Hot Fun in the Summertime.

We finally made ourselves get a fuel belt last weekend.



I think Zero enjoys wearing it more than I do (And she really didn't like wearing it).

We tried it out on one of our shorter 5.6 mile runs on Monday morning and what can I say? I just hate running with anything attached to my body. I was awful. I didn't even make it one mile before I handed it off to J so he could wear it the rest of the run. Maybe it was the weather (almost 90% humidity at 6am with NO BREEZE), or the fact that I did lunges for the first time in 3 years the day before and could barely walk (idiot). Whatever it was, I just was not feeling it. Luckily J has given in to his inner "I don't wanna look like a dork" mentality and has decided to take one for the team and wear it for our long runs so that he and his wife can stay hydrated in the sweltering Miami summer. I have a good man.

Not much else to report on. The weather is only getting worse. We usually begin our runs in the mornings to escape the actual heat from the sun, but humidity levels are at their highest then (80-90% average) and the temps are still in the 70-80 degree range. Then, I do one evening run a week with Mercy through her neighborhood at around 7:30pm. The humidity is a bit lower, but the gnat problem is out of control. When we were done running Thursday night I went to her bathroom to wash my face and my neck was COMPLETELY covered in dead gnats. I was pulling them out of my hair and ears all night (even after I showered) and later, I kept getting shivers just thinking about how many were actually on me. I also kept psyching myself out thinking they were lodged in the back of my throat. Uggh!!! I can't win.

Here's my training this week.

Sunday, 6/24 - Gym, abs, lift, lunges :( elliptical, 40 minutes
Monday, 6/25 - 5.6 miles/53:54 - 9:37 pace
Tuesday, 6/26 - rest
Wednesday, 6/27 - 3.2 miles/29:42 - 9:13 pace
Thursday, 6/28 - 6.5 miles/1:08 - 10:31 pace
Friday, 6/29 - rest
Saturday, 6/30 - 12 miles/1:57:38 - 9:48 pace (Long, hot, but way better than last week)
Total Weekly Mileage: 27.3
Lift Days: 1

Here are some pics from after the 12 miler this morning. My fingers were so swollen they looked like lil' sausages.



My shorts are soaked here. I had just wrung them out.

Always a Little Crazy on Every Run

I've been busy with so many little things it's been hard to update lately, but training has been going pretty well for the most part despite the weather. It's funny, we run early (6am) to avoid the heat, but the humidity levels are at their highest here that time of the day. So, its the lesser of two evils I suppose. This morning the weather at 6am was 73 degrees, but the humidity was 82%. Uggh.

So here is a quick update on my training over the past two weeks. I want to make it short because there is a really funny story about last week's long run I HAVE to share.

Last week:
Monday 6/11 - 3.4 miles/32.:38 - 9:39 pace
Tuesday 6/12 - Gym, lift, abs
Wednesday 6/13 - 5.6 miles/52:40 - 9:24 pace
Thursday 6/14 - 6 miles? /56:30 - (not sure of exact distance during this run)
Saturday 6/16 - 8 miles/1:28 - 11:10 pace (not sure what happened to our pace here)
Total Weekly Mileage: 23
Lift Days: 1

This week: ( I slacked a little since I was out of town a few days)
Wednesday 6/20 - 5.6 miles/52:38 - 9:23 pace
Saturday (today) 6/23 - 10.38 miles/1:37:35 - 9:24 pace
Total Weekly Mileage: 15.98
Lift Days: 0 Booo!

Todays run was very warm, but I felt pretty good until mile 9 when we had to cross back over the Rickenbacker Causeway. For those of you who never saw my last post on this bridge, here is a picture of it.





I have run this bridge before and never had any problems. But today it sucked. It felt about 10 miles long and on the way down I actually had TEARS welling up in my eyes. Good thing I had sunglasses on or I would have never heard the end of it from J. Ha! But I DIDN'T STOP and ran all the way to the end of the run. However, I seriously think it was some of the hardest physical activity I have been through in a long time. It was worse than anything I felt running the Half-Marathons. I suppose I will have to get use to this pain if I am going to do 26.2.

So anyway. Last week...I'll try to make it short.

So we are running 8 miles last Saturday, which sucked because it was raining the WHOLE time. We thought about cancelling, but what kind of marathon runners would we be if we couldn't run in a little rain? Basically it sucked, by mile 4 our clothes AND shoes were soaked to the bone and the whole run we had our heads down making sure we didn't splash through any unnecessary puddles.

Around mile 6, we passed Cocowalk, a fairly busy pedestrian mall with many outdoor restaurants, bars, shops, etc. and were making our way back on a road called Main Highway. It is a busy road and on Saturday mornings it is always bustling with runners, walkers, bikers and drivers. It is called Main Highway.

So we are runnning, minding out own business, passing random runners, etc. when all of the sudden J bust out with a sudden warning,

"O.K. this guy is naked."

As if to say, "Watch out, he might be swinging that thing!"

I look up and sure enough, there is a guy walking towards us, TOTALLY NORMAL looking, young guy (18-23), clean shaven, not looking a bit drunk/stoned/tired/crazy whatsoever. And he is TOTALLY naked. No clothes at all. Not even shoes. He was walking towards Cocowalk with a newspaper in his hand, not to cover himself with but more like as if to say,

" I'm gonna go to Cocowalk on Saturday morning and get some breakfast outside and read the paper...where there are a ton of people...and cops...and I'm gonna do it naked."

And that my friends is why I love running in Miami. Cause you always see a little crazy on every run.

I'll play along...

I've been tagged by a couple of you (Michelle. and Irish Blue) to post 6 weird facts about me. Hmmmm...

1. I have moved a total of 11 times since I moved out of my parent's house in 1993. In those years I have lived in Tampa, FL, Athens, OH, Circleville, OH, Columbus, OH, Memphis, TN, Starkville, MS, and Miami, FL. Quite an eclectic mix. I am not in the military, I just like a change of pace.

2. One of my favorite meals is pasta with cottage cheese. I know, it's odd. I think it is from when I had no money.

3. I gave a guy CPR one time after he electrocuted himself while standing in a puddle of water and plugging in a refridgerator. The EMS guy said he would have died if I hadn't done it. It was very surreal and I still have trouble believeing it happened, even though it was over 10 years ago.

4. When I was a kid in the early 80's,I was obsessed with You Can't Do That on Television. I would hold a tape recorder to the TV to record the audio of the show and listen to the tapes over and over in my room at night. For about a year, I couldn't sleep without one playing.

5. I am 1/4 Lebonese and 3/4 Slovak.

6. I hate Goat Cheese. It's pretty much the only thing I wont eat.

There are many more, but I was only asked for 6 so, I guess that'll do.

More on running later. :)

It's On!

Today is the day!

This morning J and I got up at 6am for our very first run of my very first day of training for my very first full marathon. It was short and more than hot, but I survived it.

3.38miles/32:38 (9:39 pace)

Good thing too, I need some structure in my life, I have been a major slacker lately.

I haven't really done any running in two weeks. Last weekend I spent Thursday through Sunday in Fort Lauderdale photographing the NASSM conference for J. It is an annual Sport Management Conference that is hosted every year by a different university. This year J and his collegues from UM hosted it and my job was to come to this fabulous beach resort where it was held and sit by the pool, drinking Pina Coladas and every now and then, photograph a meeting or lunch. But since it was the first day of hurricane season, it rained for four days and looked pretty much like this the whole time.







Needless to say, I ended up taking a lot of pictures. Although Tropical Storm Barry made a short visit, the weekend was a huge success! And lucky for us, Sunday (the day we were leaving) the sun came out and we got to hang out for a few hours at the hotel's amazing pool.







I did manage one treadmill run at the hotel gym while I was there. I hadn't run on a treadmill in almost a year and was a little apprehensive. For a long time in my life, a treadmill was the only way I could run. Once I finally got the courage to really give outdoor running a try, I became addicted and felt clausterphobic running indoors, so I gave it up all together. This run was actually OK though. It was a nice change for my knees and it felt good to start at a pace that I used to finish on as my sprint in the past. My average time on a treadmill run in the past was about 2.7/30:00. This time I ran a 3.1/27:10. It's amazing the difference a year can make.

It's also amazing the difference a couple of weeks can make. I have worked out twice in two weeks and feel like I have gained about 30lbs. Other than the treadmill run, the only other exercise I have gotten has been random dog walks and a long 6 mile walk on South Beach with J this past Saturday morning. I brought my camera and spent the first 2 miles shooting a lot, which J looooves by the way (sarcasm), but I picked up the pace for him the last four miles. Of course, the waffle breakfast we had at Big Pink afterwards pretty much cancelled out any health benefit to our walk. Here are a few shots since I know how much you guys like the beach.













Here are the rest if you are interested.

So yeah, I haven't gotten much excercise in and pretty much ate whatever I wanted and drank a lot of beer, but whatever. I know the next six months will be very long, hot and miserable, so I'm ok with it.

By the way, the weather here has been out of control. I know I complain about it a lot, but be prepared for a long summer of me whining incessantly about the humidity. I am apologizing for it now. There was a "feels like" temperature of NINETY DEGREES the other night at 12:30 PM!!! AT NIGHT PEOPLE!!! There was NO SUN! CONAN O'BRIEN WAS ON FOR THE LOVE OF GOD!!!

Sigh.