Update

* School started today and I found myself envious of the herds of kids walking to school in the morning. Although my job has a large learning component, I miss  being in school. My little guy had no issues getting off the door this morning, particularly since his 2 best pals were waiting for him.

Walking to school with his wife. They got married on Tuesday. They want to have 2 kids, a girl named Horse and a boy named Cheetah. She will stay home, he will work as a policeman giving tickets to those who do not respect traffic signs. They will live in Wisconsin (near Dells Water park) and in New Mexico in the winter. They will make the kids do all the chores.

Waiting to cross the street along with new and old friends. 

Walking with an old friend before yelling at mom "no more pictures".

* Running is going well. I am up to 50 miles this week and so far so good. I did some strides on the treadmill the other day - first in months - and woke up with DOMS. This made me laugh. Still, it is fascinating to me to see how quickly the body regains speed after some time off, with just easy running. It's like you really do not lose fitness; rather, you think you do, but then a few weeks in you are back to where you were before you took the time off. I am nowhere near where I was yet, but my aerobic pace is definitely improving pretty quickly with not too many miles and no speed work. Sweet! 

* I am down to 2 spin classes per week and 1 swim during my day off and will most likely keep these in my schedule. My body feels so good and relaxed after I swim, like I just had a massage (yes, I swim easy!). The spin classes are great quad and glute workouts, better than any strength work for me. 

* And yes, I do strength and core 2 times a week. Recently I've incorporated exercises to strengthen my shins and calves. Interestingly these have become issues for me only when I transitioned into a forefoot runner. I would like to go back to a mid foot strike (because I think it may be the least injury related strike) which now I can do only when I wear bulky running shoes, but won't force it. 

* Truly excited to vicariously cheer on for the various half and full marathons, as well as Vegas 70.3, IMWI and Kona this fall! Not missing racing yet - probably because my fitness is not at a racing level (for me) right now, but I am starting to think (and getting giddy!) about the possibilities. 

Summer

 It's been a busy summer over here with lots of time spent with him:

(Dancing at an outdoor concert)

     (down the slide during a camping trip)

And his friends:

  (Making waterslides with marble works in my living room....and not cleaning up, of course:)

I find that the older my son gets, the more he needs me - perhaps a bit different than how I thought things would turn out (but most of what I thought parenting would be, parenting is NOT:) - and the more interesting and difficult parenting gets. I love being kept on my toes by a 7 year old blond boy - particularly since those toes have needed to be kept busy since there has been very little running during the past month. My shin splint turned out to be a sore spot and perhaps a stress reaction. I wouldn't know because I did not see a doctor for it (I believe in a good PT, but tend to stay away from doctors - I believe that they cause more trouble when it comes to running injuries). But now I am "all better" and ran 15 miles this week keeping the pace easy at my aerobic pace minus 5 beat (which is 8-8:30 these days). I am taking things super slow because I want my legs to get used to the impact; I kept in pretty good shape aerobically with high intensity elliptical and more recently 5 or so hours of spinning a week, so I could easily run a bit faster now, but this would not be good for the legs. If I can give one advice to keeping in shape when injured is to use your HR monitor and train at your aerobic zone, with intervals going up to 95% HR. These are much tougher to do without the impact from running, but they worked for me. I feel strong.

I missed running at times, but honestly not as much as I thought I would. I really dislike summer running and having to wake up at the crack of dawn to run. The AC at the gym allowed me to keep a schedule that worked well for me. But, the main reason why I did not miss running was probably because I did not allow myself to miss it; I simply embraced the bike and the elliptical and stopped reading running books for a bit (I still read blogs though:). I focused on the benefits of not running, and reminded myself that I tend to come back stronger after a break. I also reminded myself that the injury gave me an out - I did not have to run a Fall marathon, phew, because I really do not like the marathon.

So what have I learn during this bout with injury?

1. 80 miles is my top mileage for now. Going above it = potential for injury.
2. I need the hard/easy methodology. Running the same pace, even during base, stresses the legs in the same way, and leads to injury for me.
3. I may not be able to handle doubles. I may be able to run 15 miles at once, but not as 10 and then 5 later. I used *may* because I am not convinced yet about this.
4. I can't log high mileage or do lots of high intensity training during periods of high work stress. I cope well with stress, but nonetheless, when stress is there I either need to sleep even more (ha!), or cut the mileage or intensity.
5. I enjoy training myself. I love training logs, numbers, paces, reading about anything running related.
6. I need to be true to what running means to me during the present moment. This has been changing for me over the years. I rely on running less and less (a good thing!). I am attached to goals less and less (another good thing!).
7. You can work the bike and the elliptical and get endorphins just as much as you would from a run. This requires a mental shift, however.
8. I absolutely love to cheer on my friends training for marathons, especially Jenn and Katie, and am secretly happy I don't train for one myself (though I terribly miss running with Katie!).

Run/Cross train Happy:)

Bloggers in real life

When I started this blog many years ago I was not interested in followers (I still am not, sorry!). I was not interested in making connections. I simply wanted to write anonymously, document my training, and have a record of my running(s) and living(s). It took me over 4 years of blogging to even consider responding to a comment; when I received a couple of emails after my first marathon in 2009, I thought it was kind of weird. I felt perfectly content in my personal life, with enough friends and family to consider letting anyone from the blog in. Ha! How things have changed. I am now emailing almost daily with 2 women I met via this blog, who have become very close friends.

I virtually trained with Jenn for Baystate 2011 and rapidly became able to share private details of my life that typically take me years to share. Perhaps because we are so similar. I am looking forward to the time when we will be able to both train for something without one of us getting injured. I am also looking forward to our sweat contest - you see, she think she actually sweats more than I do, ha, ha, ha!   Jenn is someone who puts a lot of thought into every aspect of her life. She is a no nonsense, no excuses super busy person who somehow always makes time for those who are important to her. Oh, and she is also very hot.

 Sometime early 2012, I think, I started to exchange emails with Amanda. It was Boston 2012, however, that really sealed my friendship with her. Amanda and I are very different in many ways. She carries emotions on her face while I  often choose not to show my emotions. She is a free spirit while I am more of an analytic thinker. But Amanda won me over with her big heart, genuineness, and incredible ability to connect. She is a ball of energy and sexy muscles. You think you know her from the first meeting, but girl's got layers and depth and wisdom beyond her years.

After many many emails we finally met in Boston 2 weeks ago. Amanda arrived earlier and she and I waited for Jenn (whom none of us had met before) pacing around the airport. And then we got home and talked nonstop in my living room from 12 noon to 2:30am. Boom! It was easy conversation, and we covered topics from G to NR17 and more. There were no hang ups. Everyone was comfortable getting food, sleeping late or waking up early, emailing or talking. It was truly perfect. We walked the streets of Boston, shopped for jeans, ate a few bags of chips and a pound of dark chocolate, ran some, ate some more.... Several bottles of wine and some beers disappeared in the process. Sometime Saturday night I fell asleep on the armchair while these 2 played dress up and took pictures for a dear friend who could not make the trip (sorry, none of those will be posted!). We went to bed at 4am.

In no particular order:

                                                                    Jenn and Amanda!

                                                            Jenn and I - the dark circles under my eyes clearly show that I    
                                                               need my 8hs of sleep!

                                                             Jenn and I

                                            Amanda - this little bundle of muscle - showed us some of her talents!
                                            She can also do 10 pull up in a row, thank you very much!

Monday morning came too soon and I feel that there were so many topics I wanted to cover and did not get to. Next time for sure. In the meantime, really thankful for this little blog and for the email to continue our friendship!

How it goes?

It's been so long since I blogged that I needed a minute to familiarize myself with the new blogger layout. Ha! Lots to say, here it goes, in no particular order.

* Just got back from a little get away (avoid the word "vacation" bc I actually had to work about half of the time) in Connecticut to visit friends and go to Lake Compounce, a waterpark/ amusement park. My little big 48 inches guy is obsessed with waterparks and we ran out of all Massachusetts had to offer. And 48 inches is a very important height - it symbolizes that he does not need mommy with him on the "lights out", "death tunnel", "twister" and other such "thrilling" rides...

* It's been one on my busiest summers in terms of work. Lots of grants to write. I love my job so much that I know I will do it to some extent for the rest of my life past retirement, but the stress of meeting deadlines and responsibilities that affect many peoples is not always, particularly in the summertime:).

* The stress is most likely linked to my recent encounter with shin splints (posterior) on my L leg. This is the type of pain I could run through as it gets better after I warm up, but this strategy combined with icing did not lead to a speedy recovery (ha, ha!) so I have been resorting to the bike, elliptical and pool/pond and I am *almost* ready to return to running.

* Dealing with this setback has been easier than I would have imagined, largely because work has been  very busy, but also because after running in the crazy temps we've had, I enjoy the AC at the gym and the ability to sleep in and work out at any hour I have available regardless of weather. In addition, I did some pretty hard workouts on the bike and elliptical, keeping my HR on the elliptical within MAF, tempo and VO2 max range (which is very hard because of the lack of wind and pounding!) so I feel I am pretty fit. I only miss running when I read about it, which I did little of during the past week.

* Super excited for a girls weekend coming up in 6 sleeps. Two dear friends that I met through this blog are going to come from far and even further away to spend the weekend with me. I hope to be able to run and take them to some beautiful trails in the area. If that won't be possible, there will  be many more things to do...my fridge is stacked, the wine is bought, my boys will leave the house Friday morning and my last grant of the summer will be in Thursday night! Happy!

A bit of fast running goes a long way

Today it has become clear to me how important fast running is for my confidence as a runner. For the past month I have been running mostly aerobic pace, as I built my miles up and up and up. I enjoyed that for a bit, as I was, I think, a bit tired mentally and physically after my intense 5K training. But with the high temps and high humidity, I ended up doing a lot of slow (for me) running. Last week I hit 81 miles but my average pace for the week was the slowest I had seen it the entire year. Rationally, I understood that running in 95-100 degrees means running slower, and that in order to run your first 81 miler in over one year you have to slow down, but I did not like that one bit. 

When I saw a progression into the mid 6s today on my schedule, I was excited but also a bit concerned (OK, I was nervous!). Would I remember to run fast? How in the world I am going to be able to hold 6s if my HR was getting close to my lactate threshold holding high 7s and low 8s during my 21 miler on Saturday? But then I shut my mind up, picked up my i-pod and ran a kick a$$ progression with a HR lower than most of my miles on Saturday, and a perceived effort much lower than anticipated. We had some cooler temps, mid 70s today which helped a ton. My legs felt fresh in spite of the higher (for me) mileage. I felt light on my feet and stayed present in every mile, working hard to slow myself down for the first half of the progression. I loved this run. I loved running the last 2 miles fastish. I loved that I finished the run with a lot left in the tank, and with a renewed confidence that my legs have not forgotten how to run fast (nothing like a behavioral experiment to show one that!)

Now it will be much easier to return to building up my miles and running slower. I know this is not my time for intense speed; my marathon cycle is very different now than it was last year or the year before, and I truly believe that this periodization is going to work well for me. I already feel my legs are getting stronger and have adapted to the miles. I still have my speed in spite of no speed work since early May. 

Things are progressing well. I love running!

Kids, marathon training and books

In the past weeks I have started several blog posts only to leave them unfinished as drafts. Lots of little ideas pop into my mind and then I lose them or find them incredible boring, or too private, and let them go.

We are having a busy beginning of the summer. The weather has been finicky with lots of rain, but we managed a few trips to the pool, which are always nice. I am getting used to having a 6 year old who can leave the house and play with his friends for a few hours at a time without an adult present. Sure, sometimes there are fights, but it is amazing to me how quickly kids forget and move on. There are also missing packs of mini kit kats, and chairs stalked to get to said kit kats which are shared among friends, and fire hydrants to be opened, and tupperware containers to be taken as little houses for insects (my "good tupperware") but all in good fun! I love our neighborhood and the 8 kids on the street are like my own.

Marathon training is going well. I am building up miles, running mostly easy, and actually enjoying the no pressure running. I ran 19 miles today and felt good but my feet hurt for the last 5. It is amazing to me how quickly I lose fitness. I always struggle with pain in my feet during the first big weeks of marathon training, and even getting out of bed is painful for a while. But somehow it all goes away as my body gets strong and adapts, and I know that pretty soon I will be running stronger and faster. My Garmin 210 is really keeping me honest. It measures the miles .2-.3 longer than the Garmin 305:)

I am reading a lot. I am a nonfiction reader and I binge on good books. I read Chrissy Wellington's book in 2 days (and I worked those 2 days). I ate, dressed, walked and even ran (on the TM) while reading. Loved it so much. Loved her first coached and completely got that type of coaching style and how it could make a champion. I also read Scott Jurek's book "Eat and Run". I am not a cook, and so the "eat" part got lost on me, but the "run" part was interesting. It was an easy read and had some good tips for runners, particularly beginner runners.

In other news, I am forbidding myself from buying any more Lulu shorts, whether or not they are on sale. There, I put it in writing! And no, I will not tell you how many Lulu shorts I own.

Randoms:)

* We turned the fireplace on tonight. 60 degrees in the house in June. WTF, Boston?
* I bought a yogurt at Whole Foods when I left work this afternoon, as I wanted some fuel before my run. Only when I got to the train station (about 10 min after WF) did I realize that I forgot to return the basket. Almost as impressive as when Chris found the toothpaste in the fridge several years back when I was writing my dissertation. Stress much?
* It has been raining non stop since Saturday.
* I ran through water up to my knees on the bike path this Sunday.
* Every year Chris transforms me into a Celtics fan; I end up biting my nails, staying up into the wee hours and watching every single game. Game 5 tonight. Go Celts!
* My almost 7 years old has finally mastered riding his 2 wheeler. After unsuccessfully chanting "don't leg go, I am scare, I am scared" he switched to a little song "Petru can do it, yay, yay, yay, Petru can do it" and proceeded to ride with no help. The smile on his face was precious. And good lesson for both of us:)
* Taking 10 days off of running slowed me down by 30 secs/mile, which came down to 20 secs/mile in just one week. In 2 more weeks I'll be just where I was before. Perfect. Truly enjoying running again:)