Category: Goals

June Recap/ Mid Year Check In

June come back!! It should not be July right now. It just can’t be. I was in the doctor’s office yesterday and it boggled my mind that my 6 month follow-up was January…2016. Umm, wait, what? Then someone made it worse by saying that Christmas is now only 5 months away. Slow down!!!

While June felt more consistent than May, the overall mileage doesn’t show much of an improvement. I guess I embraced my Slacker-ness in May and June.

Miles-

Races-

Talley Vineyard 10K- 56:54

So yeah, more miles than May but just barely. Also disappointing because I thought I had 65 miles. I am a little neurotic on the way that I track my miles with my Garmin, and Nike+ and SmashRun. Nike+ had me at 65 on June 30 and I had no reason to doubt it. Until I uploaded my miles to SmashRun last night and it had me at 59.4. What? I pull up Garmin Connect and it agreed with Smash. Everything syncs from my Garmin so I was confused and started double checking all my runs. One uploaded twice to Nike and I didn’t catch it. Grrrr.

Oh and June saw my 2 year Blog-versary!

Mid Year Check In

Already!? Ok, brief goal recap. For 2015, I wanted to –

Run 1000 miles– Hmmm, at the end of June, I was at 423 miles. Only about 80 miles short of where I needed to be. I don’t want to give up on this goal but I would have to average 97 miles a month for the rest of year to hit 1000. Honestly, I don’t know if I can do that. Would I love to- hell yes, but I need to be smart about what I can accomplish.

Break 2:00 in a half- I managed a 2:06:08 at Wine Country which was thisclose to my PR. I was optimistic for SLO but between my stomach issues and my fall, that was off the table. Which is fine because I am still damn proud of how I managed to finish that race. 🙂 Even though I am currently training to break 2 in October, I still just want to have fun with running.

Non-Running- Read 15 books- I was behind on this until yesterday. 🙂 I started a book in the waiting room of my doctor’s office and since I waited a while, I got through 100 pages. I had intended for this post to go up yesterday but when I sat down to type, I just wanted to read. So I finished that book. It was book 2 of 3 so I decided to just start the third. Then I finished that one. Yeah it was a late night. So 7 books finished so far. Man, I remember when that number would have been much bigger.

Blog Redesign– partially done. I am still working out a few kinks. And I still can’t figure out Dropbox, ugh.

So moving forward? Right now my goals are to keep running, reading and living! Oh and did I mention I am running (not racing) a half marathon in 10 days?! On my birthday. 🙂

Did you make goals for 2015/ June? How are you doing so far?

Read any good books lately? I need a new one now. 🙂

Lack of Umph

You know that saying about the difference between try and triumph is a little “umph”? Or something like that? I’ve lost my umph. Where did it go? Can you help me find it?

I’ve been feeling adrift since SLO. I thought having no training plan would feel liberating. I mean I am a Slacker after all, I was looking forward to it, thinking it would be awesome. Yet it hasn’t been. My last few posts have talked of my lack of motivation and each one said the same thing- I need to get back on track. Obviously saying it means absolutely nothing. Want to know how many miles I’ve run in May? 26. Seriously!?? Ouch.

Work has officially hit crazy, and my hours got a little longer, like open to close. Friday is the biggest change, last Friday ran around 11 hours. However that should be no excuse to be lazy. Maybe I should just try to go to sleep earlier. Ok, that one made me laugh a little. What time did this post go up? I also need to work on my time management skills outside of work but that’s for another post. Anyways, time to ~~hopefully~~ actually follow through with what I say. So to that effect, I planned out a race schedule. With a goal race. So here we go.

May– Bands on the Run 10K
June– Talley Vineyard 10K
July– Rock’n around the Pier 13.1 and a possible 4th of July 5kAugust– Trail 25K
September– Central Coast Cancer Challenge 10k, HOB Fun Run 10K/ 5K
October– City to the Sea 13.1 (GOAL)
November– Big Sur Half Marathon

A race schedule seemed to work for me before, so let’s try it again. Since I really think my training plan for SLO worked, I am going to re purpose it for City to the Sea. That is also where I set my half marathon PR and I love the course…except they changed the course this year, so we will see what happens. Now, this plan is flexible, life does happen so I may adjust things if I have to. May, June, HOB and Big Sur are the only ones set right now.

Most of this was thought out after a truly lackluster weekend of running. I ended up napping on Saturday- again. Sunday did see my longest run since SLO- a slow 10K. I ran a 10:52 pace which is great for an easy run which was the goal. What was not so great was how hard it was. I was huffing and puffing the whole way, that pace felt more like race pace than easy run. Ugh. That was not confidence inspiring, but rough runs happen and we move on. But I was out there long enough to think of all the reasons I have been lazy and what I can do about it. I am 20 weeks out from City to the Sea and I am aiming for a 16 week plan. The next 4 weeks will be testing a couple of new weekly schedules out since this newest one isn’t working out so well. 🙂 Plus I need to figure out what works best with the work schedule. Running later in the evening makes it harder to sleep and now I have to get up earlier so that probably won’t work, but I will figure it out. I also need to figure out how to stop the stress eating that has been happening for 2 weeks.

What do you do when you lose your “umph”?

What’s your race schedule look like?

What do you do when you’re stressed?

2015 Goals- Time to Polish

Happy New Year everyone!

I hope everyone had a safe and happy New Year’s. Mine was uneventful- just how I like them. Actually, I ended up being sucked in to watching The 100 on Netflix which is why this post is going up one day past schedule-oops! So without further ado, let’s talk about those hoops I want to jump through, err, I mean goals for 2015.2015 Goals

Health-

So I received a notice from my doc that says “congrats, you are negative for cancer but we have no conclusion as to what is wrong with you”. It seriously said that. So, ummm, yay? So it’s back to the drawing board. That means it’s time to play with my diet some more. I am not going paleo (I like dairy) although I am buying the book, nor gluten free but I have been trying to cut my grain intake by about 85%. When I follow through, I feel a little better, holidays made following through hard. And yes, this means I need to limit my pizza intake to once a week at most. I started this in December so I am going to give it a few more months while I see if it helps. I’ve known I should restrict my carbs so I need to work on that again. On the upshot, I ran better when I did this, so fingers crossed!

Fitness- who am I kidding- Running-

Find Easy– Well, that sounds odd as a starter. I pushed a lot in the beginning of 2014 and I ended up sore, tired and sick. I’m not saying that they are necessarily linked but I want to run as long as I can not a short period of time. That means finding an easy pace that I can sustain for long periods of time. I want to enjoy my long runs and look forward to them, not dread them. Right now I aiming for around 11:15 and averaging 10:50. Would I love my easy runs to one day be 9:00- hell yes- but I want to work towards that the smart way.
Cross-training– Yeah, I know I should and I admit I ran better when I also rode the stationary bike twice a week. But it’s just so boring! Admittedly, I am setting the bar low here- I want to cross train at least 3x a month. Yes, I said month not week. If I can pull this off for 6 months, I will reassess in July.
Races– Quality over quantity. No 15 in ’15 for this Slacker. I hit 14 in ’14 and that was cool but there were some I probably should have DNS’d. That said, I am confirmed for 3 half marathon distance races in the first 4 months of the year and am debating another and a 5k. Bold is confirmed, italicized maybe. Wine Country and Firehouse have sentimental value but I won’t commit to those until the last minute. The rest of the year is up in the air.
1. Spooner’s Cove 25K
2. Surf City 13.1
3. Wine Country 13.1
4. Firehouse 5K
5. SLO Marathon
Break 2:00 in a half– The goal of the first 2 months of the year is finding easy, after that I would love to find speed. I set this as a goal for 2014 but spent the year going the opposite direction. Yes, I valid reasons but it just makes this goal all the more enticing. Now, I know I am horrible with following training plans and prefer to do my own thing but I realize I may need guidance to pull this off. An I would really, really like to go sub-2 at SLO. To that effect, this Slacker may have committed to an 8 week training plan that would start after Surf City and a week of rest. But more on that later, I don’t even know much right now.
1000 miles in 2015– Oh, man, typing that was scary. I am trying to tell myself that 1000 isn’t that far from 832. And I went from 558 in 2013 to 832 in 2014, so it’s doable…Right???????
10 down, 990 to go

Life and other stuff-

Read more– or get back to it. I used to read 4-5 books a month and I think I barely hit 12 this past year. Work was crazy and I didn’t get a lot of lunches but that should be better in 2015- fingers crossed. That put a serious dent in my reading. I would also like to get back to reading before bed which mean I need to turn off the computer and that is hard. 🙂

Socialize more- I admit I am a homebody. See above for my NYE plans. 🙂 I need to try to get out a tiny bit more often. A couple of my coworkers and I are talking about running together after work, so that’s something! I would also like to spend more time with ML, A, C and NikeC and R, I am hoping we can make something work.

The blog– I would like to redesign the blog. Which I have started on but am not where I want to be. Sorry if you saw it in it’s various states in the last few days but there’s likely to be a few more in the pipeline. Bear with me while I try to be tech savvy and will likely fail! But on the upshot, most times the mobile version looks good and it’s just the computer version that looks off.

Hope everyone had a great New Year’s! Here’s to 2015!!

Am I crazy?

What’s your main goal for 2015?

2014 Review- The Shiny and The Dull

I have been dragging my heels on this post because the pessimist in me really wants to call 2014 the year of stall. Then I wrote a great version of this in my head one night trying to fall asleep. Unfortunately I remembered nothing in the morning.

The Shiny-

So once I momentarily got over my cynical nature I was able to reminisce on all the good things I accomplished this year. But how did I do on those goals I set for this year?

Run 14 races in 2014- CHECK!
Run 750 miles- CHECK!

I completed race number 14 in November and also cleared 750 miles at some point in November. 🙂 One of my races was a virtual race and I am on the fence about how much those count. I received a shirt for it though, so I am counting it! I had the chance to be an ambassador for the SLO Marathon and it was awesome. I loved that race, I didn’t do as well as I would have liked but it was a great experience.

This year I ran 7 5k’s, 3 10k’s and 4 half marathons. I ran road races, a trail race or 2 and 2 races on the beach. I age grouped placed in 3 of those 14 races. And a benefit of running small, local races- I was first female finisher at my 5k in July. I set a PR, finished strong even with my stomach and did it all while hearing Miley Cyrus sing Wrecking Ball for 27 minutes. Stupid iPhone.

5K PR- 27:48 –Wild Run 5k
10K PR- 55:40– Heart & Soles

Best Bling- It’s a toss-up, I love the SLO medal because I had been wanting to run the race for the previous 2 years. Plus running it as an ambassador was pretty sweet! As for the abalone medal- that thing is huge! The race was rough, ocean = humidity, but it was on my birthday and I got to run it with a friend. Strongest race-

Wine Country 13.1– Before I got sick, only slight asthma issues, finished at 2:07:08 for a 7 minute course record for me.

The Dull-

Goals-
Break 27 in 5K- FAIL
Break 2 hours- 13.1- FAIL

No lies, 95% of my races this year were rough in some form or another. After years of nothing my asthma reared its ugly head and it took more than a few races for me to figure out that cold and humidity were big triggers for me. My 10K PR was set under duress of an odd but severe bout of pain in my right Achilles. I went into 2 half marathons on heavy-duty antibiotics. My stomach, which had been fairly level for the last year or so, went psycho in June and has yet to level out. While I was able to maintain my mileage somewhat, I came to the conclusion that a faster pace was not in the cards. It ~~made me cranky,~~ it pissed me off and I wondered what the point was most of the time.

I went into Ventura, cranky, ill and medicated, knowing I should have deferred. When it turned from running to walking 6 miles in, I had 7 miles to think and get my head on straight. The rest of the year was spent backing off a bit and slowing down. Getting back to basics and loving running again. I’m not loving the time change but I am loving running. 🙂

Roughest Race (s)-

HOB Fun Run– the 10K & 5K where people thought I was going to pass out. Yeah, possibly not my best moments.

So why Shiny vs Dull? Shiny is fairly obvious, and a Firefly shout out, but dull? Dull things can be cleaned, buffed, fixed- given a little TLC, a something dull can be made shiny. And that is part of my focus for 2015 but more on that later.

Thanks for joining me in my drama- issues- silliness- laziness- of 2014, I hope you stick around and see what happens in 2015. 🙂

What was your shiny/ dull for 2014?

June Recap- Mid year Check In

In some ways June was awesome, in others not so much. I started my #noexcusessummer plan on June 1^st and stayed mostly committed. I think I only took 5 rest days the whole month. 2 just happened to fall in the last week. 😦 I tried to not let the heat or my lack of sleep or even my stupid stomach get to me. I prevailed for the most part but this weekend kicked my butt. I had a full weekend planned, work, 2 runs, a friend’s anniversary party, shopping, the movies plus the usual errands. Saturday turned out to be a wash. I got through work, completed my errands but soon realized that a run wasn’t likely. I did the yoga dvd instead and it was not good. It was all downhill from there and I did not make it to the party- horrible friend alert. Shopping never happened either but I did make it to the movies (Transformers was awesome!) and was able to get in a sluggish 6 miles on Sunday at the gym. I was feeling a little rough so I would run .9 miles at 6 and walk .1 at 4. It worked pretty well for my stomach.

Monday, however was another story. After missing the planned 5 miles on Saturday, I wanted to follow through with the 5 I had planned for after work. It figures that the last day of June would be the day I felt the worst. It was all I could do to make it through work. I won’t lie I still thought about trying to run. By 3:30, I knew it wasn’t going to happen but as added deterrent I received a text from my mother telling me to get over my ego and an email from NikeC telling me to rest. I get it, I get it! So yesterday was a rest day.

What did my mother mean by my ego? I realized Friday that if I hit certain miles at each run over the weekend and Monday I would hit that impossible dream number that I never thought I’d hit in a month. But, as it was, I was 10 miles short, but still hit my highest mileage month yet-

90.5! What?! How did I do that!?

I had zero races in June but that was partially planned. I needed a break for a bit. I was feeling a little frustrated at how my last few races turned out. I planned June to be a rebuilding month. Mission partway accomplished. While I built a solid base of easy miles and some longer runs, I didn’t do any speed work. Waah waah. Hopefully July will involve some track time. Overall I feel like 84 of those 90 miles were solid miles. Even 2 weeks later, I still say that first 6 a few Fridays ago were just miserable. They were hot and ugly. Either way, I am still stoked about that number.

Month	Miles
January	77.3
February	70.0
March	74.7
April	70.4
May	64.5
June	90.5
	447.4

So at the beginning of the year I set a few goals. While I have not met any of the speed goals, my mileage is pretty solid. I set a goal of 750 miles for the year. At the halfway point, I am more than halfway there! Woo hoo!!! Now to keep it going, I think I can, I think I can, I think I can.

How was your June?

How has your year gone?

What are you looking forward to in July?