The challenge of every day

2018 was a slog year. I was excited about the smaller races I go to do (pretty much all triathlons), but my two goal races were disappointing. I ran the Kentucky Derby marathon in Louisville in April and the race organizers started packing up the race before they said they would and did not divert the back of the pack runners properly, leading to many runners probably not running the full 26.2. I’m pretty certain that, despite my best efforts, I ran only 24/25 miles of the proper course. My entire lower left side was in a pretty significant amount of pain. Overall, the only awesome thing about participating in that race was getting to see my friend Tinley.
Since my last post here was a race report of my 70.3 in August, I’ll simply echo the ending sentiment of it here: I could have pushed harder, I could have done better. Maybe in 2020 or 2021, I will try to conquer the distance again.

This sets up something I’ve talked about here a few times before: excuses vs. reasons. Last year, I had to take it easy due to injuries. But the thing about recovering from injuries is you don’t want to push too hard for fear you’ll re-injure yourself, but you don’t want to take it too easy for too long  if you’re actually capable of pushing. It’s a hard balance to strike. It’s also so easy to think yourself incapable of getting a workout done if one of the last times you attempted the workout, you were not able to do it for a valid reason. You want to take it easy “just in case”, which is fine until you realize you’re doing that every single time; maybe even cutting runs short or putting them off for that reason, too often. The more out of practice with pushing yourself you get, you might end up stopping altogether. I had a lot of valid reasons, last year, for taking it easy, making sure I healed properly. I only two or three miles at a time once or twice a week after my 70.3, if even that. I tried hard to focus more on getting back into the gym to get stronger, rebuild muscle so there would be less chance of injury, but that never quite happened consistently.

At the beginning of December, I started training for the Ann Arbor Probility Marathon, which is at the end of March. Less than a week into training, I got downed with a stomach bug and was not able to train very much. The second week, I had a prior commitment that, while causing me to spend a lot of time on my feet, caused me to break up my run over a 24-hour period and I still fell two miles short of the allotted run mileage. A week after that, I had holiday celebrations and the beginning of (what I thought was) a rough cold, so I ended up having to break up my long run over another 24-hour period. Days later, my cold became a different beast entirely. I felt so laid out and miserable. Getting through the holidays was a little rough and I laid in my bed for a couple days after that, sleeping on and off. I was tired just getting up to go to the bathroom, the pressure in my head was tremendous, everything felt awful. By the time my next long run came around, I was feeling better, though not 100%. I figured I was well enough to attempt my mileage (it was a step-back week so it was “only 10”, compared to the 13 from the week before). I knew I might be slow, but there was no reason I couldn’t do it. The pressure in my head grew with every step and, by mile four, I was feeling more and more disoriented. I got in a little over six of the ten miles.

Going into this past week, I was apprehensive about my ability to get my training done as written because I had about four weeks of proof that I could not.
My first run was a track run and I had so many reasons why I could cut my run short, but I kept running and forcing myself to think about those reasons. While I was afraid I physically couldn’t do it because I was still recovering, I realized I was doing fine. I was going to keep running until I truly felt like I physically wasn’t able to do it anymore. But that point never came. I was able to do it and I wouldn’t have known it if I hadn’t tried to push myself past the voices in my head telling me slightly valid reasons why I couldn’t. The next run was a tempo run and, once again, I was thinking I might not be able to complete the whole run. “This is hard.” And I realized that I had been having to take it easy and giving myself grace so much over the past year, that I forgot that it’s supposed to be hard. I wasn’t hurting, I wasn’t too out of breath, I wasn’t disoriented- physically, I was just fine. It was hard in the exact way it is supposed to be hard. You get done with a run like that and you know you put in the exact amount of effort you should have and got out of it what you needed. It felt so good to push myself like that again and it had been the first time in a long, long while.
Yesterday was my long run for the week. 14 miles. I went out with no expectations, but given the triumphs of the week, I was hopeful. Everything was going pretty well. I let myself be spontaneous with the route, which I tend to do if I feel my mental stamina is at risk (given that I was attempting 14 consecutive miles when I hadn’t run more than 8 miles consecutively since August, I felt it was). At mile 8/9, I started to fade a little. As I started to get my second wind around mile 10, my legs started to get tight. If I had been at a different point in my route, I might have only tried for 12 miles. But I knew that, by the time I could try to shorten it, I’d already be at mile 11. 11 miles was too close to 14 for me to quit. I had to do a lot of walking out of the last three miles, probably about a mile or mile and a half cumulatively, but I finished all 14 miles. I kept checking in on social media to keep me going throughout it all, which is rare for me, but I knew I needed the boost.

I’m getting back to pushing myself again. This isn’t just about running. I need to refocus and remember why I do what I do. It’s not just about doing new things or reaching new bests. I can push myself while doing things I’ve done before, in fact, it’s necessary. I need to push myself to strength train consistently, I need to push myself to hone my nutrition, I need to push myself to do my best instead of just aiming to get something done.

Hello, again

Every time I think I should write another post, I see how long it’s been and don’t know if it’s relevant anymore. And, for awhile, I claimed I wouldn’t turn this into a blog about racing, except that’s part of my health journey. So anyway, I completed my first 70.3 (aka Half-Iron) yesterday and my friend Kelly demands a race report, so I figured I would write it here.

Fears going into this: 1) In April, while training for my 6th marathon, I got a case of what runners call “dumb butt” and pretty much since then, I have been trying rest, stretch, and strengthen to fight further injury, but to no avail. Given a few other events/factors, this led to a hamstring strain in June, which I had to attempt to train through. As I got closer and closer to yesterday’s race, I was getting more worried about the run of the race, which is usually the easiest part for me, but my hamstring only seemed to cooperate when perfectly taped with kinesiology tape. 2) Michigan Titanium (the race) has a somewhat notoriously hilly bike course. I live where it is very flat. In the beginning, I planned to try to travel to hillier climes to train once or twice. However, we ended up moving and between that, races, and other commitments, I was unable to make that happen so I knew I was undertrained in that respect.

I don’t get too freaked before big races because it gets to a point where I can’t change anything, all I can do is trust what training I have and just do it. I knew that’s what I had to do. I knew I was trained/strong enough, just enough to do this race, but I knew I might not be able to push myself. I knew I wasn’t strong enough to hit the times I hoped for, it didn’t stop me from hoping, trying. What’s the point if you don’t try?

My stomach was uncharacteristically in knots the morning of. I honestly couldn’t figure out if it was for me or for Kelly. And then I just wanted to get into the water and start this. Overall, the swim went really well for me. The water was just beautiful- calm and warm. It was only toward the end that sighting was a little difficult and I got slightly off course. There were also a few people who ran into me, not in the usual ‘grab a foot sort of way’, but seemed to be swimming perpendicular to me and the course and actually t-boned me. Overall though, I was happy with the swim leg. For outsiders to triathlon, and half-iron swim is 1.2 miles.

I felt surprisingly okay coming out of the water, looked over at my friend’s bike to see if she was out of the water yet, and then took off knowing she was probably right behind me. One of the things I love about races is that, with each and every one, I get a little calmer, a little better at the logistics. Particularly with triathlon, getting on my bike quickly and efficiently gets easier. I got off on such a good start, but my legs felt stiff and it took about five or six miles to warm up. And the hills- OHHHHHHH, THE HILLS! For a little while, after my legs loosened up, the hills didn’t seem so bad…for a little while. Eventually, I realized my neck, arms, and shoulders were getting the most tired. Not my legs or anything else. I had gone for longer rides, but I had never gotten that tired before. One the last third of the course, the traffic got dicey, I started getting really scared of how close the cars were to us and how fast they were moving. I don’t think I’ve been on a race course with such small shoulders and that much traffic before. I was definitely starting to go much more slowly as I returned to the hills and as the traffic got worse. I was so happy as I saw the turn for the last mileish to transition! ….and then I got a flat, for the first time. One mile from transition. I was about to run it the rest of the way because I knew I couldn’t change a flat that fast, especially on my back tire (scary scary gears back there), and I was already running longer on my bike time than I had hoped. Yet, fortune smiled upon me and the bike repair van was RIGHT BEHIND ME and changed my tube out in a quarter of the time it would have taken me. I get back on my bike in a flash, hit the dismount line, and run into transition, waiting for my mom to tell me where Kelly is on the bike, but she doesn’t. (The bike leg for a half is 56 miles).

As I pass Kelly’s rack, her bike is there and I know something is wrong and I am freaking out, trying to figure out if my parents are close enough to yell to ask what was wrong, but they were too far. The sun came out during the last half of my ride (it had been overcast and drizzly for most of the morning), so I threw sunscreen on my face, grabbed the usual run stuff, put on my fellow flower that Kelly gave me, and grabbed a very special kerchief.

Yesterday was my Grandma Joan’s birthday. She died 10 years and two weeks ago. I decided to somehow incorporate a kerchief that my Aunt Ellen made out of my grandma’s fabric stockpiles when we participated in the Komen 3-Day the year after my grandma died. I also wore a new tri-suit which featured sunflowers, my grandma’s favorite. I was apprehensive about wearing a different suit than usual, partly because it’s nice to hear, “I love your kit” or “way to go, wonder woman” when you’re having a rough time on the course. All day long, wearing the sunflower kit, I heard, “I love your kit” and “Way to go, Sunflowers”. Every time that happened and every time I wiped my face with my kerchief, I felt her. I don’t know what she would think about this triathlon business. I think, at the very least, she would think I was being brave.

As I ran out of the transition area, hair flopping around, I wasn’t running because I was on the last leg and that is what I’m supposed to do, I am running so I can get to my mom to ask her where Kelly is. She tells me that Kelly says to keep running, she was okay and I needed to keep running. I have to puff my inhaler again, I throw up my hair, Rachel (who rocked the half aquabike) is cheering me on and I try to keep running. Soon, I find my legs are starting to feel the effects of biking the infamous hills. This isn’t the usual post-bike feeling, this different, harder to run through. It’s suddenly very hot and the sun is beating down. And more hills. I hit the first aid station and I’m delighted to find they have ice, I started munching on ice and putting it in my water and that’s when it starts. Every time I take a walk break, I gulp some water. I walk the hills, I gulp the water. A few miles later, the influx of water hits my intestines and I’m luckily close to a portajohn. If I use the bathroom once during any kind of endurance race, I’m usually good, but a half mile past this station and who-knows-how-far from the next, the sudden urge to go hits me again. There is no fear like being on foot in a suburban neighborhood having to suddenly, urgently use the bathroom. I had to stop completely for a few minutes, and then I could walk but only very, VERY slowly. I felt cartoonish in how slowly I was moving. After another five minutes of that, I was able to walk at a normal pace until I hit the next bathroom another mile or so away. I was still nervous to run for a couple miles after that and I waited until my stomach was rightly settled until I tried running. Once the bathroom drama hit, I knew I wasn’t going to be running a whole lot. I tried when I could, but between my stomach and legs, I gave up a little. My brain went into pure survival mode. (The run leg is 13.1 miles).

So, eventually, I finished. My leg, which I was so worried about, didn’t hurt AT ALL, which is part of the reason I feel a little upset with how the run turned out. I wanted to have pushed a little harder. I wonder if I could have done better. My official time was 8:55:45, 25 minutes longer than I hoped even my max would be, but I still got 3rd place Athena (over two hours behind first and second place). I don’t know how I feel about it. I finished, when there are things that could have broken me, but part of me feels like it was a half-hearted effort. I want to go into the next one with my full focus. So yes, much for the same reason there was a second (and third and fourth and…) marathon, there will be another 70.3 because I need to “get it right”. All I know is, while I want to get back to learning how to race short distances again, I am made for endurance events.

I crossed and immediately asked where Kelly was and what happened. She was okay, but was not able to finish the course because of the weather grossness and fueling issues (which definitely almost got me, too, I cannot even imagine attempting a full like she was).

So there it is. The race report. Which took me all afternoon to write. Enjoy.

Happy New Year, but don’t start anew

For most of this year, I felt myself getting weaker, clinging to a shred of “fitness”. I would look in the mirror, thinking that doing so would motivate me to do something about it. I thought I would look in the mirror, be disgusted with what I saw there and want to change it. Instead, I loved what I saw in the mirror. I smiled at the curve of me.
But man, do I hate getting dressed. Clothes that used to be comfortable are now less-so and clothes that were on their way to fitting just right don’t fit at all. That’s one of the more frustrating aspects of gaining weight for me. It’s been four years since I made the first changes that ultimately stuck. It wasn’t a resolution- I had started losing a little weight before the holidays in 2013, but eventually sickness and holiday eating got me off the wagon and I knew I’d need a different tack. Today, I decided to dance in my living room instead of going for a run (Just Dance 4on Wii) because this was one of my first changes four years ago- I started using Just Dance as a way to move more. I’m writing about this because, hours into the new year, I’ve seen friends post about their struggles with their bodies.

I haven’t been to the gym since this past summer and not consistently since the spring. My muscle mass has decreased very much since 2016 and my nutrition is…not so great. The nutrition thing is something I’ve battled back and forth with, but the gym aspect is something I intentionally let go during my last training cycle. While strength training is very important to running, I did not have the mental or emotional strength to keep it up. I knew I probably wouldn’t pick it up again until after New York and I did, in a way, by taking up boxing two or three times a week. As I head back to the gym with the new year throngs, I’m not starting fresh, or getting a re-do; I’m continuing my fitness journey. I put a pause on things when I needed to and nutrition got away from me, but I never stopped working on me in whatever ways I could at the time.

The way we categorize time is simply because it is easiest for our brains to comprehend it and work within its constraints, but was yesterday different from today. Does each year really hold magical powers to empower or destroy? Of course not. Our lives are cyclical. There are ups and downs. Just as sure as we have amazing moments and phases, we have awful moments and phases, but we are not completely different people within these extremes. My point? You do not have to reinvent yourself to do better. You do not have to completely scrap who you are or what you were doing to feel better. Build on who you are, on what you have; gain from the bad and the good. Did you falter in your goals? Keep going, you do not need to start over. You will have awesome streaks and you will have rough streaks, so celebrate when you can and push through when you need to, but it’s all the same life. Try something new, but do not start anew. Keep going.

Post-dance:
This is not my fittest body, nor is it my “un-fittest” body. I got here from my heaviest and also from my lightest. I’m sure I will lose weight, gain more muscle at points in my life just as I am sure that I will gain weight and lose muscle and maintain a whole lot in between those points, but it doesn’t mean I keep giving up and starting over. This is all part of my life and its cycle. So I’ll keep moving forward with whatever body I can muster up at the time.
Best of wishes, my friends.

New York City Marathon

I haven’t written on this blog in over year, despite wanting to, I find it hard to decide in which direction to take it.

However, I am now surrounded by athletes who frequently write race reports and I felt the need to do so for this, my second goal race of the year. And it’s going to be long. Maybe people will shut down while reading my overabundance of detail, but I never know how much readers want to know. Do you want to feel like you were right there with me or do you want the broad strokes? I figure there are probably people in both camps, but I like to write so I write for the former. So, here goes.

I was a little freaked by the fact that I was starting so late. I was worried about having to shift/rethink my food intake and about being more tired than usual, I would have to get up at roughly the same time I usually do to get to the start, but I would be starting and finishing my race four hours later. The race provides shuttles and you get to choose which one would be best for you to take. I chose the library shuttle. There was an extremely long line that wrapped around the block and wove through active intersections, making the flow of the line somewhat ineffective. A fellow participant who had run this race a few times before said that it had never been set up like this before (the line was contained in race barriers), but that they had actually been able to walk right up to the shuttles and board. I can’t help but think this might have been a recent safety development. I kept falling asleep on the bus and part of me was happy, hoping I could get extra rest and part of me was worried that I would be sluggish by the time I started, the more I had to sit/rest. I somehow always forget the rush of a race start- that will wake you up. Once I got through the metal detectors and bag checkers, I found my corral (thinking this was part of my start village, as every color corral had their own) and finally ate my real breakfast (I had a little something when I first woke up, as well). After an hour or so of trying to shut down/decompress, I realized the villages are actually housed farther away from the corrals and I went to find and fulfill the promise of therapy dogs. I helped other runners find their village along the way. Note: While I don’t wish anxiety on anyone, it’s nice to recognize that I’m not the only one freaking out. Though, I wasn’t so anxious once I got acquainted to the layout and had eaten- everything I could control. There was nothing left to do but run.

But first! I feel it is worthy to note that in my three years of running (my two years of distance running)- trails and endurance, I thought I had smelled/seen the worst port-a-johns. NYC proved me wrong. The last time I went before heading to the corral, I almost left the toilet without actually going. Yes, the smells rivaled ultra toilets, but the mess is what astounded me a lot of them. In this particular one, it looked like the person before me tried to squat/hover to pee and failed. They failed in an epic manner. Urine was all over the seat and platform in which the seat resides. Instead of leaving the mess for the next tense runner, I decided to take one for the team and clean up the mess as best I could. Anyway, I had to tell my tale about that one. I suppose it wasn’t the start gun, but that which woke me up before the race.

There’s something about listening to the chatter heading up to the start. People talk about the races they’ve run before, some break out into dance or song, some (like me) stand there quietly  waiting to put one foot in front of the other. There were a couple Brits behind me who were reciting lines from a movie and man, I cannot believe I can’t remember the movie. It was almost something like Mean Girls or Talladega Nights- something hilarious and quoteable, but it was hilarious to hear it in a British accent. That kept me entertained while we waited. As we crept closer to the start line, things got quieter, but there was still a buzz. And then one young woman jumped from behind me, grabbed my shoulder and gave a Dean-ian screech. “Sorry, I’m just so excited and I need a friend!” Her smile as wide as the Cheshire cat. Softly smiling, myself, I guarantee her it’s alright and try to conjure up a way to demonstrate that I share her excitement. But I just stand there with only the slight smile on my face, letting my excitement and nerves turn me into their battleground. I’m not usually too nervous because I’ve done the training and all that’s left to do is trust it and triage issues along the way. However, I was nervous because my training hadn’t gone well- I never had a truly good-feeling long run when I usually get at least one or two a training cycle, I had walked eight miles the day before, etc. I wasn’t nervous I wouldn’t finish, I was nervous I would feel absolutely terrible during a lot of it. My worst marathon was in New Orleans in February 2016 and I never want to revisit that feeling again. Every time I set out to run a marathon, it’s to feel better than I did at the last one.

The gun went off and it’s all a blur. We started out on the Verrazano Bridge, but my color/corral had to run on the lower level. Within each wave there were colors assigned the color determined which route you took for the first few miles. There were three different routes for those first few miles to avoid bottlenecks because the race field is just that enormous. Before I had even known it, I had gone three miles, though it helps that you reach one mile before you even get off the bridge. I chose not to run with my run watch so I didn’t know what mile I was near until I saw the marker. I kept feeling like I was going too slowly because of the push of the crowd so I tried maintaining pace without pushing too hard. There are negatives to running with a watch, but one of the positives is it keeps you from pushing too hard, too fast because you have the reality check of your real pace vs. the pace you feel you’re going. When I look at my splits, I realize I probably started out a little too fast. Around mile five or six, I started to get, what I assume was, a stitch in the side of my chest. I tried to breathe through it, but I finally had to walk and stretch it out. After a mile or so, it finally stayed away. It was hard to keep track of things in Brooklyn because we ran in a straight line for six or so miles and it was just a blur of aid stations and runners and spectators. The crowd of spectators was huge and fantastic. My singlet started chafing my collar bones again, but luckily there was a med tent every mile and they handed out petroleum jelly on popsicle sticks so I grabbed some around mile nine. It worked perfectly, but was a little too much and ended up all over my neck and ended up having to wipe the excess on my shirt and pants. It was around here, I was also recognized by someone with which I had raced a tri earlier in the year. That was a happy coincidence. Soon after, my intestines started giving my a familiar distress signal, way too early, and I decided to stop at mile ten to use the bathrooms- which had the shortest lines I had seen so far. The whole process took at least ten minutes. Since I’ve noted the status of the port-a-johns, I would like to expound on this toilet: in the urinal, someone had discarded a gel pack from…Japan? While I don’t think it is necessary to throw gel packs anywhere but a trash receptacle, it was interesting to see the different packaging of gels from different countries. Unfortunately, the bathroom stop did not end my stomach troubles as I hoped and I started to feel nauseated about a mile and a half later. I kept trying to run through it but it became overwhelming. At mile 12, I was due for a gel and I did not want to take it. I made myself take it anyway, knowing I could feel much worse given I wasn’t even halfway through this race. Slowly, I started to feel better and then we hit the Queensborough Bridge. Ugh. Once again, we were covered because were on the lower level, it was quiet- dead, it was steep and my legs were starting cramp up. I see the 6:00 pacer pass me by, which breaks my heart a little as I was never able to catch back up to the 5:45 pacer after the bathroom even though I had been ahead of them for awhile. I probably stopped three times on that bridge to stretch my legs before I hit the decline of the bridge (which felt a lot shorter than the incline). I get to the bottom, see bathrooms without a line and decide to stop one more time. Joe is supposed to be somewhere in the crowd here because this is right near our hotel. I look for him, but never see him in the roaring Manhattan crowd (but he did see me). Between here (mile 16) and mile 17, something happened. I bounced back in a big way. I didn’t make a full recovery speed-wise, but I felt amazing. It was during this stretch of Manhattan that three female cops (all at different points) cheered me on as ‘wonder woman’; every time, it catapulted me- I had to live up to those cheers. I love wearing my BAWG singlet, besides the fact that it connects me to a wonderful group of badasses, because others love it and because of the kids who look at me with awe. Multiple times, including twice at this race, I’ve seen and heard little girls gasp, pull at the nearest adult’s shirt and reverently whisper, “Wonder Woman.” And I wave or high-five them and their eyes get so big. It’s funny how something so simple, maybe even silly to some, can help out the vibe of a race experience so much.

We reached the Bronx around mile 19 or 20 and I loved every step of it. Even though it was later in the afternoon, dark and drizzly, there were still spectators and, best of all, a group handing out ice-cold water. Cold water is terrible for digestion but, no matter the weather, I will inevitably crave ice to soothe my rising core temp during any distance over 13 miles. Eventually, at least for a little while, the run will devolve into a mission to finish for the sake of finding ice or ice water. The woman who handed me that ice water was an angel of mercy. A goddess. She was my Wonder Woman. Also found in the Bronx: a school or youth center drumline. Nothing keeps you going like a drumline. A mile later, we crossed our final bridge, where I saw one of the only good signs I saw the whole race: #lastbridge. To be fair, there were so many spectators and runners at points, that it was hard to single out signs, if there were any. Now, we were in Harlem. The crowds were nowhere as big, but every single spectator was cheering hard. I felt most at home in the Bronx and Harlem; they felt familiar. In Harlem, we hit mile 22 and that’s when I started to sag. Aid stations were being cleaned out, my calves started to cramp again, and then we started to see a hill slowly rising before us. It just kept coming. The last couple miles blurred together. Because the end of daylight savings time, it was confusingly dark to me, the crowds got bigger again as we moved closer to Central Park and deeper into the heart of Manhattan. As we got into Central Park, there were just so many hills at the end. Up and down, up and down- and not in the fun trail running, rolling hills kind of way. The turns and leaving the park again made it hard for me to tell how far away I was from the finish and my calves were starting to fight me more and more, despite taking extra salt. Finally, there was a huge stage as we started to enter the park again and the finish very (and I mean VERY) slowly came into sight. The lights were blinding and there was a clump of runners right ahead of me. They stopped as soon as their toes crossed the mat and I almost ran right into the wall they had created. I was in a fog, perhaps my usual fog, but it was exacerbated by the dark and crowds. I kept moving so my calves wouldn’t get worse. Unfortunately, they did anyway and it was incredibly painful. I was near tears. I took extra salt tabs and, a little later, Gatorade (which I never drink but was desperate). I finally had to sit on a curb and massage them, just for a minute because I could longer stand on them. The med personnel were trying to keep us moving forward, which I understood, but I was doing absolutely everything that could be done at that moment. I had never experienced cramping like that before. There was one last ‘fuck you’ hill to get to the ponchos/exit and we all looked very much like zombies ambling up it.

This was fifth full marathon in two years and my third this year. I completed the Detroit Free Press Marathon just three weeks prior to NYC and I completed both in the exact same time: 6:08. Given the all of the circumstances, of the race itself and my training for it, I am perfectly fine with that time.  I am most happy about the fact that I felt really quite good during mileage which I often feel terrible.
Five. And counting. Because I just signed up for Louisville 2018.
It doesn’t matter how many I do, it will never not be a big deal to me. I’m still the girl who started this blog. Go back and read all of my struggles when I was still training to run my first 5k races just three years ago. Months later, I ran, not only my first 5ks, but my first 10k, then a few months after that- my first 13.1 and just a few months after that, my first 26.2. In my head, I’m still the girl who thought she’d never be a runner. I’m the 290-pound person who was so close to completely giving up on herself. It will never not be a big deal because I have run five full marathons and one ultra and I still cannot believe what I have done. I can’t imagine ever believing it. All I know is every time I put my feet at that start line, I’m moving forward.

Goals and celebration

I set two goals for myself earlier this year: participate in two triathlons and complete a 50k. The triathlon goal was one I had for a little while and I was excited about it. The 50k goal was one that snowballed with the trickery and encouragement of friends, a goal of which I was apprehensive. As of yesterday, I have achieved both.

Last weekend, I completed my second triathlon. I was supposed to have checked this goal off my list a week earlier, but that race was cancelled due to weather and I was able to compete on Belle Isle (one of my favorite spots) for a discounted price. I was very happy with my swim leg for this race. I didn’t get anxious at all during the swim, even when the current pushed me and some women ahead of me under a buoy. Overall, I took 13 minutes off of my sprint race time.

The trail at Hell Creek Ranch for the Run Woodstock 50k was extremely muddy after a night full of storms. The storms left the air cool, though still a little humid. I felt so badly for 100k and 100 mile runners who ran through the storms all night. By the end of my first 16.6 loop (I had to complete two loops), my hips and feet started to hurt from the pulling of the mud. The last 4 miles of the loop were the worst of the mud madness. Twice I almost slid off of the trail- it was like high stakes ice skating. While it made what might normally be easily run-able parts of the trail completely un-run-able, if the temperature had been 80° with the humidity we had earlier in the week, I would have felt a lot worse and had the same overall pace if not slower. Once again, I’m sure the hundred-ers might rightfully disagree with my preference of the mud to the possible heat.
I don’t know my official time because, for the second time in a week, timing equipment seemed to go wonky around me, but I know I finished around 9 hours and 20 minutes. My knees hurt a lot after and I blame that on the mud as well, but today I feel pretty good. In fact, I really would have loved to go for a short run today and if it wasn’t for my toenails (might have kept them a little too long and my left big toe is actually in a good deal of pain), I might not have been able to stop myself from the temptation of an ill-advised two or three miles.

I have heard people gruffly ask why someone would race long distances. Why would someone tear their bodies down, push themselves so far past the brink of exhaustion, and dedicate their schedules and lives to preparing for such a thing? They ‘pffft’ that “because they can” is not a good enough answer. I have never felt like I could give a succinct answer; it’s a hard thing to put into words. The night before the 50k, I very much believed that I did not belong there and I had no clue why I was doing this. I don’t feel that I gave 100% during training- it was 85-90%, especially toward the end. How could I defend others’ decisions to push themselves like that when I couldn’t even answer the question for myself? Running those trails made me feel alive and happy. While running my first 26.2, there was a point when I was so far past feeling like I had nothing left and then I would tuck my head and burst forth into a run and it fortified my existence. While it wasn’t a particularly long distance, when I came out of the water during my first triathlon (within the first 100 meters, I was ready to give up and go home because I was freaking out so.much.) I was elated. I genuinely enjoy doing these events (especially trail running, as difficult as it can be). However, I found the succinct answer I had been searching for as I crossed the finish line of my first 50k. I participate in endurance events and challenge myself with new, unthinkable things not simply ‘because I can’, but to celebrate that I can. To celebrate that I am alive and that I can. There have been times, times which have even been discussed on this blog, during which I have not always wanted to be alive or did not relish life. Yesterday was difficult and painful, but it wasn’t anywhere near the lowest I have ever been, in fact, it was quite the opposite. Pushing myself to great distance amidst beautiful, changing nature was a high and long before I ever crossed the finish line, I was one step closer to a life well-lived. I am lucky to have the means to participate in these races; it’s a luxury that not many can afford for one reason or another. So, dissenters, I will continue to celebrate that I can do these things in all the ways that I can for all of the different reasons that I can.
Edit: The whole time I was writing this, I kept waiting for the right segue to thank the volunteers at Run Woodstock. There were some aspects that felt a little unorganized and I was a bit harried, but the aid station volunteers were amazing. AMAZING. Almost every single race volunteer I’ve ever had the pleasure of coming across is awesome, but to be a volunteer for something like an ultra and dealing with zombified runners who are aching and just trying to get trough their next step, the constant cheering and the smiles and trying to get the runners whatever they can, just amazing. One aid volunteer at the Richie’s Haven station gave a downtrodden 100-mile-runner the socks off her own feet because the poor runner didn’t have any more dry socks of her own. The runner was crying, saying she couldn’t take someone’s socks right off their feet and the volunteer insisted that she was not running so she did not need running socks on. Just…outstanding. These volunteers were out there overnight with the hundreders, in the same conditions (I’m sure the volunteers took shifts, but still). Thank you, volunteers. It means the world. We could not do this without you.

Emily the vegan?

In my last post, I mentioned becoming vegan. While I find some of the ethical byproducts of being vegan to be a bonus, I started the diet for health reasons. If you like to keep boundaries and often find yourself yelling, ‘TMI’ at someone, then this post might not be for you. While I don’t always shout about things from rooftops, I have always been an open book. I think being open and honest about nearly everything makes life simpler in a lot of ways and sometimes the information shared might help someone else.

My entire pubescent (starting in the 6th grade at age 11) and post-pubescent life has been lived in a shadow of extreme and often debilitating menstrual pain. I was never a student who liked to leave school for any reason. I opted out of field trips in high school so I wouldn’t miss my other classes, but my periods sent me home pale, doubled-over and in tears quite a few times. 3-4 times year, I would have “episodes” so bad, I would throw up from the pain. I have also had to leave work in the past. The other months of the year were lived in fear that that cycle would be one of those episodes, trying desperately to stay on top of a cycle of meds without over-medicating. I taught myself at a young age not to take ibuprofen for anything else (like headaches, or orthodontia-induced pain) because I did not want my body getting so used to it that it would not respond to it when I needed it most during my period. No pain ever matched or exceeded those cramps and backaches.
Little was done, even when, after high school, I went to my first GYN.Tried the pill which was abandoned due to high blood pressure and then a naproxen prescription was thrown my way.

That brings us to the last year and a half, or so. For about year, during much of my weight loss or training, my periods felt better. There was still pain, but it was “more normal” or at least what I imagine normal to be. Every now and then, I needed ibuprofen but I did not need to be taking something every 4-6 hours just to stay upright. At the beginning of the year, it started becoming “bad” again. I hypothesized that this might be because I had gained back a little fat since my first 26.2 and maybe that was affecting my periods, as fat loss might have made it better. Trying to reduce my fat within my usual diet wasn’t seeming to work, so after watching an acquaintance talk about her fat loss with a starchy, vegan diet, I decided to give a it a try. Cutting out meat, cheese, eggs and milk can instantly reduce a lot of fat.

So this, friends, is the very long story behind my current veganism.
Unfortunately, I cannot definitively say whether or not it has worked- my pain since has been skirting the line. What I can say is that the diet has GREATLY reduced my cravings. The overwhelming cravings I would get for sugars is extremely low and not at all overwhelming like it used to be. I don’t really miss animal products like I thought I might. I went into this just to see if it could help but I don’t know if I want to go back, even if it turns out that the fat loss is completely unrelated to my pain. While it can be inconvenient, this is actually a pretty good time to be a vegan. I can find one whole aisle in Kroger that has stuff I can eat, though I don’t actually eat the fake meat and cheese stuff. There are a fair amount of restaurants that I can find stuff to eat, somewhat easily- probably more easily than 20 years ago.
The book I read that convinced me to transition into being a vegan is called The Starch Solution, but be warned: the author comes off as arrogant and kind of an ass. However, much of the data he presented was enough to pique my interest, I just decided to look past his personal anecdotes and opinions.

Mostly, I wanted to write this to present another reason, one that might not be considered, for trying out a vegetarian or vegan diet.

Lost, then found

I have been wanting to write this post for months, but between training and work, I have less time and discipline to devote to this blog.

It was an easy run, nothing special, but steps into it, I was hit with a wave of epiphany. It was an epiphany about how this journey has morphed and been so much bigger than I could have imagined, even when I wrote 5k for Freedom. I could not fully comprehend how completely I would reclaim myself. It was just about being happy and trying to let go of more recent baggage. I am Emily Elizabeth again. Not the Emily Leach from 7/8 years ago, not the Emily Stowell of 2005. I am the Emily Elizabeth who stood tall at age 9, defiant but loving. Excited, but nervous. Outspoken and earnest. Unabridged.  I am an Emily I never thought I could recapture.

This revival is absolutely not because I was buried under fat. I did not find myself through weight loss. I found myself by believing in myself more and more, bit by bit, opening myself up to self-love. Through self-love, I wanted to eat healthier to feel better. Through self-love, I wanted to move more to feel better. Through self-love, I had more faith in myself to keep challenging myself, keep going because it made me feel more alive than I had felt in a very long time. Slowly and inadvertently, I started to uncover a girl who I thought had been lost forever due to the ongoing war that is life. Eventually, as I saw flashes of a hand, an eye, a knee, I realized she was not gone; I had hidden myself under baggage and pain and a belief that my voice was not relevant or worthy. Every step, every goal met made me realize this was so far from true and I found my voice again. Now I sing out wherever, whenever I can- letting everyone know that I am beautiful, strong,and loved and they are, too.

In a week, I will be going back to Copper Harbor, MI to participate in the Run the Keweenaw festival for the second time. It was on these trails that I started to really become something amazing- I reconnected with the girl who loved nature and hiking, my primal self loved running through the woods with semi-reckless abandon, and I kept going through really tough racing conditions (high heat, humidity, and hills)- the toughest I had faced to date. I am so excited.
To continue the update: I completed my first triathlon, a sprint distance, on June 12 in Ada, MI at the Grand Rapids triathlon under the Athena category. I am training for my first ultra, a 50k. I have another tri and a few other races (mostly trail) coming up over the next few months. I have not really seen the scale move outside of the 185-175 range in well over a year, but I believe my body composition has changed. I am strength training at least two days a week, which is usually all I can manage between the other components of training. I am currently on a vegan diet and have been since April, which is another post for another time, but was not motivated by weight.
If there are readers out there who want me to try harder to post more, comment or like this post and it will let me know that there are people who want to continue to read about my journey and I will start making this more of a priority- just know that this is no longer about weight loss unless someone has specific questions.

Let me tell you, I have missed me.

New Orleans Rock’n’ Roll Marathon

During the first marathon, I hit a wall a little past midway and I was in utter dismay about my life choices. It was slow-going after that, though I managed to get through it and regain some energy.

Just a few hours later, I was ready for my next marathon because I knew I could feel better, do better.

A couple weeks later, I was back into training (though it was started slowly and lesser mileage than intended due to a minor injury). The winter training was rough on me, I think, in large part due to the way the lack of light affects my mood. I have since promised never to train for more than 13.1 during the winter again.

Going from training in icy, snowy weather to bright, glaring sun…I knew it would be rough. even though I spent all summer training for my first full, the rules of water intake had been absent my training long enough for me to forget them and I ended up drinking too much water at once in feverish hopes of combating the sun staring me down. This led to nausea, sloshy stomach, and a porta-john stop- ugh!

There was a lot of walking when the nausea would kick in or the sun was just too much. I was stuck on the image of being able to chew on ice and get something cold into my system (as the water at the aid stops and in my bottle were understandably lukewarm). For at least 10 miles, I had loops of risque tableaus of ice running through my head. Oh, elusive ice. Of course, the more walking you do at that point, the harder and harder it is to get running.

I finished a half-hour over my first full time and it irks me a little that, for my first two races of the year, I feel the need to qualify statements about those races with, “given the conditions…”.

Once again, it only took me a few hours after crossing the finish line for me to say, “I can do better”. In fact, with every day that passes between me and that finish line, the need to try again grows. However, I had made a promise to myself that this was the last longer distance I was doing for awhile…I guess I’ll just have to see if I can keep that promise. Though, I am excited to change my workouts now and focus on other things which is something I have not been able to do much in eight months. I am really happy to put more energy back into weight training and start training for my first triathlon.

While I would like to go back one day to show the NOLA course who’s boss, I have a hard time believing I could participate in another Rock n Roll series event. This event had approximately the same amount of participants as the Freep events, yet it took around an hour and a half to get everyone over the start line. I find that pretty unacceptable. I crossed a little over an hour after the first horn blew when I was expecting my wait time to be 30 minutes at most (which is just above my wait to start at the Freep).

I want to publicly thank my friend, Katy, for opening her house, time, and resources to me this past weekend. It really went more perfectly than I could have imagined. I am humbled to have such a friend and support system. She was there for me all weekend, dealing with my quirks, slow race time, and being a perfect host and genuinely amazing friend.

As mroe and mroe time is put between me and the NOLA course, I become both accepting of what happened and slightly more bitter with hindsight. “But I made it That is two more marathons than I ever thought I could do and it won’t be my last!” And then, “Why did I do THAT?! Why did I drink so much water? I know better.”
Que sera and c’est la vie.

The journey continues.

 

It’s been quite a while

Mostly because I was trying really hard to get back to basics after the marathon. It was extremely hard to reign in my eating once I was done with the major mileage for awhile. During training I did well, I didn’t gain any weight as many marathon-trainers can, but I was I was still obviously eating more calories to keep up with the mileage. During training, while I would not have minded it, weight loss was not a priority- being in an energy hole during a run or a workout feels absolutely terrible and even a little scary sometimes so I tried to eat to make sure that did not happen.

After training, Halloween hit and I went on a few candy binges while also being sidelined with a minor injury. As I said, I had to go back to the beginning and try to be stricter with how often I had a “treat” and substituting things like fruit and whip cream when cravings for sweets were at an all-time high. It was slow getting back into a regiment; it took weeks to even face that I needed to get free of some re-formed bad habits and months to really feel like I had gotten back to me, fully.

I have been inspired to write a new post because, lately, I feel like I have seen a lot of people pushing themselves into extremes of unhealthy behavior because they think it will help them lose weight. While I do not purport that everything I have done to lose or maintain weight will work for everyone, I do know that one’s aim when they’re looking at weight loss should be health. Starving yourself is not healthy. Depriving yourself is not healthy. These tactics are not healthy for your body or mind. I suggest that people get a very general idea of how many calories their bodies burn if they did absolutely nothing but lay in bed all day. To do that, you can use a basal metabolic rate calculator. These kinds of calculators are not the most accurate for calculating BMR, but they can help in giving a general estimation. Once you have this estimation, you can see how much energy your body expends by doing nothing and I feel this could help some realize that they need to eat to fuel their body throughout the day. Said in another way, I’m hoping that utilizing such a tool would help people to realize that eating a meal of only 200 calories is not sufficient to get you through your morning or afternoon. Based on an online calculator, I burn around 1500 calories a day just by breathing and living and it was higher when I was heavier because it takes a lot more effort to keep a heavier body going. To measure your exact metabolic rate, you would have to go to a testing facility which can be found in some hospitals or universities. Metabolic rates change as weight and lean muscle mass is lost or gained.

Food for thought: Is this sustainable? When you look down at your plate, ask yourself whether or not eating meals like that one is sustainable for the nest 6 months or year. Is it too small? Does it make you feel extremely deprived? Will you still be hungry afterward?
When you hit the gym, is this sustainable? Are you going at it too hard? Could you or should you really need to be at the gym for two hours two times a week? Probably not.
Try to form habits that you can see yourself sustaining for the rest of your life. You and your body are in this together for the long haul, be kind and good to it.

5014

I had a post that I started writing a little while ago and, in fact, had completed and then…I accidentally deleted it. I have enough saved that I can piece it back together, but since I just finished my first full marathon yesterday, I think I’ll get a post about that out of the way first.

Training
I started running in March 2014, with a C25K-type phone app. I had a hard time, for a couple different reasons, getting up to running a whole 5k straight through in the time that most of those apps give you to do so (usually 8 weeks). But then, in November, I ran my first 10k and I ran it straight through. After that I signed up for my first half marathon in April 2015. I ran 2 more half marathon (and countless other types of races) while training for my full marathon and then, came the day: the Detroit Free Press/Talmer Bank Marathon. I used the Hal Higdon Novice 2 training plan as I had used Hal Higdon for my first half and liked it. I changed the schedule around a little to fit my own schedule.

The Report
All of the aid stations were great. There was a great energy from the volunteers and I was so grateful to them and the rest of the communities of Detroit and Windsor for being involved in cheering us on and keeping us alive and pumped. This race is international- it goes over the Ambassador Bridge into Canada and comes back into the US via the underwater tunnel, giving it bragging rights to the only race involving an underwater mile. The border patrol authorities were all very nice and were cheering us on- one was even taking pictures. Overall, this was a great race to participate in, if nothing else, for the views and the sense of community. Favorite posters include: ‘Good job, random stranger!’, ‘Chuck Norris never ran a marathon’, ‘May the course be with you’, and ‘Only one more country to go!’
I wasn’t really nervous at all. I had trained for this. I was as prepared as I was ever going to be. The only thing left was to just get it done. I let my guard down after mile 3/4 and started going too fast, too soon. I hit, what I think, was my wall between miles 13.5-15. During this time, I kept joking with myself that I needed to reassess how I make life decisions- this bit of humor actually helped me get through it, but really it was rough and there definitely a few seconds where I was believing I couldn’t make it. I was miraculously able to get through it, though. I didn’t return completely refreshed, but I got through and wasn’t dying when I crossed the finish line. The unfortunate thing that helped hold me down a little was something that I hadn’t ever experienced during my long runs while training. I started having some GI discomfort about halfway through. I have trained through training runs and races with the energy gels and salt pills I used for the marathon as well as eating the same breakfast always- there was nothing new, yet somehow I was facing some pretty painful gas at times. I’m chalking it up to either nerves or the temperature of the drinking water. There was a small checklist of things that have hindered races and runs for me before that I was afraid would hit during this race and, luckily, they didn’t happen. I much prefer the discomfort that happened to the pain that could have happened, but didn’t.
I was a little bummed that I just barely made it under 6 hours because general pace has become so much faster than when I first signed up for the marathon in January that I was excited that I might be closer to a 5:30 finishing time. With a 6:30 time limit, I only wanted to make 6 hours, but I trained hoping that I could get as far under 6 as possible so that I could have a cushion if something went wrong and I’d have to walk more than I hoped. Well, something did go wrong- I didn’t pace myself well enough, had that random GI distress (which lead to something like 5 different porta-john stops), and I hit that energy hole a little more than halfway through (probably due to the pacing issue), so I used my cushion and still made it under 6 hours, even if just.
There have been a few races during which I get emotional near the finish line and, therefore, start to breathe erratically which makes me start to dry heave, so I’ve learned that I can’t increase my pace too much or let myself get too emotional.  However, I turned the corner and saw the finish line and it started hitting me and then my sister screamed to the right of me and was cheering me on and then they called out my name and bib number (5014); my face crumpled. I soared, bawling, through that finish line and stopped in disbelief. I’m a marathon runner now. I run long distances. Heck, I did not merely run 26.2 miles, I ran for nearly 6 hours.

I had friends and family cheering me on throughout the course. I am so, so lucky to have people like that in my life. People who came from 8 hours away to see me cross that finish line and cheer me on at mile 17.5. People who spent their Sunday morning following me from mile 10 to 11 to 14 to 16 to 18.5 to 25.5 to the finish. People who made signs and screamed their lungs out for me. People who belong to the same fitness group as me and hyped me up along the way. Not everyone has that, but this journey has sort of led me to the people who really care for and support me (not that everyone who cares for and supports me has the means to physically follow me around during races, I know that).

By the way, it took me only mere hours to want to sign up for my next marathon. Mostly, because I can do better. Not necessarily for time, but better in pacing, better in how I utilize my gels, maybe. I can do better at how I attack it.

This milestone was so much more meaningful to me than my weight loss. Any time I lift and find I can step up to the next set of dumbbells, that means more. Weight loss is a huge deal, so do not mistake me. It is simply that I find more enjoyment in being able to do- which is linked to my weight loss, but not encompassed by it. Weight loss is only one facet of this journey. Not everyone wants to run marathons or build muscle (maybe one only wants to maintain), but finding something that keeps you active, gives you targets or goals to aspire to, and makes you happy- that is something worth searching for.

I am a marathon runner now.