ENDURrun 2019: Stages 1 & 2

As you know from my previous post, I've been coming off of injury and was going into this week with no real goals or expectations. That being said, I wasn't planning on dilly-dallying. It is still a race, after all.

Stage 1: Half Marathon

Yesterday (Sunday) was the start of the event, a half marathon in Conestogo. The course is two loops, a ~13km loop, followed by a ~8km loop. I had the privilege of wearing my gold jersey from 2017 as a member of the "Golden Club" and started with a few others who were also wearing theirs.





The race was relatively uneventful (which was a good thing, seeing as I didn't know how the foot would feel). It didn't bother me at all, so I was happy with that, but I was a little slower than I would have liked to be. I was pretty much bang on what I thought I would reasonably run, given the spring and summer I had, but of course, there was always the glimmer of hope that I might pull off a minute or so faster. All was well, though. I finished the day in 4th female, 23 seconds behind 3rd. My finish time was 1:35:38.

Stage 1 Results

Stage 2: 15K Time Trial

This morning, we had a staggered start, each runner starting one minute apart, in reverse order of yesterday's finish order. Last place starts first, first place starts last.

I didn't have a great run today. It didn't feel "bad" per se, but my legs just didn't want to go. I didn't feel tired or sore, just didn't have anything to give today. The first tiny bit, I was running what I thought I might be able to maintain for the whole race, but the course wasn't exactly what I pictured (I thought it was a little flatter), so that changed pretty quick after the first few km, which included two short road sections.



My 5K splits today were (according to me hitting lap on my watch at the course markers):  22:24, 23:35, 23:17. Finish time of 1:09:16, 5th female today, no change in placing in cumulative, but 1-3 are further ahead and Rebecca is now actually tied with me to the second.

Cumulative results

ENDURrun 2018, Stage 1: Half Marathon

It's 6:05am: I'm drinking coffee and eating some apple & cinnamon bread type thing with a bit of peanut butter. The race starts in one hour and fifty five minutes. Am I ready? Who knows. As ready as I'll ever be, I guess. Time is up.

***

Well... the race happened. It did not go as planned. It started out fine, but that didn't last. And it didn't last for a very frustrating reason. The second loop (the course is a ~13K loop followed by an ~8K loop), my back started bothering me. I had slept on the GO train on Friday morning and when I woke up and moved, I had pain in my back, something that has never really happened to me before. For the most part, I wasn't really having any issues with this, but when I'd lean over, occasionally I'd feel it in the same spot. I felt this this morning when I leaned over to spit after brushing my teeth, so I knew it was still there, but didn't really expect it to bug me when running, because I was fine yesterday. Mind you, I only ran a few km yesterday. So... this back issue crept up and I did not have much fun. I slowed down somewhat... just wanting to get to the finish line where I knew I could be treated by either a massage therapist or a chiropractor who were offering their services for the week (KW Health Connection). Colin worked on me for a bit, so hopefully things will be better tomorrow.

Funny thing is, I actually had a lingering leg thing for a few months, which I thought would be the issue. I never expected a back thing! I guess it's not really funny... but yeah.

So... finish time today was 1:34:57. I am currently 4th female. 55 seconds back from 3rd.

Rob and Robyn were awarded the gold jerseys today and will have the privilege to wear them and start last in the time trial tomorrow. 

Leaderboards so far:

Men:

1 Rob Brouillette

2 Dave Harmsworth

3 Aidan Rutherford

4 Nick Burt

5 Conner Krofchick

Women:
1 Robyn Collins
2 Valery Hobson
3 Lisa Leskien
4 Vicki Zandbergen (me)
5 Rebecca Kruisselbrink

(Full results can be found here)

Tomorrow is the 15K time trial, where we start 1 minute apart. My scheduled start time is 8:48am, so I'm looking forward to sleeping slightly later tomorrow morning.

A Summary of September

It appears that I've neglected the blog, once again. I tend to get a little lazy when ENDURrun is over. I slack. I've been slacking in the blogging and also slacking in the strength work that I was doing leading up to ENDURrun, and a bit in the rest of my training as well. Not too bad... but I've been lacking a bit of motivation to work as hard as I wanted and intended. Looking back at previous years, I tend to feel about the same at this point every fall. Then I generally look back and see that it hasn't actually been nearly as bad as I thought it was. I really haven't been focusing on 50 mile training, though.... we'll see how JFK goes next month.

But for now... here's how September went.

I'm going to ignore the first three days of September.. for no reason other than it was the end of a week and I feel like starting with a Monday.

Sept 4-10 - The week of.... nothing, really. I can't think of anything of interest. It started with Labour Day, but nothing else was different than a regular week.
Monday - 6.2 mile run.
Tuesday - Wee WO: 7.1 miles, including 4x Marshall Hill.
Wednesday - 7.1 miles, combo of road and trails.
Thursday - WO: 4x 1.5 miles at half marathon pace. 15.7 miles total.
Friday - no run
Saturday - Long run with H+P: 17 miles.
Sunday - 10 miles
** Total mileage for the week: 63.2 miles. Total elevation gain: 3,097 ft. 

Sept 11-17 - Another week of nothing special.
Monday - nada
Tuesday - WO: 6 miles at half marathon pace. Total run: 8.3 miles.
Wednesday - 8 miles combo road and trails.
Thursday - Wee WO: 8 miles, including 4x 2 min hard.
Friday - 3.5 miles
Saturday - 15 miles
Sunday -  20 miles: 16 miles road, then 4 miles trail.
** Total mileage for the week: 62.9 miles. Total elevation gain: 2,844 ft. 

Sept 18-24 - The week of the Harvest Half
Monday - 7.1 miles trail
Tuesday - 0
Wednesday - 1 mile x2 commute runs in the day, then 6.3 miles in the evening.
Thursday - WO: 5x 1km @ 5K pace. Total run: 11.7 miles.
Friday - 7.6 miles
Saturday - 18.1 miles, including a half marathon at around marathon pace. This was a last minute decision to hop into a race (Harvest Half) since it was a super hot and humid day and aid stations sounded like an amazing benefit. Gillian and I ran most of it together, talking pretty much the entire time, then Gill went ahead to run the last 3K as a fast finish. I maintained my same pace for the last 3. She invited me along for her fast finish... I declined. :) We ended up finishing 1-2 for the women (small race). I ran 1:37 for the half.


Sunday - 13.3 miles, mostly trail.
** Total mileage for the week: 66.4 miles  Total elevation gain: 3,196 ft.

Sept 25-Oct 1 - The week of The Toad and the Beer Run.
Monday - WO: 8 miles including 8 min 10K pace and 10x 1 min hard.
Tuesday - 4.4 miles
Wednesday - 5 miles
Thursday - Wee WO: 7.8 miles including 6x1 min hard.
Friday - 3 miles
Saturday - Run for the Toad 50K. I ran this as a training race for the 50 miler, so I guess I'm doing *some* 50 mile training..... just not much that's 50 mile specific. The race was fun. Well, mostly. The last loop got lonely.... but the first 3 loops were great! It's a 12.5 km course, so you run that 4 times if you're doing the 50, twice if you're running the 25K. I ran it at a comfortable pace, but didn't dilly dally. I didn't race it, but I didn't saunter. I ran a solid 50K, finishing in 4:22, 10th overall, 4th woman.

Sunday - Kitchener/Waterloo Beer Run: 10ish K route with beer sampling stops. This was a super fun day with some of my H+P teammates.

** Total mileage for the week: 67.7 miles. Total elevation gain: 3.907 ft.

So there you have it: September (and the first day of October). Next up, Fall 5K Classic tomorrow... More proof of how much I'm focusing on training for a 50 miler. ;)

ENDURrun 2017 - Stage 1: Half Marathon

ENDURrun is now in full swing!

This morning, stage 1 happened: the half marathon.

My alarm went off at 6am after waking up numerous times in the night. I got out of bed, made coffee and toasted an English muffin, couldn't find the shoes that I wanted to wear (turns out they were in the trunk of my car the whole time), so I grabbed my slightly older pair of the same model of shoe. I drove to the race site and was super excited to get this event started! I said hi to people, signed in, ran a very short warm-up, did some last minute prep and got to the start line.

Ten minutes before the start, we took a "class photo" so to speak. A photo of all of the Ultimate contenders before the race begins. A second photo will be taken next Sunday, after the marathon, of all of the Ultimate finishers.

The race began at 8am, and I found myself running next to Vicky S. We soon realized that we were hoping/planning to run right around the same time today, so we stuck together. Vicky was running Stage 1 for the H+P relay team that I am also part of, so it was nice to share the stage today.

Awesome Ultimate @vickizandbergen and former yellow jersey @vicsie10 cruising thru 16K with Amazing Masters @valhobs69 not far back @health_perform #hpendur @endurrun

A post shared by Dave W Rutherford (@enduredave) on Aug 13, 2017 at 6:23am PDT

For the first 10ish K, we had company, with Catherine D just behind us, but for the remainder of the stage, we were mostly on our own. We crossed the start/finish at the end of the first loop (~13 km) in just over 56 minutes, and finished the race in 1:32:02. We were the first females across the line.

@VicZanRan and @vicksie10  come in together. #HPEndur # teamwork #cantwontstop pic.twitter.com/PZjWm4Cn7h

— Health & Performance (@Health_Perform) August 13, 2017

One stage down.... six to go.

After eating a bunch of delicious food, the results were read and gold jerseys were awarded. Today, for the first time in my life, I was awarded with the gold! I have the privilege of wearing it tomorrow for the 15K time trial. Rob B. is in the gold for the men.

The gold is worn by the male and female who are in the lead cumulatively. As of right now, I have a 1:32 lead over 2nd place, 1:35 over 3rd. It's close right now.. and it's a long week. Anything can happen.

Cumulative results can be found here: Ultimate 2017

After the race today, I headed over to the Schmidt house (race director) to hang out with a few other runners in the pool. It was great to catch up, share stories, enjoy a beverage, and soak the legs in the cool water.

Once I was back at home, I got my stuff ready for tomorrow, did a few other little things around the house, and then made my way to the hammock for some lounging.

Life is rough. @endurrun week.  #recovery #raceweek #ENDURrun #runcation #ENDURrun2017

A post shared by Vicki Zandbergen (@vickizandbergen) on Aug 13, 2017 at 3:52pm PDT

Tomorrow's stage is a staggered start, with runners starting one minute apart, based on today's finish times. The final finisher from today starts first tomorrow, and the first finisher from today starts last. My estimated start time tomorrow is 8:47am. But... I'm not going to think about that right now. Right now I'm recovering and soon I will go to bed.

Good night everyone, and for those who are here... see you in the morning!

Chilly Half Marathon

March 5th, 2017: The Chilly Half... I had never run it before, but I had heard only good thing. OK, maybe not only, but mostly. The only negative I ever heard was that if it's a windy day, it's a very windy course since there's nothing to block the wind coming off the lake. So, a minor negative, really. Everything else was positive.
I decided in the fall that this would be a good race to run leading up to Boston. Perfect timing, and a good, fast course to test out the fitness and (hopefully) build up some confidence for April.

I arrived in Burlington nice and early on race day. I wanted to make sure it was a stress-free morning, so I left my house not long after 7:30 and was parked about a block from the start/finish by 8:20am. Perfect! I had lots of time to wander around and check things out, talk with some friends, get a warmup in on a bit of the course, ditch some stuff at the car, and go back to the start to line up. It was great not feeling rushed for any of that. 

One thing I noticed when walking around and also when running, was how much colder it felt there than it did at home when I was leaving. The wind coming off the lake made a big difference. But... the sun was strong. When there was no wind it was comfortable, but when there was wind, it was a bit on the frigid side. The wind didn't seem too bad, so I didn't feel like I needed to cover my ears and was able to wear a regular hat (cap), capris, two thin shirts, and thin gloves.

For my warm-up, around I did a 2 mile run with an out and back on the course, then another half mile after stopping at my car to get my number on, etc. I finished up the second little warm-up run about 15 minutes to race start.

As the race started, and we turned the first corner, I noticed that I was just behind the 1:30 pace group. It was windy in this section, so I tucked into the group to get some shelter from the wind. This had me running a little quicker than I intended to run, but it was a bit of a downhill and it kept me out of the wind. I only stuck with them for maybe 5 minutes or so. I got back onto my own game plan at that point. Well.. sort of. My plan for this race was to keep my pace just under 7:15. Aside from the first mile at 6:51, I was running just over 7 mile pace and it was feeling great. So, I figured I'd roll with it. 10K marker... felt great, then reached 10 miles in 1:10:something... and... only 5K left! I was NOT going to slow down a single second. I was focused on a couple of runners in front of me and actually picked it up slightly to sub-7 pace for those last 5K.

I finished the race in 1:32:01. 01..... I couldn't find 2 seconds somewhere? ugh. but I didn't (and don't) care about that... it was my fastest half marathon so far (by several minutes) and a nice confidence boost.

Just before the final turn to the finish: ~12.9 miles

I was proud of myself, not for the finish time itself (I was happy with that as well, of course).. I was proud of how I ran the race. I was super happy with my splits, which I've included below. I'm becoming a smarter runner!

After the race, I ran a cool down with Graham and then went out for chilly and beer at one of the local establishments. The nice thing about this race's post-race festivities, is the spread it out. There are several bars near the finish line that all serve the beer and chilly to the runners instead of just having it in some gym or community center or whatever.

After the beer and chilly, I went back out to watch more friends finishing and then out for lunch on the way home. All in all, it was an enjoyable race day. I think this race might find it's way into my race schedule again in the future.

ENDURrun Stage 1 - Half Marathon

This morning, at 8am, the 2016 ENDURrun began.

Today was the half marathon, the first of seven stages, which will total 160 km between today and next Sunday.

The start to the day was cooler than it has been lately, which was absolutely fantastic. The sun was strong, so it did warm up pretty quickly on the course, but overall, I really can't complain about the weather today. If only it was going to stay that way

This year, a couple of new traditions started before the race start.

• Past Gold Jersey holders are now allowed (and encouraged) to wear their gold proudly for stage one.
• A pre-start group photo is taken (and a separate gold jersey wearers photo).

The official photos aren't available yet, but here is Dave Rutherford's photo that I've "borrowed" from Facebook.

I went out a little too quick today; I pointed out that fact to Patrick Voo, who was running near me at the time. I attempted to back off (or at least I thought I did), but apparently that didn't really happen and a few K later I was wondering what the crap I was doing. I felt good... but it was only a few km into the race. I kept going along, trying to slowly ease off as I went, until I was closer to the pace that I had planned to run. It sort of worked, but not really. There were some slower and some quicker miles here and there, not overly consistent. The effort, however, didn't seem to fluctuate a whole lot. I definitely ran a positive split today, but I'm happy with the overall result. My average place ended up being what I hoped, and I ran a 26 second PR, so I'll take it. Maybe some day I'll learn to run this course a little more evenly.  

Results:

Top three on the men's side were as follows:
1. Rob Brouillette: 1:14:01

2. Mark Meyers: 1:25:43

3. Kyle Den Bak: 1:30:24

And the women:

1. Angela Batsford-Mermans: 1:30:28

2. Me: 1:38:58

3. Hunter Kelly: 1:41:34

After the race, it was time for socializing and time to enjoy some of the marvelous food. I couldn't tell you what I all ate, but I know there was a burger, some hummus, sweet potatoes, some salads, jambalaya, and a smoothie.

I forgot to take my usual photo of my platter of food until I had already eaten my burger and probably some of the other food on my plate... but I did take one eventually!

Tomorrow, at the 15K Time Trial, starting in Conestogo, Angela and Rob will be the only runners allowed to wear gold (or yellow). The starting list has already been posted, so we have our approximate start times and I am slotted at 8:41.

Now it's time to rest up, and be ready to race again in the morning. Great work today, everyone!

It's been a while...

My last post was back in August... ENDURrun time... and I had an injured foot.
Since that time, my foot got better, training resumed, and racing happened. I was going to write a post about the time from then until now, but it turns out that's 10 weeks! So... I will break up this update post into two or three posts. Today's post will cover the weeks between ENDURrun and The County Marathon.

August 17 - 23
Total distance: 15 miles
The foot needed to get better and I needed to let it. This became very clear when I attempted to run on the Monday. I started running, it started hurting, I headed home. I ran one mile that day and I didn't run again until Friday. Those rest days were very good to my foot; I ran a pain free 7+ miles with Craig and Val on the Friday morning! Saturday and Sunday, I was camping with my family at Silver Lake Provincial Park so I kept the runs short (3.1 & 3.5 miles), but also did some paddling on both Silver Lake and Black Lake.

View from my SUP: Silver Lake

View from my SUP: Black Lake

August 24 - 30
Total distance: 61.3 miles
This week, I got back into training. I did a couple of workouts with Health and Performance, had some solid longer runs at decent paces, and was back to running every day. It felt great to be able to get back into training and not have pain.
M: 7.7 miles total including 3x (5 min half marathon effort, 5 min 10K effort, 3 min recovery) and some strides
T: 5.1 miles solo
W: Track Workout - 9.2 miles total including 2x (1 mile at half marathon pace, 400m recovery), 1 mile 10K pace, 400m recovery, 1 mile 5K pac
T: 7.7 miles with Craig
F: 4.2 miles solo
S: 10 miles with H+P
S: 17.3 miles with Lumi from Runners' Choice

August 31 - September 6
Total distance: 54.3 miles
I did one track workout (Yasso 800s) on the Thursday and it went quite well. On the Saturday, I had to drag myself through my 18 mile long run on a hot day. The rest of the week was relatively uneventful: just regular runs. I took one day off this week.

September 7 - 13
Total distance: 73.1 miles
Solid week with a midweek workout alternating marathon and half marathon pace and a Saturday long run of a little over 20 miles.

September 14 - 20
Total distance: 59.2 miles
M: 7.5 miles including 20 min half marathon effort, 4 min recovery, 6x 1 min on/off.
T: 8 miles
W: 6 miles including 10x 1 min on/off
T: 3.5 miles
F: 5 miles
S: 20.4 miles including 13.1 miles at slightly over marathon pace at Harvest Half
S: 8.6 miles

Finishing the Harvest Half - photo by Kailey Haddock

September 21 -27
Total distance: 46.4 miles
Taper time. Runs were a bit shorter, but included two H+P workouts a progression run on the weekend at the Laurier Loop 10k.

September 28 - October 4
Total distance: 49.9 miles
Marathon week! Shorter runs, a wee workout of 1 mile marathon pace into 1/2 mile (ish) half marathon pace, then 5x 1 min on/off, a day off on the Friday and a super short run on Saturday morning before hopping in my car and sitting in it for way longer than expected due to a highway closure... but I still arrived in Picton in time to grab my race number and to meet up with friends for lunch. I will go into this weekend in more detail in my post about The County Marathon, which I will write in the next few days.

So there you have it... somewhat of an update. Really, just a boring list of runs... but at least there were a couple of photos! 

ENDURrun Stage 1: Half Marathon

Good morning (although it will be afternoon by the time I publish this blog post). It's 6:58am and I have a few minutes before my ride gets here, so I thought it was a good opportunity to quickly start today's blog post.

I am excited to get to the start line this morning and I'm looking forward to everything this week has in store. I hope everyone has a fantastic week!

........

It is now 3:27pm. I ran, I ate, I got a massage, I swam, had a beer, and now I'm home, sitting on the couch, drinking smoothie #2 of the day. Time to actually write this blog post.


The Race:

Stage 1 of the ENDURrun is a half marathon, starting at a park in Conestogo, running one ~13km loop on roads and paved trail through a golf course, then a smaller ~8km loop following a similar, but shorter route (obviously).

The race started at 8am with a record number of people this year. Although the registration numbers were not the highest (there were over 50 registered in 2012), it was the year with the most starters. Each and every one of the 46 registered Ultimate Competitors was able to run (and finish) today's stage! Already, this was shaping up to be a great week.

It was fairly cool (for August) at the start, which was fantastic for running. The sun was definitely out in full force and it did warm up in the second loop, but it didn't get overly hot. In fact, I finished much less sweaty than I normally am at the end of an easy summer training run!

My plan today was to keep each mile below 8 minutes. I had my watch set to only display the laps and not total, so if I looked at my watch (which I didn't do much) I actually didn't know what my pace over the whole distance was or how many minutes I was into the race, just the time and pace for the mile that I was currently running. I came very close to successfully implementing this plan.... one mile (mile 13) was 8:01. So close!

I finished the stage in 1:42:00, which was 6:59 faster than last year and 4 seconds slower than my fastest half marathon, but more importantly, it felt good.

Looking at the results, I see that there were a lot of great times today! It's going to be interesting to see how the week plays out and how the standings change (or stay the same... you never know!) throughout the remaining 6 stages.

The gold jerseys, which represent the top male and female contenders based on cumulative time, have now been awarded and will be worn by two newcomers tomorrow: Mindy Fleming and Matt Leduc.

Great job out there today, everyone! See you tomorrow in Conestogo for Stage 2!

I almost forgot to take a photo of my post-race food today.... as you can see, my watermelon was already consumed.

Last Weekend: The Double

As I mentioned in my last post, I had a double race weekend coming up. Well, it has now been and gone (a week ago) and I realized that I didn't write anything about it yet.

ENDURrace 8K
The first of the two races was on Saturday at 6pm. It was a chilly and windy evening, but at least it wasn't raining (or snowing). I made sure I didn't go out as ridiculously as I had done for the 5K and the race felt way better as a whole. Conditions were quite good for this race, except for the headwind for maybe a 1/4 of the course total. My goal for this race was sub-36 and I did just that. I finished in 35:53, which was a PB by 16 seconds (previous best was the Re-Fridgee-Eighter in February of this year).

H+P Team post-race - Photo by Julie Schmidt

H+P's ENDURrace Results

Waterloo Half Marathon
After being home for maybe 10 hours, I was out of the house again, on my way to my next race. I wanted to work the half into a big mileage day, and that I did.

I left my house at 6:30am to run to Bechtel Park. I wanted to arrive by 7am so that I'd have plenty of time to get my number, etc. When I arrived, I was pleasantly surprised to find absolutely no line. I walked straight up to the registration table and was done. I hung out with some other runners, watched the start of the marathon, chatted with my Health and Performance teammates for a bit, and then headed back out to line up for the half.

I had hoped to run 7:40 pace (4:46/km) for this race which would result in a finish time of 1:40:30. I wanted to give myself some more confidence for the upcoming marathon, but I didn't really know what to expect having run the 8K race the night before. I feel like at spots in the race, I used the previous night's race as a built in excuse to not achieve the goal. I actually remember at one point thinking that I was fine with anything under 1:45. I did get back into race head space near the end of the race, but not quite early enough. I finished in 1:41:56.

After the race, I ran a short cool down around the park, then hung out to eat some food and watch others finish. When there was a lull in finishers, I decided to head back out onto the course and find some friends who were running the full. I had fun running back to the park with the group and enjoyed being able to witness Sandra's new PB!

To wrap up my running for the day, I ran home from the park.
Total mileage for the day was 22.2 miles (35.7 km).

H+P's Waterloo Marathon and Half Results

All in all, it was a good weekend of racing, with a Personal Best time in both races. I couldn't ask for a much better double race weekend than that!

ENDURrun Stage 1: The Half Marathon

As usual, I didn’t get to bed as early as I should have last night. I did some running around the house, locating items, gathering items, and packing items to bring to the race. I will make sure to be ready earlier for the remaining stages. At least now that my running stuff is more organized, it’ll be easier to be ready for the rest of the week.

Since stage 1 went better for me in 2011 than it did in 2012, I decided to have the same breakfast today as I did two years ago: a toasted English muffin with peanut butter and a banana as well as a cup of coffee. 

Ed and I pre-race in our ENDURrun swag from 2012 and 2011

I tried to run smart today. It didn’t quite go as planned, as I started quicker than I should have, but I felt like I did regain a fair bit of control and was able to finish strong. I feel as though I ran better than I normally do and had more “left in the tank” at the end of the race than usual. As a bonus, I even ended up with a new half marathon PB of 1:49:59! So far, I do not feel like I overdid it or anything today, but I guess the following stages will reveal whether or not that is true.

First place Ultimate finishers for today were Mark and Catherine, who will have the honour of wearing the gold jerseys tomorrow for the 15K time trial. I sit in 4th place of the ultimate females after stage 1, but anything can happen over the remaining 6 stages.

Now to rest, fuel, recover, and get ready to race in the 15K time trial tomorrow

But first… here are some photos from today’s stage.

New to 2013 – Menu board to specify which items are vegan, vegetarian, gluten free, etc.

Susan, Dave, and Kyle post-race

Thanks for a great morning, everyone. Let’s do it again tomorrow!

Update and Late Photos

I realized that I have not posted anything in a LONG time, so I figured I should throw something together. Actually, I had started a post after Easter, but didn’t finish it and therefore, never published it. So… I know this is super late, but better late than never, right?

First, the update:

I see that my last post was after the Re-Fridgee-Eighter. Well, I’ve run a few races since the last time I posted, so I let you my my results for those races and compare them with my times from last year.

March 24, 2013 - Around the Bay 30K – gun time: 2:44:23, chip time: 2:42:16 (PB)
2012 chip time: 2:42:44. Actually, I just noticed something right now when looking up the results. My gun time for 2012 and 2013 was exactly the same… to the second. Both were 2:44:23.

April 13, 2013 - ENDURrace 5K – gun time: 23:00, chip time: 22:55 (PB and first time I’ve ever broken 23 min for a 5K)
2012 chip time: 23:22

April 20, 2013 - ENDURrace 8K – gun time: 38:18, chip time: 38:14 (PB)
2012 chip time: 38:50 (that was my previous best 8K)

May 5, 2013 - Mudpuppy Chase 10K – gun time: 48:47, chip time: 48:38
2012 chip time: 47:57.
My 2013 PB streak (every race so far in 2013 was a PB) ended on the day of the Mudpuppy, but I still ended up with my 2nd fastest 10K time, so I’m happy with that.

And now… the Easter Run.

When I was at my parents’ house for Easter, I headed out to one of my favourite places to run in Eastern Ontario, the Long Sault Parkway. That probably doesn’t sound like the best place to run, but the road is technically closed from fall until May, so it’s virtually traffic free and offers wonderful views along the St Lawrence River.

The road/causeway itself is 10km from end to end and I decided to run a half marathon that day I started at the West end of the section of road, parked the car by the entrance, and ran along the road to the East end, where I turned around and headed back to my starting location.

I took some photos with my phone along the way. Here are a few. I hope you enjoy them.

As you can see from the photos, there was still some ice and snow, but it was also a very nice and warm spring day. I had a great run and got to enjoy the wonderful views of 2 countries as I ran, with water on both sides of me.

ENDURrun Stage 1: The Half Marathon

My plan was to be in bed by 11pm past night, but of course, I didn’t have everything quite ready for race day, so it got stretched a little. I was still in bed shortly after 11:30, so I had time to read a story from my Canadian Marathon Stories book (I read one before every half or full) and still get over 6 hours of sleep. Hopefully, I’ll be getting more than 6 hours per night for the rest of this week, but for today, I feel good with it.

Breakfast: steel cut oats with banana and a bit of peanut butter, coffee, and water.

When I arrived at the park, I noticed that Paul Mora was on the swings, so I ran over to join him. What a great way to have some fun and de-stress before a race.

After a quick look at the computer that was set up, streaming the Men’s Olympic Marathon, it was time to head over to the start line. Roll call was done and after a couple of last minute instructions, we were off, with a note of “Good Luck” on the start line.

Last year, I ran a half marathon PB on this stage. I realize now that it probably wasn’t the best way to start a week-long event, so I slowed it down a wee bit today, took a few walk breaks, enjoyed the run and came in at 1:56:30 (time on my Garmin, I haven’t seen the official time yet). Last year, my time was 1:52:38, so just under 4 minutes slower than last year, but I was happy with my time today. I hope to make up that time over the week; I’d like to try and beat my overall time from last year.

After finishing the race, it was time to sign up for massage, grab my recovery drink, and also get some food.

Catherine – post race massage

First I had a delicious smoothie which was made with chocolate milk, banana, berries, kiwi, and plain yogurt and then I grabbed a plate (or platter) and selected some of the amazing food that is always a great part of this race week. As you can see below, I had several items on my plate including some fruits and veggies, cheese, egg, nachos, pasta salad, sweet potato salad, and Caribbean rice. There was also burgers, candy, chips, chicken, salad, and more.

 

The results were announced after all of the runners had come in and the gold jerseys were awarded to Bob Jackman for the men and to Jackie Jackman for the women. They’ve both won this event multiple times in the past. Tomorrow, they will wear the gold jerseys and will start last in the time trial.

I’m not sure of all of the rest of the placings right now, but they will be up on the ENDURrun page in the results section, which will most likely be updated daily.

It will be interesting to see how the order changes throughout the week. A lot can happen over 7 stages of running!

Now that I am back at home, it’s time to to rest up and get ready for stage 2 tomorrow – the 15K time trial. Tomorrow’s stage is being held at a different location this year than it was in past years, so it’ll be interesting to see if this affects my time (and other’s times) at all. I guess we’ll have to find that out tomorrow.

Great run today, everyone! Let’s do it again sometime.

ENDURrun Stage 1: The Half Marathon

6:15 am
The alarm woke me up and I could hear and smell coffee brewing in the kitchen. I decided to stay in bed for a few more minutes and was up by 6:22 am.

6:30 am 
Sitting in the living room eating breakfast (toasted English muffin with peanut butter and banana and my cup of coffee) and reading updates and comments of other runners all getting ready to start the ENDURrun today. Looking outside, it’s quite wet out there, but as long as it’s not pouring, it should be just fine.

7:00 am
I’m all ready, dressed, body-glided, and excited to get to the start line. Race start is in 1 hour. Just waiting for Ryan (http://shootthethrill.ca) to get out of the shower so we can go.

Okay.. it’s now early afternoon. I’m home, I’m clean, and I’m ready to finish this post my thoughts and some BB photos.

The half marathon started at 8:00 am just about the same time as the rain. It was a light rain, so not too bad at all, but I’m sure the volunteers and spectators weren’t too happy with it.  For the majority of the run it was humid and damp, but not actually raining. It did, however, rain more after I was finished.

I finished stage 1 in a time of 1:52:39 (according to my Garmin, I didn’t catch what my official time was and it’s not up on the website yet). This time was actually a PB for me in a half marathon event. I ran the first half of the Mississauga Marathon in just over a minute faster, but as far as running the specific half distance, this is my best time yet!

(Now feels like a good time to share my post-race sweaty BlackBerry self-portrait)

I really enjoyed this stage today. At one point I wished I had a camera on me because I looked toward the Grand River and saw a man standing in the middle, fishing, with the mist surrounding him. With no camera on me, I had to take a mental picture. Perhaps I’ll just head out there one morning to see if this is a common occurrence.

Okay.. back to the event. I kept a decent pace today and I felt really good, too. I don’t feel like I overdid it, so I should (hopefully) have lots of gas left in the tank for the rest of the week.

6 more stages to go and I’ll be One Tough Runner.

Congrats to everyone else who completed stage 1 today. I’ll see you tomorrow at the 15K time trial!

   

Above photos: Top: Ryan McGovern, Middle Left: Paul Mora, Middle Right: Dave Rutherford, bottom: Catherine Kelly.

Las Vegas Rock ‘n’ Roll Half Marathon

This past Sunday, December 5, 2010, I ran the half marathon in Las Vegas. Here’s how my morning went.

* all photos in this post are from my Blackberry and some are blurry due to me being in motion at the time the photo was taken :) *

4:10 am – I woke up. The alarm hadn’t gone off yet, but I was awake.
4:45 am – this is when the alarm was supposed to go off, but apparently something screwy happened and my Blackberry had turned off even though it was connected to the computer at the time.
5:00 am – went down to Starbucks to grab a coffee and then head back up to the hotel room at MGM Grand to eat my Luna bar and banana for breakfast
6:00 am – headed out of the room to start the walk down to Mandalay Bay. We met up with some more runners in the elevator and even more walking through the casino on the way out. Once we were outside, there was a large crowd of runners walking down the middle of Las Vegas Blvd, which was closed for the event.

During the walk to the start, I tried to turn on my Garmin. It wouldn’t turn on. I started frantically pushing buttons, trying to remember how to do a soft re-set. I finally got it to turn on, but it had a message that did not make me happy at all “battery low.” Crap. I was upset. I wanted so badly to do well in this race and the thought of not having the Garmin to verify that I was maintaining the pace I wanted did not make me feel confident. Ryan told me to calm down and turn off the Garmin for now. I did. I kept it off until just before race start.
6:30 am – arrived at the corrals, walked past all of the Southbound corrals and around the corner onto the Northbound side of the blvd where I showed my race number to prove I belonged in this section. I found my way to my corral and settled in. I was pleasantly surprised to see that they had port-a-potties right in the corral. Very smart.
6:45 am – start line entertainment included “Cher” singing the national anthem (with some sound glitches, where she couldn’t hear the music and actually only sang the last half of the song).
7:00 am – race start for corral #1. It was a wave start, so each corral started about 90 seconds apart. For the few minutes I was waiting, I was entertained by the Blues Brothers.
 
7:03:32 am – I crossed the start line

Now that we’re into the race, I will talk in km and miles since I’d have to reference various files to figure out times.

6 km mark – my low back started to hurt – no doubt due to the 6 hours on a plane the previous day where I didn’t get up to walk around until the flight was almost over. Note to self: always get up and walk around on a plane when running a race the next day.
7 km mark – had to take a wee walk break due to the back pain. Decided to take a couple of shot blocks and drink some water slightly early (was planning on doing this at 5 miles/8 km)
10 km mark – had to take another small walk break, but on the plus side, the Garmin was still going strong.
9 mile mark – Ryan was on the side of the course taking photos. I let him know that I was running well but that my back was hurting me since 6km. A nearby runner overheard the conversation and told me to run with him until the half and full split. I was grateful – it was nice to have someone to talk to for a while
10 mile mark – the runner from Chicago was a little too fast for me, so we parted at this point. Very very shortly after, I looked at my Garmin and it went blank. It had finally died at  I was on my own for the final 5k.

I took a walk through the next water station and drank some Cytomax. At this point, I saw the 1:52 pace bunny run by. I knew I was doing alright, and thought that maybe I could catch up with me. This thought quickly went away as I was running hard, but not gaining ground. I decided to just keep my pace and do the best I could.

As I approached Mandalay Bay, I was feeling good and was happy that I was very close to the finish. I was passing a few people, which is always a confidence boost. When I crossed the line, the clock time said 1:58:25, but I knew my time was faster and thought it might be a PB (previous best was 1:57:08). After I collected my medal and food and left the secure area, I noticed a sign that stated that race results would be online by 7pm. Boo.. I was hoping to see my time.. and with no Garmin, I had no reference. I spotted the medal engraving booth, so I dropped off my medal, paid my $20 and had them engrave my name and finish time onto the back. These people have the chip time results, so I was able to find out my time about 20 minutes after finishing. As I picked up the medal and looked at the time, I was very happy. A new PB!  Yay!

The race was great and well organized. The course was fantastic and I would definitely run it again!

 

My post-finish self-portrait. (after I took this, another runner offered to make my photo for me, which is my current profile picture on Facebook).

And my finisher certificate

Final Long Run before the half

One week from today is the Rock ‘n’ Roll Las Vegas Marathon and 1/2. I am running the half and I’ve just come back from my final long run before the race.

I ran 18 km today and felt quite good. I’m hoping for a PB (of course) and maybe just maybe Lady Luck will have my back in Vegas.

I’m all packed (except for some running essentials that I still need to use this week) and I’m ready to go. Just 5 more days and I’ll be on my way!

Today’s Run:
Distance: 18 km
Weather: –1 C, felt like –4; wind SW 4 km/h

What a busy Month!

October has been flying by! It’s been a very busy month. I posted the first weekend of the month when I ran the Laurier Loop, so you know about that part.

The 2nd weekend was Thanksgiving, where I ran a 5K race in front of the Oktoberfest Thanksgiving Day Parade. The event was fun, but not quite as good as last year. Last year it was chip timed, they finisher’s prizes, and age group prizes. This year, no chips, no finisher’s prizes, no age group prizes (just top male and female overall), and the cost was the same as last year.

The 3rd weekend of the month, Ryan and I spent Friday and Saturday in Toronto at the Henry’s Photographic, Video, and Digital Imaging Show, then came back here where I ran the Oktoberfest Run on the Sunday. I had a cold starting a few days before that race, but I still ran my second fastest 5K, so that was a pleasant surprise!

This weekend, (almost all better from my cold) I ran the Niagara Falls International Half-Marathon (although on the full marathon crosses borders) and also ran my second fastest time. My fastest half was in Virginia Beach last year, where I ran in 1:57:08, this time I did 1:57:40.

This morning, I made sure not to fall off the training horse and got up to go for an easy run. I did 6.5 km. My next race is an 8K in early November, and then a half marathon in early December. Hopefully I’ll achieve a new PB in Vegas!

Running to go Running

Today I ran from work to Runners’ Choice for Quality Workout night. It’s not that far, just about 2.5 km, so it only made sense. I had to run with a backpack strapped to my back, though, so that made it a bit more difficult. I’m sure I looked wonderful as I showed up at the store all sweaty before we started our workout.

Tonight’s workout was a race simulation type workout. We warmed up (even though I was already nice and warmed up) but running a few km to the trails where we were doing our real workout. We did 10 km at a bit faster than easy run pace (to simulate the start of a marathon), then 10 km at goal race pace, then a final 5-10 minutes at “shut up and run” pace (to simulate the run to the finish line with any remaining juice you have left). After I finished this, I did 5 hill repeats, then headed back to the store.

Today’s Run:
Total distance covered: 14.25 km
Weather: 19 C, sunny

ENDURrun

Yesterday, I ran Stage 1 of the 8 day, 7 stage race. I was part of a relay team for Runner’s Choice. Stage 1 was a half marathon on a nice course starting in Conestogo following roads and trails over rolling hills. The weather was good (except for a nasty headwind for a while near the end of the race) and race organization was fantastic. The group of runners are great as well. I find that at so many races people don’t really talk to one another. This race is an exception. There is a group of 50ish runners who are taking part in all 7 stages, completing 160 km over the week. They become a bit of a tight-knit group.
I’m considering doing the whole ENDURrun next year, but we’ll see. I’m going to watch a stage or two more this week and cheer on the runners. I’ve given myself a deadline of the end of January to decide if I’m going to sign up for the Ultimate Challenge.
Click here to see Ryan’s photos from Stage 1.

First Quality Session

Tonight, in the heat and humidity, was the first Quality session of the Marathon and Half Marathon group’s summer/fall session.

We met up at Runner’s Choice and after a bit of announcements, group info, etc we headed out to run to a local park. Once we arrived at the park, the night’s workout was explained to us. We each had a partner (we’ll call each partner P1 and P2) for the workout. Each of the P1s went out first to run (staggered start) a loop around the park, when P1 returned the start, they tagged P2, who then ran the loop. So, you ran hard around the loop, came back, had a break to have some water while your partner ran the loop and then it was time to do it again. We did this around 8 times each before we ran back to the store for some nice cold, fresh watermelon! Great session!

Today’s Run:
Quality workout that totalled up to 5km on my Garmin.
Weather: 30 C, feels like 37 C

Marathon/Half Marathon Clinic

Yesterday, I signed up for the next clinic at Runner’s Choice. I decided that I needed something to get me out running my long runs consistently on the weekends and people to give me a swift kick into doing my speed work, so it seemed like a logical idea. Now to train hard and to run a super-fast half marathon this fall!

Today’s Run:
Distance: 11 km
Weather: 16 C, sunny