a week in RI

This week : 

M : run 2.5 / 7:44/ 223 ft

T : group bike intervals 23.7 / 18.5 mph / 689 ft

W : run w/Diane 3.2 / 11:08 / 63 ft

(warm up + 4x400 (1:37-1:44) with 400 walk/jog recovery)

R : group bike hill circuit 26.7 / 18.6 mph / 1263 ft

total run miles : 5.8

total bike miles : 50.5

I spent 11 + hrs in the car on Monday driving from WV to RI.  Had dinner upon arrival, and then thought it would be ok to run within an hour or so of eating.  I was wrong.  Hence the ridiculously short run.  

Met up with the Ten Speed Spokes crew on Tuesday for the Ocean Drive interval ride.  Tried this ride last year, and got dropped every time.  This year, instead of trying to join in the middle of the ride, I started on time with the group.  We did the first lap at a steady pace as people joined us, then the second lap picked up the pace along the drive, but kept it at a pace that everyone could hold on to.  The third lap a chaser group held back, then overtook the rest of us somewhere along the drive, causing some of us to also speed up and try to hold on.  I chased the faster group til I knew it was a lost cause, then held up until the people behind me caught up.  I called it a day after that loop, because my back was starting to bother me.  

My back was pretty sore on Wednesday, but I decided to run with my sister anyway.  We did a 1+ mile warm-up around the fields, and then did the 4x400 on the track.  I let her set the pace.  About halfway through the 3rd 400 sprint, my back started spasming.  It was a weird experience.  I've had back spasms before, but never during a run!  If they had been much stronger I probably would have fallen on my face.  I kept running however.  I decided if they got too bad, I would drop out, but I did end up doing all 4 of the 400s.  I skipped the cooldown jog in favor of walking 2 laps though.  

At some point, I finally located the source of the back problem as a really really tight muscle or 5 in my hip.  Since my foam roller was back home in WV, I ended up using some hard balls of yarn to try to roll it out.  

Thursday I met the TSS crew again for their hill circuit ride.  I missed out on this ride last summer when I was in town, so I really wanted to do it this year even though my back was telling me I should probably skip it.  I made it through 2 of the 10+ mile figure eights, then called it a day because my back felt like it was breaking in half.  It was slowing me down and I didn't want to hold up the group.  Or break my back.  

Was going to try a jog on Sunday but I napped for 2 hours instead of 1 and ran out of time so...more time off. 

Hanging Rock 6/25/2016 : Holly's Farewell Hike

It's a hard thing to watch your best friend and adventure partner move away.  I'm sitting here thinking about all the photography adventures we talked about or thought about and didn't find the time for.   And I'm grateful that we got to go on one last adventure together during her last weekend in town.  Looking ahead, I'm hopeful that we will be able to find exciting places between West Virginia and Michigan where we can meet and adventure together in the future!

We did this hike together back in October (Hanging Rock in the Clouds) and because of the extreme fog, Holly didn't actually get to see the amazing view.  Since this is one of the closer hikes to home, and because I wanted her to see that view before she left, we decided to do it again for our farewell hike.

It was rather cloudy when we got up there this time as well, but we could at least see all the way to the ground.  And we stayed long enough to see the view expand as we watched.

Obligatory adventure selfie.

And of course, a sunglass selfie. 

Because it was really hard to take photos without major squinting.  

Sunglasses solve squinting problems. 

 Laughing together on top of a mountain, what could be better?

I may or may not have given her bunny ears in order to get us an entertaining photo. 

Tiny Holly taking in the view

My favorite tree ever. 

Can't do this hike without taking a picture of it's face!

We startled this fawn from a nap in the first few minutes of the hike.  Lucky for us, it didn't run too far before stopping to observe us, so we were able to get out our cameras and capture some photos before continuing on our way.

Holly said this sign made her feel like we were in Jurassic Park.

Photos of me that Holly took : 

Tiny Gretchen

These green boots were made for adventuring!

week of laziness

Monday should have been a day off, after a half marathon on Saturday and a long mountain hike on Sunday...but Monday is Pub Run day so I ran.  And then I proceeded to not exercise again until today.  I can perhaps blame the weather for some of that...but really I was just being lazy.  At least today's run was decent.  It was hot out and I was not quite hydrated enough, but I still felt surprisingly good for a whole 5 days off, so I guess all the time off wasn't such a bad thing.

This week : 

M : Pub Run 3.2 / 7:24 / 0 ft

Sa : hike 2.5 / 21:06 / 440 ft

Su : Run 4.2 / 7:42 / 282 ft

total miles run : 7.4

Yesterday was Holly's and my last WV photo adventure together before she moves back to Michigan.  Photos will be posted in a later post. So sad to be losing my photo-adventure partner!

McAfee Knob 6/19/2016

This hike was the last part of my Roanoke adventure with Jessica.  I've been wanting to do this hike for a long time, but the combination of it being almost 2 hours away, plus a 4 mile mountain hike each way, made it unfeasible for me to do alone as part of a day trip.  But when I signed up for Race 13.1 Roanoke, I decided I would spend two nights in the hotel and do the hike on the way home.  The trailhead was only 20-30 minutes away from Roanoke, and right on Rt 311, which is one of the roads that will get me home from Roanoke.  (just not one of the fastest ones)

Let's see...I had 1 quart of water, of which I drank about half.  

I was wearing Chaco sandals.

No flashlight.

We started around 10 AM.

We did stay on the trail the whole time.

I had some pretzels and cashews in my backpack.  Ate a little bit at the top of the hike.

No raingear or extra clothing.

Common sense?  I always have that.  (Might not always use it though.)

There were trails leading out of both sides of the parking lot, and it was not immediately obvious which direction was going to take us where we wanted to go.  Finally we just went to one of the trail heads and saw an arrow pointing the other way telling us how far it was to McAfee Knob.  Problem solved.  We crossed over 311 from the parking lot and started our hike.  

It was a good climb, certainly tiring, but I pushed the pace going up because I didn't want to take too long on the climb and then feel rushed to get photos at the top and run back down the mountain.  It took us about 1.5 hours to get to the top, and then we spent about an hour up there taking photos, snacking, and enjoying the view before heading back down.  

We could not have asked for a more perfectly gorgeous day!

Who needs hiking boots?

Not everyday that you get to look down on the birds. Or be at their level. 

The hike back down was not too enjoyable, but we made it.  Heat plus tired feet had us dragging, plus going down sandy mountain trails is not exactly pleasant on a good day.  The view from the top was worth every bit of pain though!

We stopped at the Swinging Bridge restaurant in Paint Bank for lunch, which I think was roughly halfway between the trail and home.  It was crowded because it was Father's Day, so it was a little slow, but the food was good.  

Race 13.1 Roanoke 2016

This year's race went ever so much better than last year's.  It has something to do with the fact that this year I did not go off course and run 16 miles instead of 13.  And because of that little mishap, Race 13.1 paid my race entry this year.  And then I came in first place and got prize money, so...no complaints about this race experience!

My friend Jessica came with me on this trip, so we decided to make a weekend of it.  Dinner out on Friday evening plus a trip to the mall, race Saturday morning, thai food and sushi for lunch, dinner and drinks out Saturday night (thank you Uber!), checked a hike off my bucket list on Sunday, and had lunch on the way home.

We arrived in Roanoke around 5 on Friday, went straight to Fleet Feet to get our race bibs, and then checked into the motel.  This is about the 5th time I've stayed at the Ramada Roanoke.  I like it because it is within walking distance of my races.  It's not the nicest place I've ever stayed, but it's usually good enough.  This time our non-smoking room smelled like a combination of cigarettes and sweaty feet.  Mostly sweaty feet.  Like, men's locker room sweaty feet.  I think I'll be staying at a friend's house in Roanoke from now on.


We planned to hit the breakfast buffet at the Ramada on Saturday morning before the race, but when we got there they didn't have ANY fresh fruit, and most of what they had was donuts (gross).  So...my breakfast was the hunk of banana bread I had brought, and a Kind bar.  Not a whole lot of fuel, but I had only brought 2 Kind bars, and I gave the second one to Jessica for her breakfast.  I was a bit worried about the lack of a proper breakfast before a half marathon, but I figured it was as good a time as any to find out what I could do without proper fuel.  I had also decided that I didn't feel like making my usual post-race protein drink for this trip...so I was also risking a huge crash after the race.  Hooray for experimentation!

I ran a mile warm-up, stood around for another 15 or so minutes, and finally the race started.  I didn't want to start right on the line, but it appeared that no one else wanted to either, so I finally stepped up along with a handful of guys.  I tried not to start out too fast, but even with a pace that felt like a jog, I was in the top ten.  And no other females were near me.  I did my best to keep a relaxed-feeling pace as long as possible, and felt pretty good for the first 2 or 3 miles, before the awful flatness of the course started wearing me out.  Whenever even the tiniest hill came along, I used it to re-energize myself and get ahead a bit.  But the longer flat stretches really wore me out.  Clearly I need to start making myself run flats more often...ugh.

Since the course was an out & back, I was able to see where the 2nd and 3rd place runners were.  I was pretty sure that the 2nd place female would only catch me if I fell too far off my pace + she had a really strong kick.  I used my inhaler sometime in the 8th mile, because I was starting to struggle on the breathing and really didn't want to let it get to a point where the oxygen debt started hurting my legs.  I started trying to pick up the pace a bit during the last 5k.  It ended up being spurts of speed followed by backing off when I felt I couldn't maintain the speed.  I did try harder in the last mile, and finished really strong.  Finish time was 1:33:33, and according to my watch the course was over 13.2, which gave me a 7:05 pace.  Was hoping to get under 7:00, but I'm happy with having a strong race & finish, and no injuries.

I downed 2 bottles of water after the race.  I knew I needed some salt as well, but the food options weren't great.  I had a granola bar, and then had to cave in and have a piece of pizza (along with a 3rd bottle of water) because it was the only salty food they were offering, and sitting around for over an hour waiting for awards was too long for me to go without replenishing some salt.

Tiny little hills...better than no hills!

Finisher medal, first place medal, cash prize!

Finishing with a smile...because I saw Jessica across the line taking photos with her phone!

The weekend in food : 

We got a fried calamari appetizer and over half of them were whole calamari. 

Legs!

Dinner : I loved the mix/match option.  I got to have lobster ravioli, prosciutto wrapped pork, zucchini and a salad for a really reasonable price.  Much more reasonably priced than just getting the lobster ravioli, which I really wanted because...lobster!

I was all delicious, but the pork tasted like it was cooked in a salt bath.  Majorly dehydrating.

Post-race lunch.  Pad thai!

 Saturday evening appetizer : fried oysters

Saturday dinner : Maple Burger.  

It had yummy stuff like bacon and apples on it.

Second Saturday dinner...because we shared the oysters and the burger and then I was still hungry

So I got chicken tenders and fries. 

Sunday breakfast : iced coffee and a chocolate croissant. 

Sunday lunch : Bison BBQ, fries, and cole slaw.

A race and a mountain hike

It has been a long week.  Between dog-sitting and going out of town for the weekend, I haven't slept in my own bed in over a week.  I can't wait to collapse on my clean sheet-ed comfy bed tonight! I get to enjoy it for less than a week before I hit the road again, headed up to RI for a week or so.

I worked 30 hours on my feet this week, then ran a half marathon, and then did an 8+ mile mountain hike.  My feet are dead...and I go back to work for a full day tomorrow.  My feet are definitely going to enjoy my vacation in RI!

This week : 

M : Pub Run 4.6 / 7:26 / 72 ft

 T : run 6 / 8: 00 / 443 ft

R : run 4 / 7:36 / 194

Sa : warm up 1 / 7:13 / 49 ft

race 13.2 / 7:05 / 358 ft

Su : hike 8.2 / 22:11 / 1727 ft

total miles run : 28.8 miles

Worked many long hours on my feet but still found time to exercise

My new summer job at the brewing company is going well.  I am very unused to spending all day standing, but my feet and legs are adjusting, and my back stopped hurting when we raised my canning-day table about 6 inches.  I spent 1.5 days cleaning kegs (which is a great workout for my arms and back, hooray!) and 2 days putting plastic rings on 6 packs of cans.  The work is mindless and repetitive, but I am finding it really nice to have a stress-free job that doesn't require much thinking.  It is a nice break.

This week : 

M : morning jog 4.4 / 8:41 / 325 ft

Pub Run 4 / 7:20 / 151 ft

T : run 3.1 / 8:01 / 171 ft

R : bike w/Stu 22.8 / 16.4 mph / 1640 ft

F : long run 10.2 / 8:24 / 781 ft

Sa : warm up 1.1 / 7:14 / 0 ft

race 5 / 6:38 / 125 ft

bike w/ Dan 21 / 17.3 mph / 1516 ft

Su : horseback ride 50 min

total run miles : 27.8

total bike miles : 43.7

Monday I ran before work, spent 8 hours working on my feet, and then ran again.  Tuesday I spent another 5 hours on my feet, and then tried to run.  My body said heck no.  So I cut the run short instead of torturing my legs and feet any further.  I can be nice to my body sometimes... And then I even took Wednesday off to let it rest up.  Also I worked another 7 or 8 hours on my feet Wednesday...

I had Friday off from work so I took advantage of the chance to get one more long run in before my next half marathon.  It was an absolutely gorgeous day out and I enjoyed the run immensely.  Even if it was a bit slow...it was my first long run in the heat, so I'm not complaining too much about the pace.