Young Party of Four

It's official! We both get to say that we are half-marathoners. 13.1 miles is no joke. There have been a few times that we have walked that equivalent throughout a day (though it is rare because that is a LOT of walking and you are hard pressed to randomly walk that amount in a day even if you are on a mission), but to purposely try to complete it in a set amount of time all at once... that is some serious stuff. The week leading up to the race was nerve racking for me. I ended up having what I think was my plantar fascitis flare up the Sunday before the race after our last 6 mile training run. It was bad. I developed it a few years back when we lived in a house with almost all tile and it comes and goes randomly depending on activities I have done or shoes I have worn. It hasn't bothered me at all though during training until a week ago. Because of course it would show up a week out from race day. Why the heck not? Let's liven up the mood a little. Freaking heel. As a...

This is it. This is officially the middle week of the 13 weeks to 13 miles training plan. It's the odd man out week. It is also the week after our rest week and the week that things really start to pick up speed. We have mostly done overall low mileage weeks up until this point topping out at 13 miles which is overall less than the half marathon... by a measly .1 mile but that mileage was all divvied up over 3 runs so it's definitely not the same. Now we start ramping up and we don't slow down until the week before the race when we essentially taper. This week is an overall 15 miles and by the end, we will top out at 22 weekly miles. Eek. We can do it! I know we can. I hope. Haha! Tuesday Plan: 4 Miles, Actual: 4 Miles Whew! Another run in the books. This one was probably one of the worst ones so far. Not because I didn't run okay. I was actually fine for most of the run. I kept my 1:1 intervals and paced about 13:30 without too many outliers as far as timing goes. ...

New decision made. I'm only blogging actual run days from here on out. Those added days are just taking up my time and since this is mostly to look back at myself and see how I did (and no one else is likely to ever read them), I'm not writing about those anymore. This is officially our "off week." We literally have two 3 mile runs... and that is it. Not complaining. I need an off week. I'm glad that Track Shack threw this one in there. Tuesday Plan: 3 Miles, Actual: 3.12 Miles Technically, I probably should have run 3.4 miles in order to make up for the .4 that I missed last week... but I didn't. So, that's that. It was actually a great run though. I ended up finishing with a 12:35 pace which ended up being my fastest pace using the 1:1 intervals so far. It just felt like a good run too. I find these shorter runs are definitely becoming easier. I would have liked a slightly cooler morning though. Fall can come at any time. I have taken to just doing a...

Week 4 is here!! After this week we are around 1/3 of the way through the training plan and less than 10 weeks out from race day. I'm getting more and more excited and yet more and more nervous all at the same time. I know I can finish 13.1 miles. I'm just worried about doing it in the time allotted. I should be fine though. I could mostly walk and run a couple minutes each mile while staying under the time allotted. But... on to week 4. Here we go! Monday Plan: Cross Train, Actual: Life Does that count? To just say that I did life that day? Probably not but I'm busy all the time so I'm counting it. Again, another day of 10,000 steps without training. And that even included not doing a ton during baseball practice AND going to worship rehearsal where I pretty much stood in one spot for more than an hour. Honestly, other than those two things and making sure Will stayed out of trouble, I can't even remember what I did that day. Tuesday Plan: 3.5 Miles, Actual:...

Let's go! Week 3 is here. 3 mile runs are certainly getting easier each time I do them. We shall see what happens as we start adding more and more mileage as time goes on. This week remained fairly easy. Monday Plan: Cross Training, Actual: Rest I mentioned in my last day's recap that I was having weird pain around my c-section incision. Well, it was still sticking around on Monday so I didn't do anything extra. I hit my 10,000 step goal just doing my everyday normal thing so that was a bonus. I did walk around the cul-de-sac once just to get a few extra steps but I didn't rush and didn't track it or anything. Tuesday Plan: 3 Miles, Actual: 3 Miles Up and at em early again. This getting up at 5:30am thing is definitely getting a bit easier. I still find that I am awake about 20-30 minutes before I have to be with a bit of anxiety about getting up on time that makes it to where not only am I on time, but I'm early getting up because I can't sleep worr...

It's week two of half marathon training! Yay! So far, the training plan has remained fairly easy. I know those long runs are coming and I'm not looking that forward to them. Though I'm not worried about it either. Here's how this week went... Monday Plan: Cross Training, Actual: 1.3 mile walk with Will (2.8mph) Today the plan called for cross training. I don't have a lot of extra time to do something significant but at least walking lets me get out, get moving and is easier on my body than running. So, I'm calling my walk today my cross training. I decided this morning that if I didn't do something, I was not going to get anywhere near my step goal. So, after running a few errands, Will and I decided to go for a short walk. I tried to convince him to sit in the stroller so I could go faster, but he really wanted to walk. So I told him that if he thought he could do it without complaining, he could walk. He did great! We didn't move nearly as fast as ...

It's been a while since I have done a "series" type post(s). When I first started running, I documented my progress via this blog using the C25K method. Well, after running for four or so years, I have finally worked up the courage to give a half marathon a go. A freaking half marathon. That's 13.1 miles. Steven and I officially registered for the OUC Orlando Half Marathon about a month ago after talking about how this was a goal both of us had. At this point, my main goal? Finish. Finish and be able to say I completed a half marathon. Bonus if I finish in under 3 hours. That seems like a ridiculous amount of time to run... and it probably is. I'm going into this though with minimal time consideration other than less than 15 minutes per mile (which is the recommended slowest pace on the half course so they can reopen roads). A 15 minute mile would let me finish a half in 3 hours, 16 minutes. And hey... if it takes me that long? So be it. But I plan to be done. I w...

Well, last Saturday we did it again. Almost a full year after our last 10K, we took on our second one. And this one we did with far less training. Last year we were both doing so well in our training, but this year... not as much. I think both of us topped out at 3.5 to 4 miles over the last month or so leading up to this race. That was for a few reasons. One was timing. It felt like with Steven's work schedule and him traveling so much combined with all we had going on as a family and some things I had going on over the last month that we just couldn't find time to run more than that. It's hard to train for longer distances when there are two of you and you have small children that can't stay home alone and are too big (and way too heavy) to push in a double (not even a jogging) stroller for any exceptionally long distances. Also, we have both been dealing with some aches and pains over the last month or so. They aren't enough to sideline us entirely, but they d...

Last weekend Kenzie ran in her first "real" race. She has run a few Kids' Races through Track Shack when we have run races in the past, but this was her first race that she was actually registered for as a participant. It was also far longer than her prior races and required some training rather than just showing up and taking a leisurely run. This race is done by Track Shack, as well. They remain our favorite company that puts on races. They are so well run and we would run a Track Shack race before any others. This race was called the Smile Mile and was open to kids from 5-11 years old. Kenzie was right at the bottom of this age bracket which meant that she ran the half mile race. She was set to run with other 5-year-old girls and was really excited about it. A few months ago we brought up this race as something she may want to do. She wavered a bit at first regarding whether or not she would like to do it. We decided that we would start training with her for the...

We returned this year to the Run 4 Love that is part of the Track Shack Running Series. And this year, we brought along the family. Nana came into town on Friday night so she could be there to watch the kids. This time though, we decided that all three of them would come with us and then the kids could run the kids' race after the 4 mile. We got everyone up at the crack of dawn (technically before) and were quickly on our way to Winter Park. Actually, with us moving around, both kids woke up on their own which helps because sometimes Will is a bear if you wake him up instead of letting him do it alone. Kenzie was up early enough to get dressed which helped. Otherwise we would have needed to change both kids when we got there so this was good. The drive there was quick and easy but we noticed immediately how foggy it was. That fog actually hung around for the majority of the run. It was pretty serious that morning.  When we got to the start of the race, we got Will dressed a...