In honor of recently signing up for the Grand Rapids Marathon, I'm going to start doing "Motivational Mondays." Each Monday I'll post some sort of motivation (whether it be a quote, a photo, a story ... ) to help keep me going. It won't necessarily always be marathon related, but it will always be motivational.
For me Monday's are the toughest day for me when training. It's time to get back to work, I'm still aching a bit from my long run on Saturday (or Sunday if I wasn't quite motivated to run Saturday morning, like this weekend).
The other day, I found the comic strip below. It's the perfect first Motivational Monday post as far as I'm concerned!
If anybody sees this hat in stores, would you mind picking one up for me? Pretty please?
The drawing for prizes for the Virtual Mile will be Monday, July 25. I will choose winners via Random.org and notify them by the end of the day. Anybody else interested in entering has until 10 p.m. CST Sunday, July 24, to do so. Click here for details.
One entry each is given for every $10 donation, reporting your time and sending a photo before/during/after the run.
Here is a list of those who entered, with the numbers that correspond with their entries:
After weeks of conversations and racking our brains, my super great running friends and I have chosen our fall marathon. We thought about running the Quad Cities Marathon, the inaugural Savannah Rock N Roll Marathon, the Des Moines Marathon and the Indianapolis Monumental Marathon. All would be great races, and all would add to my goal of someday — and when I say someday, I mean probably when I'm in my 70s — running a marathon in all 50 states. But that list will continue to dwindle. After October 16, I will be able to scratch off Michigan. On that date, we will hit the streets of Grand Rapids at the 2011 Metro Health Grand Rapids Marathon.
I always feel a little nervous when registering for a marathon. With three under my belt, that still hasn't changed. But yesterday, just before registering, I interviewed a couple local ultra marathon runners for a story I'm writing for work. I go into this interview thinking, "These guys are crazy!" During the interview, they started trying to convince me to do an ultra. At which point, I thought "These guys are carzy!" They said their training really isn't much different that that of a marathon runner. They each have full-time jobs, wives and kids and said they honestly don't have the time to log hundreds of miles each week. A key part of preparing for 50 or 100 mile ultras, they added, is mental. I had almost considered taking them up on their challenge, until mentality came into play. I'm still having issues wrapping my head around the mental challenge associated with marathon running, I'm not sure I could stretch my mind even further and tackle an ultra (even a 30-mile ultra sounds terrifying right now).
I came home from the coffee shop where I interviewed the guys, grabbed my credit card and computer, and sat down to make marathon #4 official. Just as I was about to click "Register" there was a ridiculously loud clap of thunder and my power went out. My laptop —with its dead battery and therefore dependent upon that power — turned off as well. I thought this might be a sign. But if it was, I wasn't listening! As soon as the power came back on I completed my registration. Take that, crazy loud thunder and momentary power outage!
So, I am now preparing to run 26.2 miles in precisely 86 days, 20 hours, 33 minutes and 52 seconds (according to the countdown on the marathon's website). Hopefully this chick is there with her encouraging words of wisdom, which I would assume ring true for runners of all distances:
I'll try and keep that in mind during my training runs as well! Training runs, which I should probably step up a little now that Grand Rapids is official. I'm very excited for Michigan to join Arizona, Illinois and Tennessee, raising my 50 in 50 total to four! Watch out 50 in 50 ... I'll get there someday! And, who knows, I may even run an ultra someday. But for now, I'll just have to focus on Grand Rapids ... and not shitting myself.
As promised, the following is a blog I wrote last August about my first experience running in my brand new, shiny and beautiful Vibram FiveFinger Bikilas. It was quite an experience, but I'm sorry to say that nearly a year later, my FiveFingers are still pretty shiny. Minimalist running definitely sounded good at the time, but my calves ... and later my ankles just weren't convinced. Anyway, here's what I thought after giving them a go for the first time:
I don't care if people are staring ...
I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I’ve kind of been obsessing over a certain pair of shoes lately.
My not-so-subtle hinting paid off, and I received a pair as a birthday gift from my boyfriend.
He surprised me Monday morning with the hot-pink-and-orange loveliness of my new Vibram FiveFinger Bikilas. I immediately slipped each of my toes into their individual pockets.
Luke was almost as excited as I was when I opened my “toe shoes,” as he likes to call them. But he won’t have to wait too long to own a pair of toe shoes like mommy and daddy. Check out the Vibram Kids KSOs that will be out sometime in 2011. The three of us will certainly turn heads as we wear these shoes around town. Now there’s a great Christmas card idea!
I wore my new shoes around the house for the remainder of the morning and considered wearing them to work, but they didn’t really go with my outfit.
Yesterday after work, I decided to take my new shoes on a test run. I’ve heard that too much, too soon in Fivefingers can cause muscle pain and such, since our feet are used to the support provided in everyday, cushiony shoes. But, I figured if I can rock a pair of super uncomfortable heels for hours on end, surely I can run a few miles in these shoes. Just to be safe, I planned on running a quick three miles around my parents’ neighborhood in East Peoria. I strapped on my pretty pink shoes and hit the road.
About a quarter of a mile into my run, I wanted to call it quits. My calves were already burning and the balls of my feet were not liking the rough pavement. I pushed on, but decided to shorten my run to two miles.
I felt everything under my feet. I felt the cushion of grass, the flat hard pavement and even a few rocks. I definitely noticed the rocks, but they weren’t enough to hinder my run.
From everything I’ve read, one of the major reasons runners are forgoing traditional running shoes for minimalist or even no shoes, is to help them maintain a forefoot strike. This guy explains it better than I ever could.
So, as I was running, I was concentrating on my forefoot stike. It was incredibly awkward. I can only imagine what I must have looked like out there. I felt like Phoebe in this episode of Friends.
Good thing there were no horses along my route!
I’ve also heard that barefoot/minimalist running can help increase your speed. But, during my two-mile run, I struggled to keep a 10:30 pace. I usually have no problem holding a 9:00 pace in my Brooks and Nikes.
I finished my run a little frustrated and woke up this morning with calves that felt like they had been put through a 20-miler as opposed to two measly miles. But, I plan to run in my Bikilas again soon. Probably not tonight as I tackle a few hills, but soon.
I’ll just try to keep my Phoebe-esque running skills in check. But, to paraphrase the great Phoebe, I don’t care if people are starring. It’s just for a second cause then I'm gone!
After about seven months of listening to my running friends tell me how much fun the Main Street Mile is, I finally have my own opinion of it — and it's not great!
I was not the least bit nervous about this run during the days leading up to it. I mean, it's only a mile, why would I be nervous?
The Main Street Mile is one-mile race, part of which is downhill. It's the perfect race for a mile PR. The website says it best: "We're talking fire starting, rubber burning, unleash your cheetah kind of fast." Here's the elevation chart:
I met my friends Friday evening and boarded the bus that would take us to the start of the point-to-point one-mile race. The race is run in three heats, depending on your projected finish time. I was in the first heat, but our bus pulled up to the start just as the first group of runners started. Whoops! So I jumped in with the second group.
Christa, Christy, Aimee, Michelle, Me and Julie, before the Main Street Mile.
It was at the start that it hit me. As a distance runner, I have never sprinted a mile in my life. I'm also not a fan of running downhill. Some runners love a nice decline in elevation, but I have a slight fear of rolling down the hill bowling ball style, taking out any runners in my way. While this might do wonders for my pace, I'm not sure others would appreciate being knocked down like my own personal bowling pins.
I took off ridiculously fast. I glanced down at my Garmin and saw that I was right at a 5-minute mile. Knowing that would never end well, I slowed down a bit. I was huffing and puffing before I reached a quarter of a mile. It was horrible! I started the decline and my nerves about running downhill quickly changed to pure bliss. But the bliss was short-lived and I was back on flat ground before I knew it.
I'm in the blue shirt and feeling awful at this point!!
I crossed the finish line at 6:35 — by far my fastest mile ever — and struggled to start breathing normally again. I spent the next few minutes complaining about how much I hated the race. One of my friends — a fellow Main Street Mile virgin until that evening — found me and told me how much she hated it as well. She said she'd rather run 10 miles any day, and I agreed. Looking back a couple days later, it doesn't seem as bad as I made it out to be. I probably will run it again, and will shoot to beat my 6:35 mile (even though the thought of that makes me cringe). But I did go for a nice 10-mile run yesterday. I took my time and ran a nice, slow, non-record breaking 9:22 pace, and I loved it!
