I don’t give a crap what happens, not one stinking worry.   If I get 1:35, ok, if I get 1:33, ok.  I’m going from what I know to what I don’t, different conditions, new environment, a race course I’m completely unfamiliar with…it’s all good.

I also have a mental “get out of jail free” card since I’m so overdue for that training break that if I do crappily, I can blame it on that, if I do well, I’ll blame it on something else like the weather (which I can handily blame if I don’t do well too – what a bargain excuse, it’s 2-for-1!).  That said, I feel pretty strong this week, the taper is kicking in and my energy level is good.  Bottom line: I’m going to race this thing to the best of my ability, the result to be determined on Sunday.

The 2-Week Training Break
It’s almost here, starting on Monday.  I’m pretty circumspect about it, as in, I don’t expect miracles and am happily resigned to the fact that it probably won’t make a tangible difference, except for some fresh motivation.  Coach A Muse/Adam disagrees though, saying he thinks it will indeed change something and bring an improvement of some kind, though exactly what remains to be seen.  That’s an uplifting thought and one I would love to prove out, though ultimately, even if all it does is make my tendons and muscles happy and my brain ready for a fresh go, it’s still a big win.

A Man
If you follow this blog, you know I haven’t dated anyone since my last relationship ended a year and a half ago.  Realizing how much time has flown by makes me cringe, but on the other hand, I’m a very self-sufficient gal and can handle being solo to a fault.  It’s not optimal of course, but I couldn’t stomach internet dating (did that before Nick and met a lot of weirdos and unsuitables), I never go out and no cute guys have magically sauntered across my living room floor, so it’s been a long drought.

Meanwhile, in the park…

There’s this cute runner dude I’ve passed for over a year; not all the time – there’ll be months when my running schedule changes and we don’t see each other, but when we do, we have a little palm-slapping ritual that’s sweet and always leaves me smiling.   I could tell this guy had good humor about him plus a bitchin’ bod (thank you, shirtless summers) so a couple weeks ago, when he stopped to ask my name and if I’d like to get together, I said “Sure”.

Now, since he’s going to read this and I don’t want to color anything, I’ll just say that we’re having a nice time.  I like my new friend.  That’s all I’ll divulge but I figured you’d appreciate knowing something was going on in my life besides tempo runs and sore toe-knuckles.

And with that, I guess this is my last post till the weekend.  I’m bringing my laptop so I can hopefully post pics and an update before I get home.  Have a great rest of your week, folks.

Big love,
xxxflo

My veggie burger toe looks like it ran a marathon, nice purple nail.  Hurts a bit normally but not bad running, though I could feel it with my strides yesterday.  I’m not worried about it for the race though, it’ll be fine.

Life/Love thoughts have been messing with me this week, brought on by the hormonal wonderland that is Lady Time, I’m sure.  I think it probably falls under Lust Angst more than Life/Love Angst though, so nothing serious, just…angst.

Some stupid flashback of last Fall’s evil neighbor drama happened the night before last (though nothing even approaching the misery of that story, thank god).  The idiot girl who lives above me – not directly above but the one next to her – so named “The Idiot” because she kept putting her trash out after the trash people came (they only come once a week) so other people had to clean up her messes…anyway, she was up to something the other night, going up and down the stairs for a couple hours, making a lot of noise past midnight. I didn’t say anything about it except for a muttered “shut the fuck up” while lying in bed.

The next morning I wake up to a note under my door telling me I was rude to make so much noise tromping up and down the stairs.  Even though the author (the girl below me) had the offending party wrong, it really bugged me that I was being called out for it.   I wrote a nice note saying it wasn’t me and that it was the idiot above.

About an hour later, The Idiot makes a couple more up and downs and I open my door to say the neighbor below left me a note “just so you know”, and the girl got this deer in the headlights look, like she’d stolen something and said “My friend was here from Michigan and I brought her suitcase up”.  WTF?  I have decided that either she was moving someone in (though I didn’t hear another voice) or that her 20-year-old self looked in the mirror and thought she was fat, so she went up and down the stairs for 2 hours.  I’m leaning toward the latter.

Purrrr
My gal-pals Audra and (hopefully) Kat will be here on Saturday, staying with me to spectate and/or race.  Kat’s deal is up in the air, thanks to an unexpected case of shingles, of all things, but I’m hoping she gets here at least.

After the race is a gathering of RWOL and FB folks at a local bar, only a couple whom I’ve met in the flesh before, so I’m looking forward to it.  Hope to see my local cuties, the Knast twins and Peggy there, too – it’d be cool to get to talk to you gals longer than a millisecond.

I’m calm about the race, just taking it for what it ends up being, which will if nothing else, supersede the memory of the collapsing Half.  That alone will be worth its weight in gold.  The weather looks stellar, btw.  NOAA says 40 degrees and 3mph wind.

I got a new iPod Shuffle, my 3rd one, having fried the first two with sweat.  I have a Creative Nano for my fallback mp3 player when I’m between Shuffles.  Because it sits a bit off the waistband, it doesn’t have the frying problem, but it’s a bit trickier to use thanks to a minuscule wheel that doubles as a button.  Plus you have to change the format of iTunes songs to mp3s to play them on it.  Not that I take music out all the time, probably on 1/4 of my runs, but I do love the simplicity of the Shuffle.

Been getting some great voiceover jobs recently and have been told by several different people at the company that does the medical learning modules that I’m the company favorite and “No wonder everyone loves working with you”, which is oh so flattering.  And I just now got a call for a long non-medical job next month with a new (big) client.  Between that and all my other little streams of income, I’m making more moolah now so hopefully, I will leave the Blue Hovel without a look back when my lease expires next Fall.

Now, about those brisk runs – I had a hell of a good time this week.  It’s been the fastest month of training I’ve ever done.  Fastest week, too.  The week went like this (with Heart Rate Reserve % so you can see I’m not being irresponsible):

Monday: off
Tuesday: 10 @ 8:16 (71%)
Wednesday: 7 @ 8:11 (69%)
Thursday:  15.5 @ 7:45 (79%…was the workout mentioned in the previous post)
Friday:  7 @ 8:53 (63%)
Saturday:9 @ 7:59 (75%)
Sunday: 12 progression @ 7:57 (75%)
60 miles total

The Good
What I liked about the week, besides the fact that my heart rates are better than they have been in a long time (along with the corresponding paces) was that my legs felt tired after Thursday and a little tired yesterday.  I know it sounds weird that I’d like that, but I don’t often feel tired legs, though I’ve run many recoveries because it was expected, rather than needed.  Friday was a recovery because I needed it.  That’s good.

There is something to be said about doing things because you feel them or have instincts about them, not just because you read about it.  I’m not defying standard training practices outright by making moderate pace the norm – I have 3.5 years of data in my logs that lead me to believe it’s truly worth testing – though it does require trusting myself which can be a scary thing.

The Could Be Better
As far as mistakes, Saturday should have been slower, 8:15 – 8:25s would have been fab.  Friday’s recovery was so effective, coupled with my continuing delight at how certain paces feel, that I got greedy.  If I’d parceled it out properly, I’d have held back for fresher legs yesterday.

No biggie, lesson learned.  All I have to do this week is taper for Sunday’s Half so aside from 3 x .75mi tomorrow, not much else is happening.

Patience Ahead

Yes, I’m training faster than ever but this is not going to be a miracle of running faster for 3 weeks and “Boom, I’m PR queen!”  I still have some relearning to do when it comes to pushing in a race.  I’ve done 3 races since September’s collapsing Half: the first one was slow to start on purpose then the next two were slow to start but not on purpose.

Obviously, I still have some anxiety about getting into race effort and what I can handle, so bear with me a little while longer – patience is required while I get the mind and the body all working on the same page.  So while I guarantee there will be no surprises this weekend (I’m thinking 1:34:xx is a reasonable goal that won’t have me working my last nerve), keep a lookout for the future.  Faster times are coming.

The Anti-Dicking Around Method
Over the last week, I’ve had a few emails and comments from readers/friends who really connect to the idea of taking the emotion out of weight-loss and are starting to treat their own weight-loss endeavors with this in mind.  Matt commented in the last post “It is analogous to running. Stick to the plan- log the numbers- get results.”  Yes!  That is exactly it.

Simple geometry: the shortest distance between two points is a straight line.  I’ve said this about running improvement and it also applies to weight-loss (or anything in life, for that matter).  You can dick around and cross fingers, hoping that you get to point B eventually, or you can take control of the situation, figure out what you need to do and just friggin’ do it – then you will most assuredly arrive at Point B, and in a timely manner to boot.  No question marks involved.

The best part about the “I’m through fucking around” mindset is that it takes a huge load off your brain.  There were some sweet comments mentioning my hard work and dedication but in truth, it feels the opposite, there isn’t anything worky about it.  I’m just jotting down a few numbers on a pad of paper.  This is so much easier than constantly trying and failing, guessing and missing, then ripping myself a new one for having screwed up again…now that is work!

The cool thing is that this simple idea works for anything you want to change in your life.  It’s worth remembering that you are your own boss and with it, you wield real power.

Edit: In eerily well-timed events, this video is going around Facebook today.  Talk about supporting the message of “just friggin’ do it!”.  Great stuff. (thanks for linking it, Priyanka!)

Double edit: I went to the guy’s website and thought this was hilarious.

Which Direction Are You Headed?
When you improve yourself, there are two ways you can go about it:

1. Focus on what you’re going to get out of it: faster times, a better body, a feeling of accomplishment, etc.  This view has you heading towards something.  That’s fun! Like winning a pot of gold for your trouble.

2. Focus on the negative: I’m fat, I’m slow, I hate that I blah blah… This view is more of a fear based one and the method I was using unconsciously and unsuccessfully for the past year.  With this “running away from” mindset, you’re at a disadvantage from the get-go because you’re already in self-defeatist mode.

I’m not saying #2 doesn’t have a place at all, this is usually what gets my ass moving to change in the first place, I get so sick of the thing I don’t like about myself that it’s just easier to stop doing that one thing (quitting cigarettes and drugs comes to mind).  But #1 is what keeps me interested, focused and turns it into a fun game.

Besides, negative shtick gets old.  It’s boring to live it but even way more boring for your friends and family to have to listen to.  Seek out the light, it’ll make everyone happier.

OK, enough ching-ching, didn’t mean to get all self-helpy on you.

Race Weekend
Girlfriends and running: a winning combo.  Can’t wait to finally meet Rebecca, remeet Reyana, hookup with old buddies Kat, Doggie and Loren.  Sweet times ahead.  I’ll hopefully get some photos up before race day so this isn’t the last you’ll hear from me.

Mentally, I’m feeling peaceful, uncluttered and not too concerned with the outcome.  It’s a fast race, typically multiple sub 1:30s from my age group which takes the pressure off completely.  My goal is still high 1:33, no crazy surprise antics in store.  Just try to run a solid race, drink enough water and if I’m really lucky, get a non-sucky race photo out of the deal.  It could happen.

I’m in good spirits because I’ve been keeping busy.  After I got Gifted Runner redone, I redid another one of my t-shirt sites (x-rated shirts and no, I won’t provide a link (h) ).  After all this re-making of old crap, and to wipe the nasty off, I was inspired to do a brand new t-shirt site based on sweet, innocent kiddy designs.   I’m still working on adding stuff, but here it is, AdorableShirts.com.  Forgive the stupid name, that’s me whoring for Google’s attention.

I also sold my first ad space on Websitebeginner.com last week which was a giggle-worthy event.  Sometimes I get emails from people inquiring about advertising and because I really don’t know how to deal with pricing for it, I just toss the emails away.  This time, because I need the moolah, I replied and the guy was very easy to deal with, so it worked out great.

While we’re on the subject of cash, yesterday morning I had a voiceover for a funny commercial, one where I start speaking at a normal rate, then speed up till I’m talking super fast – was great fun.  But it’s been slow for VO work the past month.  I’m up for another funny one, though, where I play a Language Instructor teaching Swedish – I had to learn the pronunciation off an mp3 for the audition.  I got a call yesterday that it’s between me and one other person, so crossing fingers I’ve got it.

I’m still planning on racing that 5K this Sunday, though it’ll be a hot one and I’ve not done anything fast since the last race, so no PRs for sure.  I might even ensure a particularly sucky time by getting drunk the night before since my friend’s having a party.   But then I’ll have to leave my magic shoes at home because that would be embarrassing to suck in magic shoes.  Then again, the race is “Run For Cover” to fight melanoma and I don’t wear sunscreen half the time, so I’m a total poser anyway.

What?  You never heard of it?   Can’t remember what Menarch even is?  Let me jog your memory…Menarch is the day a girl begins her period.  For someone like me, who didn’t even get a Sweet Sixteen party, I now feel doubly gypped.  Luckily, I can relive that special day by visiting Menarch Parties R Us. They offer all the accouterments you need for such a wondrous event, including everybody’s favorite party game, Pin The Ovaries On The Uterus.  Sounds painful but I guess that’s part of the fun.

Back to the cake, it’s quite lovely as far as cakes go, but I do think the white blobs in the corners would be more complete with a string coming out of each blob.  And poor Levonna, forever memorialized as the girl who got her period and had a mom who thought it was worth celebrating over.  But enough holiday talk.

As far as this party-deprived runner goes, I’ve been enjoying easy runs these last couple days.  Yesterday was the closest I’ve come to a recovery run in weeks, a 12-miler at 8:53.  It was 82 degrees at the end, but my goal was to keep the HR low throughout – mission accomplished with a 65% average.  Today was a 9-miler at 8:16/mi, 71% HRR.

Tomorrow I’ll be doing 7, then 4w/strides on Sat, then race.  I like these little mini-tapers on race weeks, it’s a nice change and creates a cutback week, which I wouldn’t pay attention to otherwise.

I went a little race-crazy yesterday and committed to 3 races in June.  I’d had them on the calendar anyway, but thought I’d wait closer to the actual race days to evaluate weather conditions before signing up.   Changed my mind and paid for all three when I realized that even if the weather’s hot as hell, at least everyone will suck evenly, plus it’s good practice racing in adverse conditions.  But the best part is that it’ll be a vacation from speedwork, while giving me the benefit of Super-Speedwork, since you never run as fast as when you’re racing.  It’s win-win.

And with that, I’ll wish you all a wonderful holiday weekend, whether it be Memorial or Menstrual.  Either way, have a beer on me.

I had a lovely day off yesterday, went to Marshall’s and scored a pair of Brooks Epiphany shorts for $7.99! Took them out on my last pre-race run today (4 w/4 strides) and decided they are my favorite shorts, ever. Just ordered another pair at Runningwarehouse (because that’s what a girl does when she’s waiting for a big race…spends money).

The clock is ticking down and I’m excited as all get-out. The weather looks great except for a growing chance of rain (which might easily change). Temps and wind are absolutely perfect: 48 degrees at the start, 50 when I finish and no wind to speak of. I can deal with the rain just as long as my feet don’t get soaked beforehand. I’ll be taking some extra shoes and socks, just in case, to stand around in before checking my bag.

I’m rooming with one of my BQ Women buddies, Kat, so that’s going to be a blast. We’re staying at the hotel where all the action is (Expo and Pasta dinner) so once we park our cars, we’re done for the weekend. I love this, as it’s the traveling logistics that freak me out more than anything.

It’s also a huge racing weekend for many of my online running pals so I want to give a shout out to all my Women’s BQ thread marathon gals, BQs for everybody! And a special one to my Steamtown marathon buddy, sometimes running partner and constant email exchanger, Doggie Girl. The BQ is yours, my dear – it is written. Also, for all the BQ Babe Halfers and Julie, good luck!

On an utterly tragic note, a RW forumite who was set to run the Pittsburgh marathon this weekend, a 22-year old girl whose smiling avatar would break your heart, got hit by a truck a few days ago while out running and was killed. I’ll be thinking of her this Sunday, as I have every day since hearing this horrible news.

And that’s about it. Thanks again everyone for following my running adventures, you truly are a great support team and you can bet I’ll be thinking of you as I cross those mats.