Awesome Run, Muddy Run & Birthday Fun!

First off, I want to thank everyone again for the birthday wishes. And yay, we finally got to celebrate it over the weekend with a bunch of friends and fams.

Some running buds. “Must be this tall to ride.”

But I’ll get to that…

…The weekend started with one of the best runs I have had in a long time. I woke up early to meet up with WRRC in Dallas. The weather was gorgeous. It was especially lovely as we ran by White Rock Lake.

This sunrise is the kind of stuff runners see every day. Almost makes up for the early alarm clock…almost.

The folks I joined up with said they were doing 10 miles at an 8:45 pace. “OK, sure.” I said. I’m not really training for anything specific, so just running for fun.

Buuut, one thing that WRRC group runs are famous for, is always running further/faster than planned. We ended up going closer to 11 miles at an 8:15 pace.

My GPS was off – hence the pace/distance discrepancy.

I felt really really good on this run. I think I could’ve gone all day long. I wish more runs were like that.

Afterwards, a few of us got breakfast tacos…Natch! I didn’t take a picture of the tacos (they got in my mouth hole too fast), but I did take a pic of a pic of a friend that I spotted on the wall.

Pic of my good friend…his name is Dean. Oh, and also there’s a pic of my pal, Sylvia (who just ran her first 13.1). BTW, how do I get on the Taco Wall of Fame?

The next morning I met more friends for a really muddy trail run. They also surprised me with some birthday presents…I didn’t take a pic, but trust me, they were Klassy.

Anyway, we went about 6 miles and had a few photo ops along the way.

Taking a break. Bummer that I forgot my giant headband.

A couple friends even camped out there the night before. They let us play with their toys.

We got so hammered.

Even though there were some really muddy patches that slowed us down, we eventually finished the run.

The park rangers didn’t like our shenanigans, so they put us in their tree jail.

After the run, guess what happened? Yeah, that’s right…

I had this thought as I was eating.

From there I had to get all cleaned up nice, cause it was finally time for the birthday party! We went to a runner/kid/dog friendly Texas patio bar. It was packed (like I said, gorgeous weather). Because of the crowd, most of us were spread out all over, but it was still great to see everyone!

I was really bad about taking pics – too busy with birthday bevvies socializing. But we did get a few.

That’s a small glass of water.

Ha, but I did take one photo with a friend who complained it was too “normal”. She wanted a more “Scottish pic”. OK, you asked for it.

I needed salt for the tequila.

So all in all it was a really good past few days. It wouldn’t be a bad life if every day you got to go on a run, eat some tacos, then sit on a patio with friends/fams, would it? Need to work on that.

How bout you? Ever have one of those runs where it just felt effortless? Any guesses what my trail runner friends gifted me? Is it patio weather where you are yet?

-Scott

Animated Running, Trail Nimbleness, Yoga Bliss, & I’m a Sunglassed Winner!

What’s up, Playas? I know the holidays are upon us, but I feel like things are kind of getting settled around here. Not normal, I know. But now that the Dallas Marathon is over, people in these parts are kind of on hiatus, running wise. Not me though!

Before I get to what’s up, lemme wrap up my Dallas race. The proofs came in and I had some fun turning them into animated gifs…

At the finish with a mystery run partner.

If the animation was too much for you, here’s a still.

And one funny thing I found: I didn’t know it, but I was running for a while with one of my training buddies. I didn’t realize it until I saw the pics! Ha, I guess we were too focused on being in beast mode.

Me and a not mystery runner.

Me n Liz (Ironman shirt & visor). We ran many miles together this training season.

Anyway, on to this weekend: 10 solo miles on Saturday, followed by a muddy group trail run on Sunday. The highlight being that I was particularly graceful and nimble as I crossed a creek.

It only took me like 8 minutes to cross, but I didn’t want to fall in like my friend did before me!

Anywhoodle, after the trail miles, it was on to yoga. I was pumped when I saw which instructor it was – this lady is awesome…and she kicked our booties!

Can you spot me?

I am seriously sore after all the yogaing.

I swear we did more than just this pose.

Oh, and I just got some good news…At the Dallas Marathon Race Expo, I posed for a photo at a local running store’s red carpet. And guess what?!?! They liked it so much they said I won a $50 gift card! Booyah!!!

The winning photo. As my one friend put it, “two sets of shades because the sun never sets on a badass” Truer words have rarely been spoken.

So there it is, kiddos. Tryin to keep it real in the face of holiday chaoticness. Boom!

How bout you? Ever get surprises when you see a photo? Can you imagine how graceful I was crossing that crick? Yoga much lately?

-Scott

Dopey Challenge Training Week 15 – The Big One!

I’ve circled this week in my head months ago.  This is the final simulation week for the Disney Dopey Challenge (5k, 10k, 13.1, 26.2 in 4 days).  I’m following the plan Hal Higdon created for this event.

Bring it on, mister dwarf!

Here’s what this week looks like:

Mon: rest

Tue: 5 miles (+ weights)

Wed: rest

Thu: 2.5 miles (I’ll do 3 + weights)

Fri: 5 miles

Sat: 10 miles

Sun: 20 miles

I feel pretty good going into it.  My knee feels the best it’s felt in weeks, I didn’t even tape it before my 5 miler today.  We’ve also had a warm front come through, so it’s patio weather right now, but they say the weekend will get cold again.

True words. It takes a lot of work.

Either way, I’m ready to knock it out!  I’m already trying to figure out which taco joint I’m going to hit up after the 20 miler.  That is good motivation right?  Tacos?

After that it will be all taper time until the main event!  We’re getting close!  When I was putting in the miles for this back in July and August, it felt like we’d never get here, but now we are!  Let’s do this!

I know most of my friends are in the off season right now, but is anyone training for anything?  How difficult is it to train this time of year…what with all the darkness, coldness, & rich foodness going on?

Respect the Run & Don’t Fight Giraffes

Before I get into it, lemme fill in on last night’s social run.  It was good.  Cool temps and low humidity made it so I could actually breath on my run.  It felt awesome.  I ended up doing about a 7:20 pace for the 3 miles.  Much different than the humid & hot 9 per the 3 miles I ran just two days ago.  Anyway, afterwards we traded running stories and shared a few drinks and snacks like we do each Thursday.

Here’s some of last night’s group, along with our laser eyes.

Now onto today’s post…

The weekend approaches.  While most of our friends are thinking about how to relax this weekend, us runners have a different perspective.  The weekend for us either means a race or some training – usually a long run of the week.

For my Disney Dopey Challenge training, I have an “off” weekend.  Which means no back to back medium and long runs.  Instead I have 9 miles on Saturday and only cross training on Sunday.  The off week is designed to let me recharge a bit in anticipation of next weeks mileage – culminating with a 6 and 16 mile back to back runs.

Who put a cartoon character in charge of a major race?

But as I prepare for tomorrow’s 9 miler, something occurred to me.  I was reading a strong runner’s blog that I follow – BayRunner Jamie, and she had a line in one of her posts about respecting the run.  I started thinking about this, and it’s true.  Here’s what I mean about respecting the run:  That means you do not fear it, nor are you cocky about it, you simply respect it, and in return you should have a better performance.

My sis and I after a recent 1/2 marathon in OBX, NC.

Look at it like this:  My marathoner sis is a real keeper.  And by keeper, I mean Zoo Keeper (you see what I did there?).  She works with animals that could rip her skin off.  Gorillas, elephants, and don’t get me started on giraffes.  They look nice, and most are, but they can fight, and when they do, it looks WEIRD.  Giraffe fights creep me out.  Look it up on youtube sometime.

A pic my sis took recently of one of her giraffes. I don’t like the way it’s eyeballing me…like it wants to fight or something.

Sorry, I got off topic there.  I told you not to get me started on giraffe fighting.  Anyway, here’s what I’m getting at.  If you are around animals, you cannot project fear, or they may bite your knee off.  You also can’t be so cocky that you think you can just walk right up to them and take a selfie, cause they may teeth bite your face’s cheek.  You must respect the animal if you want it to respect you back, and hopefully not swing it’s giant spotted neck in your direction.

So when you wake up for your race or long run this weekend, don’t be afraid of it (the distance, pace, course, hills, etc.)…you got this.  And don’t be so confident that you assume you’ll own it…that’s a recipe for disaster (You could go out too fast, or if you think it’s going to be easy, you may freak out once you hit a difficult patch).  Respect the run and you should be able to handle it better than a fighting giraffe.

So what are you doing this weekend?  Racing?  Long run?  How far?  How do you feel about it going in?  Do you think there should be an organized giraffe fighting league?

Disney Dopey Training Week 5 & Motivation

Let’s get doped up.

My training for the Dopey Challenge (4 straight days of races- 5k, 10k, 13.1, 26.2) has gone swimmingly runningly so far.  This week looked like this:

Sun – Yoga, Mon – Rest, Tues – 3 miles + weights, Wed – 6 miles, Thurs -3 miles + weights, Fri – Rest.

Here’s what’s up for this weekend:

Sat – 5 miles, Sun – 15 miles.

Yup, it’s starting to get real.  But so far I’ve stuck to the Hal Higdon plan (actually, added a few extra miles along the way):

I unofficially backtracked the plan, but it officially started 5 weeks ago.  Click the image to enlarge it.

We’ve had cooler temps this week which has been heavenly for my runs, but of course, it’s supposed to be warmer and humidity-er this weekend.  Chance of rain, so hopefully that will help cool things off a bit.  I know I have a lot of friends racing this weekend locally and in more exotic places like Chi-town.  So hopefully the weather gods are kind to them!  Best of luck people!

If you’re not racing, you’re probably doing a long run this weekend too.  You probably also will be hating your alarm clock when it goes off, like I do too.  But I’ve got some motivation for you.  A runner friend of mine sent a video to me, and I thought I’d share it below.  As someone who’s won an Emmy for writing, this makes my writing bone jealous.  I can guarantee it will get you pumped for your race or long run this weekend:

What’ve you got planned this weekend?  Did the video give you goosebumps too?  Ready to rise and shine and find your greatness?

Training tip: Practice like you Play!

I’ve always been an athlete.  I’ve always loved playing sports.  And I always followed the “Practice like you Play” mentality.  I don’t remember who first told me that phrase, but I always thought of it during practices.  I always tried to push myself to work as hard as I did in a game or track meet.  I even remember my basketball coach calling me “AP” for “All-Practice”, as in I was named to the all practice team.  Haha.  Truth be told, working hard in all the practice sessions made the games actually feel easier in comparision.

Nowadays, since I’m older (slightly) and wiser (greatly) I know you can’t go all out all the time.  You have to be smart about your training.  You don’t want to overdue it and get an injury, or get burnt out.  But on my 14 mile long run the other day, I realized something – I should treat some of my training runs as though they were races.  Specifically, I’m talking about the preparation for the run.  Lemme ‘splain.

This past weekend I slightly overslept both mornings and found myself scrambling to get ready to run.  That will not happen again.  From now on, I’m going to treat these runs as though they were races.  What I mean is, you know how the night before a race people always post photos online of the race outfit they are going to wear the next morning, complete with bib attached?  Now personally, I don’t take pictures of the clothes I’m going to wear the next day (not hatin, to each their own), but I DO still get my race gear ready the night before a race.  I get my outfit ready, my shoes are by the door, I pack a bag with everything I’ll need after the race (change of clothes, wallet, etc.), I have my Gu ready, I have my water bottle ready, I have my breakfast ready, etc. etc.  Everything is consolidated, and kept together in a singular place.  That way, when the alarm clock goes off, I just have to put it all on, grab the bag and walk out the door.

I will take pre-race photos of my clothes when they are on my person. -With my sis and boy before 2013 Disney Marathon.

This goes for nutrition too.  I have been smart enough to start preparing for my long runs by eating better and smarter several days leading up to the run.  If you do it that way, you can get your carb levels where they need to be instead of trying to cram it all in the night before the race.

But I need to now also do it with all my running gear too.  (B to the W, remember when you only needed shorts, shoes, and a shirt to run, now we have gps watches, road ID’s, advanced hydration systems (water bottles), etc.)  The other day I did not like scrambling around in the dark, which made me even later than I was.  So from here on out, I’m going to practice like I play.

What about you?  Do you have everything laid out the night before training, or do you just wing it when you wakey wakey?

Dopey Challenge Training – Week 3

Week 3 of 18 is run and dun.  The Disney Dopey Challenge is 4 straight days of racing (5k, 10k, 13.1, 26.2), and so it takes a lot of training to get ready for it.  Here’s what my week looked like:

Sun: yoga, Mon: rest, Tue: 3 mile run + weights, Wed: 5 mile run, Thu: 3 mile run + weights, Fri: rest, Sat: 4 mile run, Sun: 14 mile run

The highlight was the Sunday 14 miler.  I was a tad worried heading into it, not because of the distance, but because of the weather.  You see, on Saturday morn it was in the mid 80’s with a humidity percentage near like a quadrillion.  My easy 4 miler felt like twice that far.  My legs felt heavy, and I was worried I wouldn’t be able to handle the 14 miler the next day.  But you know what, I felt great Sunday morning!  And it didn’t hurt that the humidity on Saturday finally turned into rain!  We had a pretty nice storm all afternoon.  After it passed, it left a nice cool evening.

The morning was cool too.  I planned to do my long run before sunrise at White Rock Lake in Dallas.  Problem is that I overslept…oops!  Not too late, but by the time I got down there, the sun had just come up, and with it some heat came.  Not too hot.  It was still in the 60’s at the start of the run, but did get up into the 80’s that afternoon.  A pretty gorgeous day.  And running at White Rock Lake is good because there’s a 9 mile loop around the lake, there’s tons of other runners and bikers and sailors and kayakers and picnickers and you get the idea.  There’s also a couple trails that branch off of the main trail.  For this run, I took one of them for the first time – White Rock Creek Trail.  It was a beautiful trail with lots of nature in the heart of the city.  It went through a green belt up north.  I took it until I got the extra 5 miles that I needed to get to 14 total.  There weren’t a ton of runners on that trail, more bikers, but I liked it.

Anyway, I felt pretty good, so much so that I caught myself smiling a few times during the run.  I did just read that smiling can help trick your body into going faster and/or stronger.  Something to do with brain receptors and neurons and whatnot.  Either way, it felt good to smile and run.  I also did just read that your “wall” is reached at the point of your previous long run.  I think this may be true.  My previous long run this season was two weeks earlier – 13 miles.  Yes, at mile 13 I wanted to be done.  But like always, I sucked it up and finished.  That’s how we build endurance – by slowly building the miles.

Anyways, week 4 is underway.  Today was 3 miles with weights.  Tomorrow 6 miles.  Bring it week 4!

How far along are you in your race training?

Disney Dopey Training (Week 1 Done)

If you follow this blog, then you probably know that I’m training for the Dopey Challenge and I’m following the Hal Higdon plan for this event.  The first week came and went pretty well.  The weekday runs were pretty uneventful, then came the weekend back to back runs.  The Saturday mileage is still pretty low – Only had to run 3 miles.  Then on Sunday, the plan called for 13.

I backtracked the plan, but it officially started last week.

I met up with a couple friends at White Rock Lake in Dallas.  I like to do my long runs down there because it’s scenic, there’s facilities, and there’s lots of other active people out and about.  My friend Robert was one of the friends.  He’s been getting into running more and more lately.  I was happy for him because he said it was his first time looping the lake without stopping!  My other friend Meg was acting as our pace coach (just under 9 min miles).  She’s a great runner and probably could’ve left us in the dust, but she’s coming back from injury, and she’s nice.

Anyway, the lake is a 9 mile loop, but there’s a secret Batman detour that we took to add an extra mile.  So after those 10 miles, Rob and Meg had to go, but it only left me to run about 2.5 by myself.  I started off taking a new path for me.  There’s the main path, but off to the side at certain places there’s a mystery path that I’ve never run on…until now.  It pretty much ran parallel to the main path, but went through more wooded areas and had less people on it.  I’ll have to explore more of it in the future.

Back on the main path I had less than a mile to go when I paused my gps watch to grab some water and swag from a local radio station set up on the trail.  If they post the photos, I’ll snag em and share em on this blog.  It was cool because I got a whole swag bag for a training run, just like I would at a race.  Score!

Only problem is that I forgot to restart my watch when I started running again.  I went at least half a mile more that will never be documented.  Ha!  No matter, a little extra is good, right?  For my last stretch, I took a side road off the path.  I see bikers go up this road quite a bit, but I have only done it once…in a race.  This side excursion was very basically a big hill.  People go up it apparently to get some extra work in.  It definitely got my legs and lungs burning.  But I’m glad I did because at the top of the hill it had a great view of the Dallas skyline over the lake.

I felt pretty good during this run.  It helped having friends to chat with along the way.  But what really helped was the slightly cooler temps.  Don’t get me wrong, it was still warm.  Probably around 80’s at sunrise, but that’s much better than it’s been around here.  I felt strong at the end of the run, unlike two weeks prior when it was a battle to get my 12 done.  I’m hoping this weekend was a small taste of what’s to come!

Official Disney Dopey Challenge Training – Week 1

116 days until the Dopey Challenge commences, and I’m feeling good.  I’ve completed my “unofficial” training and now the “official” plan kicks in.  Hal Higdon designed the plan, and I had to train for it because week one’s long run is 13 miles.  So obviously I had to train just to be ready to train.  Here’s the week’s workouts so far:

Sunday – cross train (6 mile trail run)
Monday – rest
Tuesday – 3 mile run + weight training
Wednesday – 5 mile run with hill repeats
Thursday – 3 mile run + weight training
Friday –  rest

The weight training and hill repeats aren’t in the official plan, but I added them in.  The cross training choice is up to you, and I decided to join friends on a trail run.

I’m a tad sore and tired heading into the weekend of workouts, but not too bad. This weekend calls for a 3 mile run on Saturday (I may also go to yoga) and 13 miles on Sunday.  Luckily some friends are going to join me on Sunday at White Rock Lake in Dallas to run part of the way with me.  I’ll let you know how it goes next week.

I will say this – most friends, family members, etc. only get to see the finished product – the race.  They don’t get to see all the work that goes into getting there.  I say this because if I were to run a half marathon race this weekend, I’d get a medal, food, drinks, and all the other stuff that comes with a race.  But this weekend I’m running a half marathon training run.  There won’t be cheering spectators, bands, funny signs, or any of the other stuff that comes with a race.  But gotta do the work so hopefully I’ll be strong at the actual race.

If you’re in the Dallas area and want to join us on Sunday…holla!  Everyone else, how’s your training going?

Dopey Training Week 4 (I think) Weecap

Not a typo in the title, I just invented the word for week recap.  Anyway, last week’s runs went fine.  The mileage is still low, which is frustrating, but good too.  The weekdays only had my run 10 miles total.  Then came the weekend’s back to back runs.  Saturday called for 3 miles, I went a tad further.  Sunday called for 12 miles, I didn’t go a tad further.  Sunday was hot again and humid again.  I met a friend at White Rock Lake (9 mile loop) before sunrise…it didn’t matter, the weather was still pretty miserable for running.  We did pretty good the first 7 miles, but by then the sun was up and blazing.  It was a bit of a struggle the next 3 miles, then a noticeable struggle the last 2.

Now I follow some big time runners on Twitter – Hal Higdon, Jeff Galloway, etc.  And I can’t remember who, but one of them likes to tweet that your “wall” hits at the mile of your previous long run’s last mile.  I’m finding this to be true.  So that partly explains my struggles the last couple miles.  But I also know the heat plays a role too.  And I found myself wishing for fall temps.  I have hope with the start of English football and American football, and the fact that the calendar says “September” that it hopefully it will start to cool soon.

But we got her done.  That’s what counts.  Injury free, that’s what really counts.  So on to the next week.  Keep on keepin on.  Bring it!