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By kilax, June 10, 2014 6:06 am

A good friend of mine is going to be an official pacer at a fall marathon. You know, that person you seek out in the starting corrals and stick with for as long as you can*. 

I actually wasn’t planning on doing a marathon this year, but then I found out this person was pacing and that they were pacing the time I was aiming for at my last marathon (and missed by 15 minutes, but still PR’d, so yay!), and that is a SIGN! You don’t ignore a sign like that! I discussed the race with Steven, then signed up the day after my friend told me they were pacing, uh, back in March. Fast forward to last week when I get an email from the race and remember, “Oh yeah! I signed up for that!”

I also happened to chat with my friend last week and told them how excited I am they were pacing. That was when they said the race actually assigned them to a marathon pace that is 20 minutes faster than they requested. Um, geesh, as if pacing a group of strangers isn’t already stressful enough, now you have to pace faster than you wanted to? Wow! (I know they can do it, but still! Stress!)

Do you think you would be comfortable being an official pacer for a race? What distance and what pace?

It’s an honor when a friend asks you to pace them, but that doesn’t mean it’s not stressful. You want them to have a great race. Even though it is their legs that do the work, you are really taking on the race stress of two people. 

So I can’t imagine that, with a group of people! But! I do think it would be fun to be an official race pacer someday. Cause I like to talk to strangers during races. And I can run a steady slower than race pace. And I wouldn’t mind holding a pace poster/flag/whatever. Oh, and getting a free entry and clothes and sometimes shoes. Ha ha. 

*or if you are really awesome, that person you start behind, keep in your sights, catch up with… and pass, ha ha. 

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By kilax, June 9, 2014 6:35 am

(at least, for me)

Christina (my snister) is in Chicago for work, so we used her visit as an opportunity to do something touristy that has been on our list for awhile – visit the Adler Planetarium (which has stunning views of the city)!

In typical museum fashion, I was overwhelmed by the amount of information (and in this case, overwhelmed by feelings of by insignificance after reminders of how large the universe is) and attracted toward the exhibits meant for children:

Ha, and toward anything I could poke fun at. Apparently all the hipsters had telescopes FIRST in 1608.

There was a small exhibit on the constellation Orion, with an interactive display showing how it appears in different areas of the world. I have gleaned no new information to share with you, BUT! Seeing that exhibit reminded me of something really cheesy, and I don’t think I have ever shared it here. 

When I lived in Rome (I know, enough with the Rome talk, it was 8 years ago, let’s hear something new!) I volunteered at a cat shelter every night of the week, and always walked home in the dark. The summer walk was a bit longer than the spring walk, because I had moved a bit outside of the city and away from the shelter. And being outside of the city, that walk felt a bit more open, so I paid more attention to the sky. 

So every night when I walked back to my flat, the Orion constellation would guide me there (I mean, I paid attention to the streets and such, it was just always in my view, ha ha). And this oddly made me feel at home, because I related to being out late at night doing studio work in the states, and seeing that constellation on my way home in the fall/early winter. I also had memories of pointing out this constellation in the sky when Steven and I were together, and that made me feel comforted.

Like I said, cheesy, right?

But anytime I hear/see something about Orion now, I am immediately brought back to those memories – walking back to my place in Rome, up a huge hill, and seeing Orion. I knew that my loved ones in the states didn’t see him then, but they saw him other times of the year, and that that connected us. 

Okay, and thanks to Men in Black, I also think about a cat when Orion comes up. 

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By kilax, June 8, 2014 9:04 pm

Highlight of the Week(s): Week 241: my team getting some runs at our softball game, and riding 50 miles on my bike! Week 242: finally having a decent run on Sunday. 

Monday | May 26, 2014: rest
Tuesday | May 27, 2014: 5 m run
Loc: hood, Temp: 85°/73°, Time: 52:56, Pace: 10:35 avg, Difficulty: medium, Felt: so so/happy when it started to rain
Wednesday | May 28, 2014: 1.9 m run (w/Steven) + catch
Loc: Nippersink FP, Temp: 67°/62°, Time: 23:18, Pace: 12:20 avg, Difficulty: easy, Felt: good
Thursday | May 29, 2014: Softball Game #2
Friday | May 30, 2014: teaching strength class + 2.5 m run (w/Steven)
Strength: 2/1 dumbbell switch, Difficulty: medium, Felt: crummy, then better (exercising made my cold feel better)
Loc: Millennium Trail, Temp: 71°/68°, Time: 29:11, Pace: 11:43, Difficulty: easy, Felt: okay – annoyed with coughing and bugs
Saturday | May 31, 2014: batting cages
Sunday | June 1, 2014: 50 m ride (w/Dawn)
Loc: Union, Temp: 68°/84°, Time: 3:38:31, Pace: 13.9 mph avg, Difficulty: easy/medium, Felt: good, but like I should be in bed resting

Monday | Jun 2, 2014: teaching strength class
Strength: 1/2 dumbbell switch, Difficulty: medium, Felt: pretty good, minus massive amounts of “sick” sweat
Tuesday | June 3, 2014: 2.4 m run (w/Steven) + batting cages
Loc: Millennium Trail, Temp: 83°/82°, Time: 28:02, Pace: 11:42 avg, Difficulty: easy, Felt: annoyed
Wednesday | June 4, 2014: rest
Thursday | June 5, 2014: 3 m run + Softball Game #3
Loc: hood, Temp: 76°/76°, Time: 32:21, Pace: 10:47 avg, Difficulty: easy, Felt: so so – still have that cold
Friday | June 6, 2014: teaching strength class
Strength: 2/1 dumbbell switch, Difficulty: medium, Felt: good
Saturday | June 7, 2014: 8 m run (w/Chris & Meechi)
Loc: DPRT, Temp: 60°/70°, Time: 1:30:08, Pace: 11:16 avg, Difficulty: medium, Felt: much better in the second half
Sunday | June 8, 2014: 12 m run (w/Bobbi)
Loc: Grant Woods to Chain O’Lakes Trail, Temp: 55°/57°, Time: 2:12:32, Pace: 11:03 avg, Difficulty: easy, Felt: great! (the weather and company helped)

Notes:

• I’m posting two weekly recaps (instead of my normal one) because I was sick from Wednesday the 28th until, well, really, today. And I am still coughing up questionable things. Yay! Summer colds. Ha ha. Not much to report when you have one! 
• But! Being sick gave me a chance to finish reading Born to Run and to start and finish Ultramarathon Man: Confessions of an All-Night Runner, so there’s that! I also stumbled across this list (pdf here) of five running books Competitor thinks you should be reading. Oops, I’ve only read one. Have you read (m)any?
• On the softball front… the team we played our second game against seemed to be closer to our level, which was nice. Unfortunately, our third game was against a team of rotten people which really ruined the fun for us. Luckily, we don’t play them again!
• After I read this article, “Roadblocks Ahead” (pdf here) in Running Times, I was waiting for the digital copy so I could share it with you guys! The article starts with the story of a person who missed a 5K PR because they took a wrong turn (with other runners) at a 5K. The article then talks about the responsibility of what you should know before you attempt a PR race, even if the information is hidden on a website. Things such as how different events will merge at a race (half and full marathon for example), how hydration stations are organized and what they offer, where to park and the best way to get to the race, how overall and age group prizes work (is doubling dipping allowed?), and who is managing the race (someone with experience, a race company, a newbie, whatever). First, I wanted to share this with you guys because I have missed a turn on a race before, when I was walking a half marathon. Luckily, I used my friend’s smartphone to get us back on course, but I was surprised we missed a turn! Have you ever missed a turn on a race course? And secondly, I wondered, what would you add to that list of things to look in to before a race (or, before a PR attempt as the article put it)? I would add seeing if there are pacers… and for small races, it’s nice to see past results so you can get an idea for the field!
  

Link to Training Week 240

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By kilax, June 7, 2014 3:26 pm

I’m feeling…

… surprised at how quickly the time has passed from the start of the year to the wedding. But I probably say that every year, about most things. 

… relieved my dress still fits. I’ve been trying it on periodically, but hey, you never know!

It’s a lovely little photoshopped number.

… panicked that I don’t have my matron of honor speech done. Lots of ideas floating around in my head (and in google doc drafts) but nothing I’m in love with yet. Have you ever given a speech at a wedding? What inspired you?

… ecstatic to see family and friends come together to support Christina and Will (and to PAR-TAY!)!

… emotional to see my little snis as a bride!

… and proud of all of the hard work and planning she has done for the wedding. 

… sad already, for when it’s all over. 

… excited to see my snister tomorrow and ask how she feels. Who gives a crap what I am thinking about!

OH! And one last feeling. Another relieved for a week from now when I can quit worrying about tan lines, mosquito bites, and getting owies. 

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By kilax, June 6, 2014 12:11 pm

Do you talk with your hands?

Ha, I don’t mean using sign language! I mean speaking with your mouth, but making gestures with your hands. 

I sure do it. Um, rather animatedly. 

I never understood why I gesture, because I have been told my gestures do nothing to help along my story telling. In fact, I have been told it makes my stories more confusing. Ha!

But this article (pdf here) I stumbled across when writing this shed some light. It theorizes that one of the reasons we gesture is because it helps us organize our thoughts as we speak. I can believe that. Something about it feels natural and does help me tell a story, even if it doesn’t help the story itself. 

The article also suggests that teaching children to gesture when doing math problems could help them learn new problem-solving skills, and says other studies say gesturing could help us remember information and even empathize. Interesting stuff!

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By kilax, June 5, 2014 6:28 am

I encountered something interesting in Data’s room the other night.

Photo in B&W, cause no one needs to see the details of his litter box in color

Next to his litter box was something small, brown, and squiggly. 

Ew. I had three immediate thoughts:

1. What is that?! IS THAT A WORM?!
2. I hope Data is not sick!
3. Maybe I should leave that for Steven to find?! (then, nah, he just cleaned up Sunday’s mess…)

I was brave. I grabbed a paper towel, bent over, trying not to look at it, and grabbed it. I slowly opened the paper towel and peeked inside…

Wait! That’s not a worm!

Any idea what that is?

It took me a second…

It’s Mater‘s hook and tow line! Ha ha ha. 

Luca kept saying that his Mater was broken when he was here. I didn’t realize that piece had fallen off! How it got in there (and just now showed up?!) I have no idea. But I put it inside the one sock Luca left behind so I can give it back to him. 

So, phew. Data is fine. 

My eyes? Not so much. 

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By kilax, June 4, 2014 11:56 am

Have you ever revisited old blog posts to edit or delete things out of them? Or make them private?

People have told me they’ve done this before. Either for privacy reasons or embarrassment reasons or whatever. It’s never crossed my mind to do it. In the USA the Internet doesn’t forget! Hee hee. 

All joking aside though, I was looking through my Rome archives for a photo for a post idea* and thought… these posts don’t represent who I am now. At all. They represent who I was, then. A 21 year-old, finding her way in Rome. On her own.

Some things I read were downright cringe-worthy/awkward (special points to anyone who met me through the blog and has been my friend since then!!!).

But I keep the posts. For diary/sentimental purposes, and to remind me how much I’ve grown. What’s my blog if not a documentation of my life and (hopefully) progress toward becoming a less annoying person? Ha ha.

But every time I look through those archives, I wish I could go back in time and re-do Rome with who I am now. Not that anything held me back from travel, or that I wasn’t street smart or independent. I’m just a bit less of a loner now. And I know more. But! I wouldn’t have gotten here without that experience. So. Yeah. It just makes me excited for when Steven and I have the resources to travel all over the world together!

You know, just visiting places featured in Star Wars films by myself (here’s another, in Spain). Ha ha. If ANYONE can name the location of this and the film it’s from, you get a Star Wars related prize. 

And I’ll never regret tossing my high school journals. That timeframe does NOT need to be remembered! So thankful I didn’t blog then. Or have Facebook. I think keeping kids offline until college is a goooood idea (<— somewhat sarcastic here… but only somewhat).

*Which was cold medicine induced, so it may never see the light of day. Or the light of a computer screen. 

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By kilax, June 3, 2014 6:23 am

Is a race qualified by its distance (and events) alone, or by its brand, as well?

That is the question I was asking myself after reading “Ironman or Iron-Distance? A Triathlon Branding Battle Brews” (pdf here).

The article starts with mentioning how fast Ironman branded events sell out compared to non Ironman-branded events. Apart from a few anomalies, the Ironman branded events are the ones that sell out. One none branded event had only 30 registrants total this year (according to the article, Ironmans typically have 3,000 participants). 

The article surmises that the reason the Ironman branded events sell out is that when people finish one, they want to say, “I did an Ironman.” Not, “I did an Iron-distance” or “I did a full-distance triathlon.” That, and when you sign up (and pay the big dough) to do an Ironman branded event, you know it will be a quality race.

I don’t mean to write this like I have done an Ironman! I haven’t even done an individual triathlon. But I have participated in a Half Ironman relay, and apart from the lack of information for relayers (seems typical for most relays I’ve done) I was very pleased with the event organization.  

But I can see doing what one person in the article mentioned – an Ironman branded event first, then moving on to the non branded ones:

“You want to do the [Ironman] branded race first, because it may be the only one you ever do,” she says. “After you’ve done a few, what does it matter if you’re doing an Ironman or an Iron-distance?”

The non branded events are probably a lot cheaper, definitely easier to get in to, and maybe offered in different locations than Ironman races.

Of course, after reading this I started thinking about how race branding compares in running. And… I don’t think it’s the same. If you run a race of any distance (and the distance is correct, ha ha) you can call yourself a “marathoner,” or “half marathoner” or “5Ker” (hee hee) or whatever.

But! That doesn’t mean that people don’t take “brand” in to consideration when they register for their first event at a distance. There is a reason I chose a 5K in Chicago for my first one (with Steven) and why the Chicago Marathon was my first marathon. I went with well-known, and well-organized. 

But since my first race, I’ve been likely to try any race brand (which feels funny to call them, since often, it’s one-race brand), at least once! Sometimes, the low-key, smaller races are the ones I like best!

Do you take brand in to consideration when you register for an event?

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By kilax, June 2, 2014 5:30 pm

I rode 50 miles on the Udder Century Ride on Sunday and didn’t see any cows except this one!

Ha ha, when I said, “We haven’t seen any real cows yet,” he said, “What?! You don’t think I’m real?!?!”

But I did see plenty of horses, um, a few dead animals (what was with the large fish on the side of the road?!) and miles after miles of gorgeous country scenery that made me wish I had a GoPro to take photos!

The Udder Century is the McHenry County Bicycle Club’s annual supported 32, 50, 62, 75 or 100 mile bike ride through the backroads of Illinois (and if you do the 100, Wisconsin). Dawn, a member of my multisport club, told me about the ride, and with my itch to get on my bike, low registration price ($25 when I signed up), and day of availability, I was in!

I didn’t know what to expect. How many cyclists would there be? Would we be out there all alone? Would the course signage be clear? Would there be vegan friendly food at the rest stops?

Short answers – many, ha ha NO, YES, and yes!

We arrived at the site to see waves of cyclists going out, which got me feeling pretty pumped (we later learned there were over 1,300 cyclists!).

We quickly got ready (switching to cycling shoes, putting air in our tires, loading up our jersey pockets), got our wristbands, hit up the bathroom… and hit the road just after 8:00 am!

After, a “we’re doing this!” selfie, of course! Hee hee.

I thought it was interesting that there was a window for start times – between 6:30 am – 10:00 am (by 8:00 am if you were riding 100). The wave starts makes sense for road safety. But I have never done an event like that and appreciated the flexibility!

It was partly cloudy when we started, but not too hot – 68°. I knew it was going to get in to the high 80s, and appreciated that we started earlier. I had (still have) a nasty cold, and felt kind of miserable. You know that gross sweat you get on your face/body when you have a cold? And how warm weather makes it worse? Well, add layers of sunscreen to that to stop your skin from breathing and imagine how awesome you’d feel. Ha! So the less time in the sun/high temperatures, the better.

The first thirty miles were fantastic. We were maintaining around a 15 mph pace (which was our goal) and feeling good. We stopped at the first rest stop at mile 18, and we both agreed that the fresh cut oranges were amazingly refreshing. I was also digging the lemonade!

I was in search for ibuprofen – I had a low-grade headache and every bump in the road (there were few – the roads were very nice to ride on) made me cringe. I figured they wouldn’t be allowed to give it out (they weren’t), but it doesn’t hurt to ask. Lesson learned – bring drugs next time!

We kept riding north – the course was a big rectangle, starting in the southeast corner and going clockwise – and stopped at the second rest stop, at mile 30.

I was kind of dreading what was coming when we left that rest stop – riding south. The entire time, we could feel a wind coming from the south. And I knew we mostly had to go that way to get back.

And it was just as awful as we imagined. Ha ha.

Of course, the wind speed was only in the high teens, with who knows what gusts. But you really feel that on your bike. We tried riding in a line to block the wind. That helped. We shifted way down in our gears to feel like we were at least moving our legs. That helped too. But it left me mentally exhausted. I mean, even going on downhills, I was still only hitting 13 mph! Come on! It felt like we were getting no where.

Luckily, the hills were not that bad!

There were volunteers handing out water around mile 40, which I used as an excuse to stop to fill up my water bottles (man, I drank so much water!) and to take my left shoe off. My toes and forefoot felt numb. I expected to see blood when I took my shoe off, but nada. I completely loosened the straps on my shoe, and that helped big time. Probably not the safest way to ride with my clip-ins, but whatever!

I was completely happy to see a huge downhill right after that, and just fly down, mostly coasting. Um. I learned that I coast A LOT on this ride (on straight-aways, too). Probably not a good thing.

I noticed after the hill that the ground was wet. Hmm. That had me feeling cautious, as I was with a group riding in the rain last year when someone had a major wipe-out that left them injured. Soon after that, rain starting coming down HARD. We slowed down, but the rain immediately made the sunscreen on my face run in to my eyes. So while it only rained from miles 45-46.5, I was blind in my right eye for most of the rest of the ride.

The good thing about the rain is that it made it feel cooler. It was 84° by the time we finished! And although that wind was annoying, it was keeping us cooler.

“We finished!” selfie.

We pulled in to the final destination close to 12:30. The riding portion of the trip took us 3:38:31, but our overall time with stops was 4:25:11. We were pleased with our average speed of 14 mph! And really pleased with the event overall. It was so well organized, with fantastic signage – I didn’t have to get out the cue sheet, once! I felt safe the whole time, and really enjoyed talking with Dawn for the first 30 miles (until it was too windy after to hear one another!).

I was really impressed with the post ride buffet salad and pasta, too! Even though this cold has killed my appetite (and messed up my taste buds) it was great to have a warm meal waiting for us at the finish! And it was fun talking to a few random people and seeing whether or not they rode through the rain. Since there were different loops to get different mileage in (and the different start times), some people missed it.

It was fun to try this and I’d totally love to do an organized ride, again. You feel safer, in large numbers, and it’s nice to ride out in the country and not have as many stops due to traffic! And it’s so odd, but this was the first time I ever felt safe leaving my bike away from me, unattended (at the beginning and end, and at the rest stops). I’ve been wondering about that, with RAGBRAI. It’s set up with five stops on our 67.5 mile ride, and I keep thinking, “Where will I leave my bike when I stop to partake in all the (food) festivities?” Maybe I will feel this comfortable then (maybe not).

Of course, I did learn a few things, as I am a major biking n00b. I am pretty sure I have awful form. I think I need to get my bike adjusted again, because I am hunching my shoulders. And like I said, I coast a lot. I should have more of an even cadence. The good things I learned – I am not sore at all (even in my shoulders!) and my body never felt tired during the ride. My bike is really comfortable, so I am happy about that! Now I am even more stoked for RAGBRAI! 54 days!