MTP Week 2 Overview...

New shoes, head lamps, and bald eagles...the three things that characterized this week's training runs.

Here's the low down on my weekly runs:

Monday: This was the first week where we did an evening group run, complete with reflective gear and head lamps!

 I had never run with a head lamp, so this was a totally new experience for me...and I thrived!  I felt invigorated running in the dark, probably because no one could really see me, so I didn't have to worry about looking funny or people watching/judging my running.  I ended up being the first member of the group to finish the 3 mile run, and I ran those 3 miles in 26:59!  Fastest time yet.

Tuesday: 7 miles in 1:09:13...I was suffering from the three blisters and bum toenail I had earned the week before from my too small running shoes, so I decided to complete this particular run on the elliptical machine at the gym to try to give my feet a bit of a break since I wasn't going to be able to purchase a new pair of shoes until the next day.  I used the Cross Country setting on the machine to simulate a hill workout, so I still got a pretty good 'run' in.

Wednesday: Stretching/rest...Headed out to Fleet Feet in Bonney Lake and used my day off to get a new, bigger pair of running shoes.  Tried several pairs on, and at first I had a very hard time trying to pick out a pair of shoes that were a full size too big, but eventually I ended up choosing my very first pair of Brooks running shoes, the Brooks Ghost 4!

Aren't they beautiful?!?!?!  I'm normally an Asics girl, but I'm pleasantly surprised with how comfortable these shoes are to run in!  I would recommend them with two thumbs way up.

Thursday: 8 miles in 1:17:32...used my new shoes for the first time as I did my 8 miler along Ruston Way, and dropped 4 minutes off my time from the previous Saturday.  Pretty freaking awesome if I do say so myself!

Friday: Stretching/rest...calves and shins were a little sore from the previous day's long run in a brand new pair of shoes, but other than that I felt great.

Saturday: 9 miles in 1:25:49...the Saturday morning group run was a little on the cold side when we started out, but I was feeling pretty good, and ended up keeping all of my mile splits under 10 minutes.  Additionally, I was spurred on/inspired by a bald eagle that flew directly over my head as I was cruising along at around mile 4.

It couldn't have been more than 50 feet above me, and it was an amazing experience!  I even ended up finishing my last mile with a 9:10 split, my fastest split of the run!

Sunday: Stretching/rest

Overall, this was a great running week.  I'm starting to feel more confident that I'm going to slowly, but surely, work my way toward my ultimate goal...qualifying for Boston!  This coming week should be interesting as not only do we start our hill training, but we also hit double digits on our long run...

Monday: 3 mile head lamp group night run
Tuesday: 3.5 mile with hill repeats (yikes!)
Wednesday: Stretching/rest
Thursday: 7 mile run
Friday: Stretching/rest
Saturday: 12 mile run (double yikes!)
Sunday: Stretching/rest

MTP Week 3...HERE I COME!!!

MTP Week 1 Overview...

For those of you who aren't used to my seemingly constant abbreviations yet (blame it on the day job...teachers are constantly shortening words to save themselves writing time/hand cramps), MTP stands for Marathon Training Program.  Well yesterday marked the end of my first week of training for the Tacoma City Marathon...

...and it was definitely a little harder than I thought it was going to be.  Before the MTP, I was averaging, at most, about 10 miles per week.  The first week out, we did a total of 24 miles over the course of four separate runs.  The increase in total mileage was pretty rough on me, especially since, for some unknown reason, I unwittingly chose fairly hilly courses for my 6 mile run on Wednesday and my 7 mile run on Thursday.  Thankfully, those two runs made my relatively flat 8 mile run on Saturday seem like a breeze...ok, 8 miles was nowhere near a breeze, but at least it didn't kill me! So here's the breakdown of my first week of torture...I mean training:

Monday: Ran 3 miles in 27:21 along Ruston Way...relatively flat, but I still got tired toward the end.

Tuesday: Stretching/rest...very sore!!!

Wednesday: Ran 6 miles in 59:39...actually had to split the run into two parts: I ran the first 4.6 miles in 46:12 near my school along a couple of our cross country runs (the Telephone and Bridge Runs combined) and had to stop because there were too many hills, so I drove home to give myself a little rest, and ran the remaining 1.4 miles in 13.27 around my neighborhood.

Thursday: Ran 7 miles in 1:14:02 on the Nyanza/Telephone/Bridge Runs combined...had to walk up a couple of the bigger hills because my legs felt like jello from the day before, but I ran the entire mileage together, so I was prouder of myself than I had been the day before.

Friday: Stretching/rest...stretching hurt a lot, so I pretty much just rested...so sue me!

Saturday: Ran 8 miles in 1:21:04 with the entire training group out on the Orting City Park Trail...I only stopped at the designated refueling stations to get water/gatorade, but otherwise I ran the entire time.  Interestingly enough, my best splits (and also the miles where I felt the best) were on miles 6 and 7...found that kind of funny.

Sunday: Stretching/rest...stretching felt great today, and I wasn't as sore as I thought I'd be.

The one thing I did learn the hard way on my run on Saturday is that my running shoes are a bit too small and I need to get new ones desperately as I now have 3 huge blisters and one toenail that is threatening to fall off. (Sorry if I grossed anyone out there!)  Even with that, I'm still pretty excited about the MTP and am excited to see how I feel after my runs this second week.  My schedule for Week 2 is as follows:

Monday: 3 mile head lamp group run
Tuesday: 7 mile run
Wednesday: Stretching/rest
Thursday: 8 mile run
Friday: Stretching/rest
Saturday: 9 mile morning group run
Sunday: Stretching/rest

Thanks for keeping me honest guys...hope you are enjoying my escapades in running!

I'd like to get some variety in my weekly runs, so...do you know of any good running routes in the Tacoma area that aren't completely flat, but also don't have hills so huge that I keel over dead trying to run up them?

Ready or Not...

...Here it comes.  And by it, I mean my Marathon Training Program through Fleet Feet Sports Bonney Lake.

I haven't been so great about keeping up with my running over the past couple of weeks, but I'm extremely excited to start this program tomorrow.  The best part about the training program is that each participant gets their own online workout log to which the coach submits a personalized workout every week.  This coming week, my workouts are as follows:

Monday: 3 mile run
Tuesday: Stretch/rest
Wednesday: 6 mile run
Thursday: 7 mile run
Friday: Stretch/rest
Saturday: 8 mile group run
Sunday: Stretch/rest

Thankfully, there is a huge accountability factor in that you have to record the workout you did each day in the online workout log, so that the coach knows which workouts you are completing and which you aren't.  I suppose you could lie about what you had done, but what would be the point of that because you wouldn't be preparing for the marathon at that point.

So, my workout is decided, the Garmin watch and iPod are both fully charged and ready to go, it just needs to be tomorrow so that I can get started!

Anyone else participating in a training program right now?

Friends and Food and Snow, Oh My!

This weekend was pretty monumental...three friends who haven't been in the same area together for FIVE YEARS were able to get together and have an amazing girls' weekend!  And who were these three friends you might be asking, well I'll tell you...it was me and my two closest friends from high school, Heather and Megan!

Fate definitely conspired to bring us together for this wonderful weekend of super girlie fun...my incredibly talented, intelligent friend Megan (the gorgeous red-head in the middle) is in medical school right now and is currently going through the process of interviewing for residency spots with different schools/hospitals.  And which places did she have scheduled to interview with this coming week but University of Washington and Virginia Mason.  Well of course, she wasn't allowed the option of staying anywhere else but with me, which would have been fun in and of itself.  But good ol' fate wasn't done yet...when Heather found out which weekend Megan was going to be up here staying with me (which she only found about a couple of weeks ago), our savvy, uber-travelling Southern California blonde bombshell friend immediately started looking for plane tickets and was able to find a reasonably priced ticket so that she could come stay for the weekend as well!  Let the good times roll...

Both Heather and Megan got into town by 11am Saturday, and we immediately headed to Duke's Chowder House for some yummy chowder and the start to a weekend of much needed girl talk!

This was the gorgeous view of the South Sound from our table...and yes, we were inside.  What do you think we're nuts, it was cold outside!  Next we went back to my house, which both Heath and Megs saw for the very first time this weekend.  We relaxed for a while, then slowly but surely started to get ready for our big girls' night out for a wonderful dinner and drinks at one of my favorite restaurants in Tacoma, Indochine Asian Dining Lounge.

As you can see from the picture, the atmosphere inside is absolutely awesome, and that's only one of the things to LOVE about this place.  The service is incredibly fast (I'm not lying or exaggerating when I say I've never had to wait more than 10 minutes from the time I ordered my food to the time it was set in front of me steaming hot and ready to eat), everything I've tried, from appetizers to entrees to desserts, is fantastically delicious, and they carry a wine that is currently one of my favorites, Trefili Pinot Grigio.

The dinner was so tasty, but the portions are huge, so we needed to take home leftovers, which of course only means one thing...yummy yummy leftovers for breakfast on Sunday!!!

Happy happy tummies!!!  Since Saturday was Girls' Night Out, Sunday was Girls' Night In.  Megan is an excellent cook and baker, and since Heather and I are not so much 'with the cooking', she offered to make us a homecooked meal, complete with dessert.  Fine by us!  Since it had started to snow, and people in the PNW (Pacific Northwest) aren't so great at driving in the snow, we decided to jump into our warm clothes, strap on our boots, and walk to the grocery store to pick up the necessary ingredients.  The Albertson's is only a few blocks away, and the snow was so pretty, so it ended up being a very fun adventure.

We got all the fixin's to make homemade macaroni and cheese and gooey chocolatey brownies...or I guess I should say for Megan to make homemade macaroni and cheese and gooey chocolatey brownies while Heather and I watched.  I did help a little by grating cheese and making homemade chocolate hazelnut ice cream to go with the brownies.  In between all the cooking, baking and eating, we watched movies and played games, including one very hilarious round of Imaginiff...

...Heather got this particular question...and being the child-loving, maternal-type lady that she is (insert 'dripping with sarcasm' voice here), it's probably no surprise that it was decided unanimously that she would be a #6!!!  All in all, the evening was a ton of fun, due in large part to the fact that we were getting uncharacteristic snowy weather, which Heather is not used to seeing in SoCal, and so was super excited to watch it fall out the window all evening long.

Unfortunately, all good things must come to an end, and yesterday evening, after another fun day of lounging around together, Heather headed back to Cali and Megan headed up to Seattle for her interviews.  Hopefully it won't be another 5 years before we get to do this again!  I miss them already!!!

This morning I got the call telling me we had a snow day...

...which seemed a little silly to me because by 8:30am even the side streets had enough traffic on them that they were drive-able, but there's nothing I can do about it, so I'm enjoying the day off by watching the snow and relaxing.  Tonight, the PNW is supposed to get another 8" of snow in certain areas, especially the South Sound...not looking good for in-school days the rest of the week!

If you're in the Seattle area, how are you enjoying the snow?

Hood to Coast Here I Come!

Ever since I started running seven years ago, it has been a dream of mine to be on a Hood to Coast Relay Team.

The Hood to Coast Relay is a 200 mile race that consists of 36 different legs which range in length from 4 miles to 8 miles.

The race starts at the beautiful, majestic Mt. Hood...

...and travels west, through Portland, and heads all the way to the beach at Seaside, OR for the finish.

This year, they are anticipating that 1,050 teams are going to participate in this amazing event...and with 12 members per team, that comes out to 12,600 racers!  So what that means is that with 12 members per team and 36 legs in the race, each runner is running 3 legs of the relay, which will end up averaging about 15-16 miles per racer.  Obviously, each runner could never be a part of this race without being part of a team, and the wonderful team that I get to be a part of is the Project Zero Relay Team.

If you are unaware, Project Zero is an amazing organization that raises awareness and money for Prostate Cancer.  Being a part of this team means that not only do I get to run for a great cause, I also get to raise money for a great cause as well...in fact, I have set a goal of raising at least $750 for this particular race.  If you would like to help me out by being one of my sponsors for the Hood to Coast Relay, I would greatly appreciate it!  If you would like to and are able to help out this organization, simply click on the link for My Fundraising Page and donate whatever you can.  Every little bit helps, and I will find a way to carry the names of all of the fantastic people who sponsor me with me when I run my 3 legs of the race!

Have you ever run as part of a relay team?

Three Great Reasons to Run...

1) Chocolate!
2) Champagne!
3) Sister-Bonding Time!

A half-marathon that weaves these three wonderful incentives together beautifully is the See Jane Run Half-Marathon Series.

The See Jane Run races are amazing events where women get a high quality race designed just for them in four fabulous cities across the country...this year, the Alameda, CA race is on June 3rd, the Boise, ID race is on June 16th, the Seattle, WA race is on July 15th, and the Austin, TX race is on October 7th.  And along with getting to run the race with a bunch of other amazing ladies, each finisher gets a sweet finisher's shirt...

...an awesome medal...

and probably most important of all, a champagne glass with the race logo inscribed on it, that gets to be filled with lots of yummy champagne at the post-race expo...

...where there will also be plenty of yummy chocolate to sample, and other tasty post-race food as well.  I can't think of better swag after a race than chocolate and champagne, can you?

I'm looking forward to the Boise race in particular this year because, for all the races I've completed in my running career, I haven't as yet been able to run one with my sister.  She's a nurse and has an extremely busy schedule, so this is the perfect solution since I'd be coming to her neck of the woods for the race.  So not only would she not have to worry about traveling to get to the race in Seattle, but she'd only have to get one day off for the actual race, as opposed to trying to get multiple days off for the race and travel time.  And after the race, did I mention that we'd get to celebrate over champagne and chocolate?!?!  Because I believe that warrants being mentioned again!

As if all the incentives to run these races weren't enough, the wonderful ladies at See Jane Run are sponsoring a 5 Days, 5 Ways to WIN! contest and are giving away 2 free slots in one of their races.  One of the 5 ways to win is through mentioning See Jane Run in your own running blog...so I'm hoping after reading my post, they'll agree that my sister and I are the perfect candidates for those two slots!

I'd like to end the post today with a little running poem to my sister (I'm coming up with this on the fly people, and I'm a math teacher, not an English teacher, so don't judge my rhyming skills too much!):

Ode to Running Sisters
As the race draws near, we'll all toe the line,
many sisters to run with, one of them mine.

When the gun goes off, away we will run,
giggling, singing, laughing, and just having fun!

Now 13.1 miles is a long way to race,
but with my sister by my side, I'll keep up the pace.

We may face some hills, and be tired a bit,
but with her running with me, I won't want to quit.

For a sister's the best friend one could be,
and the only one I want crossing the finish line with me!

Well, look at that, I'm a poet and I didn't know it!

Have you ever run a race with your sister?

Good Times Baking Holiday Sweets!

While in Boise with the fam, my sister decided that I could learn a few tricks of the baking trade from her so that when I got my Kitchenaid Mixer for Christmas, I'd be an old pro at the making of the baked goods!

So a few days before Christmas, we set to work...there was flour, sugar and butter galore, with some chopped nuts, mashed bananas, nutella, cream cheese, and red food coloring thrown in for fun effects.  The results were some of the most delicious concoctions that I've ever had the pleasure of saying that I helped create!  First on the list of baked delicacies were a couple batches of my sister's famous Nut Roll...

...we made six rolls in all (each batch produces 3 loaves) and I'm proud to say that I made pretty much the entire second batch by myself, though my sister did aid with the nut filling and my father was a whiz with the rolling pin!

The next order of business was finding a use for a couple uber-ripe bananas that my mother had been holding onto for who knows what reason.  I was thinking just regular old banana bread, but that's because, unlike my sister, I'm not a member of Pinterest yet.  She went looking through her pinned recipes and came up with Nutella Banana Bread...

...which I have to say is much more decadent than plain ol' banana bread.

Our third baking endeavor involved combining cream cheese, chocolate and red food coloring into another glorious Pinterest find, the Red Velvet Cheesecake Brownies...

...which I might add that my sister and I managed to polish off in the matter of only a couple days, they are THAT good!

The next day, the baking goodness continued when my father got his bake on and made my absolute, all-time favorite Greek cookies in the entire world...Koulourakia!

These buttery little rings of awesomeness are by far the best cookies on earth, and no one can make them better than my dad...which is why my sister and I did not help with the baking process...I did partake fully in the eating process however!  I'm pretty sure I almost single-handedly polished off the entire batch he made, and there is a sad spot in my heart now that they are gone and that another batch will probably not be made until next Christmas...definitely an argument for keeping Christmas alive in your hearts (and kitchens) all year long in my opinion!

Now, I don't know any of the recipes by heart, but if you like what you see and would like one of the recipes, leave me a comment and I'll see if I can get the recipes from my sister.  Like I said before, the banana bread and brownie recipes are somewhere on Pinterest, but the Nut Roll is a family recipe, so I would definitely have to get her approval before giving it out.  I may not be able to pry the koulourakia recipe away from my father though, sorry, grandfather's recipe.

What wonderful goodies does your family make for the holidays?