She Do Run Run: July 2013

Sunday, July 14, 2013

Run for the Buzz

OMG--I'm 60! That means a new age group. To start things off, I ran a 10K yesterday. It's been a while since I've raced that distance. Truth be told, I haven't even done much running beyond 5 miles until the last two weeks. I've only raced 5ks so far this year, so it was time to set a record for my new AG. The Brian Waterbury Memorial Rock to Pier is a point to point run on the beach, from Morro Bay to neighboring Cayucos. There's also a half marathon, which loops back to Morro Bay. Although two of my friends were running the half, I knew I wasn't in any shape to race that distance. We started out together, but they were soon ahead of me. I thought I was doing pretty well, and although I started to tire, I never stopped for a walking break. I was pretty focused and didn't do much chit-chatting along the way. I looked for people who I thought I could keep pace with, but didn't find any. I also looked for runners that I could pick off. So I was vaguely aware of my fellow runners but focused on finishing. One woman started to pass me and I spend up. As I neared the pier, which was the finish line, I heard someone say, "I'm coming in with you." I don't know who she was talking to, but my thought was, "Oh no, you're not!" I may be slow, but I'm still competitive. Mostly we ran on hard packed sand, but you had to run on soft sand to cross the finish. I was steps behind a woman, and then I realized I could cross before her so went for it. Hey, it means one number lower in the overall place. I got my comeuppance though. The results gave us the exact same time, and put her name in first! My marathon training plan called for me to run 9 miles, which means I had 3 miles to make up. So instead of taking the bus back to the start in Morro Bay, where food awaited, I decided it would be smarter to run the six miles back. I figured I'd jog 3 miles then walk the rest. Except I forgot how much I hate walking--it's so slow! I also forgot that I had run hard the first 6 miles and that maybe I should take that into consideration. It occurred to me about two miles out, but by then I didn't want to turn around. I tell you, that was the longest 6 miles I've run in awhile. I doubt that I even ran 3 miles. I was sore and tired, after having only 5 hours of sleep the night before. And I was alone. Although there were plenty of runners and walkers who were heading towards the pier, no one seemed to be running back to the rock at Morro Bay. It was brutal. Kind of like the last 10 miles of a marathon. I had re-filled my water bottles prior to turning back, which helped me wash down the 2 GUs I took. Yes, 2 gels in 6 miles. They didn't help much, except maybe psychologically. My Garmin watch is set to vibrate so I would force myself to run until I felt the watch buzz. Then I would walk. As long as I was running on the beach, I tried to appreciate where I was. Dogs were playing on the beach, young lovers were kissing passionately, and surfers were riding the waves. The race started at low tide which was good for runners but bad for sand crabs. I avoided one but I'm sure someone else behind me got it. Poor sand crabs were trampled under the hordes of running feet and I saw evidence of that as I ran back to Morro Bay. I saw a few interesting birds. Here's a sandpiper. I love their long beaks, designed for digging deep in the sand for tasty sand crabs.

And here's a pretty white egret. At least, I think that's what it is. I'm not much of a birder.

You don't have to be a birder to know a mile marker. This sign for the half marathoners meant I only had one more mile to go. Hallelujah!

After arriving at the staging area, I was rewarded with scrambled eggs, hash browns, bread and delicious strawberries from nearby Santa Maria. Then I looked up my results--1:13:40, 15th place in my age group. And to add insult to injury, my left foot is swollen and I've got it wrapped. Hopefully with a little TLC I'll be able to keep on my marathon schedule, since my next run isn't until Tuesday. I'll keep you posted.

Friday, July 05, 2013

End of a Decade

Tomorrow I turn 60. Right now I'm not too excited about that, but I'll get over it. Birthday's haven't bothered me since I turned 30, but 60 is hitting me hard. Oh, well. I started running 10 years ago, so that I could run a marathon to celebrate turning 50. I never anticipated where that would take me. Of course I have to run a marathon as a 60 year old! I once saw a woman at the Twin Cities Marathon who was in the 75-79 age group. What a pair of legs she had. She is my inspiration for continuing to run marathons. Her name is Joy and she's from Los Gatos. There was a mention about her in Runners World last fall. I've decided to run the Paso Robles Marathon, which is at the end of October. Now I just need to register, ha, ha. I started training this week. My girlfriends are running New York, which is the week after Paso, so we'll be training together. We have a three day a week plan, with cross training on three other days. The race is in 17 weeks. The highest mileage is 33 miles per week, which is low, but I'm hoping with the strength training and cycling I'll be fine. Yesterday I ran a 5K, finishing in 33:18 (Garmin time). I wasn't too thrilled with that finish, but looking back at 2005 and 2006 5Ks, I'm about 3 minutes faster. Of course, I would prefer to be running sub-30 minutes. But this was my last race in this age group. (Did I mention I'm turning 60 tomorrow?) While cleaning up the other day, I found an old receipt and realized I've been doing Personal Training for a year now. I did it to make me a better runner, but my mileage has been so low that it didn't seem to have much of an impact. Hopefully I'll see the payoff during my marathon training. Tomorrow is my first long run--8 miles. We're heading out at 6 a.m. I'm having a birthday party tomorrow night, so I'm going to have to take a nap in order to stay awake past 8 p.m.! Have a great weekend, everybody!