Delayed Race Report - Coming Soon I Promise!! :)

I wish I could say its because I am OHMYGOD so busy, but honestly, its just because I find better things to do than blog.

 



ABB 5K - Houston January 18, 2014

I thought it was pretty cool last year when the marathon in Houston added the 'double' option: Do the 5K on Saturday and either the full or half marathon on Sunday and you get an extra really cool medal. 

 

When I saw a few friends do exactly that last year, and how cool the medal was, it was even more awesome :O)

 

It seems that this is starting to catch on in other places, Disney races of course are notorious for this and RnR does have something similiar but its 3 of its races within a years time.

 

So when I signed up for the half (2014), I also signed up for the 5K because well, its cool.  Its simple enough (when you arent going for one two punch on time on either race or both), and well, you end up with 3 blingy bling blings!

 

My approach was simple from the start:  I would run as slow as possible, walk a lot and just finish the 3.1  Easy enough.  All I knew was that I didn't want to do anything out of the ordinary to make me even have the SLIGHTEST bit of soreness for the start of the half the very next day.

 

Going into it honestly I was actually going for something like 36:00

Thats 12min miles ish, and I could walk a lot, and still finish probably before half of the people since the 5K draws, for the majority, groups of students, a lot of walkers, newer runners and generally those that just want to be a part of marathon weekend somehow.

 

My friend and I got to downtown around 7ish, race was at 8, parked CLOSE for FIVE DOLLARS!!! and walked on over.  Went inside the Four Seasons to pee...

 

And then it was time to start.  The weather was PERFECT.  Cool to me, freezing to most.  Figured since it was only 3.1 miles, I could wear a thicker long sleeve and shorts and not burn up.  I was thinking I was going to walk a lot more than I did given my overall goal.

 

Honestly I should have worn a thinner long sleeve because I did in fact get warm.

 



Well to make could be a long story, not long at all, but short:  I did it much faster than I intended.  It is VERY hard (at least for me apparently) to not want to 'race'.

 

I kept looking at my Garmin saying oh shit, oh shit, going too fast.  You have to run tomorrow too...slow down.  Walk.  So what I would do is just stop and walk, watch the pace on my Garmin until it hit a certain point and then go again.  Hoping that walking would slow me down when I started up again.

 

Eh whatever.  I felt good and so what if I was a bit out of it the next day?!  FTR I wasnt out of it at all.  Under fed and under rested yes but that wasnt because of the 5K.  :)

 

So I ended up finishing in 32:45 which obviously is a lot slower than normal for me, but it was easy and like I said, I just wanted the 3.1 recorded, my 5K medal and then I would qualify for the Double Medal after finishing the half on Sunday.

 

I thought it was a great little route too.  You basically run about 1.5 miles down to if I remember correctly close to 59/Smith maybe??  Turn left, go a block, turn left again and you are on your way back.  There is the right turn to take you to the finish same as with the full and half as all 3 races share the same Finish line.

 

Super fun little 5K!  I will definitely do this double race weekend for as long as Houston Marathon has the option.

 

Stay tuned for the half marathon recap and NEW COURSE REVIEW!!

About 400m into it, my friend snapped this photo

Approaching the finish; another shot from my friend.  I was running 9:13 in this last bit but I look like I'm crawling!

#shwings   HAD to show you those on my running shoes :O)  You know me, glittering it up any way I can!!!
 

Houston (Marathon) Weekend 2014 - Recap

As I am 32,000 feet in the air right now, I figured I would type out a few things:

First off I have to say how incredibly sad I am right now.  The past few trips I cry a lot both while in Houston and for a while after I leave.  This time was worse when leaving.  It was like ugly face crying.  I'd cry right now typing this ... But I am on the plane and well ... There's that :)

Going back to Nebraska is just blah.  I will never say going home because it's NOT home.

Texas is home.

But as sad as I am right now, it was a FABULOUS weekend. Even more so than the past. Not that I don't love my family but I've missed my friends terribly and I haven't been able to see them on my quick holiday trips.

I'm so looking forward to an even longer trip home early March so I can see even more folks, run another Houston race, run w Kenyan again..see my new great nephew who will have arrived by then..so much to look forward to...so it is that which makes my current sad a bit better!  Six weeks is nothing!!!

So on this trip it was all about running and friends, yes I saw part of the fam but only briefly; once to go see my nieces new house (HOLY MOLY!!!). SO beautiful. And BIG!!!

And then briefly on Sunday just around mile 10 :)

But I got to spend most of my time w Nicole, and of course friends I met up w at the expo, the 5K and at the race on Sunday (since the full and half folks were in same corrals, I was able to mix w both instead of just those doing the half same as me).  It was nice running in to so many people that I just didnt have the time to meet up with as it was yet again another whirlwind of a trip.

Oh...and we are about to land...so for now, just know that I ran the 5K as slow as I possibly could (but faster than I wanted) and I ran the half with fun in my heart just knowing I was running again in my hometown that I love and miss so much!

 

More in a race(s) recap and an overall post about just how SPECTACULAR the new course is!!!!! 

 

OMGOSH SO SPECTACULAR!!!

Healthy Healthy and Unhealthly Healthy

As someone who has seen the darker side of restriction, food obsession, weight obsession, feelings of guilt, despair...etc., etc. this post is one that I feel obligated to write. Whether or not anyone reads it, oh well.

Listen I totally get that obviously yes, there ARE foods that might not be the best thing to ingest (processed) the majority of the time, but by saying that you cannot eat bread, or ice cream, or a donut???  Um no I do not want to live in a world like that.  Even throughout the years instead of NOT eating those things, I injected guilt and associated how much exercise it would take to counteract it...OR I would just not eat for x number of meals.

I don't know which is worse to be honest...

My guilt trips are fewer and farther between the past year thankfully, but I still struggle with a bit of guilt from time to time.  I still buy some things and never open them; or I do, but it takes WEEKS sometimes before I am 'OK' with it.

I just wish the labeling of good and bad would stop.  This post is being fueled mostly by rage at some of the things I am seeing on FB and Twitter a LOT lately.  Just the other day for example, a friend on Twitter was saying that someone brought back some chocolate) and how 'well there goes my healthy eating'...um...

Wait.  What?

Look.  Unless, and this is my opinion, you plan on giving up EVERYTHING THAT IS YUMMY AND DELICIOUS in this world FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIFE...then what are you doing?!?!?!?

Why are you restricting?  Like I said, yeah, there are some things we shouldn't eat, but you know what?  Its OK.  Really and truly.  Every once in a while isn't going to hurt.

BTW, there are exceptions obviously as in that you cannot eat certain things because of allergies, intolerances etc.  You know foods that actually could cause REAL bodily harm.  But, and I say this now after experience, even if you are 'dieting' (which you should NOT be IMHO), having a splurge is OK too.  Really and truly.

I am not a doctor, nutritionist, therapist or anything like that obviously, but what I am is a woman who has struggled her entire life with low self esteem, body dysmorphia, disordered eating and just an overall horrible, horrible relationship with food in general.

But, and this is probably going to not go over so well, but if you are not allowing yourself something for any other reason other than you or society deems it not healthy, then you too have disordered eating and an unhealthy relationship with food.

Disordered eating is not just anorexia or bulimia; far from it..There is also orthoexia and its very real.

One of the things that's tricky about our culture is that orthorexia is socially acceptable and often even heralded as a great statement of self-control and doing the right thing for your health. 

So wrong.  So very very wrong.

Although orthorexia shares characteristics with anorexia, orthorexics don't always lose weight since they fixate on the quality (as opposed to quantity) of food. And they usually lack the distorted, negative self-image -- known as body dysmorphia -- that causes some people to look in the mirror and see oodles of fat when in fact they're severely underweight.  And not just severely underweight, but just not what they truly are seeing.

I could talk and talk and talk about this sort of thing, but I won't.  However I will leave you with this little quiz and if you even respond yes to one of them, well...Like I said...

Thinking about food and food preparation for more than three hours a day

Planning tomorrow’s menu today

Feeling virtuous about the food you eat, while not worrying much about the pleasure you get from food

Becoming stricter with yourself;

Getting a self-esteem boost from eating healthy

Skipping foods you once enjoyed to eat “healthy” ones

Feeling guilt when you don’t follow your diet

Experiencing distance with friends and family since your eating habits make it difficult to have meals together.

*********************************

Maybe we can look at it a different way...By setting up rigid parameters to keep yourself on track with eating, it can make you become out-of-control. HOW DID THAT HAPPEN? To understand, let's move away from the topic of food and consider the same scenerio with a less emotionally charged thing.

 

Consider a friend who avoids flying. Maybe she is afraid, maybe she dislikes it. What is the first thing she thinks of when she wins a trip to Hawaii? "Oh, no, I can't go if I have to fly." She spends all her time thinking about the thing she has avoided. Will she have to fly, is there another way to get there, can she cancel the trip, can she get some Xanax?

 

Now consider a friend who doesn't love flying, nor does she hate it. Sometimes its fun, mostly it’s neutral. She wins a trip to Hawaii. And she spends her time thinking about who she is taking with her and what beach they will be visiting.

Who thinks about flying the most? The person who is trying to avoid it! The same thing happens with food. The more you try to avoid it, the more you think about it. Maybe not today, but eventually.

 

And there are additional problems with these rigid divisions of good/bad, healthy/unhealthy, and/or legal/illegal food. When you label a food, you instantly suppress the natural flow of information coming back from the body. Your body regularly sends rich and complex messages back to you about the food you choose, and the quantity you eat. But you can’t hear it because you are caught up in mental calculations of the damage the food is doing.

 

For example, 12 year old Betty Jo eats 15 homemade chocolate chip cookies then complains that her stomach hurts. Her mother may say, "Eating that many cookies is bad for you, no wonder your stomach hurts." The message: "That was a bad thing to do." Often interpreted as "I am bad for doing that." Which often results in eating more cookies to feel better.

 

What if her mother said, "Yes your stomach is hurting, that's natural when you put so many cookies into it." The nonjudgmental message: "It's natural for my stomach to hurt with so many cookies." Betty Jo is affirmed, and since there was no "bad", no guilt, she is free to decide if she again wants to eat so much her stomach hurts. She probably won't.

 

Moralization around foods stops the feedback process. And that same feedback process is crucial for self-awareness. And it is nonjudgmental self-awareness that will bring you self-control.

 

Yes, food can have both positive and negative impact on your health. Some foods have more health benefits than others. Some can detract from health when eaten in quantity. But dividing foods into “good” and “bad” is not making American’s eat healthier.  As a matter of fact, in my opinion its what was the root of so much evil in my most definitely unhealthy relationship with food.

 

Consider making all foods neutral, and begin to pay attention to your body’s feedback. Slow down and listen. Chances are you will get a subtle message when you eat “junk” food for lunch that that didn’t feel so great. You will also get the message that having some birthday cake after dinner is not such a bad thing after all!

Someone recently said, Oh this clean eating!  Only bad part about it is when I do eat a cookie, I get sick to which my response was: Well then eat a cookie every day and you won't get sick!

But seriously folks, I know its hard.  Oh how I know its hard.  But cut yourself some slack every once in a while.  I certainly do. 

Not often, but moreso now than ever and its wonderful!

Happy New Year! Resolution (Snow) Run

Mid-Run; Just had to stop and write :)

Under the carport before heading out; I overdressed big time! Had on capris then tights, 2 pairs of socks and 2 super heavy long sleeve shirts along with the jacket; earband and a beanie.

One of my goals for the rest of this winter is to go out and run more outside in the miserable weather.  Too often I just go to the gym and run on the treadmill when it dips below 20 and ESPECIALLY when the wind chill is below 10.  This morning the wind chill was 11.  Brrrrr...but I sucked it up and got it done.  It was slow going as I am super nervous on snow, but since it was fresh and not deep, I just went along carefully.

Pretty darn proud of myself for it too :)