Wednesday, September 30, 2009

5 miles and still going strong!

Wow. Training over the weekend was intense. Saturday's group run was at Miramar Lake, not too far from home. We worked on distance this weekend, rather than speed. 5 miles! Woo hoo! That is the farthest distance so far this training season. And it's just going to get longer. I think next week we'll be increasing it another 1 or 2 miles.
I did the lake in about an hour and fifteen. Not too bad. I have a personal goal to work on. I want to try and get 5 miles done in one hour. I know it's possible, but it's going to take a little work. Saturday trainings I focus more on the needs of my mentees rather than my own, so I have to do some distance training during the week. And this past Saturday I did all walking. There was no running involved. Instead I worked with one of my mentees on speed. She's a fast walker, but I think it helps to have her long legs. :) So to walk 1:15, I think if I were to add in some running intervals, doing 5 in 1:00 is definitely possible.

Last Wednesday at group training, I didn't have any mentees with me. I was by my lonesome. No walkers. So the coaches had me work on speed. I did 40 minutes at a fairly steady fast pace and felt great! Since I had told Coach Dave that I wanted to try running a little, he is having me work on a 4/1 interval to see how my lungs and I can handle that. 4 minutes walking, 1 minute running. It's doable. :)
Zoe came with me again. Coach Dave LOVES having her run with him and I can say that Zoe absolutely loved it too! She was a happy and tired dog.

Tonight's group run is in Balboa Park. So far most of my mentees are planning on being there. We're doing TEMPO training tonight. Will let you know how it goes.

Monday, September 21, 2009

Happy Birthday To Me!



Today is my 30th birthday! I can't believe I'm 30 already. 3 decades of me. Crazy. But I'm excited for what this next decade will bring. Since Monday is really not a good day to celebrate, I'm throwing myself a big birthday bash on Saturday. It should be LOTS of fun.

I did get up and go for a run today! Well more like a walk/run. More walking than running. My achilles is still hurting but not as bad. It actually feels a lot better, but I decided to take it easy.
I've been working on a personal goal to try and do 2.5 miles in 30 minutes. I'm getting close. I did 2.27 miles in 37 minutes. Though I did walk almost all of that, so I think it's pretty good. I figure if I can do 5 miles in one hour, than I can finish the race in just over 2:30, which would be totally awesome considering I did 13.1 miles last year in 3:33. So it's just a goal of mine. I'll let you know when I reach it.
We have training on Saturday at Lake Miramar. If you go all the way around the lake, it's almost 5 miles. 1 hour to get around it would be awesome. But I think that's something I have to accomplish on my own time and not on Saturday. I want to make sure that my mentees stay at a good pace and not push themselves too hard. I want them healthy and not in a hospital. If I can get them to walk it in 1:30, that would be great. I want them to start at one thing/one goal and then work their way up - pick up speed or whatever it is they need to cross the finish line.

Well, I'm going to go enjoy the rest of the day! Have a good week!

Sunday, September 20, 2009

Recap of the Week

So I realized it's been about a week since I last wrote. Let me catch you up.

My fundraising is going super duper well! I'm already up to about $1700 and I just got 2 more donations in this weekend which should bring me up to about $2000. You guys are awesome! Please keep forwarding out my fundraising webpage to all your friends, family, co-workers, etc. You know what's really cool is that I've had a few people donate $26.20 in honor of the 2 half marathons. 13.1 x 2 = 26.2 It's AWESOME!! I love it!
So I've got about $3000 more til I reach my goal so keep them coming!


Wed (16th), we had a really good run/walk. Group training was at Mission Bay again. I took Zoe this time with me. She was soo good. Everyone loved her. Even Coach Dave fell in love. He ran with her on the way back. Zoe LOVED it. When I run with her, she still sort of has some freedom to sniff since we don't go so fast. But with Coach Dave, he's a runner in the true sense of the word. Zoe actually go to RUN. And from what Dave said, she was actually going faster than him, but he didn't want to push her too hard since he wasn't sure if she could take it. I told him next time to go as fast as he wants. She'll keep up. He's excited to do it again. I think as long as we have runs on Wednesdays at Mission Bay, I'll probably bring her. She'll be our Wed night mascot. Now I just have to work on getting Zoe her own "I get the runs for Crohn's & Colitis" t-shirt. That would be so awesome.

I wasn't able to make the Saturday group run because of Rosh Hashana, the Jewish New Year. I had to be a good Jew and go to temple. So needless to say, this weekend has been training free. But I'll get back to the grind on Monday.
I've been feeling some pain in my right achilles. I think I need to stretch it out and do some strengthening exercises. It totally kills to try and walk. And I don't even know why it started. I don't remember aggravating it at all. It sucks. I'll have to email the coaches and find out if there's anything else I can do besides the calf stretches to get it healed. Bleh. No pain, no gain. Right?!

Well, I'm gonna go work on healing my achilles. Send positive thoughts my way. Thanks!

Sunday, September 13, 2009

The End of Week 3

I can't believe how awesome you guys are!! I have now reached 25% of my goal! And I have a handful of names to be adding to my racing jersey. Keep those donations coming!!

Yesterday's training was in La Mesa at Lake Murray. I can honestly say that I do not ever recall being at that lake (in my almost 30 years of life). It's really gorgeous! I love Lake Miramar, but this one has these gigantic geese honking around everywhere. It's really cool. Though the trail doesn't go all the way around the lake, you can still get a good 6 miles or so it if you go out and back. I think we did about 3.5 maybe 4 miles total, which is really good. A little running. A little walking. It was pleasant.
I'm concerned my mentee, Sherry, is pushing herself too hard. I love that she is so motivated to get out there and train and try and run a little. But I'd rather her walk and work on maybe a faster pace, than see her get complications from running (if it's been too soon since her surgery) and relapse. But only Sherry knows her body, I'm just here for moral support.
Bruce is doing awesome. He's picking up speed really well and before he knows it, he'll be ready to do some running/walking intervals at a good pace.

We had a nutrition clinic after training. Learned some new things. I went out to Target today and bought some G2 (the lower calorie Gatorade). I haven't tried it before but I guess it's supposed to be better (less sugar) for training. Though there are better sports drinks out there, that's all that Target had while I was there. I need to go into REI and pick up some Power Bars. I have some of the energy shots from last year (which I think are still good), but I don't have power bars.

I went with the Dale's to D.Z. Aiken's for brunch afterwards. I LOVE that place. The challah french toast is my favorite. They hadn't been their before so it was nice to be there for their first experience at DZ's. I'm thinking we might have to do breakfasts more often after trainings on Saturday. It's a good way to get to know my mentees better and to help them brainstorm for fundraising ideas. They have to raise $6800 I believe in order to get all 3 of them to Vegas. But I know they can do it. We'll come up with some good stuff for them to do.

Anyways, I can't believe it's already the end of training week 3. Only 12 more to go! Vegas will be here before I know it.

Friday, September 11, 2009

Donation Received!

So I sent out the letters on Wednesday. And guess what?!! I just received my first donation in the mail!
My thanks go out to Dr. Fred Larson, my dentist. He donated $100 and I will be adding his name to my jersey for race day! That brings me to $571 and 11% of my goal.

Keep them coming guys!!

Click here to donate now!

Wednesday, September 9, 2009

My Mentor Shirt























How awesome is this shirt?!!
I finally got my mentor t-shirt and I'm so excited! We have a run tonight at 6pm so I'll definitely be sporting this.
It's so orange, you can see me a mile away!

Sunday, September 6, 2009

Awesome Mentees

So I finally got to meet my mentees, well almost all of them. They are super nice. I have a family I'm working with. A husband and wife duo. They are too cute! The wife has Crohn's, which almost took her life last year but she's doing great now! And I'm so proud to have her and her husband as my mentees. They are starting out as walkers, but in the future, they want to be able to work up to running. PERFECT! I can do that! I can get them there.


Our group training was in Encinitas this time. I've never run up there. It was a nice run/walk. We ran along the coast highway. I think we did about 3 miles in just shy of 45 minutes. Not too shabby. I got some good advice from one of the coaches we have about walking. Since walking, I've found that I've been using totally different muscles and the pain I've been having on my shins (not shin splints) is completely normal. It means that my muscles are working to get stronger and eventually the pain will go away. That's good news. And I got some good stretching suggestions for my shins. Yay!
Oh, I almost forgot...I ran for a while too during the training - for about 8 minutes! It was awesome! I'm working on stretching those lungs out. I still haven't called the acupuncturist yet, but I will. I think probably some time this week.
There are 2 of us walking mentors. Me and Jake. I found myself at the training in between the fast walkers and the slower ones. I think my walk/run intervals will be good. I met a couple new participants who just joined our team on Saturday morning. Both walkers. One is the fast walker (she has long legs) and the other is more my speed. Not sure which of us mentors they will be matched up with, but I'll be very happy to have one or both of them.
I have one more mentee who Jess said probably won't train a lot with us as he is part of Team Fusion (a large group of people from a company who joined Team Challenge). But I hope to meet him soon. At least I can support him via email or phone.


I took today off from training. Back to the streets tomorrow.
Hope you're all having a great Labor Day weekend!

Friday, September 4, 2009

Picture of the Day


Zoe is completely pooped out from our walk/run today. I think she'll
sleep well the rest of the day.
Wish I could say the same. I've got errands to run. But at least I
feel energized, right?!

Thursday, September 3, 2009

The Power Of 3

So I've been matched up with 3 mentees. I have not met them yet, but I'm hoping that they will be at the training on Saturday in Encinitas. I'm looking forward to being able to help them and answer all their questions (or at least the ones I have the answer to). Tonight/tomorrow I'm supposed to introduce myself via email and remind them to come out to the training on Saturday, make sure they're out there starting to fundraise and "sell" how much fun trainings can be! I can do that. :)


Ugh! This weather sucks! It's so hot, even at 8:30am! I'm good with high 70s low 80s, but high 80s and feels like 90s, does not give me motivation to run or even walk. I guess I'll have to get up earlier. But I'm doing it! Yay me!

Wednesday, September 2, 2009

Fundraising Letters


I finally finished addressing about 100 letters to be mailed to family
and friends. I hope this works like it did last year! They even have
self addressed stamped envelopes. How can you not write that check?
Please pass on the info to all of your family and friends. I could use
all the help I can get. $5000 is still my goal and I'm only at 5%.
I included a picture of my letters awaiting the post office.

There's a run today at 6pm in Mission Bay. I hope it cools down by then, at least a little. Running in 90 degree weather is really not all that fun.
I hope you are all staying cool in this heat!