Category Archives: Running/Fitness

Run, Baby, Run

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This morning I woke up to GCB’s alarm. This in and of itself isn’t so odd, but what is odd is that today was the GO! St Louis marathon.

That I didn’t run.

After he left for work, I got out of bed, walked across the living room, and opened the blinds. I stood there watching hundreds of people running in a race that just last year I was singing and chanting and in some points skipping my way through.

It’s the first half marathon in St Louis that I’ve missed since October. Of 2011.

The feeling was bittersweet.

You see, running and I have had a very tumultuous relationship for the past little while. Remember last August? I do. I HATED running at that point. And I hated that I hated it so much.

I’ve been a runner for the better part of my life. Hating it felt odd, alien.

A couple weeks ago I set out to take a walk through Forest Park. I haven’t really done a whole lot in the way of physical activity since the marathon, and it was one of the (rare) beautiful days we had earlier this “spring.” Once I got out there I realized I couldn’t just walk. I was tingling with the anticipation I normally got before a run I wanted to do.

WANTING to run again is one of the most beautiful feelings.

So I did what I normally do, turned on some music and went to set my watch timer, and was stopped dead in my tracks.

My watch still carries my marathon time.

I couldn’t erase it. That time, though maybe not what I intended on it being, means something to me. It means bull-headedness determination. It means doing something greater than I’ve ever done. It means dealing with an abhorrence of something that’s always been my solace and somehow pushing through it anyway. It means being so damn stubborn that quitting was just not an option, even if it meant hobbling eight miles through various Disney parks. I am more proud of that time now than I was the first month after I finished that race.

So I left the time where it was. And I ran.

Just because I felt like it.

I’d like to say that muscle memory and still being in decent shape helped me have an awesome run, but, well, people fall quite a bit when instead of working out, after work habits include eating columns of Oreos, watching too much TV, and gratuitous napping. It was a short run, punctuated by walking and side stitches and that pesky little voice in the back of my head that yells “DUDE, they’re watching you stop.”

And it was the most glorious run ever. Because I MISSED it. Because it reminded me of what I loved.

Because it reminded me that mile splits and sub-8 minute mile goals and being better than anyone out there is not the point. The point is to feel free, content, relaxed.

I don’t think I’ll time anymore runs.

The stress, anxiety, flashbacks to those horrible feelings are not worth it.

It’s finally spring. My running shoes are bright pink. Bright pink seems like a perfect color to paint this city with.

New apartment, new running locations (like the steps under the Arch), new attitude.

Feels good.

Hips Don’t Lie

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This adventure is going to be VERY different from my last few adventures.

In fact there are two adventures I’m looking forward to in the very near future.

I know that I am less than three weeks past that stupid marathon. I also know that I am MISSING the routine, the gym, the outdoors.

Guys? I miss running.

Progress. It is awesome.

So. Adventures. No, I’m not doing another Ragnar (even though I would say yes to one in a heartbeat). No, I’m not signing up for STL’s April half marathon (or the October one, for that matter).

I’m moving on up.

September 14. I’m already excited.

However, there’s one more adventure I have to get through before I even consider training for something like this.

Next Friday I have an appointment with an orthopedist who specializes in hip injuries. You see, I have had this stabbing pain in my left hip when I walk more than ~300 feet since the marathon. I’ve dealt with hip soreness before, but in my right hip and more of an ache than a stab. It’s not debilitating, and I don’t limp (much….or noticeably), but I am absolutely petrified to even try to run on it. I won’t even go lift with it like this.

I am kind of scared as HELL about it. Best case scenario, I’m fine and just took longer to recover than I expected, so the doctor appointment will be a double-check. Worst case scenario, I’m heading for surgery.

Surgery is absolutely not wanted, but at least April has recommended to me the guy she had hip surgery with a few years ago.

One week. I’ll know in one week.

What the Hell am I Doing Here?

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Here being the registration page for a half marathon in April. Just to see the prices.

Here being even CONSIDERING running again when my left hip is still protesting at every step.

What?

I know, I know, I just got done with a race and training program that looked more like this than anything else.

But honestly, less than a week later, still in pain and still VERY tired from a marathon, it feels WEIRD to not have a race to look forward to. Since August of 2011 I have had something to look forward to, to train for, somewhere on my horizon.

It’s a bit of an empty feeling to not have something on the horizon.

So now I just can’t figure it out. I can’t tell if I’m looking at the registration fees because I want to run a race or if I’m just used to having an upcoming race and feel like I need it.

Meh. I have a month until prices go up again. Definitely not deciding anything right now.

No Giving Up Now

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I just have one thing to say.

I finished that fucking marathon.

Ok, so that’s not all I have to say about it, but dammit, it feels good to say it.

For one thing, let’s just all shake our heads at me (again) for running TWICE in the two months preceding this race. Dumb move, Ann. Very dumb move. Pretty sure if I’d have actually trained for it, I wouldn’t have walked the last eight miles.

BUT. It was walk those eight miles or keep running and injure myself and possibly not finish. So I walked.

I walked, and I finished, and I will never do this again.

Let’s talk about the race, shall we?

It all began at 2am EST when my alarm went off. Well, actually, I suppose it started when I went to bed at 7pm the night before, but I’ll stick to just Sunday. Two in the morning, which meant that most of the people I know here were STILL AWAKE. GCB was actually still three hours from the end of his shift. Crazy.

The pre-race stuff included a lot of “what were we thinking”s and “this is dumb”s and “we totally should have trained for this”s. It also included lots and lots of people who looked way more like runners than we did, THREE trips to the porta-potty before we even got in our corral (pre-race hydration, FTW), and this picture, wherein we still look happy:

Oh, did I mention it was 65 degrees at 4 in the morning? Because it was. God bless Orlando.

This race. 25,000+ runners, 530am EST start, fireworks, music, and more spectators than made sense given the hour.

Highlights and lowlights:

Mile 1: Had to stop and pee AGAIN before we hit the half mile mark. Not dying. Good times.

Mile 3: Looked out a bit and saw runners who we later realized were at mile 8. That’s right. They’d gone eight miles in the time we’d gone three. Buzzkill.

Mile 4-6: Came upon the castle. THE castle. All covered in lights and looking gorgeous, even though none of my pictures turned out. Ran through the castle at dawn. Still felt great.

Mile 7: Bad mile. Had a brief moment of “oh crap, I can’t breathe” followed by “oh crap, I can’t run.” The lung thing didn’t last. The leg thing did.

Mile 8: Ran around the WHOLE Disney race track. That was kind of cool. Cars characters and country music.

Mile 11: Ate a banana. Took Tylenol. Didn’t puke. I consider this a ridiculous success.

Mile 13: Laughed (because otherwise we would have cried) at our half marathon time, officially the worst I’ve ever run in 2:44.

Mile 15: This is where it got rough. My intervals of walking to running weren’t very awesome, and I could tell Steph was getting frustrated, so I sent her ahead. I also visited THE grossest porta-potty I’ve ever been in. Guys? I ran a Ragnar last year. The fact that THIS porta-potty was the grossest is really saying something.

Mile 17: Got into the Wide World of Sports Complex. Realized that continuing to run was going to probably result in a DNF.

Mile 18: Started walking for good.

Let me break real quickly to talk about this. I knew going into this race that I was physically and mentally so far beyond unprepared that it wasn’t even funny. I also knew that with only running twice to “prepare” for it that I would probably not be physically capable of running through all 26.2 miles. I know people who have put forth the effort to train for a marathon and have still not completed it due to injury. It might sound crazy, but I was finishing this race whether or not it meant army crawling my way across the finish line. So I chose to walk the last eight miles. I know, I KNOW, that if I had tried to continue running that I wouldn’t have crossed that finish line. It was an internal battle that threatened to burst out of my eyeballs, but at that point there wasn’t any giving up. I had started, I was going to finish no matter how long it took me.

Mile 20: Noted that after having gone nearly four straight miles with the sun at my back that I was probably going to be incredibly sunburnt, given that I hadn’t even thought about putting on sunscreen.

Mile 21: Heard “Sweet Caroline” four times in a row. This is too many times in a row. Took more Tylenol.

Mile 22: Chocolate! And?

As much pain as I was in at this point, I SKIPPED over to get a picture with these two. That maniacal grin stayed on my face for quite a while.

Mile 23: Walking NOTICEABLY became limping. Both hips were (and still are) very, very angry.

Mile 24: Got into the heart of Epcot. The park was open, so there were TONS of people on the side of the course cheering and being supportive, even for someone who was walking and (after looking at my race pictures) looking absolutely miserable. At 24.8 miles, passed the 40K sign. Kind of wanted to puke seeing that.

Mile 25: Hobbled. Tried not to cry. I was going to FINISH.

Mile 26.2: I ran across that finish line. The last tenth of a mile, I clenched my jaw, tried to ignore every square millimeter of the lower two-thirds of my body screaming in protest, and I ran. I must say, it took quite a bit of will-power to not burst into tears when they handed me my medal. I crossed that finish line at 6:12:58, and though that is literally HOURS after I’d planned on finishing when I signed up, I finished. That’s all I’m worried about.

Today I feel ok. I am exhausted, I am still limping, my muscles are still sore, my hips are still VERY angry, my lower back is still achy, but this afternoon when I laid down my hips didn’t hurt badly enough to make me cry like they did last night. This is progress. I know I’ll be sore for another couple of days, and that’s ok.

There’s a small part of me that wishes I would have finished faster, but that part is greatly overshadowed by just how much I’ve enjoyed what I’ve done these last few months INSTEAD of training.

And oh my goodness, I am OVER THE MOON excited to not have any single, solitary form of a training schedule. Anywhere. The half marathon in April that I was thinking of running, well, I might run it, but I’m not signing up for it just yet. If I decide I don’t want to? I’m ok with that. The Tough Mudder that was supposed to be in April is actually in September. As of two days ago, the only running/lifting/exercising in my immediate future is the kind that is going to make me HAPPY, the kind that makes me feel better and healthy, not the kind I feel obligated to do.

Guys? I finished a marathon. Then I celebrated with this.

Marathon. Check. Off to the next great adventure.

M-I-C…..K-E-Y

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Well. I leave a week from tomorrow to fly down to Orlando for the marathon. Shit’s about to get interesting, folks. I mean, it has to be interesting considering that I’ve run just twice in the last six weeks. Oops

We only have to keep a 15 minute/mile pace, and I can walk that, so I’m hoping it won’t be too bad, but I’m also considering buying stock in Advil just in case.

It’s just….I’m still burnt out. I’ve been fighting through burnout for 7 months now. It hasn’t gotten better. Not really. There have been flashes of things getting better, but they’ve been fleeting and partial at best. I miss running being fun.

My friend Stephanie has set a goal for herself to finish a half marathon in under two hours in May. I’m in awe of that, as I’ve pretty well determined that I will not be setting any running goals for myself until it becomes fun again. I don’t foresee any running goals for a while.

The thing is, life’s been absurdly incredible lately. Even though I have the marathon in the back of my mind quite a bit, it’s not there like I thought it would be this close to the race. Yet I still, like I wrote a while back, don’t care.

I can’t bring myself to take so much time away from doing what I promised myself I’d do a long time ago and live in the moment. And my god have these moments been incredible. I was chit chatting with Josey on Skype the other day, and we were discussing the changes we’ve both seen in our blogging habits/twitter habits/etc. She pointed out that besides the 30 days of posts I did last November, I haven’t really written a whole lot since September of 2010.

She was absolutely right. Looking back I’ve noticed that instead of writing about the things I WISHED would happen, or lamenting about the opportunities I didn’t have, I went out and got to living. That became the priority over writing. It was worth it.

Now, instead of beating myself up about the fact that my training has been absolute shit, about the fact that I’ve completely blown off any and everything even related to this marathon (ask me how many calzones I’ve eaten over the last month), I’ve just rolled with it. This has made me so happy.

It’s amazing the kind of relief you can get by recognizing that the choices you’ve made (for instance, the ones made to spend time with your new boyfriend and make memories together rather than going for yet another training run) were made for reasons, and if they made you happy, there’s no sense being upset at what other thing you didn’t do.

Live and let live, I suppose.

Either way, I have a marathon in just over a week, which is crazy stupid to me. This plan was not well thought out. Because it will make it even more memorable, Stephanie and I are going to try live-tweeting the whole thing. Well, whenever we get a chance to tweet we will. I’m sure there will be plenty of walking breaks. Follow along if you want. I will be there, living another crazy experience.

We Don’t Care Anymore

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So it’s really happening.

On Friday Steph emailed me confirmation for our hotel.

On Monday we both booked our flights.

Yesterday I reserved the rental car.

Welp. I guess I’m going to run a marathon.

I mean, yeah, I’ve known I was going to run a marathon for months now (eight of them, actually). I’ve been signed up since EARLY APRIL. I’ve been running and running all year.

All except the last little while. Why?

Honestly, because I can’t bring myself to care anymore. The burnout that hit me hard right before Ragnar never really left. I made it through Ragnar. I struggled my way through another half, then giggled my way through yet another since then.

And I don’t care.

Close to two weeks ago I went out on a sixteen mile run. I made it 12 (two fucking hours of running) before my hip stopped me. And I cried and walked limped the last four miles home. The very next day I went out and got brand new HOT FUCKING PINK running shoes.

They’re still sitting in the box.

Because I don’t care.

I want to care, but I don’t. I want to go out and give my new shoes a spin, but I’d rather go get drinks with my friends. I want to spend the next few Sundays building my mileage to a previously unheard of (to me) level, but at least this week I’d rather go to the Chicago Bears game with GCB.

I want to get to a point where I am READY, mentally and physically, to run 26.2 damn miles all at once, but I feel like with six weeks left, the physical part is going to be perhaps decent since I’m not starting at nothing and the mental part? Well, I’m going to finish the thing, but it will be slow.

And I don’t care.

Guys? Marathon training is HARD. I would totally recommend NOT signing up for one when you’re on a combined high of friend-in-town plus just-met-amazing-new-boy plus feeling-in-great-shape-four-days-prior-to-a-half-marathon.

Half marathons? Fun. Glorious. A great fucking time. I love half marathons. Seriously. No sarcasm font. This? Mileage this high? Not fun.

So.

I’ll run when I can. I’ll lift when I can. I’ll go out on my long runs and pray that both my hip and the water I bring with me both hold out. I’ll try to maintain my current physical fitness level and hope that maybe the next six weeks will actually help me out.

And I’ll run it.

Then I’ll never consider running another full marathon ever again.

Marathons? We are never getting back together.

Pain

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I’m in a lot of it.

It all started around mile 4.5 of yesterday’s race, and continued to the point where I wanted to sit down and just quit by mile 11. It was brutal.

By far, this was my worst half marathon. By far. I am not pleased with this.

I would recap the thing, but I kind of don’t feel like it’s worth recapping. I’m at a point where I’m not proud of myself, where I’m disappointed with my body and kind of feeling like it’s failed me a little, and I’m absolutely fucking terrified for January now.

Today I am limping. My hip is aching, both achilles tendons are making it difficult to go down stairs, and I am still so tired that all I have been thinking of since I woke up today is getting home and taking a nap.

Right now other people have more confidence in me than I do in myself. GCB has been an incredible support system, and tells me I’ve motivated him to get into running some races (which is the reason I pre-registered both of us for next spring’s Tough Mudder……yes, I’m bitching about a half marathon and am looking to do nearly that distance plus obstacles).

And then there’s Miranda who almost DAILY leading up to my races sends me motivational pictures like this one:

She believes in me more than words fully express, and I will forever be grateful to her for that.

I feel a bit like a masochist right now. I’m miserable with yesterday’s race, yet I have another in (now under) two weeks. I’m looking at races in the future, and I’m still dead set on finishing January’s full marathon.

Even though right now I don’t feel it, I know that I love this. Even though it’s really difficult to remind myself through the popping Advil like candy, this brings me joy. Because I fucking finished it. I wanted to quit over countless miles, and I didn’t.

That right there is something I can be proud of.

And now I have two weeks, then two and a half months, to make my next races better experiences. It will happen.

————————————————————————————————————

As a completely unrelated note, but one that should be shouted from the rooftops, the HUGEST of congratulations go to my girl Ali who got engaged on Friday. I’m so beyond thrilled for her!

A wedding? I love weddings!! Drinks all around!!!

Much too Young to Feel This Damn Old

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Yesterday I ran ten miles.

Wait, let me rephrase that.

Yesterday I “ran” ten miles.

I say “ran” because in all actuality, I RAN seven miles, I jogged mile 8, and I SUFFERED through miles 9 and 10.

Hey, hip flexor, how YOU doin’?

You want to know how much this freaks me out? A lot this freaks me out. Why? Because right now I am physically prepared to run a half marathon in five weeks.

I have two half marathons in the next four.

Well, fuck. That math just doesn’t add up.

Part of the freak out comes from the fact that in my first half marathon, miles 8 and 9 were where I hit my block, where my mind and body started rebelling. And that was after ACTUALLY training!

So, yeah, not feeling so confident about this whole RACE thing. I mean, I’m going to fucking do it. Of course I’m going to fucking do it. I’m just kind of worried about how my brain will process the whole thing.

Yesterday I also printed off my waiver form for the Rock N Roll half, which showed me having registered with an expected completion time of 1:50:00. Aaaaaaahahahahahaha.

At this point, honestly, I’ll be happy to finish sub-2:10. Granted, this time I’ll have a support system at more places than miles 2 and 13 (hi mama, I love that you and baby sister were there!), being that hopefully GCB will be feeding me beer at mile 9. And really, I ran a 5k (yes, I know a half marathon is like 4-something 5ks) the other day and felt…well, perfect after actually.

Granted, today my hip flexor is still angry, I’m still limping, and now I have a week and a half to talk myself into going balls-to-the-wall for 13.1 miles.

Psh, no big deal, right?

Stronger

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Over the last few weeks, multiple times I have opened up my dashboard to actually write something here. Sometimes I’ll get a title, some days a couple sentences, but more often than not (obviously) I close out the draft and delete it.

Some days I feel like I have run out of words.

Yesterday I went running. Seven and a half miles, officially the longest distance I’ve put myself through since Ragnar. I found a few words when I was done.

OH HOLY FUCKING SHIT BALLS THAT FUCKING HURTS OW.

However, those words actually made me feel better.

You see, the ow comes from a sore hip. Not my lungs, not my muscles. That means big things to me.

It means I’m getting stronger.

I’d imagine that you could tell with the lack of any sort of blogging (besides the vomitous sunshine and rainbows about GCB) that this round of training has been anything but ideal. Throughout the entirety of August as well as a big chunk of September, I hated it. Hated. The weather was abysmal, my muscles weren’t remembering what they were trained to do fast enough, I wasn’t improving, I was slow, I was miserable. My workout schedule from those months is rather depressing, given how many days I would highlight the content and hit “delete.” I honestly did not fucking care. Didn’t care about my desired PR or about the fact that my next two half marathons are both less than (at this point) 40 days away. I didn’t care that I was severely handicapping myself by NOT caring. It got to the point that GCB was incredibly worried about me. He’d never seen me struggle so badly with something I loved so much.

And then last week happened. Two weekends ago the weather changed. It went from blisteringly hot and suffocatingly humid to sunny, breezy, 70F, and beautiful. It became running weather.

I’ll admit it. I was terrified to go running. What if my runs were STILL just as bad as they had been? Would I be as slow or as incompetent? Would my mental blocks stand firm? Would the burnout from before Ragnar carry into now?

It didn’t. Oh my goodness, it didn’t. Last week’s six miles were THE best miles I have run since the second leg of Ragnar (you know, the one at 330 in the morning). I was exhilarated. Ecstatic. ALIVE. Every single step, every breath that I took reminded me of just how much I love doing this, how much this is a part of WHO I AM.

It gave me hope. It made me feel SEXY, even through the sweat and running eyeliner and bug carcasses that were stuck my skin (gnats = plankton, as far as I’m concerned).

I went straight to GCB’s house afterwards, and I know I was grinning like a maniac for a few hours after. It was the best runner’s high I’d had in a while.

Which of course leads me to last night.

I texted GCB about being sore, but then I got home, walked up my stairs, and realized it was just my hip. My hip that has more to do with my joint and the fact that I could probably use new running shoes rather than my muscles not being strong.

I am stronger than I have been in a while. My muscles are REMEMBERING what they were made to do, REMEMBERING how good this feels. I feel like I have reclaimed my motivation, my desire to get that PR, to FINISH THAT FUCKING MARATHON.

Progress.

I have missed this.