On February 7th we had a crazy race back in Lake Geneva and it was ridiculous! It was a small trail race but there was SO much snow on the ground that it was hard to walk it, let alone run! My time was HORRIBLE but I ended up being the 3rd girl overall and first place in my age group! Amy also won her age group! Shelly & Ryan were supposed to run it with us but they ended up getting really lost and couldn't make it. We all spent a little time in Lake Geneva looking at ice sculptures and going out to brunch after the race! Our fans were awesome!
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It has been a long couple of weeks of running on the treadmill! Blah! I was actually able to run outside the past 3 times that I have been running and it was great! Cold, muddy, slippery and amazing! :) Hank loves running with me, yesterday we did a 7 miler together out in the country and he did great!
However, I do feel like I am getting slower because of my treadmill runs :( Even when I go "fast" on the treadmill I still am not running as fast as I run outside...oh well...I guess that's part of the winter running game! I got Sammi to run with me last weekend when I was visiting her at ISU and now she is hooked...woohoo. I think the challenge is going okay...about 25 days are left in the challenge and I am at mile 47 - only 43 to go! This has been a long week! It has been so cold - like brutally cold. We were even off school Wednesday and Thursday! Cold temps = a lot of treadmill time. I was dreading it but I actually enjoyed it and found some more good workouts to try. I've been trying to do a lot of inclines still because that's something I can't do too easily outside! This one I had to modify a bit... Originally it was only 30 seconds running at the 7 speed which I changed to a full minute. It also was supposed to be 3.5 but i changed it to 4.5. I wanted it to be hard and I didn't want to walk at all. It was okay... Kinda boring to be honest but it did seem like a good workout.
I killed it this week - 30 miles done towards the 100 Mile Challenge! First weekend of 2015 is officially over - I can't believe I have to go back to school tomorrow!! It's been a lot of fun the past two weeks and I've loved hanging out with Dylan all day BUT I have really been slacking on my running! Oops! I think this challenge really helped to motivate me and get me back on the right track. Since I started it on Friday I have already done 10 miles! 5 outside on Friday and 3 outside on Saturday (it was snowy and beautiful) followed by 2 on the treadmill today. It is always so hard for me to get back on the treadmill after running outside so much so I'm trying to find some fun workouts to do. I have constantly been focusing on speed for the past few months so it is a LOT different for me to not obsess about my average pace for a workout. I guess I'm going to have to let that go for my treadmill workouts this winter...it's impossible for me to just RUN FAST on a treadmill! It's scary (I feel like I'm going to fly off) and it is SUPER boring! Jenie & I have been trying to find some fun treadmill workouts for those super cold/super snowy/ super busy days this winter. We created a board on Pinterest so hopefully we find workouts worth repeating!! Today I did a 20 minute workout that had low speeds but high inclines. I thought it would be really easy (and it was at first) but WOW! In the middle of the workout my legs were exhausted!! I really don't run hills at all, so I think doing some high incline treadmill workouts will actually help my training a lot :) I wish sooo badly that I would have done a running blog last year! So many fun races, so much training and progress! Well hopefully this year will be just as great as last year! I saw something cool online about a 100 Mile Challenge, basically you have to run/walk/bike/swim/whatever 100 miles by Valentine's Day. I thought it would be a really easy way to get motivated through the next month & a half when it is dark early, cold and boring! I got a great jump on it this weekend - I ran 5 miles yesterday and 3 today. Hopefully tomorrow Amy & I will actually be able to run together - we haven't run together all break! Crazy!
I hope I can complete the challenge, it will be hard but it is definitely doable. I tried to get a lot of people on board with me. For the 100 mile challenge I have Laura, Amy, me, Genna & Shelly. Doing a 50 mile challenge is Drew, Lori, Phil, Jami & Sammi. Of course I'm a nerd so I had to make a paper copy...I LOVE crossing things off! :) The Rudolph Ramble was awesome. Sammi and I slept over at Shelly's apartment in the city the night before (and went out to a party at Bridget's) so we were super tired! Luckily Shelly gave us a ride to the race (it was right by Lincoln Park Zoo). Jenie, Brock and Eric met us at the race. Sammi was our lovely photographer/holder of all of our stuff :) It was really cute, they handed out antlers for everyone to wear during the race (so of course I had to) and Santa was there to take pictures with. It was all for a good cause: Lurie Children's Hospital. They had the cutest "reindeer dash" after the race that the kids all did, I can't wait for Dylan to do that!
I had never done an 8k before, but I loved the distance (it is just under 5 miles). It was my first race running with Eric and I reaaaaally wanted to beat him - and I did (barely). I'm sure it helped that he doesn't really run outside ever, but oh well :) It was a super fast race but I was really happy with how it went. Here were my stats:
The family did this race last year as well, so it was fun to do the same one again! This time we got EVERYONE involved! We even made the most adorable turkey shirts so we would all match. A lot of people loved them and we would yell "turkey power" every time we saw each other on the road! We really like doing this race since a lot of the money raised goes to Hospice in McHenry County <--they are amazing!!
Thanksgiving was FREEEEEZING! Luckily they changed check-in to be in the high school so everyone didn't have to stand outside (that would've sucked). Drew was planning on pushing Dylan in the stroller for the race - Dyl even had his own bib and everything - but it was miserably cold and Dylan was sobbing so they took a nap in the super warm van while we ran :) We had me, Genna & Steve (and his sister), Shelly & Ryan, Mom & Dad (he did great, he even jogged a little but his chip didn't work). Sammi was super sick so she couldn't come :( I had an awesome race!! I felt great! Genna & I ran together for almost the whole race. I didn't think there was ANY chance that I would place in my age group since there are SO many people that run the race, but I got second place! I actually really like this race because it is super boring, you run 1.55 miles and then turn around and run back - BUT I love seeing all the people that are ahead of me come back around! The girl that beat me in my age group beat me by only one second!! (It was chip timed so obviously she started way in front of me otherwise I would've beat her haha!) Results below:
Amy & I really wanted to do a trail race together before the year ended, so we signed up for this random race that we found online. It was called the Clear Water Outdoor Turkey Trot at Big Foot Beach State Park, WI. There were two options, 5k or 10k so obviously we signed up for the 10k because we are nuts! We had a huge work party the night before so we were struggling to say the least :)
We got to watch the 5k before we ran (there was a crazy dude who ran without shoes). It was a fun race, we ran nice and easy and talked the whole way. It was super snowy and icy, REALLY hard for me with my shoes. I realized that those shoes are NOT ideal for running in wet conditions OR on the trails. It was SO cold! We had to strip about halfway through because we were hot hot hot & the food afterwards was amazing! So many choices! :) Results:
I love this race!! It is at Woodstock North High School (so close to home) and my school always creates a team to participate in it! This year Dylan joined us - Laura was nice enough to walk the whole race with him in the stroller so I could still run! I ran the whole race with Amy and we kicked major butt! We went super fast & both placed in our age groups - I never thought that would be possible since there are SO many people that run/walk the race! Maybe it was because we were running where we run all the time - who knows?!
Jenie & Brock also came and ran the race with us :) Results:
Jenie & I always wanted to do a half marathon together so we signed up for this one last winter! It was a huge race & we were super excited! I stayed in a hotel with her and Brock the night before!
I was trying really hard to get as close to 2:00:00 as possible. I knew that I probably wouldn't be able to do it, but I wanted to see how long I could keep my pace. I was doing really well until about mile 9 when I saw Genna & Mom cheering for me, I was SO tired! Around mile 10 I saw Drew, Peg, Don & Dylan which gave me some more motivation, but I crashed after that and had to slow way down. After going slower for miles 10 and 11 I sped up and finished strong. I was exhausted after the race, I could hardly walk for a few minutes! It was a lot of fun though, it was great to see how hard I could actually push myself - all of my training paid off!! Results:
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