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September 29, 2005

Two productive runs

Well sometimes a person is so busy that the only time to go running involves errands! Today I ran twice, both times in order to accomplish something productive.

My first run was at 10:00 am. I needed to stop at home and pick up my computer (long story) so I went to the gym, changed, ran a little over 4 miles, picked up my computer, and walked back downtown. I felt pretty good although it was actually colder than I expected! Then I showered and went back to work, computer in hand.

My second run involved going to pick up my parents' (they are getting a joint present this year) birthday gift. The place where it is - hopefully they will not read this and figure it out! - is about a mile and a half from home, so I ran there, picked up the gift, and ran home. I almost ended up with three mini-runs today, as Matt and I were going to go running when he gets home from work, but I don't think we'll end up running since he won't be getting home until at least 7:00. But that is okay, I feel that I have run enough by now, even though I don't have very many miles for today.

I will try to write before we go to the airport tomorrow, but if not I'll catch up on the weekend when we get home Sunday night. Yay for vacations!!

Posted by barb at 05:38 PM | Comments (1)

September 28, 2005

5 miles and chicken pie

Today was yet another day in which I drove for a long time to do very little in Greeley. Happily for me, today was cooler which seemed to mitigate the almost constant smell of maneuer in the town (no, I am not kidding. Most of the time Greeley smells like cow maneuer). So that was kind of nice. However I also think that at the company where I am working right now they don't have very good air circulation, which always makes me feel kind of tired and lethargic. This is seriously a big problem. When I was consulting at another client several years ago, we all knew that 80% of the building's air supply (air supply - ha!) was recycled. It really gives you headaches and all kinds of stuff. Yucko. Just goes to show that humans should not be inside so much!

Anyhoo, I had a rough work day on several levels which I will not go into quite yet, but next week possibly I will. I was so tired as well, as I have not been sleeping too well due to work problems and stress. I left a little after 4:00, drove home for a long time, and got a much needed hug from Matty when I got home. This sounds kind of silly but sometimes a hug is very necessary for well being.

After relaxing for a few minutes, I got changed and went for a nice 5 mile run. At first I was still feeling blah from my day but after a while some guy passed me (I was on my second lap around the park) so I kind of went with him. This is a weird thing with me, but I feel like if someone is wearing headphones I can kind of tailgate them and they won't be annoyed by it. He was wearing them so I went for it. It felt good and made me realize how much slower I run than necessary sometimes.

So I finished running and Matt and I went to this local store to buy stuff for dinner. We (mostly Matt) made this awesome chicken pie from the newest Jamie Oliver cookbook. It is a great cookbook and we've made several things that we really liked. This was especially delicious! We've both had two helpings, and there's some left over for tomorrow night as well which will be perfect.

It is so nice and cool here right now. My run was so pleasant! It is amazing how much less dehydrated I feel when it's cool out. It will not last - it'll be in the 80's again by the weekend - but we're enjoying it while it lasts.

I need to get up and run in 8.5 hours, so I am off to relax before bed :)

Posted by barb at 09:36 PM | Comments (2)

September 27, 2005

Sleep, run, drive, work, drive, drive, drive

That is the story of my life this week - drive, drive, drive. For yesterday, today, and possibly tomorrow, my commute is 2 hours a day. It is ridiculous and it makes me feel really bad for people that have commutes like this all the time. Although frankly I think some people do it by choice and for them I just do not know what to say! I am just not a glutton for punishment in that particular way. So not only am I driving for a long time to get to work, I am driving really far and going through much gas, which is really annoying me. Not only is it expensive, but I really feel guilty about it since the US is in a fuel shortage currently, and frankly natural resources like the components of which gasoline is made are becoming more and more scarce on a global scale. I am so worried about this and to think that I am personally making it worse by driving so much is really troubling!

So in spite of whining about my commute I have found the time to run this week. Not much or particularly far, but what can you do. Yesterday I had to run after work because I decided that staying in bed was preferable to getting up and trotting around in the dark. It has finally been cooler at night but during the day it's still pretty warm - yesterday when I was driving home on my way to run it was 84 degrees according to my car's thermometer. However, when I was running it didn't feel all that bad.

I ran 8 miles, my normal route, in about 1:10. I had hoped to run a little faster as I was on record pace two miles in, but I kind of died at the end. Oh well, can't win them all. My stomach has been getting pretty upset during a lot of my runs lately which is just another reason to try to run first thing in the morning instead of after work.

After my run we went to a friend's house for dinner and Monday Night Football. I had low to no hopes for the Broncos so I was very pleasantly surprised when they kicked KC's butt! It was a fun night and we got home a little before 10:00 which is nice on a Monday night. I am still kind of exhausted today, but lately it is par for the course.

Tonight I am going to a girls dinner for our ski house - the 4 girls in the house are getting together to get to know each other a little better, chat about the winter, and basically to bond. It should be fun. Thus I had to get up and run before work this morning or I would not be able to run. It was not all that bad although now it's 10:30 and I could stand to take a nap! Unfortunately I believe they frown upon that in a work setting.

I ran this course that I always thought was a little over 5 miles, but today I ran it in over 50 minutes so I am calling it 5.5 for mileage logging purposes, because as slow as I was going I do not think I was running over a 10 minute mile. At least I sure hope not! That would be kind of sad. I had a decent time, although my legs felt a bit dead, and I was dodging many sprinklers. This is one of my pet peeves. Why do they need to run the sprinklers at 7:00 am, when lots of people want to use parks, instead of in the dead of night? I guess I will never be able to change this unless I am in charge someday. Funny to think about what a runner would change. I would also like to have dirt sidewalks!

I think that I have prattled on for long enough, and now it is time to do some work today.

Posted by barb at 09:35 AM | Comments (0)

September 25, 2005

Weekend Update

So, a few people were slightly unclear as to what a white trash party is. I think that if I describe what Matt wore, it will all come together: a mullet wig, huge cheap sunglasses with the UVA protection sticker still on it, a fake blonde moustache, a flannel shirt with the arms cut off, shorts, and tube socks with sandals. When I figure out how to post pictures, I will post one of us. He was so funny looking, I hardly recognized him. It was lots of fun. After the white trash bash we went to our friend's birthday celebration, where they were watching Australian Rules Football. It was so cool and really fun to watch - those guys are amazing athletes!

On Friday I ran 4 miles, nice and easy. Saturday I did absolutely nothing! It was outrageously bad of me but I was really exhausted for some reason that I still don't understand.

This morning I ran 9 miles and then Matt's mom came down to Denver for a bike ride. She has this cool bike computer so I know we rode about 11.5 or 12 miles. I would like to say that my day off did good things for me and made me feel great on my run this monrning but that would plainly not be true! I felt pretty lethargic and had a dead legs feeling for most of the run. This was too bad as the weather was more pleasant for running than it has been in several months - cool and cloudy. I don't really know what's going on with my body lately, I am constantly tired and want to sleep a lot and it is hard to run. I figured it wouldn't hurt to take an iron supplement or two, so I took two this morning.

Anyway we went out for lunch which was super yummy and then went to see the Corpse Bride movie (the new Tim Burton film). It was good and a nice length, only about 90 minutes. Now we are hanging out, relaxing, and enjoying the rest of our weekend! I will be going to bed early tonight and getting up to run at 6:00, and then driving to Greeley (blah!).

I hope everyone is having a super weekend! I know I am certainly enjoying it.

Posted by barb at 01:33 PM | Comments (2)

September 23, 2005

Wickedly Fun

Wow, so all of a sudden I feel like I am very behind on my blog. I cannot believe I neglected it yesterday as I had lots of free time, but I hadn't run yet while I did have free time.

Anyway on Wednesday Matt and I had planned to run 4 miles. He is having a pretty busy week at work and for some reason he had to bring his pager and I had to bring his cell phone in my amphipod, and when he got paged 20 minutes into the run he had to do a few things. Then after he got paged he had to get home as quickly as possible, so we ended up running 3.5 miles instead of 4. However, on the way home Matt was trying to hurry so that he could do stuff for work, and he went so fast! I was really proud of him. We were probably running 9:00 pace which is really good. However, right when we were turning onto our street, Matt ran over a root or something and twisted his ankle. Poor guy! I hope he will be feeling better by next weekend when we run our 5k.

So that was lots of fun, I love running with Matt. Yesterday I slacked and slacked and finally started running at 4:00. I really should have run first thing in the morning but it was such a nice day later on that it was nice to be able to run in the middle of the afternoon. However, I had cereal for lunch and a lot of times dairy products just do not sit well in my stomach. It was kind of churning the whole time I was running. However, something about that must have been good as I finished my 8 mile loop in 1:08, which is my second fastest time ever on that run. So I am thinking I'm pretty much recovered now from my half marathon if I am able to run that kind of time. I really did not feel like I was straining much or running terribly fast so that is good news too.

Last night we went to see the musical Wicked, which is touring in Denver right now. It was so much fun and we really enjoyed it! However, I was kind of in bad shape as I will explain. So I ran at 4:00, and finished right after 5:00. I took a quick shower and we left home at 5:45 which was pretty soon after I finished running, and my stomach was still a little jacked up. We went to this place that has great steaks for dinner and we got a cocktail there. This drink just knocked me on my tail, I was really wasted after I drank a little less than half of it. Which was bad. I was guzzling water the whole time as well but it didn't seem to help. I started eating to see if I could sober myself up a little bit, because I really didn't want to be drunk at the show. Of course once I started eating my stomach felt terrible! So I was not feeling good at all. When we got to the play all of a sudden I could barely keep my eyes open. And I was behind an abnormally tall person so during the first half of the play I couldn't really see anyway. I almost fell asleep at one point! How embarrassing. After the intermission I felt a lot better, although I did have a raging headache. But at least I could see during the second half (although Matt couldn't), which kept me awake.

So the lesson there is, don't run, have a strong drink, eat rich food, and try to go to a three hour play!

Tonight we are going to a white trash party, which is always a good time. I hope I'll have time to run between work and the party but if not, a day off never killed anyone. I hope everyone enjoys the weekend!

Posted by barb at 09:55 AM | Comments (2)

September 21, 2005

House Hunting and Back to Doubles

So lately, I have been into house hunting while I run. It is kind of a silly thing to do at this point in time since at the very earliest we will be able to start looking at houses in January. And the only thing I can do now is covet the houses I want, and think of harebrained schemes wherein we would be able to buy them before we sell our current place. But it is so much fun! Today I found this cool place that is in a nice area and it even has a sauna in the basement. How sweet would it be to have your own personal sauna!

Anyway, that was a good time. While doing house hunting I had a nice, albeit slow, 7 mile run. I do not know why but my easy runs have been pretty slow recently. I am not too worried about it as I just ran a half marathon but hopefully I will be able to start going faster soon!

After work today, Matt wants to run 4 miles, so I will go with him and get my first double in for a while. It is so nice that it's been more temperate lately - it makes it a lot easier to run doubles. This should be good because Matt has finally asked me how he can get faster (I never wanted to give him running advice until he asked for it), and I told him it would be good for him to run outside a little more instead of on the treadmill, and that maybe once a week he should run a little farther than normal. This is going to be important for him later on since he is currently planning on running the Cherry Blossom race next spring. So I am all excited, it is always nice to have someone to run with, especially Matt! Time permitting I also need to run to the store to pick up a prescription and then we need to grocery shop. We are planning to make Chicken Tikka Masala tonight, which should be delicious, if we can manage to find the time to do everything on our agenda tonight.

Posted by barb at 12:20 PM | Comments (2)

September 20, 2005

Is it Friday yet?

Shoot, I do not think it is. This week is kind of sucking from a work standpoint and it feels like I have already been at work for seventeen hours today, when realistically I've been here maybe 4 1/2 hours. Yucko! Oh well, at least I have a lot of fun things to look forward to this week. Tonight we are going to dinner with Matt's parents, who are really fun to hang out with, tomorrow we are chilling and maybe going for a bike ride, and Thursday we are going to see Wicked, which is a musical that I've been wanting to see for ages! Very exciting stuff. Not to mention that now that we're only going to dinner (when we pay) once a week, it is more exciting and I already can't wait to go to dinner on Thursday before the play.

Anyway, that aside, running is going pretty well. I was a bit stiff yesterday but not too bad really. However I did want to have an easy day especially since I did not have a lot of time in my schedule for running. I just ended up trotting down to pick up my car, where I had left it before the race on Sunday, and driving it home. Kind of a productive errand-running kind of day. I got in about 4.5 miles and also did some lunges while I listened to music after I ran the first 4 miles. I hadn't done lunges in a long time so I was thinking I might be really sore today and actually in fact I felt fine.

This morning I got up and ran 8 miles before work. I have had such a hard time dragging myself out of bed but today I did all right so that is good since I will not have time to run after work. It was not one of my fastest or my slowest runs, just kind of an in betweener. My legs felt good and most importantly, my hip which got really tight in my half on Sunday felt fine. So I am happy about that. When I get home today I think I will torture myself on the foam roller just in case.

I think that we will have a fairly mellow weekend this weekend, which will be nice because it'll be the last quiet one for a while. Next weekend is our trip to Kentucky for my grandma's 90th birthday, which will be lots of fun! We are doing a 5k in Kentucky on Saturday, October 1, which I think we will enjoy. I am trying to decide if I want to race the 5k, just because it's a chance to run at sea level and maybe go somewhat fast, or if I want to run with Matt and help him meet his under 30:00 goal. We shall see...

Posted by barb at 12:29 PM | Comments (0)

September 19, 2005

Half Marathon Report

This has been a big racing weekend for the elite running bloggers. I just got finished reading several race reports, and I am so proud of everyone! Good job guys.

I thought I would add my race report now as well. I cannot say that I had a fantastic race yesterday, but you win some and lose some, and frankly with the small amount of training and speed work I have been doing I think this actually went pretty well.

So let me start out with the premise of this race as I do not know how clear I was in last week's fog of exhaustion that was my life. This was a half ironman triathlon race, and my friend M., her boyfriend S., and I did it as a relay. So M. did the 1.2 mile swim, S. did the 56 mile bike, and I was doing the 13.1 mile run. We had pretty high hopes as the fastest coed relay team last year was not that fast. The race was at the Aurora Resevoir which is not the nicest place in the world and seems to be almost in Kansas but that is not too big a deal. Additionally I ran a few cross country races there in high school and remembered those races as death marches - it is very hilly.

This race was pretty cool. It was very small (219 finishers) which was nice because parking at the resevoir is somewhat limited. And it made for a nice, mellow environment. We got there very early - I left my house around 5:35 to go to M.'s for my ride - so there was lots of time for me to hang out, read my book, warm up, stretch, cheer, and take pictures.

So here is how the race went. M. put on her wet suit (she is getting into doing tri's so she got the gear which is good because the water was COLD!) and went down to the start. She did the swim in about 40 minutes which was about what she expected. She did a great job and was about middle of the pack. She ran out of the water and tagged S., who took off on his bike. He is a very serious cyclist and completed the bike in about 2:15, which is around 25 miles an hour. In other words he KILLED it!! So we made up some time in the bike portion. By this time it was about 10:30 am and pretty warm. I ran up to S. and tagged him (he was tired so I did not think he could tag me) and then I took off.

The race starts through the transition area and then you basically go almost all the way around the resevoir, turn around, and come back. I started at 8:00 pace, then went faster for several miles, then returned to 8:00 pace, imploded at mile 11 and ran an 8:48 (yuck), and then picked it up at the end. My final time was 1:44 high, which brought us in at 4:39. We were the third coed team to finish and the 16th overall finisher. Which means that several people beat us and they did the entire thing themselves! Those people are crazy, and amazing all at the same time. The overall winner was a man in his 30s but the second place finisher was actually an all female team. It was really cool to watch them, they kicked butt! Go girl power.

Anyway I should say a few more things about my race. Overall I feel pretty good about it, although I wish I would not have had such a bad mile 11 split. That was about 90% mental and 10% physical. Luckily no other teams passed me at that time, but I still wish I would have run a little better. However I will say this in my defense: the race was hot (about 80 degrees), the course was very hilly, and on the way back there was a pretty strong headwind. All of which was annoying. I am still pleased with my time as my goal was 1:45 and I just barely beat it.

I can't wait to train this winter and run the same half marathon I ran last year, again. I would like to hit a 1:35 next year and I really think that with the proper training I could do it. At least at this point in my running career 10 mile races and half marathons seem to be my sweet spot - I can run those at a pace that is not far off from my 5k and 10k paces. So more than anything else this race has motivated me to train smarter for next year!

Today I will do a nice easy run at lunch time (I think it might involve picking up my car from M.'s house, which I didn't do yesterday since I was a tired little person), and then after work Matty and I will either run errands or go on a bike ride, or both. It should be a good day, even though it is Monday!

Posted by barb at 09:16 AM | Comments (2)

September 16, 2005

Good run, mild day

I am so happy about the weather today, although I do kind of wish I had brought a sweater! It is really pleasant, like the kind of neutral temperature where the air feels perfect on your skin. However I am still feeling somewhat wretched from my days of not sleeping so I wish I was warmer.

Anyway I am so tired still. Seriously I am wondering maybe if I have some kind of illness or thyroid malfunction right now! I slept for about 10 hours last night, I believe. It was nice and I felt good when I first woke up. I decided to come on into work since I woke up so late... and since I am a slacker. It is terrible. I was in bed for like 11 hours.

I hung out at work for about an hour and a half and then went for a 10 mile run, which was nice. I felt pretty good and completed it in around 1:27. So that made me feel a little more like I can actually complete my half marathon this weekend! Ever since my run I have not felt too great but I think that if I can go home and take a little nap before we go to our friend's birthday dinner, I will be okay.

Tomorrow I will take an easy day and then Sunday I will see how it goes. I am hoping I can run 8:00 pace at the very slowest!

Posted by barb at 02:19 PM | Comments (0)

September 15, 2005

Emerging from my state of exhaustion

Well it seems like I am finally getting out of my fog of exhaustion, slowly but surely. I think that by next week I may feel like myself again, which would be nice! Yesterday I was so tired when I got home from work that I laid on the couch, listened to a conference call, and once the call was over I passed out for about 30 minutes. Afterwards, as I had not run yet, I could have easily taken a day off but Matt wanted to go for a run so we ran a little over 3 miles (32:00). Matt did really well - he didn't need to stop and walk at all, and at the end he actually outsprinted me. He is kicking all kinds of butt lately. We had a really nice time (well I had a great time and Matt did not despise running so that was good). Then we cooked chicken jambalaya for dinner, which was yummy, and chilled on the couch. It was so nice just to hang out and to not have social obligations.

This morning I had planned on running but I'm really glad I didn't. I had to be at an appointment at 8:30 and needed every minute to try to figure out how to get to my car in the garage - I don't know where the opener is and the door to the garage has an impossible lock on it. I ended up seeing some neighbors, which was very lucky, and they helped me find the neighbor who knew how to open the door.

I met my friend F. for a run today at lunchtime so that was fun! We were both tired but we still ran fast. I think we went between 4 and 4.5 miles in 36:42. Then I decided I needed to work out more since I have been a slacker this week so I ellipticalled for 65 minutes. I could not believe how tired I felt but it was not too hard to keep going since I had my iPod (I am once again in a Tribe Called Quest phase) and a women's magazine. I tried to go and get a jamba juice smoothie for lunch afterwards but the line was positively out the door and it takes forever there even when there's not a long line, so that was kind of disappointing. I am still in a no-dessert phase however so when I could have gotten a cookie with my sandwich I got a banana instead. So I feel good about that.

Tonight we may go out on a date to the place we went on our first date almost a year and a half ago. It sounds really nice to me although I could still just hang at home for another evening as well. Matt is always a fabulous boyfriend but I do have to say he has been exceeding expectations even by his own standards recently - on Tuesday evening I came home and he had bought me a very nice bouquet of lillies! It was very sweet of him :)

Tomorrow morning I will run, hopefully somewhat far if I do not feel like poo again, then I am meeting a work friend at 9:00, and then in the afternoon I may come into the office, but I may not. We will see. I can't believe tomorrow is Friday already!! Woo hoo!!

Posted by barb at 03:17 PM | Comments (0)

September 14, 2005

Social life induced taper

So now I am looking at this week as a social life-induced taper for my half marathon on Sunday. I hadn't really planned to taper for Sunday's race, as I thought it would be fine if I just ran 8:00 pace which I can do pretty easily, but it turns out I may taper this week just by virtue of my social calendar and my pure exhaustion.

So anyway yesterday after my two hour nap, which was the best nap EVER, I ran 7 miles. I thought I was feeling good and going at a decent pace but actually I ran pretty slow! Which is fine with me. I ran through this cool area where there is a lot of nice shopping so I checked out the fall clothes, not that I will be buying any but it is always fun to look.

Last night I went to this restaurant sampling event with a few girlfriends which was a lot of fun. It is always nice to chat about all of our boyfriends and stuff, and to eat some good food! We got to try out a few new restaurants that we'd never been to, and some old favorites as well. Although I had hoped to be home by 8:00, I was having a good time so I stayed out until around 9:15. I was in bed by 10:30 but did not go to sleep for a while so this morning my plan to get up at 6:30 and run fell through. I feel so bad that I keep sleeping in but I am just so exhausted, it is awful. All I want to do is sleep!

So today I have a full schedule - I am having lunch with my brother, which our mom is generously sponsoring, then I have a work meeting at 4:30 so I won't leave until about 5:00, and then I need to go for my run. Luckily yesterday and today the temperature has been blissfully cool - about 70 at the highest. Oh it is so awesome. I don't plan to run very far today so I would like to do a few pickups during my run. We will see how it goes. Then tonight I am really going to bed early - I mean it!! - and getting up early tomorrow to run before an 8:30 meeting.

I hope everyone is having a nice day!

Posted by barb at 08:56 AM | Comments (0)

September 13, 2005

Great concerts and total exhaustion

Wow, am I tired or what. I am so old now that I do not enjoy staying up until 1:00 am two nights in a row and getting up and going to work. However the two Dave Matthews Band concerts I went to last night and the night before were great concerts, and they were very different from each other as well which was kind of cool. Sunday night was fairly typical and the crowd was very young and wasted. Which was fine albeit mildly to very irritating at times - especially the drunk 20 year olds that kept standing in front of us blocking our view from our own seats. I had a good time although it ended up being me and six drunk men - Matt and his college friends. They were really funny and entertaining, it was kind of like a sociological experiment.

And let me say that I believe this is what they did in college - booze. I do not think they went to class much. I have been thinking about this relatively a lot lately as I had a very different college experience. There were times that I loved Bowdoin and times that I hated it. But for the most part I really loved my education there and the fact that I was there to study and learn and run, and that is what I did. I wouldn't have been happy getting drunk all the time and skipping class. So it was the right thing for me but others may not have liked it.

Anyhoo, last night's show was so different. The crowd was thankfully quite a bit older and more mellow, which I enjoyed. And the show was so different! They played less songs and just jammed on them forever. It was really cool to see. Although our seats were not as good last night - on Sunday we were able to hang with our friends in the fifth row which was so cool.

So as far as running goes, after my long run Sunday I decided to take an easy day yesterday and I ran 4 miles and then ellipticalled for 25 minutes. I actually felt much better than I expected when I ran and ended up finishing up at about 8:00 pace, so that was nice.

Today I had to get up at 7:00 for an appointment and now I am working from home the rest of the day so I think I will go for my run around lunchtime. I would like to run more than yesterday but I am really tired so I will just see how I feel. I could definitely see a nap in my future today.

Tonight we are doing a girls night type of thing and going to the Uptown Sampler which is an event where we will go around to all the restaurants in the Uptown area and sample their food. It should be fun but I really want to have an early evening and sleep for 9 hours tonight, then I think tomorrow I may actually feel human again!

Posted by barb at 10:22 AM | Comments (1)

September 11, 2005

crazy weekend, long run

So I am moderately proud of myself right now. Although I had to go to a birthday party and stay out very late last night, I still ran 11 miles this morning. In fact I theoretically replicated the conditions for my half marathon last weekend by running at 10:30 am, as that is probably about when I will start running - after our friend S. finishes the bike leg. And let me just say it was hot. That is really all I remember about it, hot hot hot. I didn't feel too bad although my water stop was unavailable so I didn't drink at all during the run. I think I ran around 8:45 pace or so. When I got back I was so thirsty but I drank a lot of water since then and took a shower and went grocery shopping and had a turkey sandwich so I feel lots better than I did when I first finished the run.

Because of my late run, and the fact that I really needed to do grocery shopping, I didn't watch much of the first Broncos game of the season which was probably for the best. I cannot even express my disappointment with the team this year. However now we have our Sundays free as we don't really need to watch their games at all! In any case since I went to college in New England I always enjoy watching the Pats, so I will just watch more of their games this year.

Tonight we are going to see the Dave Matthews band so although I am still kind of tired from staying out late last night I think it will be a good time! I have not seen them for quite a while.

Since I am running the half marathon this coming Sunday I won't be running all that much this week but I still think I can hit 50 miles or so.

Oh and by the way on Saturday I ran an easy 4 miles before we went up to the mountains to look for our house for this winter. It was fine, nothing exciting. We found a place to rent so we are excited, although I am freaked out about the expense.

Posted by barb at 02:22 PM | Comments (1)

September 09, 2005

Busy week!

This week has been so crazy. Starting Wednesday night we have had plans for every night for about one week. Let me tell you it has been a bit nuts.

Let's start with running which has been the most mellow part of my week. Yesterday morning I did my run down to Wash Park, around it, and back at around 10:00 am so it was warm but not too hot yet. This has been a ridiculously hot summer and it has gotten to 90 degrees almost every day. I am frankly sick of it and I cannot wait for fall to come! I did not have my best run ever yesterday but I felt okay. I was about a minute or 90 seconds slower than normal but it is bound to happen sometimes. I basically felt good in the shade and crappy in the sun.

Same basic feelings this morning - although today I ran around 8:00 it felt just as warm as yesterday. It is going to be a warm day today. I ran 7 miles in around 1:04. I ran into a friend again, so that was kind of funny, and had a nice little chatty break around 15 minutes into the run. I ran through a very wealthy neighborhood and let me just say it is amazing how much work these people get done on their houses all the time!

So that was nice, and I actually got some work done this morning which is nice. I have to drive up to Greeley in about 30 minutes for a work meeting, which sucks. Greeley is this ugly cow town about an hour away from Denver, and it is the site of my newest project at work. I am not too pleased about it, although it is much better to drive to Greeley instead of getting on a plane to go to work!

Tonight we are having a pretty mellow night, thank goodness, and we are going to cook some Thai food and my mom and stepdad are coming over. It should be nice, and I know my mom is looking forward to coming.

Tomorrow I have to get up early and run before we go up to the mountains to check out some condos we are thinking about renting for the ski season with our friends. It seems like we are late in the game to get a place in the most desirable areas but hopefully we'll find something reasonably nice and convenient. I am excited about it as it will be much easier for me to run before skiing if we're staying up in the mountains! Ah, the strange ways runners think about things. Everyone else is excited about sleeping late and I'm just glad I'll be able to run, I hate putting zeroes in my training log on ski days!

That is the news for today. Also I should mention that we are going to see Dave Matthews on Sunday and Monday night (Monday is a special concert to benefit hurricaine victims so at least we are doing a little bit for them). I have not seen Dave Matthews in concert for about 4 years and I haven't seen them at Red Rocks since 1997 but they are awesome in concert! I hope we will not be the oldest people there, and hopefully they will play some of their old songs that we like the best!

I hope everyone has a great weekend!

Posted by barb at 11:52 AM | Comments (1)

September 07, 2005

Tired Legs

Here is the good news. I think I am getting reacclimated to altitude. Again. So that is nice! And here is the bad news: yesterday my legs were so, so tired. I planned to run 5 miles and even that was a bit of a struggle. However, when I decided I would just let myself go as slow as I wanted, it got a lot better. I ran 5 in around 48 minutes which is not all that bad anyway. However you could not have paid me to run another step!

This morning I was so lazy that I stayed in bed until about 6:45, and then went out and ran 4 miles. It was nice and I felt good. I am hoping to run again after work, maybe 6 more miles, but I will see how I feel. Last night after I ran my foot felt really tight so I want to be conscious of that. But I did stretch a lot after running which I know was a really good idea.

Tonight once I finish working out or running again I believe we are going to a Country Western bar to do some dancing and people watching. I think it will be fun, I have not done any line dancing in quite a while but I do really enjoy it!

Posted by barb at 08:44 AM | Comments (1)

September 06, 2005

A little bit tired... and hungry!

I have not run yet today so I do not have anything particularly germaine to say, except that biking 32 miles is pretty damn far. After our 5k we hung out for a while and then started off to my mom's house, which is about 16 miles away when you bike there. I had not ridden that far in quite a while! It took longer than I expected especially what with disappearing sidewalks - you would go along for a while on a busy road and then have to cross because there was no longer a sidewalk. This is a source of major annoyance to me as what with gas prices and the lack of renewable energy for the purpose of transportation it would be really nice to be able to use more sidewalks than currently exist.

The route in both directions was nice although on the way home it was about 15 minutes shorter because it was more direct and we had to stop less. I was pretty tired by the time we rode up our last hill! However I think we got a lot of good exercise and I think the biking is really good for my leg strength.

Today I had to get into work early to prepare for a class I am teaching today and tomorrow, so I didn't have time to run. I think I'll be done with work around 4:00 today and it's really pleasant outside so I'm looking forward to a nice easy run. I really want to keep doing speedwork so that I can get a little faster again so I am thinking I'll try to do the 1/2 mile workout again on Friday. We also may do another 5k this weekend so we'll see!

I will update later, or tomorrow morning, on today's run. I hope everyone is able to ease back into the work week today!

I just had to edit this to say that there is a reason my title says 'hungry' also. Biking that far makes me really hungry! I am starving today.

Posted by barb at 02:30 PM | Comments (0)

September 05, 2005

Races, long runs, and days off

I have been slacking on my blog entries again lately, which is bad. It is weird but I just do not feel that I have all that much to say right now. Which is weird because I usually can chat all day long about nothing, and in particular about running! And last week actually was a decent running week which is surprising for me lately.

I think I need to start with Friday. On Friday I only wanted to run about 6 miles, and when I started out running on the Highline Canal Trail (which is the one I took Alison running on when she was here) it was rough. My first mile was 10:10 and I am not kidding. My second and third miles were around 9:10 pace however. I did an out and back and on my second three miles, I did kind of a workout, where I ran 1/2 mile fast followed by slow three times. It is not much of a workout but I actually enjoyed it and usually I abhor doing workouts by myself. My repeats were slow (7:20 pace, 7:30 pace, 6:40 pace) but at least the last one was decent. I made a goal for myself to do this workout again and try to do all the workouts at 7:00 pace or better, which I really think is doable. I was not too tired at the end at all. So that was good!

Saturday I went up to Boulder around the same time as Matt and our friends, but they started boozing and I ran. I did a nice out and back over the South Boulder Creek and Marshall Mesa trails. It's hard to explain exactly what I did but it was far. I went out for one hour exactly and back for 57 minutes. I think it was probably about 13.5 miles but it's hard to say exactly. I actually felt pretty good although it was a bit warm. I was really happy just to get out there and run that much as lately I have had a hard time running that far. And my joints and feet were fine too which is nice!

Yesterday (Sunday) I did nothing. I basically laid on the couch, which I am ashamed of but I was tired! It probably was not the worst thing and I still think I ran almost 50 miles last week.

This morning we got up early and drove to Boulder for the CU Kickoff Classic 5k, which is one of my favorite races here. It's a benefit for the CU cross country teams which is always cool - I love seeing the team as I am a big fan. I ran a 22:15 (7:09, 7:30, 7:39 last 1.1), which is pretty slow for me but I felt good and had fun. I think that if I were to run more workouts like I did on Friday I could go a lot faster. The good news is I was the 12th female and I passed a ton of women during the race!

That is all the news. I am going to try to be a better blogger this week. This afternoon we are riding bikes to my mom's house for a BBQ - it's about a 30 mile round trip - and after that we will really and truly be exhausted.

p.s. Matt ran a 2 minute PR this morning - 32:00 or so - I am proud of him. He still wants to break 30:00 however so we may run another race next weekend. Go Matty!

Posted by barb at 11:16 AM | Comments (3)

September 01, 2005

Back on my game, Checking out houses

I am feeling good this week. It is nice! I was pretty lethargic earlier in the week and last week, so I am happy to report that things are going well, my legs feel good, etc. I know that part of the reason I am feeling better is that work is finally calming down - we released everything yesterday - so I am less stressed. Also, this week I haven't needed to start work at 7:00 so I can run in the morning when it is nice and cool. Since it is officially September now (that is so strange in and of itself) I can really notice a difference in the morning - when I start running I actually feel a little bit chilled. That is nice let me tell you. Pretty soon I may be wearing long sleeves in the morning!

So last night we planned to go for a long bike ride, and that fell through sadly. Matt's neck still really hurts from our ride on Monday. However, tonight we have another ride planned. This is going to be a more mellow, ride around and check out houses type of ride. We have been talking about buying a house (right now Matt owns a condo) in my old neighborhood, next spring. We have decided to start looking around a bit now just to see what we like, what we can afford, and to set our expectations. It is so exciting! I love the area we're looking at, and it's ideal for running. It is also a very nice neighborhood and the houses are all at least 60 years old or so, with lots of character and charm. Since we've been looking around I actually feel better about the possibility that we'll be able to find something we like that's actually in our price range, which is a nice feeling.

Anyway I digress. This morning I ran 8 miles, which felt really good. I started out slow but picked it up quite a bit by the end. The temperatures were just so nice! I have to go meet my buddy F. in about 30 minutes for another run, but I think we'll only run 3-4 miles, at a very easy pace. If I am not too starving afterwards, I plan to lift weights a bit. So this will be a three workout kind of day, although two of the workouts will be easy as pie.

That is all the news. Except that I should mention that I had lunch with my fantastic brother yesterday. He is just so much fun to hang out with, and I am so proud of him, he is doing really well in school! He has made the deans list for both of his first two semesters. In addition to that he is very responsible now as he has bought a house! He is the coolest brother in the world!!

Posted by barb at 10:18 AM | Comments (1)