JDRF Rock the Run Race Recap

On Memorial Day I took park in a race to benefit the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation called the Rock the Run 5K.  This race is in its 3rd year and is still growing a following.  The race is held at the Rogers High School cross country course and yet somehow I didn't realize that it was a cross country style race!

The race began in typical cross country style...runners spread out across a long line and when the horn blew we all raced to the narrow trail beginning.  We had to run across some taller grass until we finally hit the manicured trail of the actual cross country course.

The race was 2 1/2 loops of the course and it included two chances to run a series of 3 bunny hop hills.  These little hills were there just to mess up your stride! I wasn't really sure what to do to tackle them!

My first loop felt okay but I could tell that my legs were tired.  As I moved through the second loop I started to lose that race motivation and the race quickly turned into a well supported workout for me.  I just didn't have the heart to race and even took a few short walk breaks which I haven't been doing in races for a while.  My legs felt horrible and that just messed up my mental strength.

I was happy to finish up the second loop and head out for the short finish loop.  It was great to finish and then cheer on the rest of the finishers.  It was a small race and they were really fast at getting the results posted for all to see.  They had the awards ceremony going on within an hour of the start which was great.

Overall, not a bad workout/race after a hard weekend of a long run and long ride workout.  My time came in at 32:17 and this counts as my 5K race for the Running Bloggers Virtual Race series.

Sweat Your Thorns Off 5K Results

This morning The Boring Runner hosted the Sweat Your Thorns Off Virtual 5K race!

Northwest Arkansas did not disappoint with a 6AM start time and the temps were already 82!  The humidity was supposedly just 55% but it felt much more humid than that.  We are currently under an Excessive Heat Warning with temps forecasted to reach 100+ again today.

I included this race as part of a longer run so I got in 7 miles total.  I met up with a few others for the 6AM start but the majority of the group was running trails and I'm not ready for trails yet! There ended up being just 4 of us on the roads today and the other three were faster than me so I had the road to myself. 

I put on some tunes and began a nice and easy run.  I'm slowly working on rebuilding my mileage and stamina for long runs.  Right now my focus is simply getting the distance covered...with this heat I just don't want to worry too much about the pace.  I would rather run slower and finish the distance goal I have than go too fast and fall apart.  Finishing my runs mentally strong is something that I am working on since the mental game is where I fall apart in longer races. 

The route that we did was an out and back and I simply counted the first 5K as my race effort.  Since it was part of a longer run I didn't actually race it just tracked my time.  My time of 34:59 isn't anything stellar but it was the perfect pace to get me through the distance I had planned.  I did modify my out and back route because there was a really stinky lake in the park that I wanted to skip on the return trip and my nose was quite thankful for the route change!

Below is my proof that I really did Sweat My Thorns Off! Somehow I managed to sweat off my legs and head too...definitely not the original goal but kind of funny!

Hope you had a great race and visit The Boring Runner for more race recaps in the coming days. 

I Spy With My Little Eye

I spent this past weekend with my sister Lindsey and my nephew Gavin and niece Livia.  Gavin is turning 7 in a few weeks and he is always a blast to be around.  We were driving to pick up dinner one night and Gavin decided to play I Spy with us and the little stinker would pick things that we couldn't see from the front seat of the car! In honor of Gavin, I decided to do a picture recap of my day. 

Here's Hershey going potty before I left home for work.  I think it was about 7:05 when I finally left which is a little later than normal.  If I leave at 6:45 it's about a 10-15 minute drive and when I leave after 7 it becomes a 25 minute drive due to traffic.

Packed in the car today were two swim bags and one bag with running clothes and gear so I could swim at lunch and run after work.

Breakfast at my desk was a mini bagel with strawberry cream cheese.  I had an 8AM meeting so I had to eat quick.

Lunch time and headed to the gym.  This is a cute mural that's painted along one wall of the gym.  I swam a mile at lunch.  I did one of my lazy day workouts which is sets that are 200yds long.  So I start with 200 warmup, 200 kick, 200 free, 200 back/free, 200 free, 200 breast/free, 200 pull, 250 free cooldown. 

Propped up in the car is my grocery list that I needed to remind myself to do tonight.  Girls Night Dinner tomorrow and I'm making a Jello Fruit salad. 

12:40 and it's back at work...can you believe it was 61 degrees out for the 1st day of February!

After work and had to stop for gas on my way to meet the running group.

Perfect clear night for a run!

Our Wednesday night group runs start off from the Downtown Activity Center.  I noticed tonight that the city's motto is "Enriching lives through recreation, leisure, and culture."  Bentonville has done so much over the last few years to make the city accessible for runners and cyclists.  It is great!

Some of the routes from the Activity Center.  I went with a route that kept me intown and covered right around 5 miles.  My run tonight was my participation in Maine Mom on the Run's Runniversary Two Mile Virtual Run.  My run was really peaceful and the weather was perfect.  I didn't take a picture of me on the run so I hope that Carrie will accept my picture of the trails and activity center in it's place.  Go check out her site...you have until Feb 14th to complete her virtual run. 

When I got home it was time for laundry...

and blogging. 

Hope you enjoyed seeing my Wednesday and my version of I Spy with my little eye!

Detroit Runner - I Just Felt Like Running Virtual 5K Report

Jeff over at Detroit Runner decided to host a Virtual 5K.  One of his goals was to get participants from all 50 states and he actually did a pretty good job.  I think he had around 35-40 states represented.  The official race date is Saturday, March 5th but Jeff allowed you to complete your race up to one week before or after the official day. 

I have a busy weekend coming up so I decided to use my speed workout as my Virtual 5K race.  The workout tonight was a pretty good option since it covered almost 4 miles.  Our speed workout was to start on the far side of the track. As my running partner and I were shuffling over, we both realized we needed to go potty.  Our options were to head back to the parking lot and use the porta-potty or to head to Arby's a few blocks away.  We determined that the jaunt to Arby's would be about the right distance for the first interval so we incorporated Arby's into the workout as a continuation of our warm-up. 

The official workout was:
1000m at 5K pace, 30 sec. rest.
1 mile at 1/2 marathon pace, 30 sec. rest.
1000m at 5K pace, 30 sec. rest
1 mile at 1/2 marathon pace, 30 sec. rest
1000 m at ALL OUT pace

Our potty stop constituted our first 1000 m interval.  We finished up at the start line and took our rest time.  While we waited, I reset my watch so that I could count the remainder of the workout as my race. We started off and were grooving along at about 10:15 pace for our mile repeat.  As we hit the final turn of the first lap I realized that I never started my watch.  BOOOO, now my distance was going to be off for the 5K.  I had to add just under a 200m interval at the end to get to the official 3.1 miles for the 5K race. 

I checked my total time before the last 200 and realized I was super close to a race time below 30 minutes.  I made that my goal to do my last 200 in less than 42 seconds.   Below are my stats which had an awesome fastest pace of 6:10 per mile for maybe 1 second of that last 200m repeat!  It was hard to do that 200m and I was watching the distance on my Garmin very closely and basically stopped as soon as it hit 3.1.  My finishing time was 29:54!!!! Not bad since almost 2 miles of the race were at half marathon pace.   It was also good to see that we picked up the pace as we went through the workout (race) versus getting fatigued and slower. That is never a good sign so this is just something else to be happy about! It was extra motivating to know that I was counting this as my virtual race and it held me accountable to staying on pace.




My total distance for the night was 6 miles between the warm-up, missed lap, workout, and cooldown.  Thanks to Jeff for hosting this race. 

A Note About the Workout: Most of our running group are training for our local half marathon in early April so the workout had longer intervals that are geared towards building capacity for that distance.  The mile repeats at half marathon pace seem easy but end up being more difficult when they are following 5K pace with short rest intervals. 

Freeze Your Thorns Off Virtual 5K Race Report

Adam at The Boring Runner hosted The Freeze Your Thorns Off Virtual 5K race this morning. The race director for my local area (ie. ME!) instituted a weather delay because Saturday it just wasn't cold enough.  Race morning dawned to temps in the low 20's with a Feels Like temp in the teens. Perfect running weather, right!

I brought along an unsuspecting participant in the race, my running partner Anne.  I did the first 1.6 miles by myself while I waited for Anne and then together we did the rest.  This race was part of my long run for the week so I only counted the first 5K (my ability to do math or complex watch laps during a long run is rather limited!) In fact, my memory failed me and I didn't take my split at the .1 so I'm going to have to estimate my time. 

Weather at the start...it only warmed up to 27 for the finish.

For the first half of the course, I did a loop through the downtown Bentonville area that would be around a mile since I wasn't sure how much time I had before Anne got there.  When I returned to the square she wasn't there yet so I tacked on a short loop to the North of the square.  This beginning portion had given me the insight that Bentonville was experiencing multi-directional wind today.  This is a rather unique weather phenomenon that seems to occur only when you are attempting to ride bikes or run.  It is characterized by the wind changing direction anytime you do so that it seems to always be in your face.

Given that we thought the wind was coming from the Northeast we headed out to the East so that we could have the wind at our backs later in the run.  This presented a rather challenging middle and end to our course...uphill.   We kept trucking and made it to the top near the 3 mile marker.  We then headed South and this is where I forgot to take my split.

After finishing my 10 miles, bundled up and ice on my hat!

At the 3 mile mark my time was around 33:48 so I'm going to go with a 35 minute time for today's 5K.  This is a far cry from my actual 5K but I'm not upset with it at all.  I couldn't have completed a 10 mile run if I would begun with a 5K at race pace, especially in this cold.  I actually had faster miles later on in my run once I was more properly warmed up.  My goal for participating in the virtual race was simply to provide myself with the motivation and accountability to do my long run.  January and February are historically the months where I am most likely to skip long runs and I don't want to fall into that trap this year.  In the past I have lost too much fitness and then spent the spring months trying to get back into shape versus trying to get better. 

Thanks to Adam for organizing this event and providing me with the motivation to get out there.  Sadly the weather held true and I did get to Freeze! Luckily my race director (again ME!!!) decided to spring for a Happy Meal and Hot Chocolate for today's participants.  Woohoo! What a well deserved treat!

Not Your Average Adventure Virtual Race

Pahla over at Adventures of an Average Athlete is hosting a virtual race in honor of her upcoming birthday.  Pahla is known in the bloggy world as P so I decided to host a Race to P as in a Race to Pee!!! Every week, without fail, I have to make a visit to the porta-potty at our local track before our speedwork session begins.  Tonight I went ahead and made it into a race!

The starting line was my car!

I dressed for the occasion in a pink shirt and pigtails.  P is like me and wears pigtails for races and things. It wasn't too tough for me to wear pink and pigtails since they are favorites of mine too.  I got lucky and got a parking space that wasn't too far from the porta-potty so tonight's race was going to be a short one!

Made it to the finish, but the porta potty was already occupied!

The course was flat and partially lit, the length was non-traditional and approximately 6 parking spaces in length and across the traffic lane.  I went ahead and ran the diagonal which probably shaved a couple seconds off my race time.  The finish line was well lit but wasn't the most fancy finish. 

Race results!

Overall, I enjoyed my race even if it was super short! I did make up for it with an additional 5.9 miles of speed work including warm up and cool down afterwards.  Tonight's workout was a fartlek ladder workout.  We started with 30 seconds of hard effort and built up the ladder by adding 30 seconds to the hard effort after a 30 second recovery.  It was a tough workout mainly because my legs were fatigued from my long run on Sunday...I know you were expecting them to be fatigued from my Race to P!

Happy Birthday Pahla! I hope you have a great day and thanks for sharing your journey with us!!!