On Sunday, I had 10 miles to run..... and not to my surprise it was WINDY and COLD AGAIN!?!?! so I had what I am calling my 'winter tantrum'. I am tired of being cold, I'm tired of wearing 3 layers to run outside, I'm tired of doing the laundry for those 3 layers, I'm tired of slippery roads, I'm tired of slushy, sloppy snow everywhere! I'm tired of WINTER and we're only 21 days into January today.
So I set out to run my 10 miles on the treadmill in the basement --- or as Ross and I like to call it this winter - THE DREADMILL.
After my 'winter tantrum', I did some 'thinking' on my treadmill run - I decided to make some racing goal sheets and motivational phrases to keep me going this winter. (You can see one of the papers taped to the side of the wooden shelf to the right of the treadmill - nothing fancy --- but each phrase means something to me and keeps me going) About halfway through my run, Ross comes downstairs with the kids and they parade around the basement with cow bells and horns - yelling GO MOMMY GO, GO MOMMY GO! Totally made my day!
I taped this to my bathroom mirror - I can stare at it when I wake up at 4:30am. I'm running a marathon in May and I've put my goal time and goal-pace per mile splits so I can focus on those during my Tempo runs. I've only got one half-marathon (so far) in my schedule and it's in April - I would love to be around 1:32 --- hoping for 1:30 but I'll target 1:32 and see what I can do because most of my training runs this winter/early spring will be at marathon pace which is slightly slower and probably on the treadmill.
my motivational phrases by the treadmill
While I was in the goal-setting mood on Sunday - I also sat down and looked at my half-Ironman and Ironman times from August and came up with my goals for this summer.
I'm competing in the Long Course Nationals (half-Ironman distance) in June. I would like to maintain my swim and bike time from 70.3 Steelhead but really improve my run time (Steelhead half-marathon time was 1:47) ...... and I think I can improve my transition times too. (Ross would say that I can DEFINTELY improve my transition times - he tells me that I must brush my teeth and comb my hair in transition, it takes me so long! Well, look out buddy - I'm going to work on that this summer!!!) Last summer it took me 5+ minutes in transition at 70.3 Steelhead and I think I can do better than that :) My ultimate goal in this race is to finish in the top 20 in my age group so I have a chance to be a part of Team USA competing in Sweden. Wouldn't that be AWESOME!!!! If I take my finish time from Steelhead last summer and compare it to the results from last years triathlon in Grand Rapids - I HAVE A CHANCE! and with a time improvement - my chances are even greater! I do expect a lot more competition in June because it is the Long Course Nationals, but we'll see. I also placed 7th at Steelhead and there was some tough competition there trying to earn spots at the 70.3 Ironman Championships. BELIEVE in yourself and anything is possible, right? Yes, it is!
My Ironman goals are definitely going to be a challenge, but I'm up for it! I want to maintain my swim time... I think this time was a bit skewed due to swimming in the river in Louisville but some of it was upstream too... so we'll see how that changes this time in Boulder and Madison. I want to improve my bike time by 15 minutes. I'm going to carry disposable water bottles this time instead of re-filling my own water bottles. I will carry my own electrolytes but overall that should cut down on some time at the aid stations. I'm hoping to maintain a more even pace throughout the bike too and now I know what it feels like @ mile 101 of the bike --- I can mentally get past that now which I hope will help me get to mile 112 on the bike. I want to RUN more of the marathon and I won't be sitting on the curb @ mile 16 for several minutes trying to talk my tired body into finishing :) I am going to add a little more running to my training schedule to prepare me for the marathon and I'm going to work on mentally preparing myself for the marathon this time too. In Louisville, I told myself as long as I made it to the run, I would be OK ---- well, I was so tired by the time I got to the run --- it wasn't as easy as I thought it would be. I'm hoping for somewhere between a 4:45 - 5 hour marathon this time (Louisville marathon time was 5:23) ......... and the lovely transition times AGAIN. I took 10-15 minutes in IM Louisville to transition and I WILL definitely move it along in transition this summer :)
I found a really cool Ironman and half-Ironman time predictor tool at www.tricalc3.com you can put in your pace times and it will calculate an overall race time - it also breaks down the transition times and individual sport times. Pretty Cool! It also has a predictor tool for Olympic and Sprint distance triathlons.
the winter torture chamber - I mean --- the workout area of our basement. Ironman Boulder training officially begins February 3rd. We will be spending LOTS of time on these bikes going nowhere - haha!
mmmmmmm -- my favorite post-workout snack right now. Chocolate milk with a little bit of ice cubes chopped up. YUM! tastes like a Wendy's Frosty - try it!
I ran outside on Saturday with a very heavy heart - logging 6 miles for Meg.
Shortly after her death, Meg's friend Brooke Roney set up a Facebook page for an event called Meg’s Miles. I emailed Brooke today to ask how the idea started. She wrote to me,
“I posted in a running group on Facebook called Women's Running Club about my friend's death and that it's a tragic reminder of how we should all be careful on the road. Some of the women in the group were commenting about how we should dedicate our runs to Meg on Saturday the 18th. The name Meg's Miles was suggested and I just created a Facebook Event for it. I thought if people used the hashtag #megsmiles and posted pictures, thoughts, prayers, etc it would be kinda cool to have all in one place on each social media platform.”
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