sweet sixteen

I ran 16 miles today! It's been a while since I've run that far.  Since Grandma's actually. Today's run went soooo much better than last week's long run. Let's see.....what was different?  Well,  I didn't eat a huge meal of oh so yummy rich food and booze it up the night before, and I also got more than 4 hours of sleep. I'm thinking that may have helped a bit. See? I ain't super stupid.

GarminElectra stayed with me for every mile. You never
know if she'll be interested enough to stick around for whole thing.

I ran the first 10 miles with the husband. He picked the route and let me go with him.  I tend to stick to the same routes and don't stray too far from what I'm familiar with (which equals boring but safe from the risk of getting lost); he's much more adventurous plus, he's not directionally challenged like I am.  It was a pretty clear cut route around a lake. It was a nice run.  It's funny how sympatico we can be - during mile five I felt the need to find a porta-potty.  PRONTO. As I was thinking that, the husband commented that he was feeling the same need. Isn't that cute how in sync we are?  And so romantic!!  And as luck would have it, we rounded a bend and - Ta Da!! - there was a porta-potty. I swear I heard angels sing when I saw it. We only got sort of lost once during mile 9 when we took a wrong turn in a neighborhood with all kinds of winding, confusing streets, but he got us back to the car safe and sound.

The place we parked the car was just over 6 miles from home. Perfect! So when we finished our 10, I walked the husband to his car and ran the remaining 6 miles home alone. Notice the final six miles are on a straight road. Keeping it simple (like me) and eliminating the risk of getting lost.  I ran with tunes for the first time in a long time (I usually only use my iPod when I'm on the TM) and I think it helped me to not have to listen to my labored breathing.  Remember when I  had a little tequila and downloaded a bunch of tunes from iTunes?  And remember my buyer's remorse and distain of "The Hustle"?  It turned out to be a good song to run to!! Who knew?? And turns out that my running app (iSmoothRun) pays attention to the songs that are played and the pace I run when each song plays.  So I learned that I ran fastest to "Push It" by Salt-n-Pepa.

Oh, and the ankle felt pretty good today!  I ran with my new inserts and they really seem to be helping. Whew!

If not for the wind, the weather would have been declared,"perfect for running," in my opinion at least. Dang, that headwind for the 6 miles home really sucked.  Other than that, the overcast sky and temps in the 40's...love it!

Here are today's splits.

Split	Time	Distance	Avg Pace
Summary	3:00:35.4	16.02	11:16
1	11:27.4	1.00	11:27
2	11:32.1	1.00	11:32
3	11:11.8	1.00	11:12
4	11:18.6	1.00	11:19
5	13:30.5	1.00	13:30
6	11:11.0	1.00	11:11
7	11:09.9	1.00	11:10
8	11:29.5	1.00	11:29
9	11:30.2	1.00	11:30
10	11:14.1	1.00	11:14
11	11:43.1	1.00	11:43
12	10:05.5	1.00	10:05
13	11:04.0	1.00	11:04
14	10:30.2	1.00	10:30
15	10:32.0	1.00	10:32
16	10:54.2	1.00	10:54
17	:11.6	0.02	10:33

Oh, and one other thing - When the husband and I got to the parking lot after the 10 miles, I REALLY needed to blow my nose.  No kleenex on either of us, of course. So the parking lot is in this little triangle between two very busy roads.... I went behind a shrub with my back to the road but facing cars in the lot and tried to discreetly blow snot rockets.  I looked up when I was all finished and in the car directly in front of me (visible through the shrub since the leaves aren't all out yet) were two people making out.  Big time.  At 11:00 in the morning.  Who does that??  Anywhoo, I don't know if they saw me or not, but I'm guessing not since they looked kind of.....busy.  Discreet snot rockets - mission accomplished!

excuses, excuses

I know what you're thinking..... "Damn, girl, you ran that blisteringly fast 5k yesterday morning! So what happened in the Freeze Your Thorns Off virtual 5K??? Did you choke? Was that PR an anomaly?"

I ran the Sweat Your Thorns Off 5K last summer and set an unofficial PR (which still stands!) so I had high hopes for this one as well.  But it was not to be.  <sad face> So I asked myself the burning question: "What gets in the way of a PR??" I know there are as many reasons why as there are grains of sand on the beach, but let me share with you the barriers that prevented me from getting a PR twice in one day.

1. Let's start with my choice of running partner.

Jane is not as interested in the actual act of running as I am.  Don't get me wrong, she LOVES to be out running but she's much more interested in whatever it is she's interested in, rather than focusing on some stupid goal I might have for our outing.



2.  Snowmen

I just know that bastard is preparing some type of attack.

Jane hates snowmen.  


And because we've gotten some snow recently, and it's of the perfect snowman-making texture and consistency, they kept popping up where she least expected them.  


Each one had to be given a wide berth and then circled back to and examined ever closer.

Gaaaah!  It's a pack of snowmen!!

FYI- Large snowballs are highly suspect as well.

3. Bodily Functions


No, not mine.


Jane's other name is "Two Poops" because that's usually how many times she has to mail a package during the average run.










4. 5K route being altered due to bodily functions


Because I didn't want to carry Jane's gift during the entire run, we took a detour to dispose of it properly. I am a responsible dog owner, yo!

Here's an action shot of me using a public receptacle.

You should know that this was next to the parking lot of an elementary school and based on the attire of some of the kids, there must have been a basketball tourney of some sort going on.  While I was capturing this momentous moment, parents and kids were heading to cars and were noticing me taking the picture.

I shouted, "It's ok!  It's for my blog!" but that just seemed to make them hustle their kids into the cars faster.  Sigh.

My FYTO5K 2012 route.

5. Ice, ice baby!  And snow too!  


We hit it all: ice covered sidewalks, snow covered trails, and we even ran for a while on the lake.  All that stuff is gonna slow you down. Honest.

Even the bridge to the school was covered in ice.

That's pure ice, folks! 

Jane had to drag me up this hill.  It's steeper than it looks.

Jogging on the trail next to the lake.... 

....and jogging on the lake......

...... and trying to dig for fish while out on the lake.

Victorious FYTO5K finishers! Per usual, it's a hideous photo of me but Jane looks good.   You can kind of tell that it was cold and that my nose was running.  Unfortunately, I didn't get any shots of me doing snot rockets.  It's a real shame too, because they were beauties!

So I guess that's what you could say is my blame train.  You know the saying, "I didn't say it was your fault, I said I was going to blame you."  But who cares.  It was fun!


Here's what iSmoothRun said about the weather: Temp 25 °F, Wind Chill: 13 °F, Winds: 14mph W, Humidity: 63%.  Damn near froze my thorns off!


And because I'm all about honesty and transparency and crap, I must post my splits of shame.......

Split	Time	Distance	Avg Pace
Summary	37:15.5	3.11	11:59
1	11:16.6	1.00	11:17
2	12:58.9	1.00	12:59
3	11:49.2	1.00	11:49
4	1:10.9	0.11	10:43

Thanks to Adam at TheBoringRunner.com for hosting a fun run!!