HEY

New school year. New obsessions. Stay tuned!!!!

The Race!!

So I ran the half marathon last sunday and it was great!

My results:

My time was 2 hours and 10min. I was hoping to be closer to 2 hours flat but I am pretty happy with my results. The last few weeks proved to be challenging to my training because I took on another commitment that required a lot of time. I think if I had had a few more long runs that I would have been closer to my goal time.

The race was really long. It's hard to stay motivated for so many miles, but it really helps that there are people cheering for you. It's kind of sad that each mile sign only comes every nine or so minutes and you are counting up to thirteen.

The last mile was the hardest, but as I was running it a woman came up beside me and we discussed the race a little. It's always nice when someone talks to you when you are running because it makes you realize that you are fine.

So overall it was a good experience. I do want to do again sometime, and even try the full marathon, but if I do I would want to train with someone. It's just really hard to train by yourself. They give you a smiley cookie at the end of the race!

Three Weeks Left!!!

So, there are three weeks left to train in. I'm feeling pretty good about my training so far. Today I ran 4 1/2 miles. Tomorrow is my long run.

Last year, when I ran the marathon relay I had been training with Kingsley swim team. And even though they didn't do much running, they did a lot of core exercises. I think in these last Three weeks I will start to do some of those again.

This is a diagram of an exercise called six inches. In this exercise you have to lift your legs up 6 inches and hold it for at least a minute. We did this every day at Kingsley. And it REALLY helps. I builds a strong core

Interesting Article

I found this interesting article in the times today, which gives reasons why NOT to stretch before running. I feel better now... because I always skip out on the stretching. I'm too impatient.

http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/04/03/reasons-not-to-stretch/?smid=pl-share

Eight Miles!!!

Sunday I had to run eight miles... That's a lot here in Pittsburgh. Everything is so compact. So, a good portion of my run was in Frick park. I had to write the directions on a piece of paper because I couldn't remember the names of all the trails. I only took one wrong turn but realized quickly and went back to the right way. All in all, it wasn't that bad, running such a long distance. I am confident that I will be able to run the half easily.

4 Mile Week!

This week is the four mile week as I would like to phrase it. Because the days that I run during the week: Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday I had to run four miles those days.

To the right here is the route that I did today. I'm not sure what I think about going over by the Highland Park swimming pool because then I have to go up this VERY steep hill to get up to the reservoir. I'll experiment with other routes throughout the week. My long run is 8 miles this week!

Long Run Tommorow!

So, Friday I ran 4 miles. I tried a new route...

Tommorow I will have my 7 mile run. I mapped this out and it's just short of 7 so I might add something short while running. It also has some nice hills as well so that I can get a nice variety.

Catching Up

I'd like to apologize about not posting any news lately. I have been running, it is just that my internet connection at my house has been unreliable... This past weekend the time changed forward which makes you tired, but when it starts to get light in the morning I'd like to run before school. My long run on Sunday was 6 miles. I ran to Highland Park in a somewhat weaving way... I still feel pretty neutral about all this running. But this morning my legs felt the six miles. Tommorow is an easy three miler.

This Past Weekend

I had a very productive weekend! I moved my long run to Saturday just because there seems to be more runners out on Saturday than Sunday. The designated distance for this week was 5 miles. I have come across a useful tool for seeing if the distance I am running is the right milage. I use this website called Map My Run (http://mapmyrun.com/ ). On the site, you can map out your run and it also has a useful workout log so you can map your progress. So here is the screen shot I took of my 5 mile run that I mapped out:

I also timed myself to see where I am. It took me 47:35 min to run 5 miles. So my pace right now is a nine minute mile.

On Sunday I ran 4 miles. I kept the same 9 minute pace as Saturday...

New Hat

I ran 3 miles today and yesterday. It has been not the greatest weather but I've managed. Yesterday it was okay because it was just cloudy. But when I was getting ready to run I couldn't find my hat!! I looked everywhere but couldn't find it. So I made a new one last night. It didn't really take me that long.  

So here is me with my new hat! It's good I made a new one because it was snowing when I got out of school!