Exercise in futility

Okay, so last year, I decided that, you know, in order to torture myself, I would start running. Not only just running, but running a half-marathon. And, in the end, I was really happy I did it. It was a lot of fun, despite the chronic knee pain incurred.

I always said that I would not live my life avoiding the things I hate or fear. So, today began the new quest (not that I've given up running - I need to work up to it again because of my knee). Swimming, which is supposed to be better for the knee. And it is apparently worse for everything else...

Let me explain. I am a BAD swimmer. It's very simple. I did not grow up with ready access to a pool. I probably didn't even really learn how to swim until I was about 10. I never learned how to breathe properly, blow bubbles, anything. People keep telling me that blowing bubbles is simple. Not so much for me. Anytime I've tried, my immediate inclination is to breathe in, and then there's me flailing and coughing up water. So, for me "swimming" is pretty much bobbing around in the water under the hot sunshine of summer, immediately followed by sunning poolside.

Today, Crazy and Sweetpea invited me to go to the community pool with them and the kids. Should be fun. Crazy and Sweetpea have decided that they are going to do a sprint distance triathalon (not me, thank you very much), so they are swim training. While I'm not doing the triathalon, I do want to at least try to become a better swimmer.

Today, it was all about trying not to sink. My head bobbing atop the surface of the water while, beneath, my legs slowly finding their way to the pool bottom (the lap pool is only 3-5 feet deep). By lap number 3, halfway across the pool, my feet will have found the pool bottom and I need to stand up and kick off again. I made it back and forth across the pool 10 times (I won't actually call them laps since that would be an insult to actual swimmers). By the end of 20 minutes, I wanted to die - my head felt like it was about to explode and my legs felt like they were 300 pounds. Now my shoulder and arms are beginning to ache. I know that I'm going to be paying for this tomorrow morning. And, again, as with the running, I want to go back for more pain.

There seriously must me something wrong with me.

I'm so tired I can't even smile

But I had a great time.

What the &%@#*&?

When we drove into Virgina Beach, I had noticed these odd signs everywhere and wondered what they were...


Walking to dinner we noted them again. No cursing? Really? Is that what it actually means? After walking a bit more, we found the list of rules:


I love that this town feels the need to set an ordinance for proper bahaviour in public. It's very amusing actually. While walking to dinner, we heard quite a few people cursing, and wondered if we were allowed to send the thought police after them...

13.1 miles = 2:34:13

Virgina Beach was a great time. After fearing that Ernesto may wash out the weekend, it all turned out to be beautiful. It was a good omen when we were in the home stretch of the drive down, crossing the bridge-tunnel thing, that the sun broke through and clouds dispursed. Beautiful.

JS and I arrived at the hotel, where Crazy, SweetPea and SP were waiting. After picking up race packets and taking a nap, we went to dinner to celebrate and carb load for the race. Dinner, carb load, stopped at an arcade to partake of skee ball, Ms. Pac Man, air hockey and shoot 'em up saloon. It's the great joy of winning tickets to turn in for absolutely useless objects (we got 1 large and 2 small superballs, by the way). Great times and fun memories of childhood. After all this fun, we turned in early as gun time was at 7am.

Let me just say that waking up at 5am sucks. No matter what the reason. When the reason is to run a whole lot... makes it much harder. But we were there with a purpose. No crapping out now. Gun time was at 7am, which meant that the elite runners took off at that point. We of the slow corral did not even make it up to the start line until nearly 25 minutes later. Which also meant we knew that, at the point where the course loops back at miles 2 and 8 over the bridge, we would be seeing the leaders heading back before we even made it over the bridge.


It's quite humbling to see that, actually. And at the same quite cool.

My knee began to bother me at mile 2.5. Really, I was hoping that my body would coorperate on race day, and in all of my training, the distance I had been running before my knee began to annoy me had increased. Now it decides to be a bother. I ran through it. It really hurt at points and I walked a lot more of the race than I had hoped. But I kept going. There was nothing that was going to keep me from finishing, even if I had to crawl.

The course passed by the hotel at which we were staying at two points - in front on Atlantic Ave. and behind on the Boardwalk. JS and SP had made signs, and I was really looking forward to seeing the cheering squad. After having lost her earlier in the race, Crazy found me and we passed the hotel at Atlantic at the same time. No cheering squad. I was sad. But we figured that we had estimated the time we would be passing by wrong, since we didn't anticipate the long delay after gun time. Maybe they thought they missed us.

Coming around on the Boardwalk, I was searching for them again. From a distance I saw the signs hung up on the hotel room balcony. I hear my name. YAY! Cheering squad. Quick sweaty kiss and I was off to the finish, which was about 1.5 miles from that point. God, I think that was the longest mile I have ever run. But coming in, seeing the finish line in the distance approaching, I got a burst of energy and crossed the finish strong.

Afterward, well, not so much. It took forever to find each other at the end and even longer to make our way back to the hotel. But after getting off the shuttle bus, we turned the corner to the hotel and saw this on our room door:


That was probably the best thing ever. Made us all laugh out loud.

The rest of the day, I was pretty much useless. After that much stress, my metabolism was all screwed up. And I had a headache that just would not go away. I felt awful about it. I pretty much fell asleep in my lamb chops at dinner.

We're home. I'm achy. I'm sunburnt. My knee feels much better after some heat therapy. I have the personal satisfaction of accomplishing something I've never done before. I have a cool medal to show for my pains.


And I ask myself, would I do it again? In a heartbeat.

The end is near...

The end of summer that is. Okay, on the calendar, summer doesn't officially end until September 22nd or something (I can never remember). But for all intents and purposes, everyone equates the end of summer with Labour Day (just like the beginning is Memorial Day). And what better way to celebrate this last weekend of summer than a whole lot of rain from what is left of Hurricane Ernesto (aside: I find it amusing that while Ernesto, a hurricane with a pretty fun name, but little punch, is churning in the Atlantic, John, common name, much bigger punch, is slamming the Pacific. But that's just me, I like hurricane watching.)

My other end of the summer activity for the weekend is the long awaited half-marathon. Yes, it is finally here. And for all of you who made fun of me this past weekend for not running in the rain - the storm will be well past Virginia Beach by gun time. So, after a year of waiting and training, the race is finally here, and I actually feel prepared. We'll see how I feel Sunday afternoon when I'm done.

Mostly I'm kind of disappointed that the summer went by so quickly. I had so many plans that didn't work out for one reason or another. JS and I were supposed to go to the museum once a month in DC - that didn't work out. Life seemed to get in the way of living for a while, which is never a good thing.

But I have so much to look forward to this fall. Next weekend is the American Chemical Society's conference in San Francisco. Yes, I know, thrilling, right? But it's San Francisco, so I'm happy - as is JS because he's coming with me. Then it's PR at the end of the month with MS and TC. I'm sure there are going to be other fun things to do before the end of the year.

There is a mistique about summer though. It's the time of fun and free time, even though we are still working everyday. The weather I prefer is autumn. But I guess I will never be out of the kid mindset that summer is the fun time and the rest of the year is filler.

Explicit instructions

So, last Friday, as part of our half-marathon training, Crazy, SweetPea and I went out for a run in the morning in the sweltering heat. Since we were leaving just before JS would be leaving for work, we made a request: Please leave the garage door open so that we can get back into the building. This was so we wouldn't have to take keys on the run with us.

Well, returning from our run about 40 minutes later, we are happy to find that the garage door is open and we can get in. Trudge up the stairs, desperately wanting a shower (it was about 200% humidity that morning), we approach the third floor and our apartments. Happy and relieved I made it up the stairs, I try to open the door - try being the operative word here. What the?!?! F*CK!! The door is locked!! And I hear Thor barking behind the door - damn the dog for not having opposable thumbs.

I called JS to inform him of the situation (very apologetic). Maintenance was called to let me in... and I waited in Crazy's apartment until they arrived. While we were sitting and chatting, SweetPea brought up a funny point. He says, "Well, he did what you asked him to do. You told him to leave the garage door open. You never said DON'T lock the apartment. He's a guy, he needs explicit instructions..." (btw, SweetPea is a guy too, so don't get all upset thinking this is a guy bashing story) Crazy and I are laughing hysterically. Well, he does have a point, you know.

I'll just remember next time to leave step by step instructions when I go running again.

Run, run as fast as you can

So, I've mentioned that I will be participating in the Rock n' Roll Half Marathon on Labor Day weekend. The training goes... don't know necessarily that it goes well, but it goes. We did 8 miles last weekend (surprised the heck out of me that I was able to do it). We're going to do 10 miles next weekend, I think. Then just some short runs until the race.

I have a problem though. I hate running. I really do. It's boring. It's only somewhat fun if I have my running/training partners with me. Unfortunately, Crazy and SweetPea are away this week. I need them for motivation. Even going to the gym for the treadmill is hard, let alone running outside. And it's been hot (well, not today, but it has been hot). But I need to get out there, or else by the time they get back (and I know they're running where ever they are), I will be back to suck. I do need to take advantage of the nice weather, now that it's here.

I made it to the gym today, but the overall workout pretty much sucked. Maybe gluttony and sloth aren't too far off the mark, after all.

Running on empty

So, this past Sunday was the Pikes Peak 10K Run, of which I had previously spoken. I didn't do too bad. I was hoping to finish it at a 10 minute/mile pace. My official results were:

1:04:39 (gun time); 1:01:06 (actual time); 9:50 (pace)

so better than I was shooting for.

Race day is such a strange thing. I've only run a couple of races. And each time, the race is the "longest distance I have ever run before," and this race was no different. I had never run more than 5 miles (we went for a 5 1/2 mile run a couple of weeks ago... I was pretty much out of gas at mile 5, and had to walk a bit at a couple of points). So the fact that I was running continuously until after mile 5 was an accomplishment in and of itself. Had my knee (damn knee) not gone out, I would have continued. But, alas, my knee did give out and I has to run/walk the last mile. But no matter. I still made pace and that makes me happy.

It gives me more confidence for the Half-marathon in September. A few more months to double the distance to, again, the "longest distance" I had ever run. There is still time. And definitely still will.

I will say one thing, and JS will attest to this: I was really out of it the rest on the day on Sunday. Electrolyte balance off or something. And have been kind of off ever since. So, I guess my body needs a re-adjustment period. Gives me a good excuse for an afternoon nap...

Running scared

... or running in pain, depending on how you look at it. I think I have mentioned that I'm running a half-marathon over Labor Day weekend. LS convinced me by saying, "Come on, it's only 13 miles." Only 13 miles she says. Sometimes I dread this decision. But I have already said I would do it, I've paid the registration, and I've never done it before, so why not? Never mind that I've never run more than 5 miles at any one given time in my life... and, did I mention - I hate running. But as I've always said: I can't spend my life avoiding all of the things I hate. Sometimes you have to, as the old Nike tag line used to say, Just Do It.

So we went running last night. For 45 minutes. So a little over 4 miles or so, assuming a 10 minute mile pace, which is just about average for me. Funny thing is, my limiting factor while running is not how bad a shape I'm in - I'm actually fine. My knee sucks. I'll be going along just fine, breathing well, not terribly tired. But my knee will be screaming at me to stop. This happened at about 1.5 to 2 miles. Walk it out a little, begin running again. It's annoying, and totally dependent on the day. If it's a little moist - great for the knee. Too dry, too cold - sucky. Last night, I felt was great running weather. Relatively cool, not too moist, not too dry, good air to breathe. Yet my knee sucked.

But I have to push on. And I'll only quit if the pain is truly unbearable. We have the Pikes Peak 10K in 2 weeks. A little over 6 miles. A little over an hour of running. The goal? Finish with enough energy to have popovers at Normandie Farms after the race. I have to set some sort of carrot in front of me, don't I?