Monday, Monday

Gonna go ahead and post Tuesday's training schedule now, because I know I'm not going to have time to do Monday's. Ugh. I feel all relaxed and refreshed from my weekend but didn't nearly get enough homework done, and tomorrow's a big day at work. So stay tuned for a report on how this goes on Tuesday night, and hold me to that mess!

Old Habits

Click here for notes on day 1 on this Disney Detox of mine. :)

Training Logs and Nutrition

Hallo, everyone. I finally figured out a way to share training logs on this blog, while preserving the formatting I did. Only trouble is that I can't get them big enough this way. Sigh. Here's at least a glimpse of tomorrow's schedule while I work out the kinks. :) You *can* click on the images to make them larger if you're really interested.

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I'm also going to see if I can tackle a pre-Disney Marathon diet detox of sorts. I'm tired of being so addicted to food and so am going to try to pull myself off all the crap for the next 10 weeks to see if I can sort of get out of the habit of eating a) stuff that doesn't make me a better runner and b) stuff that doesn't do my health or the health of the planet any good.

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You'd be proud of me: I'm even increasing the number of calories I eat a day (up from the minimum of 1200 to lose weight to 1391) so I can make sure I'm getting a good amount of protein in to support my training. Baby steps. :)

In the meantime, our girl Kara didn't compete in today's New York City Marathon because she's taking time off to plan a family, but the race was still really fun to watch this morning. Here's a pic of the female winner, Ethiopia's Derartu Tulu, crossing the finish line with a time of 2:28:52. Amazing. Still, Kara's 3rd place finish in the same race in 2008 was better: 2:25:53. The race was slower this year.

Anyway, inspiring stuff. Welcome, November, and your lovely cold-weather marathon training. :)

Born to Run

According to a story in the New York Times today, "the human body is meant for distance." Some of the evidence for why humans evolved for long distances is a little off (or at least contradicts other science of what we were evolved for). I'm talking about the article's suggestion that we evolved to run long distances so that we could eat meat. There's tons of science that shows that we, indeed, did not evolve to eat meat. But besides that, the piece was interesting and at the very least encouraging to us distance runners. Maybe it's not a total violation of nature to run 26.2 miles at once (or more).

I'm Back.

And I'm sorry I've been away so long! I haven't run since the last time I posted about getting sick. Oy. It's been a busy and stressful few weeks, and I had a semi-epiphany about my training that shaped a new approach to this.

This blog is about qualifying for the Boston Marathon, but one of the big reasons I wanted to qualify for Boston was because I thought it would be a vehicle for me to get my life back on track. To get inspired again, to get confident again, and frankly, to get thin again. For almost a year now I've put an incredible amount of pressure on myself, trying to engineer my diet and training to lose all the weight I've gained in a really short time, and all I did was disappoint myself.

No more of that. I'm pledging to merely eat and train to qualify for Boston and for running ... not for weight loss, and not by a certain date. I've gotten rid of my scale, and I'll measure my progress in running and health markers alone. I've found that being thin isn't much of a long-term motivator for me ... to stick with something I have to have real reasons to stand on (like being able to enjoy running even more, not wear a size 4).

In the time I've been away I also started a blog about re-ordering my relationship with food along the lines of what I outline above. Might not be for everyone, but if you're interested, here's the link.

In the meantime, here's the training schedule for tomorrow:

(2) 3-mile runs (gotta build up slowly lest I get sick)
2 hours of yoga
1 hour core work
1 hour, mat workout
15 minutes jumprope

One Lucky Runner: An Entry in 3 Parts

This is where I get to run every day.

On one of my first times out to the C&O Towpath at Great Falls National Park, I told myself, I'll just run to the end of the towpath and turn around. Ha! Had no idea that this lovely, flat, woodsy/river-y path goes on for 184.5 miles. That woulda been a heck of a run!

Since then, though, the towpath's been a great companion on long runs. In warmer weather the first 2 miles of it on the Maryland side of Great Falls are busy with folks walking, biking (and some running), and then once you get past the falls overlook, the crowds drop off, and it's mostly just you, the ducks, occasional lone runner, and historical landmarks. Oh, and if you're lucky, you can also stumble upon beavers (I have!), deer, songbirds, squirrels, and herons. Go for a long run on the towpath in the snow? Magic. Quiet magic. Get stuck out there after dark? Suddenly you find the will to run those last 6 miles back to the car way faster than you thought you could. :)

I made it back before dark Wednesday night, but I wasn't out of the woods yet ...

One Out of Shape Girl

The weather was nice and crisp for my run on the towpath at around 7, when I took the pictures above.  I was excited about getting out there again. I only went for 4 miles, and if I had to rank the run on a scale of 1-10 (10's the highest), I'd only give it a 4 or 5. Stuff that shouldn't have been hurting was hurting. It wasn't awful, but it certainly wasn't great (often when I've been away from running a while, my first run back out goes really well). This time I felt heavy and tired quickly on. But it wasn't impossible.

Until I got home, and I got sick. For those of you who don't know, running sometimes makes me sick. Literally. :) It's a long story, but it can set in 30-45 minutes *after* my run's already over, and often I get no indication that I'm going to be sick till then (I've had runs go great, and then I get home and am out for the count). Doctors and running coaches can't figure it out, I've had tonsa tests, and nothin.' It started in 2003, and for a number of reasons (long process of deduction here), I think I have to build up my mileage very slowly to sidestep this sick thing.

Suffice it to say, it was a bad night. But this brings me to part 3 in this entry: 

One Good Bird

I was feeling awwwwful, but wouldn't you know, my senegal Squirrelly stayed with me all night, keeping me company with comforting little nighttime birdie noises (you bird-lovers will know this as beak grinding ... as well as little peeps and chirps). You Squirrel-lovers will know why this is so remarkable: this little bird is usually NOT quiet ... especially at night. He can be a beast (a cute one, dammit). But I like to think that he sensed that something was wrong with his mom and was therefore being a good boy. :)

In any case, Wednesday night was a mini-wake-up call for me that I'm going to have to take this build-up back to the marathon much more slowly than I'd originally intended, going out for 2-3 miles at a time and steadily adding the miles, as much as I hate to go that slow. Trouble with this sick thing is that even if my body feels fine with the mileage during the run, I can still get sick later. So I'm going to have to take it frustratingly slow ... maybe that'll make success all the sweeter when it comes? This means that this year's Philly Marathon is likely not in my future ... but I still have plenty of time to meet all my other goals/mile-markers.

In the meantime, I'm going to count myself lucky that I can run, and that I've got a gorgeous national park and a lovely, bad little bird on my side.

Biggest Loser is SO motivating.

Total guilty pleasure. But I love it. More substantive posts soon, promise.