Tag: Running

Vacation Week 2 Recap

Started off with a bang and ended with a whimper. Whereas week 1 was crazy mileage for a Slacker like me, week 2 was more like my usual. Maybe I can say I embraced the relaxation vibe of vacation? Even though I didn’t go anywhere?

Monday- Rest My ankle/calf was twinging from all the miles last week so I chose to rest. This also worked out as I ended up spending way too much time in AT&T stores this past week. My parents, brother and I share a family plan and have for years. One it’s more cost effective and two, I refuse to lose my unlimited data. It was time for my mom’s phone upgrade and since she needs me as the plan holder to make changes it worked out that I was on vacation. She picked out a shiny new HTC A9 or something another. She’s anti iPhone despite owning one the last 2 years. Her new phone was pretty until we realized over the weekend it wouldn’t send text messages. Well, that’s a problem. So, after hours of internet research and on the phone with tech support on Monda, the verdict was to give the phone back. Seriously, that’s what tech support said. 😒 So days later, after shipping fiascoes, rigged up iPhone 4’s, she is now the owner of shiny new, working, iPhone 6s.

Tuesday-4 miles More late afternoon running for the win. Well kind of. I headed out closer to dusk than planned but figured I would see how many miles I could get in before it got too dark. Parts of my run were great and other parts not so much. Once again my pace was better than I had expected and I didn’t need any walking breaks. However I stopped 3 times to stretch. My calf/ ankle thing is not happy at all and I kept stopping to stretch it out along the ways. Trees and curbs were all fair game. Grrr. The run turned out to be a nice little progression but my leg is not happy.

Wednesday– Rest With my ankle area being weird, I decided to try an every other day running schedule this week. Which works out as both my parents had birthdays this week. My mom’s was today. The brother and I took the parents to dinner that night. I may have eaten a few too many bread sticks at Olive Garden. 😉

Thursday 3.75 miles– holy ouch, batman. That rest day didn’t help the tightness is my ankle/ calf area. Once again I was using trees and curbs to stretch it out along the way. It started raining on me on the way back but I was too cranky to enjoy it. I shortened my run which made me cranky. I was hoping to hit 6 but there was no way. 😐

The weather man lied- it rained!! Oh and I saw this lovely sign. 🙂

Friday- Rest Pop’s birthday!

Saturday- Rest Unplanned, I was hoping for a run but I felt crappy. I had tossed and turned all night and felt exhausted. I also felt a little nauseous. I meant to take a 30 minute nap after lunch but ended up napping for 2.5 hours. Oops.

Sunday- Rest Sensing a pattern here? Part of me wanted to run and part of me wanted to be lazy on this last day of vacation. I still wasn’t feeling so hot so I wasted the day away watching cheesy tv Christmas movies. #sorrynotsorry

Somehow vacation has come to an end. Normally by now I am itching to get back to work. However I don’t feel ready to go back. I feel like there was so much more that I needed to do (like clean my car) but time just seemed to move quickly these past 2 weeks. Make it slow down! How is Christmas so close? And I seriously have no gift ideas. Normally by this time I am done shopping! I have wrapping paper but nothing to wrap!

So it’s back to work tomorrow. Back to treadmill running, boo. Back to better eating habits, hopefully. 😃

How was your weekend?

How is your Christmas shopping coming?

Any good calf stretches? I need help.

Wednesday Wandering- The Pinnacles

The day before Thanksgiving, my dad and I headed out to the Pinnacles. The Pinnacles is a state park located in Monterey County, about 90 minutes from home. The weather was supposed to be in the high 40’s low 50’s and that is cold to this California girl so I dressed in a few layers which included 2 pairs of socks. Once we arrived, we parked on got our gear ready. I had my Nathan vest with 20oz of water and 2 Extend bars. I didn’t think I would need the bars for what was likely going to be a 3 hour hike. Insert theme song to Gilligan’s Island.

My pops has had some pretty gnarly injuries over the years so he kept telling me to go ahead. The trail was pretty straight forward and well marked. I would go ahead until I couldn’t see or hear him anymore then stop and wait until I could. It gave me time to take plenty of photos. The scenery was amazing. That combined with the chill in the air made me feel like I wasn’t in California anymore.

I thought this copper-y bark was kind of cool

Hey Pops!

The first 2.5 miles gained about 1500 ft in elevation but 98% of that was very user- friendly. All trail, nothing technical. Just great views. The wind was picking up and my ears were getting cold. I can’t stand when my ears or toes get cold. I stopped to pull my headband out of my pack to put it around my ears and waited for pops to catch up. I made a snarky comment about how silly it looked with my hair sticking out and he commented that it’s not like anyone was looking. HA! I hit the first summit around 1.5 miles up and who was there? A crew of firefighters. Working out. Seriously?!

After that fun run in, I just kept going up until I thought I was at the top. I was wrong. My parents had done this trail in the past and I remembered my mom mentioning a set of freaky stairs but I hadn’t seen anything so I figured we took a different path. Nope. There was more to come, I had just missed it. I was looking for actually stairs. Not holes in rocks.

So yeah, I was a little nervous. At least this section had a railing. The last section to the top was a lot of hand over foot. But the view was worth it.

After a little rest on the top, we headed back down the other side. This series of “stairs” was even hinkier and interesting going down. Once past that though, we hit a nice path and going down was fairly easy. I was still super cold, my toes and ears were felt frozen. We went down like we went up, I would go ahead until I couldn’t hear my dad then wait til he was in sight again. As we were nearing the bottom of this particular trail, I admit I was tiring. While the path was walker/hiker/runner friendly, the elevation gain then loss was tiring plus I was freakin’ cold. Pops was fading too. We were just past 5 miles when we hit the trail head. And wanted to cry. We were 3.5 miles from the parking lot. 😢😢😓

We could do this, we could. This path was along the river bed and pretty in a different way. We were paying close attention to the trail as well because there was a trail head and accidentally taking it would add another 7 miles to the route. Umm, no thank you.

However we had one last decision to make. The trail split in 2 one last time. You could choose the Balcony path for 1.7 miles to the parking lot or the Cave trail for 1.3 miles to the lot. The park guide said you needed a flashlight for the cave but that was it. We figured it was more a tunnel and took that route. I was tired and my dad’s feet were hurting pretty badly so half a mile less sounded great.

Coming up on the cave, I started to doubt our shortcut. We were climbing rocks and boulders just to get into the cave. I was getting nervous. Things opened up and flattened out once in the cave. And turned pitch black. I busted out the flash on my iPhone in time to arrive a wall of stone. Ummm, where were we supposed to go? I kept moving the light around the cave wall and I found a tiny little reflective arrow pointing up. Moving closer, there was a hole in the ceiling. Seriously? And it was raining water so the rocks were slippery. We made it through that only to find more rocks to climb up and out. So that half mile less must have been in elevation and the shortcut was that we were climbing it instead. Once out of the main cave, there was a narrow corridor to traverse. Which was fine as long you were cool with boulders being wedged above your head. Granted they’ve been there for hundred and hundreds of years but this is California and the ground does like to move from time to time. 😄

The flash does pretty well actually.

Almost out!

From there it was a much easier hike back to the lot. My Garmin clocked in at 9 miles and I know I lost signal a couple of times. I was completely out of water and hadn’t actually eaten anything for the 5 hours we were out there. My feet were freezing and my dad was hurting too. As we were climbing out of the cave, I glanced at my watch and even though there was no signal it showed a lap pace of 58:something. Haha! I didn’t even think it was possible to do a mile that slow!

I wish I had better pictures of the cave but it was so dark. Kind cool after the fact but it was way harder than I thought it was going to be. 😄 Overall it was a great day just a few hours and miles longer than planned.

Ever gotten turned around on a hike?

How about climbing out of bat cave?

Vacation Week 1 Recap & Night November

Winter has arrived. The last few nights have been in the 20’s-yippie. 😓 I will adjust but haven’t just yet. My toes feel like Popsicles. Between a long, cold hike and the frozen Turkey Trot last week they still feel frozen. But besides that, I put more miles on my legs last week than I had in any training week in a long time. Yay for vacation!

Monday– 4.5 miles- progression. I chatted about that in this post but this was a good run. It wasn’t the speediest but it felt comfortable. I hadn’t felt that in a while while running. 😃

Tuesday– Rest. With 8 miles on Sunday and then Monday’s run I decided to implement a 2 days on/ 1 day off schedule for vacation. I figured my inherent laziness would kick in at some point but I also didn’t want to push too hard too fast.

Wednesday– 9+ mile hike/ trail run. More on that will be in Wednesday’s post. I’ll just say this- I had to climb up—out of a bat cave. With my iPhone flash to light the way.

Thursday– Turkey Trot! Also mentioned in my last post- so cold!! And all the miles caught up with me.

Friday– Rest. I really wanted to be outside hiking for REI’s #optoutside but my right leg was so sore and tight from #allthemiles in a short time, (for me) I could barely walk. I spent the day taking it easy and alternately cursing/ crying with my foam roller. 😒 Zero shopping was done on this #blackfriday.

Saturday– More rest. My right leg was still super tight and sore. It would actually buckle every now and then when my quad locked up. Fun. I spent the day wandering around SLO and made nice with my foam roller again.

Sunday-3.8 miles. Night 3 of sub 30* temps, there was no way I was running in the morning. I’d like to say I’ll get used to it but yeah, probably not. Winter is the time of year that running in the mid afternoon rocks. 😄 I was pressed for time as I was going to an afternoon movie but I wanted to see how my legs felt. The right one felt great, nothing at all like the past few days. The left on the other hand was back to it’s old tricks. I had to stop a few miles in to stretch out a super tight calf. Grrr. It loosened up for the last mile or so but I need to figure out why that calf tends to get super tight. Other then the tight calf issue, it was another good run. All of this week’s runs had zero walk breaks. I can’t remember the last time that happened. 😃

Weekly mileage- 23.42

Who am I? 😄 Throw in last Sunday’s 8 and my 8 day total hit 31.42. How many rules of running did I break there? 😃 To put that in perspective let’s talk about how November as a whole went.

Miles- 59.9
Races– Big Sur Half Marathon 2:23:26
Turkey Trot 10k- 1:04:49

So yeah, half of this month’s mileage happened last week. Oops. Seriously why can’t I run at 3 all the time? I know my treadmill motivation is seriously lacking. I run so awkwardly slow on it, it also makes my legs overly sore. New goal for December- conquer the treadmill. Either that or invest in a headlamp and brave the cold, dark mornings. Hmmm, decisions, decisions.

How was your November? Are you ready for December?

Anyone brave the shopping this weekend? Score any good deals?

A Tale of 2 Runs

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving! I had planned on finishing this post for Wednesday night but I was exhausted after a planned hike that grew…by a lot. More on those adventures next time. 😄

I guess Monday was my first real, official day of vacation. I slept in. It was lovely. I was feeling a little sore (my feet) after Sunday’s hike/ trail run but I was looking forward to a run. Running outside on a weekday during daylight savings? Yes please! I wasn’t sure how far I’d get with my feet feeling bruised but they felt pretty good once I started running.

I headed for the river path in the mid afternoon. Seriously, I would love it if I could run at that time all fall and winter. How can I make that happen? Anyhow, my goal was to take this run super easy and shoot for 3-4 miles. I really missed this route, it’s like the perfect excuse for a progression run. I kind of zoned out a bit and just kept running. 4.5 miles later I was back at my car. I might have added more but 4.5 was literally 2 feet from my car. 😉 Even better was that I hadn’t needed any walk breaks. Last week, I struggled with a 12:00 pace on the treadmill and Monday I ran a 12:53, 10:38, 10:05, 9:29 for the full mile splits. Why is the treadmill so hard for me?! No walks breaks but I did come to a complete stop when I saw this tree. Because holy crap!-

In trying to temper the urge to #runallthemiles on vacation since I’ve been a super slacker for the past month or so, I rested on Tuesday. I met an old friend for lunch instead. Wednesday’s workout doubled in planned size and left me feeling a little achy. I was a little nervous for the Turkey Trot. But I was running with C and her husband so I was looking forward to it.

Thanksgiving dawned and it was 30º. Allrighty then. Then I tried to get up. Aaagh! My calves were so tight, they were down right painful. How was I going to run a 10K? No lies, I texted C to see if she was ready, hoping she would say it was too cold. No dice. I had ProCompression full socks under my leggings and I left my house in my pea coat and Uggs. I registered for the race in them as well. I didn’t change shoes until about 5 minutes to the start. 😝

Me and C. I really dislike this shirt but it’s the warmest running gear I own. 😦

This trot is super low key. You register on race morning, get your t-shirt and run your race. The course is an out and back on rural roads and the start/finish is literally in the Food4 Less parking lot. C, C-Hub and I had run the race before so we knew the course. My parents usually come to the finish but when I was shivering in my car, I texted them and told them it was too cold and they should stay home. They didn’t listen. The race seemed smaller this year but that could have been due the freezing temps.

It was go time and we were off! I was super tight and cold usually triggers my asthma so I was a little skeptic about how this was going to go. Thankfully C and her husband weren’t feeling particularly speedy either so we just hung out the whole race. My toes were numb, my hands were numb and my butt felt like it was frozen. We joked about turning around at the 5K mark but kept going. It was great catching up with them, I wasn’t able to run with them as much as I had hoped this year. C-hub kept us running and even thought I wanted to walk a few times, we kept running averaging between a 10:30-10:45. I felt so sluggish and my Garmin kept telling me we were running in the 11’s. Guess it doesn’t like the cold either. I was dreaming of a large, hot coffee from McDonald’s and started pulling away towards the end. I didn’t mean to but I was letting my legs do whatever they wanted to, they were still so tight. Mile 6 clocked in at 9:42. Finish- 1:04:49. Not the speediest but much better than I had been expecting and there weren’t any asthma issues. 😎

I also wore my Turkey Trot shirt for the rest of the day. And indulged in a few too many chips and a second slice of cheesecake. It was a great Thanksgiving. I am not fond of crowds so I will be avoiding anything Black Friday related. My original plan was to go hiking but I’ve put 25 miles on these legs in the last 5 days, way more than normal, and my calves are seriously pissed. So my plan is to take it easy, maybe take the puppy for a walk. If I can move.

How was your Thanksgiving? Did you run a turkey trot?

Favorite food of the day?

Are you shopping?

Sunday Summit- East Cuesta

Saturday was my first day of this half enforced, half by choice vacation. How did I ring it in? By doing absolutely nothing. Ok, I did some errands in the morning but I spent the afternoon and evening vegging about in comfy clothes and watching a couple of movies. I also didn’t feel guilty for procrastinating my laundry. 😄 I won’t lie; it was nice. Well, until I ended the evening with the latest episode of Doctor Who and some crying. Boo.

Sunday was a different story. My mom, S and I headed out to hike the East Cuesta trail. “Hike” is kind of a misnomer, it’s all fire road. What makes it fun is that it’s 4 miles up and then 4 miles down. Nothing like a good climb to start your day right?

My plan was to power hike up then run back down.   My mother and I had hiked East Cuesta before about a year ago. It has some amazing views but it was also a trail that freaked me out at a few spots.   There were a few places that I let my overactive imagination run away on a very overcast day. 😃

Sunday was the opposite of overcast.   In fact the temp hit the high 70’s. Hey California- fall would be nice right about now!   I was interested in seeing what had changed. Not only has California been in a major drought but East Cuesta was actually the epi-center of large fire a few months back.    Part of the freeway was shut down and a nearby town was evacuated.

Overall, things looked better than I had expected. It’s interesting how much it seems that fire has a mind of it’s own. Two sections could be black and charred with a healthy, so to speak, section in between. You could see where nature is making a comeback. Which is awesome, but if we have the El Nino they are predicting the charred sections are likely to turn into slide zones.

I maintained a good pace going up and was feeling pretty good.   The forest line has changed so I couldn’t remember where I had been spooked before. 😃   Near the top, there are 2 off shoot trails and I am not sure where they lead. I headed up one for a bit but ended up turning around. I knew if my mom and S made it to the tv towers before me, they would be alarmed.    Once there, we rested a bit before heading back down.

My goal was to run down at a nice comfortable pace.   My stomach was having none of that about 10 minutes in. My fault, I had eaten a fairly large piece of pink champagne cake the night before and my stomach has not been a friend of sugar lately.   From then on it was a run-walk down. All was good until the gun shots. I froze in the middle of trail. Do I keep going or do I go back up?     I figured it was probably someone shooting at targets, I’ve heard it before on trails this was just the first time I was completely by myself and it sounded closer.    I know people like to go shooting in rural areas and it was at consistent intervals so I chose to move on.   But then I remembered the 2 game warden trucks that had passed me on the way up. What if there was a mountain lion sighting on the trail? Aaargh! That freaked me out and after a quick text to my mom, I ran down the trail.

Once at the bottom of the trail, my feet were bothering me so ditched my shoes for some flip flops before heading back up to the trail head to wait for my mom and S.   They hadn’t heard anything while on the way down but were feeling sore from the 4 mile descent.    We headed off for a well earned lunch in SLO.    I’d say we earned our pizza. 😃🍕