What is a Fartlek?

I feel like I can call myself a real runner after today.

And why you ask?

because i did my very first fartlek workout! GO ME.

yeah i do own the oiselle rundies. i'm obsessed.

what's a fartlek? It's sweedish (love my swedes) for "speedplay" and involves interval-like training. Run hard for a specified period of time and then run easy. repeat.

Today I was determined to get a run in before I donated blood for the UM-OSU blood battle (reigning champs for 5 years! we rock!), and it was POURING when i left class, so to the gym for a fartlek workout it was.

Workout
10 min warm up - 6.0 pace
2 minutes hard - 7.9 pace
2:30 easy - 6.0 pace
3 minutes hard - 7.6 pace
2:30 easy - 6.0 pace
4 minutes hard - 7.6 pace
2:30 easy - 6.0 pace
3 minutes hard - 7.6 pace
2:30 easy - 6.0 pace
2 minutes hard - 7.8 pace
5 minutes cool down - 6.0 pace

hard stats:
40 min
4.5 miles

DONE.

i felt so strong going hard on the treadmill, and I'm not sure that I could have pulled it off out on a track or just out on the roads. so it was definitely a great first fartlek.


Go. Me.

(btw, this is totally 1. major stress relief, and 2. major working off the dozens of cookies i made on saturday)

(also blood donation was a total success, per usual. Go Me again.)

Half #2: Detroit Free Press Half

Whaaaaat? I have a blog?

The answer is yes, although after this first month and a half of law school, one may quite accurately conclude that I do not.

BUT the fact that I completed half marathon #2 two weeks ago is a good reason to start it up again.

So yes, half marathon #2.

Detroit Half, I loved you.


Training
Training was a little spotty on this one, which is to be expected with freaking law school sucking up all my time. Plus toss in the fact that training didn't REALLY start until September, and we've got a tough situation. I only got in 2 real long runs: an 8 miler and a 10k, but I was decently consistent about getting in all those little 3 mile runs, and a lot of 4-5 milers.

I am significantly slower than I was last spring, which is a super bummer. Idk what it is - fear of hurting my foot, not in shape enough, not enough sleep -- who knows. But the goal for the winter is to diagnose and get fast again. I think it might also be finally time to reintroduce the five fingers.

Race Prep
I somehow managed to read the runner's world article from the september(?) issue about proper carbo-loading, and tried to do that. I was really good about it thursday, and only decent friday and yesterday. Because I'm proud of my Thursday's eatings:

bfast: cherry vanilla panera bagel + light cream cheese
banana
OJ
lunch: sushi
(+miso soup and small salad)
dinner:chicken burrito

plus the drinks from going out thursday night.

oh how i love carbs.

additionally, I had serious qualms about what to wear. Not running in my fivefingers has given me occasional shin splints, so i wasn't sure if i wanted to compression sock or kinesiology-taping it up - i ended up doing neither.

Expo + Swag!
I am the biggest sucker for free stuff. Law school is so bad because there's constantly free pizza lunches, candy, etc. and I just want it all. So, of course race expo's rock my world.

This race expo wasn't a ton bigger than the Martian Marathon Expo in April, but I did get some cooler stuff. Highlights include:
-RunDisney bag
-Wheaties fuel cereal
-5 hour energy shot

Additionally to the free stuff I couldn't say no to:

a 13.1 Detroit Marathon Pint Glass.

Yes, drinking and running. I love it.

and best of all:

an awesome freaking race shirt.

I love that it just screams "I ran 13.1 miles"
fit is good, design is good. just awesome.

RACE DAY


the 6:58 start time was kind of a killer. Especially coming from Ann Arbor. I dragged two chicas from the 1L law school class with me, Besty and Polina, and we left around 5AM. Eek.

I was running around like a crazy person for most of the morning - i definitely did not give myself enough time to get everything done that i needed to, but it all worked out okay. I didn't make coffee, which i wanted to do, and I also failed to grab my pack of sports beans which are one of the only reasons i run (okay thats a lie, but they are a great incentive to get out the door for a run longer than an hour)

Parking was effortless since my mom works and parks in downtown detroit. we got to race not too early before start time, I ran into the two other people who i knew were running sunday.

Organization of the start was good - there was a lack of portapotties, but we had luckily taken care of that beforehand at my mom's building.

betsy, me, polina
pre-race!

The adrenaline was pumping, I was going to run this and run it hard, and after about 7 minutes due to a wave start, I was on my way to running 13.1 miles.

the race course was awesome. Over the ambassador bridge, a few miles in Windsor Canada, and then back through the tunnel, which is an underwater tunnel connecting Detroit to Windsor. It is the only underwater mile in a race. Which is definitely something to brag about, but unfortunately it was maybe the most miserable.

The girls and I decided we start together, try and keep up, but if we felt the need to split up no one was going to be mad. Just do what you do. We stuck together for the first few miles or so, but went off at our own paces once we got further into it.

The bridge portion was super windy, but it was kind of nice to have the breeze. I didn't do a lot of spectating on the bridge, most of it was actually weaving and running pretty fast to try and catch up to the girls after I stopped to tie my shoe.

The windsor part was super nice as it was right on the river. The tunnel was killer. Super hot, super loud, never-ending.  My underwater mile was 8:58.

The rest of the way looping around detroit was good. There were a few points where I struggled, but for the most part it wasn't bad. I did a little walking through a water stop, and then for 30 seconds randomly.

 My mom planted herself right around mile 12, which was such a boost. I also ran past a veteran with one arm, and after thanking him, I got a bit of a boost too. It's the little things in the race setting.

FINISH:


1:59:44 according to the chip time. sub-2 hrs!

we did it!

I'm happy with it. ~5 minute improvement over last time, 9:09 average pace, and pretty damn good for being so slow and inadequately trained.

And the best parts: Space Blankets and awesome medals. LOVED it.

Garmin stats:

Love that i killed the last mile. not exactly negative splits at all, but at least my slowest miles were 10&11.

Overall, half marathon #2 was AWESOME. now I need a new race on the agenda. any suggestions?

Exciting Happenings

Exciting happening over here people! :)

first things first -- law school is creeping up very quickly. This is the first week where I've actually had thoughts like "oh crap, i should pack" or "maybe its time to read law school confidential and figure out how to approach his bad boy"

monday night one of my very first law school friends (who i randomly met this summer), moved into her house, and i attended a pretty big 1L meet-up at dominick's - quite possibly my favorite place for drinks in ann arbor.

the syllabi are being posted, books have been procured, and orientation starts next monday. holy crap.

these are not even all of my books. eff.

#2 thing: i have been a michigan student for 5 years now, and when it came time to order football tickets I was stuck with the dilemma of "use my 5 years of seniority to my advantage and not join the michigan law football group, for which over 75% have probably not had michigan football tickets before or join the 1L group and hope that the rumors that 1L's have badass seats was right." well i went with the latter, and these babies were delivered to me today:

yes it does say row 4

HELL YES. look for me on tv behind the endzone bitches.

#3 thing: Saturday's shopping involved me stumbling upon a new pair of shoes that I fell in love with. since my current frees are racking up the mileage, and I am staying away for the VFF's for the time being, I thought a new pair of free's wasn't a bad investment.

so while i didn't buy them in store on Saturday, I did buy them online on sunday, were shipped out of the ohio store monday, and arrived at my front door tuesday. sometimes, i do appreciate ohio (just not most of the time).

box 1

box 2

hello shoes

love love love

i'm always a sucker for livestrong, and the pink laces are just so darn cute. i'm sold.

#4 thing: i made another swimming purchase today. yes it is getting out of control, but unless i decide i really want another suit and i am done for a while. i swear.

if i want to swim intervals, i need a waterproof watch. so i bought one.

target. $30 + my 5% REDcard discount. baller.

love that it is purple, and is the ironman brand.

#5 thing: i made myself breakfast this morning (and by morning i mean 11, because i didn't drag my ass out of bed until 10) and it was AWESOME

english muffin, tomato, hard boiled egg, daiya fake mozzarella

deliciousness

#6 things: tomorrow is going to be awesome because:
i'm getting my hair cut.
my new lululemon zip up is coming in the mail
i'm going to ann arbor.

Training August 15-August 21

Training - Week of August 15-August 21

Monday

This was my first attempted mile/mile run. except I didn't run it that way. I tried going by time - walk 10 minutes, run 10 minutes. my poor previously broken metatarsal was not feeling this. As soon as I busted into mile 2, there was pain. I ran a little bit, seeing if it would go away - nope, no pain reduction. So I resigned myself to walking home, cutting the run down and taking tuesday as a serious rest day.

running distance: 2 1.57
walking distance: 1.58

Tuesday

serious business rest day. Was not feeling good about the foot, so did zero physical activity after being up on my feet all day at work.

Wednesday

made my way to the pool in the afternoon - 2000m following Meghan's modified pace swim workout.

warmup: 250 easy
200 kickboard

base set:

3 x 100 @ 2:30
3 x 100 @ 2:25
3 x 100 @ 2:10


cooldown:
250 yds w/ pull buoy
8 x 10 @ 1:15

attempted to bust out the timer (aka garmin) on these, but the garmin was of course dead. resorted to simply increasing effort on the base ones - which i did. so i'll call it a success. was definitely out of breath by the end of the base - which is good news.

attempt at running #2! Resorted back to the .75 mile walk/.75 mile run just to be safe. Run went well - kept the pace super easy and it resulted in a running success. always good!

running distance: 1.5 miles
walking distance: 2.75 miles

Thursday

unscheduled 10 hour work day, so i did that, ate at zingerman's roadhouse, went out for drinks at raven's club and failed on the physical activity front.

Friday


1 hour yoga @ lululemon ann arbor showroom.

run #3! finally ran a mile at a time and it was a total success. back to all grass running, and it was all good.

running distance: 2 miles
walking distance: 2.4 miles

Saturday

super shopping - counts as physical activity right?

Sunday

repeat of friday's run, except change the location - ran in the arb in ann arbor.

.5 mile walking
1 mile run
1 mile walk
1 mile run
.5 mile walk

dunzo.

also rocked the sub ten minutes miles - barely. mile 1: 9:59, mile 2: 9:55

running distance: 2 miles
walking distance: 2 miles

scheduled miles: 10
actual miles: 7

I'm okay with this lower-than-planned mileage. I ran a decently speedy mile this morning (~9:30) with zero pain, so I think I'm totally ready to graduate to 1.5 miles and I am so excited. I think I just need to give myself a little leeway, and back off the jillian michaels cardio that involves lots of jumping and pressure on the foot bones.

how was your week?

Things I Love Thursday - 8/18

Things I Love Thursday - 8/18 edition

Gel manicures

This baby is 2 weeks out and still going strong despite harsh hospital soap and cleaners, opening paint, and swimming in chlorinated water a TON. I'm sold.

lululemon's triumph tote

picked this baby up at the lululemon ann arbor showroom last week and i'm OBSESSED. purchased as a gym bag, then realized that it will not hold any of the swim things i would need to tote with me if i were to swim with it, so it may become just an every day bag, but we'll see. 

RUNNING

this has been questionable lately - i had a rough run monday night with too much foot pain to continue running. so zero activity tuesday, and today i tested it out. RUNNING SUCCESS. i majorly slowed down the pace on this one and resorted back to .75 miles as maximum without walking distance. compromises i can take for a pretty much pain free run. and i'm only losing about a mile if i continue to stick with the training plan. i'd be more than happy with 9 for the week :) 

And finally for your viewing pleasure:

meet mogley (pronounced mowgli like in the jungle book), my brother's gf's pup who i had the pleasure of pup-sitting on saturday night. i'm so in love.

Running to Bake - Puppy Love from Lauren Reid on Vimeo.

tried to get pictures of him, and failed (don't know how to work my rebel well enough), so i resorted to the photobooth video. awesomesauce.

Costs of a Broken Foot

So I broke my foot last June. Running my very first half marathon. awesome huh?

So that left me out of commission for a good two months. So what's a running-obsessed girl to do? Find something else to be obsessed with.

This post is especially fitting because right now that foot is being a humongous pain in the ass and giving me crap for switching up my return to running routine.

So my running substitute? swimming. I tried biking, but its just not as fun as actually getting outside, counting out laps, breaths, and obtaining spectacular tan lines.

I have always had a "jump-headfirst" mindset when it comes to trying new things. And a "if i buy this, i will then do this" mindset.

This worked out okay in the long run when it came to a lot of my running gear (example: garmin forerunner 305 - purchased: july 2009, utilized consistently: march 2011.) but that's not necessarily the case always.

When I bought my iPod shuffle a few summers ago, I actually intended to use it for swimming! (although that swimming never actually happened)

So to start off with swimming I made a single purchase:

An awesome multi-colored swim cap for $11.

tyr kalidoscope swim cap 

So after swimming pretty consistently for 5 weeks or so, I took a trip to swimoutlet.com and placed an order.

sporti pull buoy (in pink of course)

sporti flotation belt

triswim shampoo

and finally to round out the complete swimming essentials for semi-serious business swimmers:

a kickboard.

and not just any kickboard. a $5 from target's children's swim section DORA THE FREAKING EXPLORER kickboard.

you know you're jealous. its okay. no need to confirm/deny.

I think kickboards are pretty universal in their function, and dora seems to work just fine. (i usually flip her over so that the plain blue side is on the top when i'm swimming, just to not seem like a total creepster).

So a few comments about my swimming paraphernalia.

So the swimming shampoo. I still don't know if its really necessary since I wear a swim cap, but I figure most swimmers do, and there's still this product, so I'll go with it.

I looked into this brand a while ago, was bummed to see it contained parabens (more about these icky things later), and didn't order. Then when I looked on swimoutlet.com it specifically said paraben free and i was all over that.

When it came in the mail i look at the ingredients to see this:

but wait -- what's this?

WTF TRISWIM? what is it??

So I made a phone call to them this morning, and they're checking with the chemists.  I will keep you updated.


2nd thing: the floatation belt.

Yes, I'm going to water jog. Reading Cris's blog about her return to run post metatarsal fracture has pretty much solidified my interest in aqua jogging. so, once I'm back at school and at the school pool, I'm going to start it up. I'm a little too embarrassed to pull it out at the dearborn pool. lame lame. I will, of course, keep you all apprised of how it works out.

Evaluating Goals

Hello August 15, 2011.

Hello mid-august.

Hello goal evaluation time.

1. develop impeccable habits.

this has actually been going super well. after august 3rd, I have worn my retainer every night, as well as clarisonic+moisturizer (well minus a few nights away from home where i resorted to yes to cucumber face wipes, but i think this is an acceptable substitute). the only thing i haven't been great about is face masks, and cleaning my clarisonic like i should. also making sure to soak my retainer in baking soda (super gross i know. i am full of TMI on this blog) things to work on!

stats: retainer: 12/14 nights
clarisonic+moisturizer: 26/28 opportunities

2. run smart

this has been totally accomplished thus far, but i do have increasing mileage and runs/week to worry about, and need to keep in mind that i am not yet a speed demon and CANNOT push myself too hard.

goals for the last two weeks: keep runs around 9-10 min mile pace.
try to stick to the plan, but be flexible if necessary
x-train, x-train, x-train


3. read more

finished the 8th pretty little liars book "Wanted" (which really shouldn't even count, but I don't care), and have been pushing through "the girl who kicked the hornet's nest" ever since. I hate getting to the end of series - i always want to drag it out (see Pushing Daisies, Friday Night Lights, and Gilmore Girls. All of which I have yet to watch the series finales of, despite them being some of my favorite shows). Not sure if it counts, but I'm on disc 10 of 13 of omnivore's dilemma, which i am loving. Michael Pollan, you rock. Also working on Kara Goucher's Running For Women, which I'm also enjoying. expect a "things learned from Ms. Goucher" list soon :)

4. cook more

this has not happened at all. so now i need to get 7 meals and 3 baked goods in. crap.

super easy recipe suggestions please?

5. make a budget

haven't touched this yet. sort of problematic. must do asap.


are you a goal-setter? if so, what are your goals?

Training Log - August 7-August 13

I've decided to track my training here, just so I have a more thorough record of my training than my dailymile account.

Training Log - August 7 - August 13


Sunday
Run in the arb. 3.01 miles total running/walking. 1.25 running.
This run felt good - it was so nice to be back in familiar favorite running territory. Aside from the mosquito attack that left me with 5 or 6 bites, it was perfect.


Monday
Rest day.


Tuesday
Another rest day. Planned on getting in a run tuesday night, but the perfect weather forecast for Wed. morning mad me put it off and pull a two-a-day.



Wednesday

4.45 miles running/walking. 1.5 running
This was a park/middle school run/walk, which again, felt good. I'm just honestly so happy to be out there running again, even if its at a painstakingly slow pace.

1600 m swim at the pool.
an easy mile at the pool to shakeout the muscles. did some laps with the kick board for the first time, which went well.

Thursday
Jillian Michaels workout dvd - Banish Fat, Boost Metabolism.
50 minutes of J. Michaels cardio which kicked my ass.

Friday
yoga at lululemon ann arbor showroom.

2000m swim at the pool.
breakdown: 20 laps breast,
8 laps kick board flutter kick, 2 laps buoy arm isolation
10 laps free
10 laps breast
10 laps free
10 laps breast
4 laps kickboard, 6 laps buoy arm isolation
10 laps free

Last week I made the swimming plunge and bought some things from swimoutlet.com. seriously, i have a problem. Included in this purchase was a buoy for arm isolation, and a flotation belt for water jogging, as well as a shampoo which I have a serious rant about, but thats coming later. My kickboard is from target's children's swim section. You'll see this in my all-swimming post coming later this week.

Anyway, these purchases made me feel like a serious business swimmer, and I actually really enjoy using them. Plus, more reasons for me to continue shopping (although everything I've bought for swimming has been super reasonably priced. unlike $200 garmins, and $100 running shoes, and $20 tempos x9038204832)

This felt good at the time, but once I got home, I was SO SORE. I don't know if it was the jillian, yoga, swimming, or all of the above in combination (gotta love synergy!), but i definitely half-napped before I went to see the glee movie that night (which was PHENOMINAL btw. my glee love is out of control. my only complaint? not enough songs!)

Saturday
3.89 miles run/walk. 1.50 running.

Another day spent running in .75 intervals. but guess what? This is the last one. It's 1 mile+ from here on out, and I am so excited.

PR-crushing half marathon in 63 days, get ready for me.

 

sweaty varieties

Wednesday morning I went out for another easy walk/run combo. I upped my "running-without-stopping" distance to .75 miles (we're getting crazy over here), and just went out there and got it done.

I brought my camera along for fun, and snapped a few pictures throughout the run.

AM temps were perfect for this baby, by the way. Under 70 to start out with. perfect!

track/park entrance

pool! where i do all my oh so fun 2000m swims!

good morning world!

Post run, I came back home and decided to take the pup for a quick walk around the neighborhood to up my walking time.

hi sadie!

 I then proceeded to wear this outfit to target and sports authority, because I knew I was planning on swimming later in the day and didn't want to shower, swim, and then shower again. All about efficiency people!

also made my favorite smoothie of late - choco sun warrior, soy milk, raspberries, banana.

I did 1500m in the pool later on Wednesday, and then called it a day.

pool again!

Yesterday I attempted to swim as well, but found that there was some event going on at the pool where they removed the lane markers and there was a TON of small children. nope, not dealing with that. 

So i went to on demand and had a date with ms. jillian michaels.

For this being a "at home cardio" work out, I am pretty damn sore this morning. damn you jillian michaels. Had to do a few modifications with this one - was not doing mountain climbers with my healing foot, tyvm. but for the most part I kept up, pushed hard, and felt like I got a super serious work out. AWESOME.

And now I'm off to lululemon yoga!

what have you done to sweat lately?

Running Again!

So I'm running again.

and it feels SO GOOD.

My first run out was of course on august first (did you really expect anything less?). After a long day at work, I headed out around 8:30 for an easy walk/run combo.

In middle school I ran track, mostly because at that age it was a social thing to play sports with your friends (high school sports are just too competitive for the semi-athletically challenged like myself). Our middle school track was (and still is) pretty sad, so our warm up was always 2 laps around the fence - aka the football and soccer fields. Somehow the fence works out to be almost exactly half a mile. So that's what I did.

And guess what? ZERO PAIN. running felt good, I kept it slow, half a mile at a time, and I rocked it.

rocking the hot pink compression socks, tempos, and skinnyrunner tee!

Run #2 happened Friday morning. I was out of town Tuesday and Wednesday night, so zero runs then, and I had plans come up for Thursday night, so it was a swimming day (the summer heat limiting my runs to early AM or right before sunset is a bummer), but Friday morning I was up early to go for run #2.

Run #2 was great as well. I realized I could use the lap function on my garmin to get splits for running and walking, and ran a teensy bit faster to see how it would go. Same setup as monday: walk .5, run .5, but friday's run ended with .25 on sidewalk - something I hadn't done yet.



Although there's a little discomfort in my foot occasionally, I think for the most part I'm good. Tonight? Run in the arb. This girl cannot wait.

I have an extremely tenative training plan for the rest of august, to get me to the point where I can run the detroit free press half on october 16.

I have no set days of the week for this training events, and I'm just kind of seeing how it goes.
My swimming is limited to Wed-Sat for the month, but everything else I'm pretty flexible with.



Also contemplating the incorporation of water jogging into this baby. Kind of scary right?

I'm also contemplating how I can increase my swimming -- because I'm seriously falling in love. It may lose some of its appeal once I'm indoor swimming, and incorporating it into my class schedule, but we'll see!

Somehow it’s august already. No clue how this happened, but what it means two things:

1. I can run today! Run meaning walk half a mile walk half a mile and pray that my foot doesn’t give me any trouble, but running! Life is good.
2. In 36 days I’ll be starting law school.

So with these big impending changes, I’m making some august goals.


Goal 1: Develop impeccable habits.

This was one of my new years resolutions, and while I’m doing much better than a year ago, I’m still not where I’d like to be. So here it goes – in tangibles.

Face regimen (clarisonic+moisturizer) 90% of the time (56/62 opportunities)
Retainer 80% of nights (25/31 nights)
Face mask once a week (4/4 weeks)

Goal 2: Run smart

This is a vow to not push myself too hard too fast and re-break my foot.
I have half marathon #2 on the calendar, but there is no guarantee that I will actually run it. And that’s how Im going to approach it.
No running faster than a 9:30-10:00 minute mile for the first 2 weeks.
Keep it around nine for the last two weeks.
There will be a more in depth training plan to come, but this is the big important stuff now.

Goal 3: Read 5 books

Including two on the law school’s recommended reading list.

Goal 4: cook more

turkey tacos from saturday night! so good!

7 new meals and 3 new baked goods are on the agenda.

Goal 5: Create a budget
This is the first time I'm taking out a whole slew of student loans, and I've kind of been living the high life lately with no rent and a paycheck every two weeks with little expenses. (see marc jacobs watch and designer jeans shopping). Make a budget for the school year and stick to it!



Do you have any goals for august?