Rock N Roll Chicago Recap

HERE WE ARE - at the finish line and with medals... and smiles ;)  

This race was more of a mental surprise than a physical one.  Not gonna lie... I was pretty scared at 4:30am on Sunday morning wondering when I might need to force myself to finish.  Happily I am here to report that I thoroughly enjoyed the race and was HAPPY up through mile 8.  After that I have to give some HUGE props to one of the race sponsors - XSport Fitness.  They had teams of 6-8 people at each mile all dressed up in rocker gear and extremely energetic to cheer us on!  Coming into mile 9 I was slowing down and doing some walking and the team was so fired up that it was contagious and got me through another mile.  PURE AWESOME!  Thank you XSport!  I am proud to say I am a happier member of your gym now!  

The wheels came off my bus totally just before mile 12.  We were in the Bears tailgating parking lot and I was dreaming of sitting on a chair and having a beer instead of trying to make my legs keep moving.  Pretty much every part hurt by then.  A total and complete stranger stopped and asked me my name... then proceeded to say her name was Sue and she was going to help me breathe in strength and exhale fatique for the next 10-15 minutes.  WOW.  Truly took my mind off how bad my feet wanted to cramp... my knees felt like they had been hit by a baseball bat... and I was soaking wet as it had started to rain.  Sue - if anyone knows you - YOU ARE MY ANGEL!

So with all that drama I crossed the finish line at 2:30.  I made it out there!  Which is more than Bret Michaels :( who cancelled his appearance last minute.  LOL... And 10 minutes off what I have done in my last two.  I was thrilled that I had that finish and reminded myself once again - when the heck am I going to start take training for these things more seriously!  Rock N Roll Vegas is December 4th... I do have a chance to redeem myself....

But on to the more fun part of the recap is my amazing shopping finds at the Expo!  I show case them here in my vlog and I must say I have not taken off these new Zoot shoes in 4 days - AMAZING!!  I mean a girl has to have a reason to run 13.1 miles... I can't think of a better one that some cute new finds ;)

Ready for RockNRoll VEGAS style!

That is Bret waiting for me at the finish line this weekend in Vegas :D  He has been coaching me on how to keep my cool with pre-race jitters and then he is going to sing me Every Rose Has It's Thorn :D

Wow I blinked my eyes and November is gone.  I lost my grandfather the Monday before Thanksgiving to cancer and that made for a whirlwind week.  And it took 1 day of excess (Thanksgiving) into 4.  I am writing on a plane while kicking off a 9 day travel mess of 4 cities and a half marathon.  The PRO is I will not focus on not feeling “ready” to give my best performance in Vegas …while the CON is that I will not have any time to log some miles to get my legs to remember that they need to run 13 miles in just a short 6 days.  

I have kept up well on my cross training.  Mostly with kettle bells and a couple days with Insanity videos.  But for the most part I think out of my 12 weeks of training mapped out for the half marathon, I stuck to 5.  Hmmm lesson learned that next time I am going to start 4-6 months out so I can have a couple false starts and get back on track ;) NAH… that would be planning to fail and I DON’T do that.  I am going to plan how I am going to incorporate running for FUN into the next quarter.  I believe I am going to get more 3-5 miles enjoyment runs in vs. the I have to do INSERT PLAN HERE.  

My video talks about how I am ready to rock and roll this weekend and how I worked through my pre-race anxiety this week.  Also includes a cameo from TJ on what he did for the key points on guiding me through race prep.    

Let me know what you have been doing to kick it lately!  I love getting motivated from you all too!

Ready to RUN...

Look at me two blogs in a week and one of them on a Friday night :D  I just got home from a not so healthy "carb loading" dinner.  I am getting ready to hit the sack so I can get up at o'dark thirty to head downtown for the Hot Chocolate 15k tomorrow.  It is suppose to be 30 degrees and I am a fair weather anything.  And once again thank goodness for FITNESS FRIENDS cuz otherwise I would so want to hit the snooze at 5am.  I haven't worked out all week so I am getting excited to see what Amy shows up tomorrow.  After the run a friend and I are going to hit a brunch with the #runnerds group and have them fire me up for 4 more week of training before Rock and Roll Las Vegas. 

Amazing week of the UnMarketing Book Tour and the Naked Fitness Blog Event with Sears Fitness.  I talk about it a bit on the vlog.  I love meeting some of the social media peeps in real life.  Best things about this week in one sentence - trying things I would have never done without these events.  Hummas, hula hooping, and the EAS Sports new active game... so many new experiences.

Well I need some beauty rest because I am SOOOO not a morning person.  Wish me luck and I will vlog again this weekend and let you know how it went.  Am I Vegas Ready or Vegas Panic?  Place your bets now :D

"Official" Half Marathon Training Start ;)

No video camera that works yet but trying to convince my hubby that I need one stat!  I figured out that I probably need HD to keep up with my talking ;)  You can imagine what comments he had for that ;)  Oh but I did finally get the About Me Section done of the blog so if you don't know much about me - feel free to click on over there.

It’s been an exciting training week as I kick off the days to Rock n Roll Las Vegas so I couldn't wait to share my training plan.  

I planned out my running for the next 11 weeks so I can be ready for Vegas.  I am going to need to get my fall Under Armour shopping spree planned :)  I am especially excited about the Hot Chocolate 15k as what a BRILLIANT idea to combine running with chocolate goodies ;)  I am pushing myself to the Hal Higdon Intermediate plan as I want to increase my time.  I haven’t done intervals or speed training before so I will be learning that in the process.  This week is already a 5 mile long run so I must start the training off without missing it!  I am still doing the run/walk thing so I tried this week to run to mediation music to stay more “slow and steady” but haven’t found my zone yet.  

TRX Cross Training.  This is me on the picture up top.  I have done 2 days of TRX training.  Once I get the new camera I will set up the tripod and you can watch us in our class.  It is really fun and the trainer is giving us cardio blasts in between our strength exercises o get our heart rate up there.  Only two classes and I already feel some arms toning up AND the fat burning working!!  If you have any TRX questions - post them as a comment and I will post a blog on it and try to even tape the girl who got them to run these classes in her home.

Last component of my training is doing Hot Yoga once a week.  I am doing it at Bikram studio that is 105 degrees.  Man have I been sweating my butt of in there.  But what I enjoy the most is it really stretches out my legs from the runs and keeps me from getting really tight.  

More to come later but let me know how your training is going this week.  Did you put a goal out there?

CHEERS!