June’s Race

June 13, 2011 by · 4 Comments

Well we survived!! The person who decided to start the race at 7:15 was genius, any later and we really might not have made our goal of not dying and finishing. This being our first “hot” weather race, we were very nervous. Neither of us does well in the heat, as we are sure many runners feel the same way, although our friend Chris will tell you he enjoys it, we think he’s nuts.


We both rolled out of bed at the crack of dawn (both a blessing and a curse) as I said, any later of a start and we might not have made it, but as the busy people we are, less sleep is always a negative! We arrived at the race about 30 minutes early and met up with Tracy, Michael, Ashley and Chris. Chris pulled a hamstring earlier in the week and was unable to run, but he raised money for the cause and just loves to cheer us on, so he came! We didn’t see our friend Joe before, but we were able to catch up with him at the end. He ran the ½ like a pro!
The race started promptly at 7:15 (good job, race organizers!) It started at Williams Square, which is a really cool part of downtown Las Colinas, and ran through the Campion Trail area. The course was well laid out and the website even states that it is essentially “hill-less”! Huge plus! We were even able to run a part of the race in shade, as part of the trail ran through a tree-lined area. As previously stated we didn’t know how fast we would run, but we both came in the first mile at a little over an 8 minute pace! Not bad!  The goal really was steady and finish. We had no idea how the heat would get or how we would do having been inconsistent for the month. Around mile 3, we were both together and pretty much stayed the way through the race! For the first time in a while, both of us ran most of the race close together. We discussed afterwards how kind of weird it is. Both of us actually think it’s weird how the other can keep going based on what we sound like running.  If you ever listen to another runner’s breathing it is actually crazy! We all sound weird.  I always think Beth is dying and she thinks I am. Very funny, but somehow we both make it each time.
It really did heat up outside toward the end and the last miles was rather torturous. None of it was in the shade and it’s now full-sun in Texas. We both crossed the finish line seconds apart! Upon finishing, the Junior Military kids handed us our medal and a sweet ending treat, POPSICLES!  Beth ran straight to the restroom and Teal went straight for the shade! We both sat for a while to cool off and ate our popsicles. Two to be exact! This was the first time we received popsicles at the end and they were A-mazing! As well as the cold paper towel handed to us!

The Junior Military passing out the medals


We both hung around after the race to wait for Joe to come in and to cheer on the other runners. Joe ran an excellent half and impressed us all. Teal’s friend Chris was unable to make it- he was supporting the youth at his church and had to leave earlier than expected. Being the trooper he is, he still ran is 13.1 miles that morning on his own! Great job! Because the race had a military cause, many service men and women ran the race. Some of them were even in their full gear -seriously impressive stuff. We watched one troop come in wearing full gear and his backpack on having run the ½! Another marine carried the flag above his head as he finished the last stretch. They really have great strength and energy!  I was whining about my shorts and a tank top being too hot for the day, and I only ran 6 miles. Many carried flags and military gear and it really was an awesome thing to see. It’s safe to say we will do this one again. It was only the second year of this race and overall the organization was great and the turnout was awesome! Great event for an awesome cause!

Results


Beth: Finished the 10k in 56:46, 6th in age group and 87th overall
Teal: Finished the 5k in 56:41, 5th in age group and 86th overall

So proud of how we did!

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May’s Race

May 8, 2011 by · 2 Comments

before the race started

Well, we now have half marathon number two under our belts! And we are about 17 weeks away from our next one!  This past Saturday we ran in the White Rock Centennial Half and as we mentioned before did not really get a lot of training in before doing it.  For this post we thought we’d let you into our minds as we ran so enjoy…

Teal: This race was seriously a mental game for me. I knew going in that I could finish the race even though I really hadn’t trained consistently, but I was very nervous about what that would do to my head. One mile in I was completely off, I had accidentally turned my runkeeper app off and my music kept repeating the same song and I couldn’t get it to stop repeating. In my head I was like, this is going to be a long 13 miles if I can’t even get this stuff under control and was annoyed that my mileage and time was now off for the way that I track my running. I finally just decided to stop and fix it all after mile 1. After getting everything set I was now officially in the race. I started with my normal counting, but felt very tired, my knees were tight and I just felt like I was running heavy. The first 3 miles seemed to take forever. At the beginning I had decided that I would try to make sure I stayed between the 2 hour and the 2:10 pacers. I lost track of the 2 hour pacer by mile 3 which was slightly frustrating.  I decided that the only way to get through was literally go one mile at a time. I started to get really nervous that I had overdone the week. I had run 9 on Sunday and 10 on Tuesday, and thought maybe my body was just worn out.  Starting at mile 4 I just started saying to myself, less than 10 minutes to mile 5 and kept that up. Mile 4 was a huge tease, because they ran us through the finish line, so I felt like the race was super long knowing that I still had to make it all the way around the lake. After each mile I just said to say to myself less than 10 minutes until the next one. It worked and by 10 I felt ok, I ran a next to a trainer from my gym for about 5 miles and it was motivating, we kind of went back and forth in pace with each other, but it kept my mind off of being tired. It was at mile 10 that the 2:10 pacer passed me. I stayed with them for a while but then lost sight; I literally didn’t have much left to keep up with them. The hills were crazy and I hated every last one of them. We had run the Tour des Fleurs last year and they ran us up the same hill for this race that I had to walk in the 10k, so I was very proud of myself for making it and actually making all of the hills. The bridges scared the crap out of me too. Every time I ran on one they moved. The first one I ran across literally made me think I was passing out. It was that weird feeling you get when you miss a double bounce on a trampoline. It scared me to death and literally my heart dropped to my stomach. At 11, I seriously didn’t know if I would finish. I really wanted to walk but kept saying to myself you will be mad if you do. I had a goal to beat my last ½ by 5 minutes. I, however, decided to stop at the drink stop for the first time, I had been drinking the water from the bottle I was holding.  I walked the entire water stop; it probably took me about a minute and a half. At the end of the 11, I ran the rest and was determined to not stop even if I was running 11+ minute miles. I finally made it to 13 and I swear on everything it seemed like a ½ mile from 13 to 13.1.   I just kept thinking, you made it this far keep going, start counting and just freaking finish. I crossed the finish line and was kind of dizzy and seriously worn out, way more worn out then White Rock in December.  I looked for Beth who was just outside the fence and I looked at her and said “that has to be the longest .1 miles I have ever run!”

Overall the race was rough there were lots of hills, lots of wind, and not too many cheering spectators. The spectators are my favorite part. They literally make it easier to keep going. I kind of felt alone in this race and was sometimes bored, which makes it much harder to run.   I should be incredibly happy that my legs can carry me that far!!

Beth: We started the race right around the 2 hour pacer.  When we got started I saw the pacer and said to myself “I will not see you again during this race!”  I had my runkeeper app on during the run and it was updating me every half mile how I was doing.  This isn’t an app I want to run with regularly while the coaching feature is on.  I prefer to be my own motivator and pusher, but nonetheless I had it on.  I was talking myself through the hills and was proud of myself for keeping my miles under 9 minutes for the first 7.  It was when I got to the mile 8 marker that the 2:00 pacer passed me.  And I wanted to just break down and cry right then and there as I watched my goal pass me.  I let it get to me and I took a minute then to walk, but started again as this guy who introduced himself to me as Ryan later said, “Come on runner! Let’s go”  I started up again and ran on and off with him some – he was a great motivator for a couple of miles for me.  I’m a bit of a perfectionist, so for me when I tell you on this blog that my goal is this if I don’t achieve it that makes me feel like complete crap.  So that first time of walking I was just like “great! You know you are now going to have to blog about this!  And now you didn’t even complete the half without walking!”  And honestly, I had to do a couple more brief walking periods in the last 5 miles.  When I was approaching the 13 mile marker I heard my runkeeper app say “..distance: 13.1 miles..”  All in all when I crossed the finished line I think I had done a distance of 13.3 miles.  Thinking about my time it’s very bittersweet – I am kind of impressed I finished it just over 2 hours considering how my last 5 miles went, but I am disappointed with myself for not keeping it together and staying under 2 hours and running the whole time.  But on a positive side my favorite part of the race was high five-ing some of the kids out there cheering on their parents and the baby I passed that was at least old enough to be waving his arms around in excitement as people ran by!  That big grin on his face put a smile on my face!

Us with Bitner

 Our Results:

Teal: Hit a new PR at this race! Finished in 2:14:52, was 53rd out of 140 in her age group and finished 831st overall!

Beth: Finished in 2:06:35, was 39th out of 140 in her age group and finished 617th overall.

We mentioned in our pre-race post that Bitner was supposed to run with the half with us in December at the White Rock Marathon, but was sick and unable to run.  This was his very first half marathon race ever and we just had to acknowledge how awesome he is!  He finished in 1:44:39, was 21st out of 94 in his age group and finished 106th overall!

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April’s Race

April 18, 2011 by · 4 Comments

We are now a third of the way through our 2011 running goal!!  Yet again we had a VERY busy race weekend – are you starting to see a theme with the two of us?  Busy, busy, busy! Beth and Joe picked up Teal and made the roughly hour long drive to Ft. Worth to meet up with Mouyyad!  Since the race was in Ft. Worth one of Mouyyad’s friends picked up all of our race packets and it was very out of the ordinary for us to be standing around at the start line without our bibes 15 minutes prior race, but we got our bibes and were ready to go with time to spare!

We thought the majority of the race would be throughout the zoo, only part of it was and as it turns out that was perfect since the zoo part was pretty smelly!  For the first half mile of the 5k I think we both regretted reading this blog on clock blocking and all the people we were having to dodge (not because the blog is bad – it is SO true was just at the forefront of our minds).  I think we both were pretty tired early on due to that and we have both been a little spoiled with our last couple of 5k’s being pretty small there was no need to dodge other runners.  There were also a few hills throughout the course.  Both of us never really felt like we were running in a race where we would do well.

But then you look at our results and see that we were completely wrong:

Teal: 25:55, finished 6th in her age group and set a new PR!

Beth: 26:11 and finished 7th in her age group

 

Also, both Joe & Mouyyad got new PR’s out of the 5k Zoo Run!

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Didn’t You Run a Race This Weekend?

April 12, 2011 by · 5 Comments

So inititally I was scared I was going to wake up thinking it was Sunday and miss the 5k, as I thought Friday was Saturday.  I didn’t, but unfortunately I kind of wish I had.  This post is one I feel bad about writing, and I figured I would start out by saying that I do give the organizers a big A+ for starting a 5k race that promotes awareness of Diabetes.  Racing is a great way to raise money, we know, we pay regularly do to run them!  I felt like the effort was there, but when it came to actually pulling it off and the sheer organization, I unfortunately have to give them an F.  Maybe this is another sign I should not run without Beth?

For starters, the race time was changed AFTER registration; originally it was supposed to start at 8:00 a.m.  I work every Saturday so if I am going to race that day it has to be early enough so that I can get to work by 9:00 a.m.-ish.  A week before the race they updated the page to say the race would now be at 9:00 a.m.  Great!  I went anyways, I work for my dad so he is lenient but I don’t like to push it too much.  My husband and I arrived at UTD and the directions said to go to the Southside of the basketball courts, no one was there from the race.  There were about 20 of us waiting around, we wait, wait, nothing.  I decided to walk around this building and I found a guy with an event shirt.  He says it starts at the student services building which was not mentioned.  Sure enough I find them and it’s now 8:20 a.m.  At 8:30 a.m. guest speakers are supposed to start and their website indicated there would be a total of 2 speakers.  It’s now 8:50 a.m., no speakers, no idea when the race will actually start.  A few minutes later the guest speakers finally start, the first was a little girl who was AMAZING and totally worth the wait!  But then we get 3 more about nothing except thanks for coming out.  I think one of them was even a guy running for office.  IT’s now 9:15 a.m., no race yet, and all the organizers are standing around saying “the race will start in 5 minutes.”  I would have said fine and not been so annoyed, but they did this for about 15+ minutes.  I finally looked at my husband and said, “they have 5 minutes or I have to leave, I have to get to work!”  At this point it is 9:30 a.m. and no one has even lined up to race.  As a matter of fact, I am  convinced that they didn’t even know the race route as two of the organizers were debating where the turns were supposed to be!  I was done!  So in total I went to a race, had to pick up everything, i.e. race packet, there and literally stood around for an hour and a half to run a race that takes me less than 30 minutes to run.  So unfortunately I left.  I left out of sheer frustion and time.  By the time I left at 9:35 a.m. the race had not started and still no one had lined up in preparation for the race to begin.  I feel terrible for even mentioning the race and not running, but sometimes that’s just the way it goes!

The AMAZING guest speaker!

At the same time, I do recognize that I have a bit of a different situation with my Saturday’s and my part time job where a race that starts on time and starts early enough I can fit in before I have to be at work.  There are a lot of people who get up for a Saturday race and do not have any sort of time constraint like I do.  I also recognize that A LOT of work goes into the scheduling and organizing of a race!  Perhaps these guys have not actually run many to know a lot of the details, but I do hope they learned a lot from this race and will improve their race for next year!  Beth is actually a volunteer for Heroes for Children  and apart of their 5k race committee, which I believe she’ll talk about in a later post, and I have no doubt she will learn A TON about organizing a race. 

Also, here is a picture of me from before the race and sorry that’s all you get!

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March’s Races

March 28, 2011 by · 8 Comments

This past weekend was a very busy race weekend and is a little bit of a glimpse into how crazy the two of us are with a short race on Saturday, Kacie’s Run, and a bit of a longer run on Sunday, Rock ‘n’ Roll Half.  But first let’s back up to our week leading up to our race weekend – Teal had a lingering cough and ultimately started treatment for bronchitis.  Mid-week Beth got a cold and with a double race weekend we would be lying if we said we were not nervous.  We looked and sounded crazy, Teal would break into coughing attacks, and Beth had to carry around a box of tissues.  Not a pretty sight.

Kacie’s Run on Saturday went GREAT!  CFBISD had over 500 people participate in either the 1 mile or 5k races.  The crazy wind we had all week in Dallas stuck around for the run but the sun was definitely out and the temperature was in the high 70’s by the time we ran.  The course was awesome as it is super flat and plenty of space to not run into or have to dodge other runners.  I am pretty sure our nerves had taken over slightly as we both ran the first mile in right under 8 minutes. By mile two we were great, only one small coughing attack but we pulled through!

Our Results

Teal: 26:26, finished 6th in age group and 68th over all

Beth: 26:19, finished 4th in age group and 63rd overall

 

 

For the Rock ‘n’ Roll Half, we decided to run the relay and that we might have a better chance of placing if we ran on co-ed teams than as a Life is a Run team.  Teal partnered up with Joe and Beth partnered up with Bitner.  The boys were given the first leg of the half marathon to run, 7.1 miles, and the girls got the last leg, 6 miles.  As crazy as we were expecting the race to be with making sure we got to the right place, Rock ‘n’ Roll staff seriously had it under control.  The exchange area was well organized and it was awesome to see all the race action.  At about 35 minutes in, the first place runner passed all of us waiting for our partners at the exchange.  Oh to run a 5 minute mile…

L to R: Bitner, Beth, Teal & Joe

 

The weather in Dallas literally changed over night – Saturday we had a high in the 80’s and by the time we went to run our relay Sunday morning I think the temperature had maybe gotten up to 50 degrees with no sun.  Even the Rock ‘n’ Roll staff said that it must have been some kind of cruel joke.  It was freezing.

None of us had run a race in the Rock ‘n’ Roll Marathon Series, but we were so impressed with how organized and just how great overall the event was.  There were spectators everywhere, awesome bands, and even the High School cheerleaders from Teal’s school district.  We both talked after the race about being moved, almost to tears, by some of the pictures on runner’s shirts.  Beth saw a girl who ran with an extra bib that said “I run for my mother” and Teal ran behind a boy who had lost his mother to breast cancer, he had a giant picture of her on his back.  It is seriously motivating to run for a good cause and to see those affected by cancer, working for a cure!  This race also supported Susan G. Komen!

One of the exciting parts of the race was when Teal actually ran beside Troy Aikman!  Teal said that he literally just ran up on the side of her, he was on the left and his pacer on the right, and was talking about his race bib.  He thought he was the only one wearing it.  She looked up at him as it is weird to hear a lot of talking during a race and realized who the heck it was!  She looked at the girl on the other side of her for reassurance and yep, it was really him.  Teal looked right at him and asked, “Can I take your picture?”  He said, “Sure if you run fast!”  He had a pace to keep afterall!  Teal, who was running with her iphone to use the runkeeper app, took a quick picture and tweeted it while running.  Seriously cool!  Troy even contacted Life is a Run afterwards to find out about the picture!  How cool is that?

Beth and Teal both finished the race with an excellent pace.  It is safe to say our best 6 miles run ever!

Our Results

Teal & Joe: Ran the half in 1:50:22 (an avg. 8:26/mile pace) Teal’s half in 51:44.  They finished 8th amongst the co-ed teams and 19th out of 305 relay teams!

Beth & Bitner: Ran the half in 1:44:55 (an avg. 8:01/mile pace) Beth’s half in 50:37.  They finished 4th amongst the co-ed teams and 13th out of 305 relay teams!

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February’s Race

March 22, 2011 by · Leave a Comment

If you’ve read our “about” page you might get the idea of how busy we keep ourselves reguarly and already in month 2 of our goal we were having issues finding a race we could run together!  The first weekend of February we spent in Puerto Vallarta attending one of our closest friends’ wedding and the following weekend I would be in Corpus Christi, Texas attending my cousin’s wedding.  And in reviewing races in February in the DFW area it seemed like the weekend I was in Corpus had the most options due to it being the weekend leading up to Valentine’s Day.  Afraid to ruin the goal of a race a month at the very beginning I decided to run the Cupid’s Chase 5k Run while in Corpus.

I was so nervous to be running this 5k because I knew I wouldn’t exactly get a great night’s sleep the night before since I’d be attending my cousin’s rehearsal dinner and potentially staying up late.  About midnight I excused myself from the party and went bed.  The next morning my mom insisted on going with me just to make sure I would be ok, which I didn’t mind because she’s never seen me do any of my running as of late, just hears about it after the fact.  We ended up getting a little lost on the way to the race and I showed up just 15 minutes before it started.  Had I been in Dallas I would have been freaking out as I usually show up an hour early just in case to every race.

When the race started it was about 30*F outside, not very windy and the sun was out so in my mind ideal for a run!  I didn’t have a way to listen to music so it was just me and my thoughts!  I remember looking at my watch about 19 minutes in and thinking “ok, hopefully you have just about a mile left – let’s do this!”  I was pleasantly surprised when I rounded the corner towards the end and saw that I was going to cross the finish line when the clock was around the 26 minute mark! I’d never run a 5k race this fast before and was excited to kick some butt (my fastest time to date had been 28:01)!

Are you wondering what Teal did in February?  Like I said it was hard finding races!  There really weren’t any near by in the DFW area for the last two weekends of February so she ran a race of her own and conquered a 6.33 mile run while I was running in Corpus!  I am so proud of her!  I’m not sure what I would have done had I been in her shoes.  Also, most of the part time work she does is on the weekends starting on Saturday mornings so you can understand how proud of her I am!!

Waiting for the race to start and if you can’t tell I’m pretty much dead center in this picture

 

      

Just a tiny speck on the right side of this picture!

 

And all done!

 

Our Results

Teal – 6.33 miles in 1:00:46

Beth – 5k in 25:50

 

posted by Beth

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January’s Race

March 21, 2011 by · 2 Comments

This post is way over due, but nonethless here you go…

Fresh off our White Rock Half Marathon high, we wanted to keep up with our distance running and decided to run a 15k! On January 23, 2011 along with our good buddy and amazing runner, Bitner, we ran the Too Cold to Hold.  We definitely froze waiting around for the race to start but once it did the weather was absolutely perfect!

Our Results

Teal – 1:30:36

Beth – 1:21:23

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