A Day For Running

Happy National Running Day! I'm not sure what makes the first Wednesday in June more run-worthy than say the first Tuesday or Thursday of June but here we are. I'll be celebrating by going for a lung-burning tempo run today.

Running has enriched my life in so many ways over the years. It's been an outlet for me when I am feeling happy, sad, stressed, angry, etc... It has connected me with some amazing people who also share in my love of this sport. It has taught me about the strength of a community and the will to endure. Running has not always been in my blood. I am not a natural runner and it does not come easy for me. But it has become a big part of my life and something that I can't imagine not doing.

Of Running Shoes and Chocolate Cake!

You either clicked over here because of running shoes or chocolate cake. Don't worry, I won't disappoint you but first I just wanted to say "Ay chihuahua"! Yeah, it's been that kind of month. Busy, crazy, like a chicken with it's head chopped off. Maybe I should say something like "Great Dane" instead of something about a chihuahua. My blogging has definitely taken a big hit but I promise you that you will be hearing a lot more from me. For example, by this time next week, I will be running the 2012 SoCal Ragnar Relay and I will have a lot of down time so I will be all over the social media front. The weekend after, I will be headed up to Monterey for the Big Sur Marathon! Lots of exciting running stuff coming up. I also have a ton of restaurant reviews that I've not had time to write up but I did take some drool worthy photos so look forward to that as well.

Ok, first up...running shoes! I didn't mention this or better yet I hadn't had time to mention about this until now but I hurt my lower back a couple of weeks ago doing cross-fit. I've hurt my back before from doing HIIT but this was a first for cross-fit related injuries. Being the hypochondriac that I am, I went to see a chiropractor to make sure that it was not something really serious. It turns out that I have a subluxation (commonly referred to as a "pinched nerve") of the L5 region of my spine. So not super bad news but I have been put on a correction program to realign my spine. I'm not new to chiropractics. I've had problems with my sciatica and my back before as I mentioned above and chiropractics has brought me a lot of relief. Anyhow, after my recent chiropractic evaluation my chiropractor informed me that I have a serious pronation problem and that I am majorly flat-footed. I always thought that I had a normal arch with moderate pronation.

So I went to see this guy and told him of my pronation, flat-footed woes and he came back with these...

...no not that bright yellow pair but these! ASICS GEL Kayano 18! They fit nice. I miss me some stability cushioning as of late. This is my very first pair of ASICS...like ever so I will let you know how I fair with these. They (people at the store) tell me that it is perfect for a major heel striker like myself. Man, I have all kinds of running problems.

What better way to drown my running problem sorrows than with new running shoes and chocolate cake? There are no better ways. Have you ever tried the Killer Chocolate cake from French's Bakery in Costa Mesa? No? What the heck are you waiting for? It is *the* best chocolate cake I've ever had and I am not even a chocolate cake fan. I know, the horror! But be warned, it is not for the faint of heart, only eat this if you want death by chocolate. It isn't called the "Killer Chocolate Cake" for no reason.

It also comes in cupcake size. You know, for when you want that close to death experience. ;)

2011 Running Year in Review

Last year I did a year-in-review race recap after I ran my last race and since I just ran my last race of 2011...here is a look back at 2011!

I had quite a busy race calendar this year but it wasn't by accident. I wanted to see if I could run a bunch of races in a calendar year. Turns out I can. Do I recommend it? Not whole heartedly. It took a lot of time to train, plan and travel. Not to mention the cost. Yeah, let's not mention about that. I was lucky that I had the luxury to commit as much time, energy and money to this little experiment. Running races can be an expensive hobby. Having said that, I don't regret running any of them. I had so much fun and learned a lot about myself as a runner in each one of those races. I surprised myself by PR-ing in three distances this year, the 5K, half marathon and marathon.

I started the year with the Southern California Half. It is held in early January shortly after all the holiday festivities have died down. Naturally I am a slacker over the holidays so I was really under-trained and ill prepared for this race and it showed. Even running with full effort, I clocked this race at 1:50:16.

Then I got sick around mid to late January with a bad fever that made training almost impossible. And so I went into the Surf City Half even less prepared than the first. Clocking in at a "crap-tacular" 2:01:22 but I kept the Surf City running steak alive. Four years in a row!

Then on March 20, 2011 the sky opened up and poured rain as I ran the LA Marathon. Needless to say that didn't go well (4:26:12).

After that race, I was afraid of the rain and cold like never before. Luckily Sister K and I finished up the The Coaster Run 10K before it started to rain! A big thumbs up for that.

Then I drove up to Monterey early May to run one of the most beautiful courses that I've ever ran, the Big Sur Marathon. Ran the modified out and back course in 4:19:14. Going back in 2012 to tackle Hurricane Point! Excited! Okay not really because that part is going to suck but the other parts are nice.

Then on Memorial Day weekend, I revisited a course that I hadn't ran in a couple of years and earned my current half marathon PR time of 1:44:10 at the Laguna Hills Memorial Day Half! It was a great day!

Then I was on a roll and earned my current marathon PR time of 3:50:35 at the Ojai 2 Ocean Marathon. Another great day in my running history book!

Around mid June, I ran my second trail race ever at the Billy Goat Hill Climb Half with a 2,400 ft climb! Definitely one of the harder runs I did this year. Clocked in at 2:16:47.

Then I flew up north to eat...oh and to run the San Francisco Marathon. 4:08:51

Then it was down to San Diego for America's Finest Half, revisiting a course I had not ran since 2008. Nothing spectacular happened there, except that I overslept and almost missed the start of this race. Ran the half in 1:51:25.

Then I ran my first Disney race ever at the Disneyland Half in a fairy costume! 1:51:23

Sometime around September my right knee started to bother me a bit from all the Spinning I was doing coupled with the lack of running. So I hobbled through the Long Beach Marathon in high temps and low running spirits. Clocking in at 4:26:55. That was also the weekend my beautiful niece was born so that made up for all the unpleasantness.

I did a really fun 5K around mid October and earned a new 5K PR of 23:18 at the Chapman 5K in a pretty Sparkle skirt but that was also the day that I almost fell when I accidentally stepped on a rock and twisted my ankle. The ankle is still not the same.

On Halloween weekend, I dressed up as a black cat and ran the RnR Los Angeles Half in 1:45:56.

Last marathon of the year was the Santa Barbara Marathon and I ran a 3:59:36. My second sub-4 marathon ever. I was happy with that as it was not planned. 

Capped off 2011 with the Holiday Half! Clocked in at 1:47:25.

Honestly, I'm tired and am glad that it is done! I am however looking forward to my 2012 race schedule when the fun will start all over again. Run on and on!

The Black Friday 13.1 Miles Run

I slept in this morning.
I ate too much yesterday. 
I ran a half marathon on the treadmill to make up for yesterday.
I went to see Breaking Dawn.
I enjoyed it...very much! Don't judge me.
I spent time with my pup and my honey, represented here by a piggy and an angry bird. Just kidding.

I did not go shopping.
I had a wonderful day today! Happy Black Friday!

A 10 Mile Run

This week I started my training cycle for the Los Angeles Marathon coming up on March 18, 2012. I know that seems like ages away but I really want to improve my running base pace for that race and that means that I am planning on starting from scratch and building up. I am just coming off of a race recently so I have that base to build up from. I think I mentioned that I am not signed up for too many marathons next year because I want to focus more on improving my half marathon finish time and also to work on my marathon race pace. I guess next year is the year of 'less is more' and hopefully "more" means faster.

I went on my first official long run for Operation Run Faster (that's what I'm calling this training cycle). I will be logging my miles and pace more diligently to monitor my progress. Here are the stats from that 10 miler. Not entirely consistent but not that much off base either. I think my current race pace is a 9 minute mile and I want to make that number go down. I will use the next couple of weeks to assess my abilities and see what a realistic goal will be for me.

Mile 1 - 9:12                          Mile 6 - 9:04
Mile 2 - 8:42                          Mile 7 - 8:54
Mile 3 - 8:40                          Mile 8 - 9:13
Mile 4 - 9:14                          Mile 9 - 8:31
Mile 5 - 9:39                          Mile 10 - 8:31

This will be my bible for the next couple of months. I have a lot of work to do! Good thing I like to run.

Holiday Fitness Challenges

I am participating in the following challenges over the holiday period in order to help me stick to my goals. I don't have a motivation problem but this just makes it more interesting.

If you are into running (walking and wheel chair mileages count too), then head over to RunEatRepeat and sign up for the annual Pile On The Miles Challenge. It started today 11/1 and will run until 11/23.

Then on 11/19, RunToFinish is once again hosting the annual Holiday Bootie Buster Challenge where anything active and healthy will score you some points.

I am doing a similar thing with my Spin class in which I will be teaching a class everyday from 11/1-11/23, except for weekends and 2 Fridays when I will be out of town. We are working on maintaining our fitness level up til Thanksgiving and then we plan to get right back into it come December so that we are ready for any holiday parties that come our way. Basically our ultimate goal is to workout consistently throughout the holiday season so that come January 1, we will have one less thing to resolve.

Finally, I decided to give the 100 push up Challenge another go! Only because I need to work on my upper body strength. My last attempt yielded 56/100 push ups. No sign up is required and you go at your own pace.

POTM and HBBC will be handing out prizes to participates based either on participation or total points scored. But no matter which one of these you decide to participate in, the ultimate prize will be your health and fitness!

Countdown to Marathon #15 (Get Ready Long Beach!)

Just wanted to take a moment from all these ostriches, alpacas and farm posting to talk about my training. Believe it or not, I am still training, just not talking about it too much. Today September 9 marks the one month countdown to the running of the Long Beach Marathon. This year will be my second time running the full marathon course.

I have to admit that I have not been devoting as much time as I should to training for this race. I've been doing lots of other things...namely spinning and you would think that spinning would be a good compliment to running but that is only true to some degree. If you lean towards one discipline, the other one will suffer a bit. Plus, I've discovered that I still need to run more than I am spinning since they work different leg muscles. The one thing that spinning has given me is better endurance. What's not to like...spinning is so much gentler on my knees and body overall. It actually feels more difficult to run now that I'm gotten accustom to spinning as a workout. It keeps me out of the sun and less pounding on the pavement, see why I went over to the dark spin side?

So this month, I will be ramping up my mileages with some spinning days inserted in. I need to get reacquainted with my running legs again. I don't want to have a repeat of '09 when I got a terrible blister towards the end and barely made it to the finish line. I know, completely different woes but I really don't want to have another story to tell.

Here I am in '09, this must have been more towards the front end of the race as I still look happy before aforementioned blister made me cry mother.

Roquefort Cheese is Where It's At

Remember the lovely produce I purchased at the farmers market this past weekend?

With a little help from this...

...Roquefort cheese! I love me some stinky moldy cheese. This cheese has to be one of my all time favorites. If you like strong cheese, this one is for you. I picked up this particular block from the Cowgirl Creamery and it is simply amazing. You can also get this at Wholefoods and just about any fromagerie. This one was very smooth tasting. I say this because I've gotten some before that had a shape taste. 

Here is the "epic" salad I made with all the ingredients. I normally make a green dressing for this salad but last night I was tired after a long day at work so I just used some olive oil and balsamic vinegar. Sometimes simple is the way to go. As simple as this salad is, it is the salad of my dreams!

This morning's exercise was another 9 miles. It is my final run before America's Finest Half. I will be spinning and doing some HIIT for the remainder of the week. My legs felt a little tired this morning from spin yesterday but I did complete my run so I'm happy with that.

Photography On-The-Run - Bommer Canyon

Good morning! I went out for another run this morning. I know, two in a row! It's been amazing running weather lately in the early morning hours, so I've been taking advantage of that by running outside. Today I went running somewhere I had not been in a long while, plus I even wandered into some new grounds.

I started out here.

It was one of those running days...

Ran past this weird pond. Lots of micro organisms in there and plenty of gnats to go around. In fact it is more swamp-like than pond-like. 

Over the bridge!

Follow the Yellow Fire Road...we're off to see the...sorry that was what this reminded me of.  :)

For obvious reasons, I like running where there is accessible restrooms. @_@ The one thing that I appreciate about living in this area is that almost all the park/public restrooms are fully stocked with toilet paper and seat covers and are really clean. It's the little things that thrill me! ;)

Looks hazy and gloomy today. This should burn off soon enough.

Heading into Bommer.

Weird that this is just minutes away from businesses and homes.  

 Bommer Canyon Cattle Camp

It's dry out there already.

Some cactus that I've never seen before. 

Interesting!

This is not a lie but at one point I was surrounded by 20 bunnies. That's why this sign is here. 

Summer is in full swing and even though it is dry out there, some pretty flowers could still be found. 

I've been on the fence about signing up for the Big Sur Marathon again next year but running out here this morning reminded me of how much I love running amongst the beauty of nature. It is one of the things I love most about running. See you in Big Sur next April friends! Need a reason to love running again? Go run Big Sur!

That's it! That was only five miles. Took me a while to run that since I was taking so many photos. On a tangent, I got these new blue running shorts recently but they look really short on me. I'm sure I'll get use to them. I may be running with my camera at least once a week to bring you photos from my run. I am lucky that I live and work near some nice places to get a run in. Stay tune for that. Happy Thursday!