The Weather

I suppose the weather has been a real factor with our last few runs.  Patty and Sea-N-Sun ran yesterday from Heritage and for some reason they decided to run early on one of the hottest days all year.  From what they tell me, it was a real miserable run.  I had a class to attend so I could not make it so I made sure I ran today with my husband.  We pretty much duplicated their run except we left from our house to Copperhill.  Today the heat wasn't so much a factor as the wind was.  It was a lot cooler, but I seemed to have trouble breathing because of the humidity in the air.  I'm glad my husband nixed the idea of doing intervals with the SCRs because my legs were still dead from our 10 mile run over the weekend; however, I didn't get out of intervals altogether.  My husband suggested we do some intervals on the way back so we did several reps of rapid higher intensity strides for approximately 1/2 mile each.  Whenever I run with my husband, I always feel like I'm running slow, but I know I'm not because I also feel like I can't breath.  I'm just glad it's over and I did it and now I can enjoy my American Idol and Patty can enjoy her trip to P.S. with her gal friends.

Prom Night

As you can see from the photos and title, tonight was prom night.  I have to say that our boys do look very handsome.  It's a good thing Patty and I don't have girls because we would never have had time to run this morning.  We originally were going to run at 8 a.m., but realizing that it was prom night, we moved it up to 7 a.m. just in case we needed to "help" our boys with anything before the prom.  C couldn't make it because she was also going to the prom, but as a chaperone. You see, the thing about having boys is that they just put their clothes on and they are ready to go.  My son quite literally came home 15 minutes before he had to leave for pictures, put on his suit and then was ready to go.  That simple.  Whereas if you had girls I'm sure it would have been a big production, starting the day before.  Thankfully for me my help was not really needed so I had enough time to even do some gardening before leaving for pictures.

Amazingly enough I had enough energy to actually garden after running 10 miles with Patty this morning.  We were both feeling really good and kept a brisk pace of probably just under 10 min. miles.  We weren't sure how today was going to go because it had been quite a while since our last long run.  Nothing hurt and the both our legs felt really good.  The weather started out gloomy but cleared up nicely for a beautiful day with cool temperatures.  I was really happy with the way we ran today and was impressed with the fact that we didn't need to stop every few miles, just twice for water.  I feel like I got so much done today.

A Racer?

I don't know what the heck is going on this year, but we have encountered more snakes in these last few weeks of running than any other time and it's going to give me a heart attack.  Today the four of us (me, Patty, C, Sea-n-Sun) headed out from Bridgeport and ran toward Lowes to the new Riverpark Community.  As we just started running behind the Lowe's parking lot, a man greeted us and said "hi".  I was a few feet up ahead and the sun was in my eyes as I looked to the man to say "hi" back.  Just as I passed him, I hear all of the ladies screaming behind me, which automatically caused me to start screaming.  As I look behind me,  I see them stopped dead in their tracks as a huge brown snake comes up from the riverbed and into the bushes next to the parking lot.  I swear my heart was jumping out of my chest.  We probably scared the Sh*t out of the poor guy walking past us.  According to the ladies, I ran right over the snake (not stepping on it) and didn't even notice.  I'm usually the one to notice everything on the ground, but I think I was momentarily distracted by the man and that's when I had passed the snake.  I'm surprised the guy didn't see it either. Well after that we were  really paying attention to where we were stepping and kept to the center of the trail.  Even a twig in the middle of the trail had Patty screaming a bit.  I think the burst of adrenaline got us running a little faster too.  We finished our run with just over a 9.2 pace.  I thought that was pretty good considering we just ran the day before and it was windy and hot at the same time.

I went online to look up what type of snake it was because I had never seen one like it before.  I think it looked very much like the one in the above picture, which is very ironic because it's called a racer and it was moving rather fast.  Maybe it just wanted to join us on our run?  No thank you, I don't think my heart can take anymore of this!

Footsteps 5K

Today we ran the Footsteps 5K that started from Newhall Park and ran out and back on the South Fork Trail. C had mentioned wanting to run it some time ago, but we haven't been able to coordinate or schedules lately, so we waited until the last minute to decide whether we would run or not. It was really nice not to have any pressure leading up to the race (anticipation, anxiety etc.) I just woke up this morning and signed up at the park! Unfortunately C was not able to run, but Marathon Mom, Sea and Sun, and a friend were all there ready to run. I really HATE 5K runs because I am not in the least bit speedy, and that is what you need to be to run a good 5K. I tend to spend my first mile trying to pass the kids and walkers, and end up out of breath for the next mile, and absolutely dead legged on the last mile. I managed to stay behind Marathon Mom, and Sea and Sun for the first mile and I felt pretty good, but I could tell from experience that the last mile was gonna suck, since it was uphill and into the sun. Marathon Mom and Sea and Sun were running like they were on a Sunday stroll (chatting and laughing). Even though I was close enough behind to hear Marathon Mom reprimand the Dad who told his kid to throw is water bottle into the wash, I was definitely huffing and puffing, not chatting. I spent a lot of my energy after the turnaround trying to get around the kid who threw the bottle, kids don't want you to pass them, so they run really slow and when you start to pass they start to sprint. When I told my hubby about all these things that kept me from running faster, he said I need to concentrate on my running more and less on the people around me, hmmmm. We all agreed that we would have liked to run faster,and that the last mile did suck, but it was a fun event, and I am glad I showed up. I have to say that I don't get as stressed about these races as I used to, I am not going to win, and I know that I am going to finish, it is fun to do it with my friends cheering me on (they are always done before me anyway)!!!

Running Around

It seems like lately we've been doing a lot of running around, but not actually running.  We have all been so busy with various things in our lives that our running has taken sort of a back seat.  Again today, our run was almost a no go due to last minute changes, but thankfully those last minute changes didn't materialize so our run was back on.  Patty and I met from Cheese Park and did our usual quick run to Decoro and back.  Both of us felt rather dead legged from all the "running" around and so we took it easy and even walked more than usual.  I felt good just to be back out running with friends because it made me feel like I had some sort of normalcy back in my life.  That's what happens when you go away on spring break, your routine is all messed up and it takes another week to get it back in order.

Pierce College

I don't know how many times I've been to this college to watch my kids' cross country races over the last 5-6 years and never once did I actually run the course myself until today.  On a spur of the moment, my son had conditioning practice with his soccer team and I decided to join him so I can finally get a run in.  I couldn't have picked a better day to try this course.  It was absolutely beautiful from the top and the temperature was perfect.  I ended up doing the entire course 1 1/2 times for a total of about 4 miles and only had to stop once on the back switchbacks.  I didn't realize there were so many switchbacks back there.  Now I know why the kids always looked so exhausted by the time they got to the crest.  I can't imagine doing that on a hot day.  I even ran up Puke's Peak, which is the last hill on the course, without stopping and finally got to see what was back there.  Running the course certainly puts things in a different perspective than from my past vantage point which was usually from under the shade of the EZ-Up.  One of my son's soccer buddies, who also ran cross country, knew a different route from what my son usually ran and it turns out there's even a little lake (pond) that you can run around.  Today was certainly a day of new discoveries.  I think it would be a lot of fun to run this course again with the ladies and do some shoe shopping at Phidippides.

Back to COC

We tried to think of a different course today, since we are all on Spring Break and weren't in a hurry to get home and make dinner. The best we could come up with was to run the hills at COC, which we haven't done in quite some time. Marathon Mom, C and I met at 8am and ran the dirt part of the course twice. It was really a nice morning, cool, but not cold, and we were either sheltered from the wind, or it didn't really kick up until we were done. There wasn't anything too exciting, (snakes) except for the dog poop that people don't feel they are responsible to pick up while walking their dogs (ugh!). There were also many holes, that looked like gopher holes, but I don't know if they were since there were so many of them. Marathon Mom and I are on the road again tomorrow, heading up North to visit colleges for our boys, so we won't get much of a chance to run the rest of the week. It was a great way to start the day, and we did quite well on the hills, even though we haven't run that route in quite a while. Spring running is the best running as far as I am concerned (good weather, more in the legs, longer days). Before we know it, I am going to be complaining about how I hate Summer running!

Happy Easter

Today was the perfect spring day, a day so typical of spring when you don't really know if you will need a long sleeve or a short sleeve shirt on your run.  This morning started out chilly, but warmed up nicely as Patty, Sea-N-Sun and I met at Peet's for our long run.  Sea-N-Sun however didn't know it was going to be our long run (Patty forgot to mention that minor detail to her).  We ended up running 8.25 miles to the water pipes near the Cross Valley Connector and back. We took a fairly easy pace since our unaware friend had not run that far in a long time, but she ended up doing just fine and I think we ended up under 10 min pace.  She did so well in fact that she was talking about doing a half marathon.

We would all like to run the Wine Country Half Marathon in Santa Barbara, but just don't know if we can swing it with mother's day and track meets coming up.  The usual stuff that seems to get in the way.  I think we should just say that the half-marathon will be our mother's day present and just do it.  We feel guilty about spending Mother's Day away from our family if we do this race, but isn't Mother's Day meant for us to spoil ourselves?  We've been looking for something else to get our motivation up and I think this will do it.

I'm glad I was able to meet my friends for a run this morning so I can enjoy a busy Easter weekend with my family.  Happy Easter everyone and enjoy the spring break for those of us who are lucky enough to have it off.