are fabulous. I will share photos later.)

It was around here I also saw the best spectator sign EVER, held by a little blond boy of about 3. It said "My head was in the 99th percentile. You got this, Mom!" I laughed out loud.

Mile 19 - First Parental Sighting - 12:24.5

I finally saw Mr. Bump and my parents, and managed to swap out my empty bottle for a full one. I also took the opportunity to chuck the iFitness belt that I bought at the expo to carry my cell phone, because I just couldn't seem to get it to stay put, probably because I was sopping wet. I'll try it again but it chafed me somewhat, mostly because I couldn't get it to stay on my hips. Seeing my family and offloading some gear a boost I needed, but it didn't last for long.

Mentally I had this notion that once I got over the hill and the bridge, it would be all downhill and easier and I wouldn't hit the wall and that rainbows and unicorns would come shooting out of my ass running shoes. I wasn't prepared for how very long the last 6 miles were going to be. And I suffered for it.


Mile 20 - 12:45.2

Somewhere around here I began to feel my body and my mind separate from each other. I felt like they sort of uncoupled like two train cars, and while they were both traveling the same direction, they weren't really paying much attention to each other. I had fantasy conversations with other runners. I got fixated on a guy who's shirt said "I Am Sofa King..." and then had a list of sentence ends like "sweaty" and "awesome" and "my wife after this." I spent a good 3/4 of a mile trying to think up other ways to end that sentence.  I spent a lot of time scrutinizing the runners around me, what they were wearing, their gaits and socks and oh, just about anything. I felt like I was at a distance from all the spectators, all the other runners, myself. Also like I was sort of in slow-motion.  Probably I was somewhat energy depleted and my brain was just working triage on the body and didn't have time to entertain me.  It was weird, that's for sure.

I never had any problems with my GI on this race, and I never needed a pottie break either, which is normal for me. I did have a tough time opening up my gus and I don't think I kept up adequately with the fuel. I was trying to plan them for water stations, but I'd forget until I was out of water. I also kept meaning to wipe my face off to clear the salt off it at each water stop, but I kept forgetting that too.  My brain gets very forgetful when I'm racing. It doesn't have much short-term memory.

Mile 21 - 13:15.6/Mile 22 - 12:04.2/Mile 23 - 11:57.0/Mile 24 - 13.09.8
This is where the wheels came off the bus and I felt like I let everyone down. Remember how I said I was going to dedicate these miles to thinking about people in my life that I found inspiring and/or supportive?  I apparently am really bad at math because I didn't list anyone for mile 22-23. I therefore spent miles 20-23 trying to figure out who the hell I was supposed to be thinking of. But I also spent a lot of these miles alternating between running and hurting and thinking about walking, and then walking and hurting in different places and trying to gear back up to running again.  I felt bad for the people I was supposed to be using as "inspiration" because these splits were anything but inspiring. 

Still, I kept moving, even though I kept forgetting that I was on mile 22 instead of 23 (so disappointing). These are the "never again" miles, when you're sure that you will never run another marathon. They're also the miles where the 5:00 hour pace group caught up to me, then passed me at a water station. They were in my line of sight until about 24, when you cross back over the river. That was the point at which my goals began to shift back to "finish and not die." I was trying to do math at this point to figure out exactly how much further I had to go and if I really was going to miss a sub 5:00 marathon. I'm useless at math on the best of days, so I had no idea.

I did think, more than once, as a way to get myself back running, that this was the walk break I was going to regret later. That got me going again every time.

Mile 25 - 11:19.8 (negative split!) Around this time I realized if I didn't have too much further to go, and if I picked up the pace, I might actually finish sub 5 hours. Hence the negative split. Actually, this is the pace I should have run every mile. But it felt like a hurry after the last five slow run/walk miles. There is some good downhill on this part too, so I opened it up as best I could. The fact that I was able to run this mile faster lets me know that I could have run some of the previous 5 faster, if I had mentally been around.


Mile 26 - 12:00.3


Misery is the best way to describe this face. Until you round this corner, you really have no idea how much further you have to go. People keep screaming at you that "you're almost there!" which is the most useless piece of shit encouragement.  I think this was 25.9 or so, so really only .3 miles left to go. But until you can see the finish line, it's really hard to know you're close, but you can't see quite how close you are to finishing. I also knew my watch was off the official course markers, so even though I could tell how far I'd come, I couldn't do the math on how much further I had to go. If there was a final 800 meters sign, I never saw it.  I also didn't see my father waving his baseball cap at me over the barricades. I was just focused on holding on to it. I so badly wanted to stop and walk, but there was some serious shame in that so I kept running.

26.0-26.4 (my Garmin's official distance) - 5:37.8 (but I forgot to stop my watch right away, so a bit off)
Net time: 5:02:43 (official)
Average pace: 11:26/mile


I only vaguely remember putting my hands up here, but it makes for a nice picture so I'm glad I did.

Post-race
After finishing I was really impatient to get my medal and space blanket and get moving again. After being in motion for that long it's really hard to just stop and wait in a line (no matter how short) to get your medal. Also, apparently my blood sugar was nonexistant because I was ready to shove some other poor finisher out of the way to get my medal.  I was completely soaked to the skin by the time I finished, so that space blanket was great. Although it was sort of sweat under it, freeze out of it. I've seen in other races that they tape them on like a cape, which would have been helpful because of all the other stuff I was going to need my hands for. Upon reflection, perhaps there were some bags somewhere, but they weren't in my line of sight.

The finisher's chute for this race was an effort to load you down with a bunch of stuff when you can barely grip anything at this point. Medal, space blanket, rose, comemerative coin, pendant, long sleeve t-shirt, and tree seedling.  For some reason I insisted on a hot pink (not pale pink) rose from the poor girls gripping thorny roses. Why I cared, I have no idea. But I distinctly remember thinking that I'd just finished an f*cking marathon and I deserved the color of rose I wanted. 

Not to mention the fact that there is tons of food. And you really would like to eat (or at least grab some of it), but your hands are full of things you can't eat.  As I was heading from the roses to the food, the road seemed to slant one direction and a race volunteer angel descended from a cloud in front of me, asking me if I was all right. I assured her I was fine, it was the street that seemed to be slanted to the left. She nodded, gripped me around the shoulders and said "Let's get you some juice."  Once I had a little cup of juice, and she was assured that I wasn't going to fall over, she waved vaguely in the direct of the medical tent in case I needed it and used her angel wings to flutter over to the next delirious finisher.

I got orange and grape juice, a string cheese (I heard some older gentleman saying "how do you get this thing open?") a half a banana, a frozen fruit bar, and a fistful of redvines, pretty much at random. Although I really wanted that fruit bar. They also had mini candy bars, bags of chips, quarters of bagels, oranges, grapes, gingersnaps (should have got some of those), other cookies. A ton of food. I ran out of room to put stuff so I just gave up. And then they handed me the pendant and the coin in little velvet pouches. Then I really was out of room. At that point the street was sort of tipping again, and I just wanted to find my family. The reunion area was really really far away, probably  3/4 of a block from where you exit the finisher's chute. Yes, I had just run 26.2 miles so an extra 2-3 blocks of finisher's chute to reunion area was really too long. 

Thankfully my last name starts with A, so my little band of merry spectators was waiting at the head of the reunion area. And let me tell you, it was the best part of the whole day to see them and the smiles on their faces. I wish I had been lucid enough to get photos of that. It was wonderful. So much better than any of my armloads full of race schwag. Mr. Bump became my official holder-upper, and while I now regret that he to NO photos of me after the race, it sure felt good to have someone's arm around my shoulder at the time.

We walked to the car, said goodbye to my family who came down from Washington, and made it back to the hotel and into a very long, very hot shower.  Later we went to lunch at Burgerville and then over to Powell's Bookstore (somewhere along the course I promised myself that as a reward for finishing) but I couldn't even think about what I wanted to look at or buy and my feet were throbbing so I cut the visit short.  I rested in the late afternoon but didn't nap, and we went to bed early. That was pretty much it. 

I finished. I didn't get sick, didn't have any blisters, although I got a wicked chafe from my heart rate monitor because of how wet I was. I didn't hit all my goals but I did hit some. I'm calling it a win.  I'll save my thoughts and future goals for another post. Sorry this is so long. If you got all the way to the end of it, then I owe you a medal. Leave me your address in the comments section.

the waiting is the hardest part

Pictures from the race still haven't posted on the Portland Marathon's website (and it sounds like they won't be until Tuesday), but hopefully this will tide you over.  Mr. Bump didn't get very many pictures of me because it was crazy packed and just hard. They would be searching the crowd for me, and by the time they saw me, there wasn't time to snap a picture. Because I'm just that fast.

Here's one from the start line, just before I entered the F corral (ominous?) and the porta-pottie line that would kill 20 minutes between when Mr. Bump and I parted company and when the race started.

It was kind of chilly but not too bad. I was amazed at the amount of clothing people kept on. I was expecting to see a lot of clothing get shucked, based on what people were wearing, but I saw runner's near the finish line with jackets and layers! I went with short sleeves, running skirt, compression knee-highs. I thought that I was going to have some chafing issues as I kept needing to adjust at the start, but once I got going everything seemed to settle down and behave itself.

This one is kind of a where's Waldo deal. See if you can spot me, based on what you know I'm wearing from above.

As always, there's some old geezer in my way. Take a good look at my thigh, because that's the best shot of it you're going to see.  And then brace yourself.

*Moment of silence for my body image*

Man is that terrible. I'm sure there are more of those to come in the official race photos.

Anyway. Moving on!

The Portland Marathon collects a whole bunch of data from the timing chip, and uses it in a matrix to show you all kinds of cool (or depressing) information about your race, and how it relates to everyone else's. Like this:

It shows your gun time, chip time, and where you placed. I love how it tells you how many runners you passed, and how many passed you, in the final 6.2. Not too shabby, considering the out of body experience I was having at that point.  In the top 2/3rds of finishers, middle of the pack for my gender. I'm amazed there were only 8402 finishers. Supposedly 15,000 people had registered. Where were they?

Then it also shows you your pace and speed per mile/km.  It's kind of hard to see the "Your Finish" but it basically shows you who/how many people finished before you/after you (also shows their names and division/sex). You can scroll forward and back to see who finished ahead or behind you. The different colors are for men/women/runners in my division. I like seeing all those guys behind me. :)

 This one shows (yellow arrow) where I was on the course when the winner crossed the finish line.

That's mile 12.

Where I was when the Female Winner crossed the finish line.

Winner of F35-40 division

 You can also input someone else's bib number and find out where they were in relationship to you. Which would be very cool if I had known anyone else running this race. You can also see in the "Section MPH" area, that my mph deteriorated in the last half, and especially in the last 6.2.

I am still gathering my thoughts about the race itself, but this one was definitely a different experience than the last marathon. The size of the race and the number of spectators aside, it just felt different. I was somewhat fractured in my preparation, both physically because of nagging injuries, and mentally because we were traveling with my parents. I just never really had time to sit down and puzzle out my race plan. I had a vague idea of when I was going to take my gels, which wasn't correlative to water stations. I winged it on hydration, bring some gatorade but also drinking the course drink and water. While it was painful and exhausting, there were times when I definitely felt the physical and the mental uncouple. It wasn't exactly an out of body experience, but that's the closest term I can think of to describe it. I couldn't get myself to even sprint to the finish line because despite yelling at myself to, I wasn't able to reach down to wherever the mental/physical handoff happens. I would think it, but my thoughts didn't translate for my body. It was weird, I'll tell you that.

More later...once those race photos come out. Then I can give you a mile by mile play by play.

5:02:43

No sub 5 hour marathon, but a PR. And darned close. I also think I shook up my babymaking parts so that whole having kids discussion may be moot.  It was an interesting day. I got as close as I could, but I just didn't make it under 5 hours. I think I'm happy but right now all I am is tired. More later.

me against the marathon

Your heroine

vs.

26.2 glorious miles

In these conditions

The bags are packed, the boarding passes are in hand. All training that is to be done has been done.  All that's left to do now is make sure I'm properly hydrated and my liver is all filled up with glycogen goodness. I think I can handle it. The scale this morning claims my liver weighs 2 more pounds than it did last week. Unless that's all water weight. Hm.

Actually, there is one last bit of training I need to do now, and aside from Mr. Bump and I herding cats my parents around northern Oregon. And that's getting my game face on.  I've got a variety of goals for this marathon, which is partly why I'm so keyed up.

A goal:  A 4:45 marathon. Is this realistic given my training? Probably not, but if all the stars align, I might have it in me.  It's my might-just-be-out-of-reach goal.

B goal: A 4:59:xx marathon. My main goal is to break 5 hours. My previous marathon time was 5:03, and I believe I can break that 5 hour barrier, barring any major crap disasters.  There will be pacers for this marathon, and although my previous experience with pacers wasn't great, if I can keep myself between the 4:45 and 5:00 pacers, I'll be in the sweet spot.

C goal: A 5:02:xx marathon. If something goes awry, and I can't gain back a couple of minutes, I would really like to beat my previous marathon time.

D goal: Finish this mother.  Really, this is primary. Given the challenges of this training cycle, I just want to git ma giddy up and hold my medal up.  I just freestyled that right there. Next career: rap star, yo.

Beyond setting out my goals ahead of time, the mental preparation is also all about making a sort of plan and visualizing how that's going to look.  

• I plan on running the first 17 or so miles except for water stops, and then assess how I'm feeling at that point as to whether I want to switch to run/walk or just keep after it.  If I switch to run walk, I'll shoot for 5/1 intervals.  
• Mr. Bump and I are trying to make a spectator plan as well, places where they'll try to be so I can look for them.  There are going be something like 14,000 runners in this bad boy, so there's a good chance we could miss each other all together.  We'd all be disappointed to come all this way and not have the opportunity to connect, but I have to face that as a possibility, and mentally be prepared to run the whole distance on my own. With 13,999 other people.  
• Speaking of other people, I really want to try very hard not to get caught up in the start surge and run those first couple of miles too fast. This is hard for every runner, and while I've been guilty of it in the past, I know that I can also slow down and take the first few easy.  
• I'm also experimenting with a mantra or two:  I've always loved Haruki Murakami's: Pain is inevitable, misery is optional. I've actually got a headband with those words on it, which I might be wearing for  the marathon. Other options are
• Those last 6.2 miles. I'm going to try and dedicate each of those last six miles to someone who has supported me, helped me along and been my cheerleader. I've got three pros already lined up, who I hope to see along the way.  
• My two friends whose names both start with Chris. I've raced with both of them, and had so much fun with both of them.  While I'm hating miles 20-22, I'm going to try to think about the smiles on their faces while I was pushing them both to sprint at the end of those races. 
• Mom gets mile 23-24. Pretty much don't have to explain this one to anyone who has ever met my mom, but in case you haven't, I'll just leave you with this picture. Also she's the designated worrier for Team Bump, so I have nothing to worry about--she's on top of it.
 
• That guy in the matching sweatshirt is my dad. Mile 24-25 is really hard. You want so badly to quit, even though you're almost done. Your body is wrecked (pain is inevitable, misery is optional) and every step feels like the toughest step you've ever taken. My father has broken many bones, fallen several stories, flown through the windshield of his pickup truck, fallen down a well, and had so many stitches we've stopped keeping track. At almost 77, he's still a badass. If he can shrug off pain and keep at it, then I can cowboy up that mile. I'm going to be picturing him marching behind me shoving me toward the finish line. That'll work for me.

• Mr. Bump gets mile 25-26. He's been to all but a handful of my races, and he's always there after a hot run with a big glass of ice water and a fan, or a mug of cocoa after a snowy, chilly one. He always, every time, no matter whether it's a 3-miler or a 21 miler, asks me how my run went. I never could have gotten to a point in my life where I was running a marathon without him.
• Don't worry, I didn't forget that last 2/10ths of a mile, which is without question the most difficult .2 miles EVER. The person I hope to be thinking about, through the hazy stupor that comes from being able to see the finish line,is my littlest running partner, A. He runs because it's fun and most of the time when he does, he's giggling (although that might be because I'm chasing him...hm). And I'm sure I'm going to need that reminder right about then. Because really, shouldn't it always be this fun?

And have no fear. I'll probably be thinking about you somewhere between miles 1 and 20. I'm sure you'll come up.  Thanks for reading all the way to the end of this ramble. I'll be back, hopefully before Sunday.  In case you're dying to know how this all plays out, you can real time track my progress via this link on race day. My bib no. is lucky #6523.

crap

No one can say that RAIN in Portland is a big surprise for race day. But a girl could hope.

right as rain, come again

Last weekend I was supposed to run my 20 miler, the first of three, but my foot was hurting, so I thought I’d just give it a rest, and hope it got better.  It didn’t really get worse, and somewhere along the line I figured the more I focused on it the more it hurt, so just ignoring it was the way to go. So I ran 6 miles on Tuesday and 5 on Friday, did a cross-train day in there and was ready to hit another cross-train day yesterday with a bike ride and set myself all up for a 20 miler today. I was feeling great. I had mopped up the foot issues, the hip was feeling strong. I was ready to go and Sunday the weather was going to be a bit cooler, so Sunday was definitely going to be the 20 mile day.

Then Saturday morning I had the brilliant idea to shave my legs while in the shower. If I’m going to sport running shorts, I like to be considerate to others. So I thought I would clear-cut the forest clean up.  This would all have been fine if somewhere around 3/4 of the way through the job my back hadn’t had some sort of spasm, which I could hear, and twanged. Like a guitar string breaking.  I could barely straighten up. But I did, and managed to finish shaving. I had to hike my leg up and prop it up on the wall, but at least I’m not a Neanderthal. I did, however, do a mental version of whistling as you walk through the forest at night. It goes something like this “Nothing serious has happened, this is fine, just a little twang, right as rain, nothing to see here, move on.”

It was some A plus wishful thinking, but I decided to just go ahead with the errands I needed to run (aside from running my 20-miler, I’m baking a wedding cake for next weekend, so I had some things to pick up). Even before the first errand to the cake supply store was over, I knew I was in serious trouble. Mr. Bump tried to shore up my spirits with some frozen yogurt, but when I sat down in the REI without buying anything we both knew I was seriously hurting. I spent some portion of Saturday sitting, leaning over, or lying down. Standing is pretty painful, and after about a block or so of walking, my posture is odd and painful, trying to protect my lower back. Mr. Bump suggested I take a Benadryl as a mild muscle relaxer, and gave me a little back massage and put the heating pad on my back. Which was horrid because it was 97 degrees and here I was with a heating pad on my back.  But the Benadryl did the trick in terms of letting me get some sleep. I sort of passed out around 8:30 and slept for about 10 hours.

Today I’ve been popping ibuprofen and hobbling around baking cakes, but it wasn’t the way I wanted to spend my Sunday. I keep wondering if I’m playing mind games with myself, a little self-sabotage. But nobody trains for a marathon against their will. And I really want this. I’m scared. I’m scared that I’m not going to be able to run Portland. I’m scared I won’t be able to just shrug this off and run my normal mileage this week. I think this was just a freak thing, not related to my running. It happened to me once years ago when I was bending down to pick a book of the bookshelf. But for whatever reason it happened, it did. And it’s hard to think about running when you can’t even stand up straight or go for a walk to the mailbox without stopping to lean on the rock wall a half a block from home.

This training cycle has been fraught with injuries, none of which have been terribly significant in itself, but the hip, the foot, now the back? It’s beginning to making me doubt my training plan. I know I’m able to do this, so why has it been so hard this time? Too much? Too long? Too fast? Maybe all of those things. The last few weeks I’ve been trying to hold back and get myself feeling good, but it’s made me miss a few runs. And I just keep thinking that I just want to run again. I don’t care how fast it is, and how long it is, I just want to run. It’s frustrating to not feel like I should.

I keep thinking that maybe I should try and go for an experimental trot. That maybe if I just don’t focus on this it won’t prevent me from continuing my training. I can’t even freak out about it, because it feels like if I freak out about it, I’ll be admitting that it’s something serious. And it can’t be something serious. It just can’t.  it doesn’t feel broken, just stiff and sore, so I think it will get better. Any second now.

paparazzi

It's a good thing that I roll with my own paparazzi because there is nary a race photo of me from the Georgetown to Idaho Springs Half.

We left the house at 5:30. And I would've sweated any makeup off anyway. 
Gimme a break.

At about 5 miles in--I never saw Mr. Bump, 
despite the fact that he was apparently waving and shouting at me.

a matter of seconds

I went into this weekend’s race, the Georgetown to Idaho Springs Half Marathon, hoping for a PR. My last PR was at the Platte Half Marathon in April 2010, when I was training for the Colorado Marathon. Something about the really long training runs makes a half seem like such a cake-walk. But I had been having foot/ankle problems throughout the week, and wasn’t having much success with ice and ibuprofen, so I wasn’t very optimistic.

Mr. Bump was nice enough to drive me down to the start from Leadville, waking up at 5 am to get us down to Georgetown before they closed the road (the road to the parking lot was the road the race started on). He was exhausted from an early morning at work the day before (at work around 5:40 am) but like the great Runner Husband he is, we parked in Georgetown near the lake and he slept for a half an hour before I finally decided to line up.  The crowd for this half was huge, compared to other races I’ve done. Mostly, I think, because the cost of the race is inexpensive. I signed up in April, for $35.00. This is practically unheard of for a race of 2,500 people, and it explains why they only give out a cotton finisher t-shirt and why there are so many people who run it.  This race seemed like it was a crazy amount of racers, but knowing how much larger Portland is going to be, I’m having a hard time wrapping my head around it.

It was chilly at the start, but there wasn’t a cloud in the sky so I knew it would heat up once the sun hit us. The course sets out with a loop through Georgetown, and at mile 2 you cross under the start line to head downhill toward Idaho Springs. It was at that two mile mark that we finally got out of the shadow of the mountainside and the sun hit us. From about mile three I was hot. It was still only about 8:30 at this point, and it shouldn't have been above 70, but it felt pretty relentless right from mile 3. This was an ongoing factor.

One of the nice things about this particular race was that there would be pacers from a local running club, who ran with a two foot dowel with the projected finish time taped to the top like a flag. I wanted to come in somewhere between 2:15 and 2:20, so I lined up in between. When we started out, the 2:20 pacer seemed to be going fairly slowly, so I moved ahead of her.  I hooked up with the 2:15 pacer, and tried to hover just behind him. At some point I got ahead of him, but knew eventually he would catch me. Somewhere along the line he not only caught me, but blew far enough by me that I lost sight of him. From then on it was a battle to stay ahead of the 2:20 pacer, who kept getting closer and closer to me. She finally passed me at around mile 10-11, and I just couldn’t keep up with her. Since I crossed the line a couple of minutes after her, and my chip time was spot-on 2:20, she didn’t keep her promised pace. And that made me feel like shit, even though I knew she was ahead of pace according to my watch.

I did really well in the first half of the race. My 10k split was 1:05:41, beating my fastest 10k time (1:10?). It was hot, my face was really red, and I was beginning to chafe (oh the chafing!). Eventually I ended up grabbing two waters at the 10 mile aid station and dumping them over my head and down my back. I managed to pour some Powerade down one side of me, too, but that was more of a fumble than an intent. Somewhere along here I ran past a poor man who had collapsed on the course, with one person holding up something to shade him from the sun, one person holding his feet up, and one person placing their hand held water bottle behind his head. Not long after I passed him the EMT’s passed heading toward him. People (lots of people) were weaving from one side of the road to the other just to get the little shade offered by the trees on whatever side of the road was shady. Normally people are loathe to run side to side because it adds mileage to your race and doesn’t improve your time. But that’s how hot it felt. There was very little breeze, too. Along the course a woman had placed her sprinkler out in the dirt in front of her house, and we were all veering over to run through it, despite the muddiness. I may have gotten the order of all this wrong, because I can’t remember what came after what—it’s all just kind of a blur of Stuff that Happened.  The middle of the course, about 3 or 4 miles of it, are all dirt. In some ways this was ok, in some ways it was harder. I think it was cooler, but the soft dirt and rocky terrain made this section more difficult.

At some point in the middle I realized my foot/ankle wasn’t really hurting, but it seemed to be somewhat numb and tingly. I just sort of shrugged my shoulders at that and kept going. Walking didn’t solve the problem, and it didn’t really make it any harder to run, so I just kept on going. I wore my compression socks since the race was downhill, and that probably did help, ultimately, with whatever foot/ankle/calf problems were nagging at me.

After getting back on the asphalt, the heat felt like hands on my shoulders, pressing me down toward the pavement. The last mile or so was pretty torturous, just really hot, really tired. I was having a hard time keeping running, and in fact in the last 500 meters I kept running, but also thinking “How am I doing this?”  

After I finished, I wandered around looking for water (which was another 1/4 mile away—not a good thing GTIS people), gulping down two cups and grabbing a chocolate milk, tottering on my feet and looking longingly at the kiddie pools filled with ice water that people were standing in. But I knew if I took of my shoes I’d never get them back on, and I still had to find my husband in the chaos of the finish line. I knew he would call me and eventually he did, but even the effort of getting my phone out of my hand-held water bottle was difficult. I found out where he was and weaved my way up to him, then realized I hadn’t picked up my finisher’s t-shirt (no medal at this race, just a t-shirt). Got that, got some more water, got a pint glass, some watermelon, and randomly some yogurt. I wasn’t hungry so much as incredibly, unquenchably thirsty. I think I drank about 48 ounces on the course, another 36 or so at the finish line. I would’ve drunk more but they were running out of water by the time I finished. Then I drank a 20 ounce diet soda and a bottle of water on the drive back to Leadville.

I was completely hydrated before the race, even used the porta-pottie once before the start (oh, what a necessary evil they are) and really could have used it again as I lined up at the start, but didn’t really have time and really couldn’t face the porta-potties at that point. They are so nasty just before the race starts and I didn’t want to lose my cookies just before running 13 miles. So yeah, on top of a numb foot, some serious chafing and some mild heat illness, I had to pee the whole time.  I didn’t run this race at as even a pace as I ran the Platte Half Marathon. I pushed myself a little too hard and then had to walk a bit on the second half, which ultimately slowed me down and I regret now.

This half taught me some lessons: I need to work on my pacing. I’ve been focusing on speedwork, which I can see has really helped, but I need to do better with the tempo workouts, trying to maintain a speed over a longer distance, 6-8 miles or so. I haven’t gotten it figured out yet, but I’m working on it.  Next weekend is the first 20 miler, and I’ll do two more of those if all goes well. My mileage should start inching past the 30 mile mark if I can get all my workouts in. I’ve been struggling with the cross-training and the tempo runs, but I’m determined to have a week where I hit all my workouts. This has been a more aggressive training cycle than the last one, but so much so that I haven’t been hitting all my workouts. I’ve begun to question whether this plan is right for me, but I’m not sure that switching with 7 weeks to go is such a good idea. Other lessons learned include 1) I am not allowed to wear tempo shorts to a race again. I think I probably startled the horses, and it certainly created a chafe situation that has left me with scabby thighs (sorry); 2) that sunscreen should be as close to completely waterproof as possible, because I definitely sweated and watered it off; 3) larger races (this one, at about 2,500 participants was one of the largest I’ve raced in) make it really hard to find anyone else who is racing or who is cheering for you—Mr. Bump saw me at mile 5, but I couldn’t find him; 4) I really want another shot at a half-marathon PR this year.

All in all this was a tough race, but the scenery was beautiful. I probably would have enjoyed it a bit more if it were slightly cooler, but a lot of it was downhill, which always helps, and a couple of small uphills, but nothing major. Of course, after the Leadville Heavy Half, my notion of an uphill is somewhat skewed.

I am very grateful for my wonderful husband, who was there to cheer me on at mile 2, mile 5, and mile 12.8. Thanks for being my chauffeur, my race photographer, and my one man cheering section. No matter the size of the crowd, or whatever medal or t-shirt might be waiting for me, you’re always who I want to see when I cross the finish line. Thank you love, for supporting my crazy hobby.

To end this post on a whimper rather than a bang: my official chip time was…2:20:29.8.  Previous PR…2:20:28. Missed it by THAT much.  Here are my splits—you can see where I wander off the rails:

Mile 1	10:50
Mile 2	10:23
Mile 3	10:11
Mile 4	10:01
Mile 5	10:33
Mile 6	10:06
Mile 7	10:25
Mile 8	11:06
Mile 9	10:50
Mile 10	11:09
Mile 11	10:43
Mile 12	11:32 (this was a hot mile)
Mile 13	11:06
Mile 13.1	1:31
Garmin Time	2:20:34

tips for training for the Leadville Heavy Half Marathon

This post is probably not of interest to most of the handful of people that read this blog, but I wish I'd been able to find a training post on this race when I was training, so I thought if I put it out there for some other poor first-timer.

I'll be honest. I kind of floundered around in training for this beast. I wasn't really sure how to approach it. Do I run trails? Do I run hills? Do I run at altitude?  Of course the answer ideally is yes to all three.  But if you don't live in Leadville or its environs, then it's a little tough to do that.

This race is really in the early summer in the high country. And this year in particular was a snowy, late summer.  I tried as best I could to run the course, but got stymied by thigh-deep (or deeper) snow in the first week of June.  I had done some hill repeats in Denver before really running the course at all, which seemed hard but like good training, until I ran the course. Then it just seemed like a joke.  I found a hill that was 1/4 mile long, and ran it 10 times. But the course is like 15 of those and 15 more that are twice as steep, without the nice downhill intervals in between.

Now I believe that the only way to know how to train is in hindsight.  So this is what I should have done, some of which I did, some of which I didn't.

• Hike a 14er.  Hike as many as you can.  It gives you training for up, up, and more uphill, followed by downhill on shaky legs.  And you'll get a sense of how altitude works on your brain and system.  Plus, most of the final uphill on the course gets walked by all but the badasses. So learning how to keep going even when you feel like crap and you can't breathe is good practice. I did this only once, but it was totally worth it. I'd do two or three more if I did this again.  
• Take every chance you can get to run on dirt, on rocks, and at altitude.  I think I run up here often enough that I know how my body deals with running at 10,000 feet, so running on flat at this altitude isn't a big deal for me, but if you aren't used to it, you need to get some time in up here. Hiking 14ers helps with that as well.  I wish I'd been able to run/hike on rocks a bit more. Your ankles have to work really hard and it's a good idea to get a sense of footing.
• End your long runs with some downhill training, if you can. Having some practice running downhill on tired legs would have helped me on those last three fire road miles.
• I should have run the accessible three miles on the course (as two or three repeats) every single time I came up here, but I didn't.  It was nice, however, to not really know what I was in for when the climb really started at about mile 5. I think I would have been disheartened if I had known. Usually I'm the kind of control freak that likes to know everything about a course if I can. But this one wasn't driveable, and I missed my small window (one weekend two weeks before the race) when I couldn't trained on it. In hindsight, I'm glad I didn't know that upper section in detail. But knowing there was a downhill after the first three miles would have been helpful.  It's a fine balance between knowing the course and knowing it well enough to dread it, or not enjoy it because yada, yada, yada been here, seen it.
• Don't bother with "trail running" on single track trails. I did this two or three times, including the Turquoise Lake Half Marathon, and I absolutely LOVED it. I found myself running along grinning and laughing. But it wasn't helpful for training for this race. This course is all dirt road and rock. Lots and lots of rock.  I think I'll save this kind of trail running as a treat for myself. They're the funnest of fun runs.
• It was hot, so training in weather (both cold and heat) is helpful. You never know what your going to face up there on the top of the pass.  Although this year was great, and no one really needed a jacket or gloves, being able to deal with a 25 degree swing in temperature, especially after sweating the uphill and then that sweat cooling you down on the downhill, is good training to have if you can get it. And generally in April or May, that's about the time you can get that kind of swing in a single day if the weather takes a turn. Which it often does in Colorado.
• Buy a Camelbak (I have this one), or some other kind of hydration system. And train with it. I resisted getting one because I thought my back would get sweaty, and it would be heavy and uncomfortable. Yes, my back did get sweaty, but I'm always sweaty anyway.  It's super handy, and you don't have to try and plan to refill your water bottle on a 3 hour training run.  I saw a lot of people with them, and a lot of people on the course without them. Some carried two handhelds, which just looked weird to me. I had enough problems with my elbow (that was the part of me I had to ice afterwards) as it was, and I wasn't carrying one.
• Looking back my main advice would be to get a lot of time in on your feet, up and down. That's not always easy, but getting the miles in is a big part of it.  It's kind of "duh" advice, but the only way to train for a mountain is to run it.  If you can't get to one, I would suggest spending as much time as you can on your treadmill with the incline cranked up as far as you can go, just walking, or doing run-walk intervals. My calves were screaming after one of these workouts, but I think they built muscle memory in my calves, which helped.  
• I lost a lot of salts on the uphill since it was so hot. I had some salt tabs but I hadn't used them while training, and I wish I had. I took one at the turnaround point on the pass, but I probably should have started sooner with them.  I was having some problems with calf cramping on the way down. My solution was to try and stretch them out as I ran by choosing stones to step on that would flex my foot. Eventually they cut it out, so I don't know if it was the salt finally kicking in or just completing the super steep downhill portion of the event.
• Wear sunscreen. Cover yourself head to toe with the stuff, before you put your tank top or shorts or whatever on. I took sunscreen wipes along with me, but they had some spray at the aid station which was a lot easier to just wave all over me than pulling out the wipe. I didn't get a sunburn, but my mom and my mother-in-law did in the time they sat waiting for me. And Mr. Bump missed a spot on one hand that burned. But I didn't. 
• If When you run it, then I would advise you strongly to take the longest ice bath you can manage afterwards. Go here for a funny how-to. I lasted about 10 minutes (there was screaming involved), but I ended up being sorer in my upper body, probably as a result of the camelbak and lack of full submersion in the ice bath. *Shudder*

This probably isn't the advice more experienced trail or ultra runners would be interested in. But if you're a crazy (but average) runner who may or may not also be slightly overweight, then this is the advice for you. You're welcome!

P.S. I would also tell you that you can do it. There were moments before the race that I wasn't so sure myself, but what I know now is that if I could do it, with the limited and floundering amount of training I did, then so can you.

4:06:22

155th place out of 215 finishers.  It was an amazing day, a beautiful day, and I've got nothing but great things to say about the race, the volunteers, and every other person I met on the course. I'm proud of myself. And while there is always the possibility that you could have done better (I really shouldn't have walked any of those last three downhill miles, say), I feel like I did my best. 

Oh, I'm so happy that Mr. Bump was able to get such a flattering shot of my thighs for you all to see!

While the aid stations on the course were wonderful, and the volunteers were the best of any race I've ever done, I was fortunate enough to have my own cheering section comprised of my folks and my mother-in-law at the finish. And the best photographer/bell ringer/cheerleader a girl could ever hope to marry. Thanks Mr. Bump, for being the bright safety cone orange beacon for me to run toward. I love you, and I hope you know it.


Next stop, Portland!

panic!

I’m trying not to freak out about the Heavy Half this weekend.  Trying really hard. But.

I don’t feel ready.

I don’t feel prepared.  And I feel like there’s nothing I can do between now and then to catch up.

I can feel the panic crawling up my throat. I want to jump on the treadmill, crank the incline up and do 15 miles right now. But I know if I do that know it’ll just hurt my performance on Saturday.  That’s an exercise in panic. No that’s exercise in panic.

I’ve done 14,000 feet.  I’ve done 14 miles.  I just haven’t done 15 miles from 10K to 13K feet. I haven’t done more than 6 miles on trail—3 up and 3 back.

I am a control freak. Imma control fruh-eek. And it’s really hard for me to let go and let this play however it’s going to lay. I can make sure my music is ready. My gear is ready. My fuel is ready. I can hydrate. I can sleep. That’s all I got.

I was telling Mr. Bump today that I feel like this was a bigger deal even than my marathon.  He said, “Lana, don’t you remember? You’re a badass!”  I love my husband.

Then we went over my plans for the race:

• Plan A:  Go as fast as I can on the ascent, haul ass on the descent, trying to keep my feet under me and not trip.
• Plan B:  Panic!
• Plan C: This is Mr. Bump’s plan. Plan Chill. the Fuck. Out. (Ok, I added the bad words.)

He suggests going from Plan A to Plan C, skipping over plan B entirely.

Generally, my plan when I’m freaked about something is to cover it with a mental black tarp, and forget about it for as long as I possibly can. This is coupled with bouts of ripping off that tarp, hopping up and down and tearing my hair out, until I can’t take it any more and the tarp goes back on. Sometimes, though, I leave the tarp on for too long and because I’ve spent so much time ignoring that black tarp that I’ve left myself very little time do get ready for whatever is under there.  I think I’ve made it to the point where I just have to pull the tarp off, and start putting everything together.

Do I wish I was faster? Yes. Do I wish I was better on hills? You betcha.  Can I do anything other than psych myself up or psych myself out? Nope.  But I can choose to psych myself up rather than out, can’t I? Well, can’t I?

Hell to the yes!

Any words of encouragement for me? Please?

I gotta go to bed. Rest I can do something about.  Peace out.

feevty-feevty

I've been sitting here staring at a new blog post window trying to figure out what to say (and in fact how I feel) about today's race. I think the post title sums it up. It's an expression I got from The Geography of Bliss, by Eric Weiner. In it he spends some time in the least "happy" country in the world, Moldova, where he rents a room from an old woman.  "Feevty-feevty" (50/50, complete with a level hand shaken back and forth) and "no" are the only English she knows. When asked if she's happy or not, her response is "feevty-feevty." If you asked me how I did today at the Boulder Spring Half Marathon, my best answer is feevty-feevty, but not much more than that.

Ah, how little we knew how this is going to play out.

Mr. Bump and I got up around 5:45 and made it to Boulder Reservoir around 7:15. Parked, hit the port-o-potties, wandered around and eventually lined up at the start.  The race was supposed to start at 8:00 am, but for whatever reason (Mr. Bump says it was something about the timer), we didn't end up going until 8:15. The temperature was about 32, but you could tell that the sky was pretty clear so it would probably warm up.  I had a ear band on, but I shucked that and my gloves and handed that off to Mr. Bump when we were lining up. Then we waited for another 15 minutes and my fingers and toes really started to get frozen.

I should have kept on my gloves of flame--
Perhaps they would have helped.

I had my music player all ready to go, but since we stood around for so long it powered itself off.  After the gun (yep, they used a real gun), I was trying to get it to turn on and forgot to turn my watch on until well after I crossed the start line. So my official time will remain a mystery until they post the results. After I got my music going, and my watch on, I was feeling really pumped.  Mr. Bump took an embarrassing video of the start line that demonstrates just how pumped I was, but I veto showing it to you.

There are a couple of hills in the first two miles, and I managed them pretty well.  I started out with about 10:40s, which didn't feel too fast, so I didn't think I was pushing too hard.  I fell in step with a guy who had a steady 10:40 to 11:00 minute pace, and while I fell behind a couple of times, I'd catch him back up again after a walk break.  We chatted a little bit.  Somewhere after mile 4 I seemed to catch a second wind. By the halfway point, I was feeling pretty good. I was pushing hard for me, and I was feeling it in my glutes and calves, but I was doing ok.

There is a teeny pink dot in the middle that is me, a loser alone on the road.

Miles 6-9 were hard, and I had to take some breaks, but they weren't too bad.  The last few miles, though. I just ran out of gas. I knew I only had a 5K to go, but I just kept having to stop. I stopped through water stations. I stopped on hills (I ran all the downhills).

That hot pink blob in the middle of the picture is me. Walking.

Me running toward the finish line. Feebly.

Oh my god why am I not finished yet?!?

This is what pathetic looks like.

Even in the last third of a mile, once we got off the road and were on the chute up to the finish line (all up hill), I had to stop and walk. It was so demoralizing. I felt ashamed and embarrassed, but I couldn't go any faster.

Where the hell is the finish line? And why is it still so far away?

F-ing finally. I can go die now.

 I am still so tired.  I was so spent after my finish that I chucked my medal at Mr. Bump, grabbed a couple of cups of water and a protein drink and staggered to the car. I  couldn't be bothered with waiting in line trying to eat anything. Mr. Bump had to put a hand on my back  because he was afraid I was going to lose my balance.

I feel like I need to defend myself, somehow. The official time isn't up yet, but I think I finished in the 2:33 range.  This is about six minutes faster than my previous time on the course.  But about 13 minutes slower than I did on my last half marathon. This is definitely a tougher course.  The end is just brutal with the hills. And my time was pretty much all over the place.

I'm trying to figure out what I did wrong, without wanting to admit that I did something wrong. Did I not fuel soon enough, or often enough?  Did I start out too fast? Should I have walked some hills that I ran?  Or did I do the best I could, and it just wasn't my day? I felt so strong, so ready. I can't figure out what happened.

The good:

I PR'd for the course.
I left everything out there. I had nothing left in the tank at the end.
I wasn't passed by a 70 year old speed walker.
I ran most of the first half, even the hills.
I didn't get sick.

The bad:

I didn't PR.
I didn't maintain my pace.
I was passed by a whole lot of other people.
I walked more of the second half than the first.
I thought I was going to get sick afterward the race, from too much liquids.

The ugly:
I have a nice blister on my right second-in-command toe.
I need to foam roll out my IT bands, but I'm scared it's going to hurt.
I am going to sleep well, unless the pain awakens me.
I'm going to do this again in three weeks, on an even tougher course.  Hold me.

Well, that's all I can possibly say about that. Feevty-feevty it was.

And to leave you on a upbeat note, Mr. Bump took a picture of a dog, who runs like I wish I did.