The Hottest Half
August 15, 2012 by · 10 Comments
Well, we survived The Hottest Half, but it was not pretty. That idea of “you race like you trained” definitely comes to mind here. As you might have read, we have been in a lull for a while. Our last half was in April and we have been fairly inconsistent since then and very inconsistent the past month or so. With that said, this race was in fact our slowest EVER. On top of that we both did pre-race things we normally don’t do like enjoy an adult beverage or two, and oh you know, hang out on the lake all day water tubing. Water tubing also caused a very stiff, cramped like right calf for Teal. That was fun for 13 miles. Neither make for a rested body, and it definitely does not aid in a body that is already NOT in half marathon shape. Then we really started to wonder if we are supposed to run because Beth’s car keys were left in her sister’s car in Austin on Saturday, and our race bibs were locked in her car in Plano. We had to get replacements bibs, which has never happened before. Whoops! Luckily with such as small race it was super easy. Also for some odd reason we both ran this entire race sans music. Beth’s headphones were in the locked car and Teal just forgot to get them out of the car. Notice our trend of excuses? Ugh! Must fix!
Our replacement bibs
Our original bibs and shirts
We honestly can’t really blame it on the heat, it honestly was hot but not that hot. We had discussed during the week somewhat of a strategy to get the race over with. We had to make it to the finish line. Run-walk came to mind… ugh…but with Teal’s cramped calf and how our running had been we had to play it by ear out on the course. We both knew 13.1 straight was not going to happen. We started out the race and we are pretty sure neither wanted to say it was time for a break first. We made it to the 4 mile mark, ha, impressive right? Then ran what felt like 2-2.5 at a time, until we were down to resting every water station. (Wow- typing this is not fun!) As we got towards the end we really just wanted to get home without stopping and to pass up a women that was clearly twice our age. We both ended up beating her, thank god, but did not finish together.
The race was not all bad, we had a few highlights. We got to see our friend Jesus from our running group (North Texas Runners), he was well ahead of us and he passed us coming back from the turnaround. Our friend Lesley was at the turn around waiting for her Racing It Off ladies so we got to say hi to her, and again towards the end of the race! Always love to have smiley, happy runners around when you are ready to get the heck off of a course.
Teal about to finish the last .1 of the race
Beth about to finish the last .1 of the race
(Thanks to Jesus for the pictures of us running!!)
A couple things worth noting from the race. We did in fact run the entire hill that put us at the 5 mile mark on the course! A hill we come in contact with a lot since the Hottest Half had us running around White Rock Lake and so many Dallas races like to include at least a portion of the lake in them. On the way back to that hill where we’d be running the decline Beth noticed a girl squatting off to the side close to the lake. I wonder if she’s ok? Beth was so close to checking on her, did a double take, ooohhhhh, she just has her shorts pulled down going the bathroom. HA! Sometimes when you want to help someone on the course be sure to look twice before it becomes an awkward situation!
So there you have it. Our Hottest Half race…Gross. We have Disneyland Half in a few weeks and we plan on having very different results. We are totally getting back into the swing of things and have a long list of races ahead of us. The inconsistency of our running must get better or these crappy race recap blogs are going to become very difficult to write and we are sure you won’t want to read them. At least we are in this together right?
Countdown Friday
August 3, 2012 by · 6 Comments
Pretty sure we’ve said this before, but who doesn’t love a good countdown?! Here’s a glimpse at some of the current countdowns going through our heads –
9 days until half marathon no. 12, The Hottest Half
24 days until Teal’s new students are back in school
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28 days until we head back out to California for Disneyland Half (half marathon no. 13) and hopefully getting our Coast to Coast medals as well!!
Disneyland Half 2011
59 days until we begin training for the Louisiana Marathon (mary no. 2)
85 days until Beth & Brent tie the knot!
Struggle City, Population: 2
July 27, 2012 by · 24 Comments
The two of us somehow, someway and thankfully so are very in sync with each other a lot. Have you noticed that throughout our blogging journey so far?
Our passion for running, trying to live healthy lives and being so in tune with each other is probably what makes Life is a Run a team that isn’t likely to be divided!
So that’s all happy and everything is puppies and roses, right? Well, the truth is we even tend to go through struggling times together.
I’d say right now we are in struggling times. In all aspects of our lives? Nah. In the running aspect? Yes.
Here is where we could insert excuses, but we won’t do that because then we just think…….
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So we are in a funk. Both of us are not really getting in the weekly running we thought we would be. And there have been a number of times you could find us texting like this…..
or gchatting like this……
So our running lives right now equal Struggle City, Population: 2.
Reading this you might think, whatever you’ll get over it! We think and hope we will, but what’s got us reeeeally freaking out is that we are 16 days away from our next half marathon. Our first half marathon in almost 4 months! The Hottest Half! The heat at that race scares us and our lack of running scares us.
But we have each other to run with – yah, for our team of two!!
What do you do when you are in funks? Does the hot weather make it harder for you to get out of a funk?
Wounded Warrior 10K
June 11, 2012 by · 8 Comments
This weekend was another solo race weekend….well, kind of! Teal was off at a friend’s wedding in the Dominican Republic and I was still here in Tejas! 🙂 I might have driven to the Wounded Warrior race alone, but managed to see some friends out there! Before I could even get out of my car I saw my friends Ashley & Jason walk by. Somehow I always miss them at races so I jumped out of my car as fast as I could to catch up with them. I’d also planned on meeting up with a few other twitter ladies, but sadly we didn’t all see each other! :-/ We’ll have to work on that again for another race, Caron & Kyra!! But it was SO good to meet Shannon as well as your mom and Cory!
Totally stole this picture from Shannon! 🙂
The half marathon started 15 minutes before the 10k, so we all parted ways. I walked up to see the half marathoners take off and chatted with a mom and her daughter who were also doing the 10K. Loved hearing about how her other daughter was running the half and she had gotten them into doing races. They’d driven up from Katy (Houston area) to participate in the Wounded Warrior race. The mom told me she would probably be the last person finished. I quickly told her I doubted it and with her run walk method she had she would be ahead of others. I was proud of her when I saw her on the back part of my race and there were plenty of people behind her. I quickly gave her a high five and told her good job and to keep it up!
Anyways, back to the start of this race, I had run this same race last year and kind of knew what I was getting into. I just kept thinking let’s get this done and over with before it’s reeeally hot out there. Off we were! Within the first half of a mile I realized they had made the course different this year which was nice because it created less direct sunlight as a lot of it was on the Campion Trail in Irving. I ran without any sort of water on me, but grabbed some at each water stop.
Thanks to my Runkeeper app I knew I was coming up on the 3.1 mark and therefore the turnaround because I might have missed it. I didn’t need to make this a longer race than it was suppose to be like I did Too Hot to Handle last year! Ha, but there was only a small sign that said turn around. Not a human being there to reassure you that you do in fact need to turn around. Turn around here? Or like this is my warning sign that it’s coming up?? A barefoot man in front of me yelled TURN AROUND and I then said this is really the turn around?? But I followed his lead and figured if I needed to I could just admit to all of you I accidentally cut my run short. That is probably my one and only complaint about the race, but I think the Race Director does such a good job with this one that I can let it slide. 🙂
Once I turned around I kind of had a need to vomit feeling hanging around me for the last three miles. I just wanted to be finished with the heat. I drank water, dumped water on myself, took cold towels from the awesome volunteers and kept chugging along. When I got off the Campion Trail I was in the home stretch for the finish line. I kept telling myself to push but not so hard that you do in fact vomit. Well, guess I did push too hard bc in the last .1 of a mile I had to pull over to the side and you know…vomit not once, not twice, but three times. Ha. See I knew my pace had a potential for a new PR, so I was having an inner struggle of get that PR yet don’t kill yourself.
I didn’t get a PR yesterday and I’m completely OK with that. I crossed the finished line running with 2 minutes and some change until the hour mark and I’m proud of that. If you look at my results online I finished 10th in my age group and 170th overall and I’m proud of that! If you look at the ladies who finished 8th and 9th in my age group even if I hadn’t have had to make my little stop before the finish line I wouldn’t have gotten there faster than them and would have still been 10th in my age group.
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Thanks to April who got to see my fun incident right before the finish for checking on me! I got some water, powerade and pop ice in me and was feeling MUCH better! I absolutely love that they provide pop ice at the end of this race! Love it so much I ate three of them!
After that I hung around to see if I might see anyone else that I know plus I knew Ashley was around somewhere with their cute dog, Atlas, since she’s sidelined from running right now. 🙁 Hoping your recovery time heals you up all the way, lady! Overall, it was fun just sitting and watching people finish and the soliders that were out there. Love this race! It is for such a good cause that even though it’s freakin’ hot in Texas in June it still draws a crowd! This was the Wounded Warrior Half Marathon & 10K’s third year and drew in over 3,000 runners and doubled their fundraising this year from last to over $50,000 raised for the Semper Fi fund.
I ran into Jason, Ashley & Atlas again after Jason completed his half. Congrats to you on a new PR and completing a half in that heat! So impressed with everyone that goes out there and runs the half in that toasty weather!
If you are in the Dallas area you should really consider adding this race to your schedule for next year! Like I said it’s for a great cause, but it is also a race that is put on really well!
Do you have a race that you go back to every year that despite everything else the cause gets you signed up again and again?
May Report Card & Holy Cow it’s Time for June Goals!!
June 8, 2012 by · 1 Comment
Yah, yah, yah…we are a little late to get this up, but we are started on June goals already! Have no fear! A lot has been going on over in our parts of the world as we are sure it has been with lots of you too! Anyways, let’s get on with it…
Teal:
1. Lose 5 more lbs. I have tons of motivation right now because I will be on the beach June 6-11 for one of my best friend’s weddings in the Dominican Republic! C: lost 2-3ish depends on what time you weigh me (don’t you love that) BUT on a side note I am back to where I was before the marathon!!
2. Ok, I’m just going to change this yoga goal. The goal is to go 3 times per week. After looking back on the last 2 months I think this is doable and still a stretch. I had a 6 time month and a 5 time month so hopefully just 3 a week will be a big enough push that is actually time possible! B: Close… I went to yoga 9 times. So basically 3 short, not bad for a crazy month!
3. Stop skipping my morning workouts. My gym buddy and I got a little off track due to crazy lives and schedules. The goal is to go all 5 mornings. I had done this for over a year so it’s doable, just need to get back in the routine! I have been going at night more, but it’s not as easy to do and gets in the way of my yoga goal! Domino effect-boooo!! UMMMMM, not 100% sure how to grade this, I worked out the same and went most mornings, it is just sooo much easier to go at night when I don’t have grad school or something else. I did most of the runs at night but still went about 3 days a week in the morning, PLUS, if you remember from earlier in the year, I wanted to do more weights alone…. DONE!! Feeling so much better about this, well except for the super creepy guy who told me my aura was beautiful. What??
4. Be nicer! I am not evil, but stress has taken over this month with preparing for graduation, looking and interviewing for counseling jobs, planning showers and events, tax season at my dad’s, state testing for schools, blah blah blah. I have NOT been the picture of niceness at all and have become way more annoyed at things than normal. I am not sure how I am going to actually do this or prove it, but I’ll come up with something and let you know how it goes at the end of May! B-: Ok I was nicer for sure. I did some random things, that at least made me feel nicer including, walking to teacher friends to talk instead of email, putting shopping carts back in the shopping cart thing even if they weren’t mine, waved at the people in my neighborhood when we passed each other in cars, I never once honked my horn, I bought the lady’s order behind me at Starbucks in the drive through line, and I just got a better attitude about work and stuff like that. Not too shabby BUT I still have a lot of room!
Beth:
1. I’m still chasing those 5 pounds to lose! Ha, one day…one. freakin’. day. I will be able to say I did it so. This goal is sticking! C: I lost two pounds! Haha
2. Survive my first 10 mile race! I’m currently freaked out by this distance since I’ve never raced it and it is getting hotter down here in Texas! A+: I DID survive!! It was a hot one, but I did the White Rock ‘n’ Roll 10 miles!
sprintin’ it in!
3. My wedding related goal is super vague, but the goal is to have at least 3 items on my checklist marked off and report back to you what I’ve accomplished them! B-: I have a CAKE!!! 🙂 I also bought all the supplies for two projects I am working on and while that doesn’t seem like much of a feat, well, it is in my world! Finding time to work, workout and get to stores before they close is hard for me! Ha. I’ve also done a lot of research into decorations I want to use, so while it would be amazing if I was further along I am proud of where I am!
This isn’t really what my cake looks like – I got more of a simple yet elegant look to mine! 🙂
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4. I want to continue on with my preparing food for the week on Sunday’s goal, but to make it different the goal here is to find two new recipes this month and make them! Must add variety to what I’ve been doing! F: I did do a lot of food prep in the month of May, however, I only ended up finding one new recipe that I wanted to try and then I didn’t even try it. Ha! I’m not going to make this a goal for next month, but I will make the recipe I have and find at least another to try soon! So help me God!
My extra goals each month – a. Hill workouts weekly! I actually hosted hill runs in the month of May for NTX Runners, but Teal had to cover one of my hill runs because I was sick. :-/ Which means I did 4 hill runs in the 5 weeks of May. b. Read two books a month. Well, I actually finished 3 books in May! 🙂 I was a busy reader! I finished The Girl in the Green Sweater: A Life in Holocaust’s Shadow by Krystyna Chiger, Girls in White Dresses by Jennifer Close and Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet by Jamie Ford.
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Joint Goal:
We will be participating in #runchat’s May challenge which is pretty much to run a different route, a new trail or try a race you have never done before. For more information please visit the #runchat site. Beth & Brent found a trail area by his house to explore during this month. You might remember it from Wordless Wednesday No. 25
Onward to June goals….How are we in the 6th month of this year?!?
Teal:
1. Clean out the garage which involves properly deposing of all old paint, chemicals, and random things you can’t through in the regular trash, donating anything that should have donated a long time ago, if it belongs to my brother it’s going to his house, and then just generally cleaning. Why I pick June to work outside in the heat is beyond me but whatever!?
2. So I graduated at the beginning of May!! Yay, but I have very annoying things that I have/need to do
- Consolidate and move all my student loans to one place and get on a better plan to pay off faster. YUCK, YUCK, YUCK!
- Register for the LPC exam and not cry when I pay the $300 to take it
- Organize all the grad work that I did that I want, toss the old stuff, bind what I am keeping ( anyone have one of those spiral binding things?)
- Organize, bind, toss, or give away my teaching stuff! I will be moving to counselor next year and have a billion teaching things to go through
3. Follow my under 2 hour half marathon runkeeper running plan as close to possible! I will eventually run and under 2 hour half marathon if it kills me! Well not really, I want to live, but you get the point!
4. Eliminate random eating. Raise your hand if you stand around trying to figure out something to eat and you find yourself eating crap in the process! ME!! This has to stop!! It’s not like am eating like crazy stuff, but it is mindless and when I finally figure out what to eat, I’m annoyed that I ate weird random things in the meantime!
Beth:
1. This time around my weight goal is simply: DON’T GAIN ANY!!! Ha, sounds simple right? Well, this is my birth month and my parents are divorced so this usually means multiple celebrations with good food, good drinks and dessert. So it’s a dangerous time of year for me. No weight gain in June!!
2. Yoga 2-3 times a week. Ever since I finished my goal of completing 200 classes in a year I’ve been kind of a slacker, so let’s get back to yoga goals! It’s soooo good for me!
3. Finish projects at Brent’s house. I volunteered his house to host a friend dinner (like this one) towards the end of the month and I haven’t finished some art I started for the walls, since I’ll eventually move in there (you know when we are married) I had already left all of my racing medals, hook to hold them, awesome race bib board my SIL made me over there they just need to be hung up.
4. Finish the two wedding projects I have ALL of the supplies for! 🙂
Joint Goal:
We are doing and have asked YOU to participate with us in our Tone It Up Challenge for the month where we do as many days of pushups and planks!
Hope you all have are working hard on your June goals and have a fabulous month! Check back with you when it’s July! But July please do not come TOO FAST!
Things We’ve Learned & Wished That We Knew Sooner
April 24, 2012 by · 13 Comments
As you may or may not know in 2010 was when we began our training to run our first half-marathon. Both of us had run in high school and/or college, but never to the distance we would hit in our half marathon training. The two of us and probably like a lot of people who train for their first half marathon followed Hal Higdon‘s guide.
Hal Higdon’s guides are great and perhaps there are some people out there who work their way through a number of his different plans. We, however, did not and kind of decided to start looking through different plans (one of which was definitely Hal Hidgon’s) and piecing them together. After all what works for one person might not work for another and it never hurts to try something to see if it works for you!
Throughout the not quite two years of us running together we’ve learned to appreciate aspects of our training, realized some things that needed to be added and why, so we shall share with you!
Weight Training
Both of us got personal trainers at a point where we each wanted to lose weight (You can read about Beth’s story here and Teal’s story here). Boy are we thankful to Will & Johnny for helping us to get into shape, get healthy and teaching us a lot! Weight training is very important as you need to build a base for yourself. If you only rely on running to build your muscles then you are missing out! Not every single race you might run will you actually feel yourself digging deep and using that core strength or pumping those arms hard to get to that finish line, but those are important parts of your body to work on strength so you have it when you need it. With that said it’s important to find a balance with your weight training and make sure you are working every part of your body. Build that strong foundation so you can be a stronger runner! It was well into us running together that we realized we were at an advantage by already having trainers and having those weekly weights session. We didn’t know where we would be in our running if we didn’t have them!
While yes, a trainer makes it so much easier to get your weights session in you don’t neeed to have one! Grab a friend that’s knowledgeable about weights and ask them to show you the ropes a few times or look into one of the many apps that’s how there and available to guide you through a workout!
If you would like more of an explanation of the benefits weight training please see this post from Runner’s World.
Tempo Runs
We just recently started to incorporate these into our workouts. What were we waiting for with these??
What? There is lots to read out there about tempo runs and sometimes it doesn’t seem to be written in layman’s terms, or is that just us? Part of why we probably did NOT do tempo runs for awhile was because we did not truly understand them. A tempo run normally consists of running at an easy pace to start, let’s say we are doing a 4 mile tempo run, so you may run your first mile at an easy pace then for miles 2 and 3 you kick it into a higher gear. This higher gear is a hard pace yet if you were rate levels of hard you might have comfortably hard, hard, and extremely hard. You want this higher gear to be at a comfortably hard pace so that you can sustain this level of intensity for the entirety of your two miles. Once you hit mile 4 take your speed back down to where you were in mile 1 for a nice recovery mile.
Importance. The idea behind a tempo run is to raise your lactate threshold. If you are at a point in your running where you are able to run the mileage you want in a long run but are ready to work on speed this is a workout you’ll want to add into your training schedule once a week to build speed and strength. The one thing that really helped us in determining how to do a tempo run was by using the McMillan Running Calculator not only did it help with tempo runs but also discovering what type of speed we needed for all sorts of runs.
Hill Workouts
What? While yes there are races out there that you might register that are flat, flat, flat! But that is simply not going to be the case for each and every race that you will ever run. Those hills in your runs/races continue to help challenge us as runners. The best workout we have found to make sure a hill does not defeat us in a race are hill repeats. We’ll be honest they aren’t the most fun type of workout, but believe us when you finish a race with hills you’ll be thankful for the time you spent on hill repeats. For us a hill repeat workout consists of:
1. Doing your homework and find a hill that will work. You might want a hill that is somewhere between .1 – .2 of a mile.
2. Get a little bit of mileage in before your hill repeats, i.e. run from your house out to the hill
3. When you reach your hill if it’s your first time maybe try 4 or 5 runs up the hill and back down (but have a goal of working up to 10 hill repeats)
4. Get in that last bit of mileage back to your house
Importance. We’ve recently heard a couple people say this and it is the absolute truth, “the difference between me continuing to run and the people walking up the hill in that race are these workouts.” Even if you are not specifically training for a race that has hills in them, this workout is beneficial! It’ll build muscle that running on a flat path does not, help with your endurance and help you to get faster! Throw this type of running workout into your weekly mix as well and you’ll feel a difference at your next race!
Tangents
Just for good measure we are throwing this one in this post. And no we aren’t taking you back to geometry class either! 🙂 Or is it basic algebra?? Ha, math is hard, y’all! 🙂 There were plenty of times that we can remember one of us saying “ugh! My Runkeeper says I ran 6.43 in that 10k race!” and there were times when we’d finish our long runs together that we were asked “why did Teal run a further distance than you Beth?” TANGENTS! It’s about tangents! We can honestly say we were taught this very valuable piece of information from reading katieRUNSthis’ blog!
The majority of races we have run together have a certified course so it has been measured and is exactly the distance the course claims it to be. When a course is measured it is done so on tangents, so when there is a curved portion of your course the person who measured it did so on the tangents. This is also why for instance when we go run our long runs or even if we run side by side during a race our mileage for that long run or race could be different because neither one of us is running the curves the exact same. For the visual people out there, let us show you the tangents in visual form.
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While you might have learned about tangents today know that at your next race you might do your best to run the tangents but still find that you have some extra mileage at the end, well, it’s hard to run the tangents EXACTLY. As you have to be looking ahead and plotting out exactly how to run the next curve not to mention that there are other runners out there with you on the course that might keep you from running that straight line exactly. All we can do is do our best!
We are no experts by any means! We read articles, blogs, etc. online in an effort to try and learn how we can improve our running. We wanted to share some information that opened up our eyes, helped us to understand running more and that we think everyone should have the benefit of knowing!
If you already knew all of this, well, thanks for bearing with us today! If you didn’t know all of this – are you going to be making some changes now to your weekly running? Glad to know why there is extra mileage on those races you’ve run before?
We’re Running in the Rain, Just Running in the Rain
April 17, 2012 by · 17 Comments
Should we get out of the car now? Or wait a few more minutes?
Well, Saturday afternoon the winds started picking up here in Dallas. It never really rained in our neck of the woods that day and even when we went to bed that night it was still dry. By the time we both woke up think the rain hadn’t fully started until it was time to actually drive down to Fair Park. But enough about that let’s just cut to the chase. Here’s how Big D Half went for each of us…
Miles 1-3
Teal: Ugh! Where is a water station when you need it? These first few miles were HOT! I think I had more sweat in these 3 miles then I did during any other stretch of the race. It was hot and humid and the air was seriously thick! I kept coughing because it honestly felt like something was stuck in my throat. I start looking to the sky and thinking where is the rain we’ve been hearing about and if it doesn’t rain I am going to be pissed because I decided to forego buying new shoes because I felt like that would be a dumb idea to run in new shoes in the rain and then feel like they were ruined after one time.
Beth: I didn’t really have a goal in mind for this race because I knew I needed to see how the weather would play out so my goal would be determined out on the course. Somewhere in mile 1 a man asked where the water stops were and I told him I had heard they were few and far between out here. In these miles I saw a man who is a regular with me in spin class and talks to me about my running. He asked me why I wasn’t further up and I told him I was trying! Ha. Teal and I had decided we needed to take advantage of each water stop since we wouldn’t know how the weather would be throughout the race. At the second water station we had to stop and wait for water to be poured in a cup for us.
Miles 4-6
Teal: Not bad but I was worried about being too hot as there was still no sign of rain and I was like, I’m not in the mood to deal with this heat and decided to slow down. Not based on total need just based on me really only going to do what makes me happy right now and that is not run fast in the heat. Happy also meant eating all my gummi bears, which I did! At this point, I was thinking, just do what you feel like, just be happy, and who really cares about the rest. At mile 6.5 the air started to cool and you could see darkening clouds! I kept crossing my fingers!
Beth: I forget when exactly now, but somewhere around 3 or 4 miles I’d seen the 2 hour pacer pass and thought welp, there goes that, but if it’s going to end up being hot this whole time I can live with that. Still have yet to get many runs in while it’s just been HOT outside. At some point running along White Rock Lake a breeze was coming through periodically so I started to feel good and knew I could pick up my game some but that there where still hills to conquer! Even though I had my Runkeeper app going I wasn’t fully aware of where I stood to finish this thing at the pace I was at, but I knew if I wanted it I could possibly bust out another sub two half. Just as we were leaving the lake we had pretty much switched over into a new climate. It was cool! I let out a woohoo!! And the people around me said yes! This feels good! This next part I mention only because it gave me a laugh out there but shortly after this I’m coming up on this muscular guy running without his shirt on and then I see him raise one arm, flex and admire his bicep. Ha! Then I passed him. Ha!
Miles 7-10
Teal: Sweet RELIEF!! The rain hit at 7 and I could not have been happier. Had the crazy humidity kept up it would have been a different story. Everyone around me literally started to cheer! Most people put their hands in the air and you could just tell we all wanted that rain. This excitement died shortly after, and honestly I got a little worried. I didn’t want to deal with lightening or anything and decided to speed it back up and just get off the course. It pretty much rained consistently during these miles!
Beth: After the rain hit in the beginning of mile 7 I knew a sub two half was mine that day I just had work to do to in this last half! The rain was completely exhilarating to me and from there on out I was running happy! I thanked as many police officers and volunteers as I could. I also high fived as many little kids as I could! I just felt awesome so I picked up the pace! Go time!
Miles 11-13.1
Teal: Not bad at all. Not too tired, didn’t feel great but didn’t feel bad. Just wanted dry clothes. I usually count when I run but instead of counting as pace keeping I just decided to repeat the phrase “ dry clothes, dry clothes” as motivation to get this over with! I saw Beth at 13 and she ran a few steps with me and then it was over!
Beth: To me some of this last half truly runs together because I was happy. I was constantly thinking you got this! Let’s get it done! It was also somewhere in here I spotted the 2 hour pace and eventually passed him! YES! Running through numbers in my head and somewhere in here I thought, wait a second, could I get a new PR today?! So I kept pushing. When mile 12 came I knew I’d put in a ton of work and my body could only take so much more pushing. I knew if I did PR it would be a close one and I thought if I don’t I don’t care. I’ve run a strong race and I am so proud of myself! It was kind of nice that Teal and I happened to walk by the 13 mile marker that morning as we made our way to the start and knew just where the finish was.
Teal: Not my best run and not my worst run. I can honestly say I am excited for the break. I have not expected a PR or anything in a while for the simple fact that I have not been training at all. I have done a couple hill work outs and nothing over 2-3 miles randomly besides the hills. I am ready to have time to train, change things up and use the second half of the year to work getting faster and stronger. Continually just running races and using them as “training” is no bueno and does not make you faster! I’m healed now and ready to go. Can’t wait until August when I feel better about doing actual training work and regaining the confidence that I have worked on speed! The break is needed because I really have not felt that huge desire to push!
Beth: I didn’t stop my Runkeeper app right away, but I’d gotten across the start fast and when I crossed the finish line I knew I was in the 1:57 range. I missed my half PR by 34 seconds meaning 34 seconds faster and I would have hit my same exact PR so 35 seconds faster and I’d have a new PR barely. But I didn’t care! I had a good race! Overall, I finished 22 in my age group and 326th in the race. The past few months I had put in a lot of hill work and with just the two short stadium workouts my trainer Johnny has had me do in the last two weeks I had that push in me during the race. Yes, we are taking a few months off from running halfs and I’m excited to take this opportunity to get stronger! I know that I’ll come back in the Fall making sure I conquer my overall goal of having mostly sub two half marathon races.
Once the race was over we wanted to try and see a few people who were running the marathon. After the marathoners hit the mile 26 marker they had to keep running up this road that takes them along the gate of Fair Park and we stationed ourselves where they’d make their last turn into the park. We cheered for a good two hours out there! Ultimately we ended up missing the people we knew, but we managed to see Army Amy as she was closing out her marathon! We still haven’t met you in real life, but it was good to see you out there! You were looking strong, lady! So there you have it our Big D race recap and if you’d asked us 4 months ago after White Rock Marathon if we would ever be grateful to run in the rain again we both would have probably yelled NO!! But the rain made this race bearable!
We Are Seeing Doubles Again!
April 13, 2012 by · 3 Comments
We liked our double race weekend in March so much that we decided we needed an April repeat….or something like that! 🙂
As you probably already know from previous blog posts tomorrow we are running the Dallas CASA Superhero 5K at Lindsley Park! This race will bring a bit of newness for both of us as neither one of us have ever run at that park AND it’ll be the first time that Beth gets to run a race with her future sister-in-law!
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Then Sunday morning we are running the Big D Half the first half marathon to kick off the start of our Four Seasons Challenge we decided to participate in and you know, get extra bling for when we complete it! 🙂
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So it’ll be a full weekend, but hopefully a good one! Though we have already gotten a heads up email from Big D that they are closely watching the weather for Sunday since right now there is a 70% chance of rain and/or thunderstorms for the race! If it does rain at least it won’t be in the 40’s like White Rock Marathon was in December! =)
We both do not have set goals for this race! We are going to go out there do our best, race smart and hopefully have a lot of fun while running! 🙂
What are YOUR weekend running plans? We want to know!
We All Mess Up Sometimes…
April 5, 2012 by · 8 Comments
So you all know we ran a race this past weekend, right? Well, we aren’t going to name that race in this post or another company because this is NOT a post pointing fingers at anyone! So please note that now and try to not read that tone in the words to follow! 🙂
As we were finishing out our half marathon this passed weekend we both heard the guy announcing finishers and around the time Teal crosses we hear “Blanca Perez from someplace, TX.” Hmmm, how much of a coincidence is that someone with Teal’s same last name was crossing right around the time she did?? We were both confused.
Fast forward to our racing results:
Yes, Beth did pull ahead at the very end of the race, but NOT so much so that there was an 11 person distance between the two of us and not a gap that spanned 38 seconds! This morning Teal, still confused by her racing results found the item in her results that is wrong! Her bib number was 347, see…
So Teal Perez and Blanca Perez’ race results were in fact switched!! This was our 26th race together, so honestly this was bound to happen to one of us at some point, right? And as you all know this was the slowest half marathon either one of us had ever run before so the time really is irrelevant, but the real point of this post is – who else in our running community has this happened to? Did you do anything to get your results changed? You know since pretty much once you run a timed race your results are forever searchable on the interwebs! Let us know!