Labrynthine Heritage

This is truly hilarious (mostly cause I didn't actually get struck by lightening).
I planned to only run 2.5 miles at Heritage Park but I got hopelessly, blissfully lost until I got up to 5.8 miles!! Now, only about half of that was actually running--the other was fast hiking ending with all out sprinting.

Those trails move-- I swear they do--they cross each other in odd places and the signs that once said "Meadow Trail" become "Marsh Trail" and "River Loop" becomes "Scout Trail". I was just running haphazard from trail to trail-whatever looked beautiful, technical, and shaded.

Here are a few things I re-learned since last summer about trail training:

1) Don't run first mile ALL up hill
2) Keep eyes on trail as well as trees and meadows and birds
3) Keep eyes on trail
4) Keep eyes on Trail and be sure to jump-- time jumps to go completely over obstacles-- broken rocks, fallen logs, jutting roots-- landing on such slightly (or worse) twists the ankle--even in heavy trail shoes
5) Keep mind on trail-- eyes see but mind must tell the legs and arms to act
6) No fear going down a steep, technical hill + mind not on trail= lots of speed and lots of fun and lots of pain-- knees and hands not happy with me. Must get some good, lightweight gloves.
7) Subsequent fear, putting on breaks with shoulders back, and tip toeing down steep hills= no fun, might as well get back to the road.
8) No fear down steep, technical hills + mind on trail + arms winged out for balance + clearing obstacles + shoulders aligned with hips= CRAZY FUN!! Also helps you get up that steep, technical hill that is just a few fallen logs away.
9) The farther into the woods the cooler and the better-- ah, nature's air conditioning.
10) Bridges are fun to run over
11) The one time you decide to leave your camera at home so you can focus on running, a fantastic vision will appear on the trail. This time it was a fire colored deer-- huge and nimble too. I was at one of those trail splits when I looked to my left and saw this orange/brick colored deer gazing out at the meadow lands. He sensed me watching and his ears got all sonar like but he stayed still--I turned off my I-Pod and crept down that trail until I was just a few feet from him. He glanced at me and still did not move. Amazing. But as I got a bit closer he lept into the thick brush of trees and disappeared.
12) Meadow mowed sledding hills are really crazy fun to lope down and near impossible to run up-- you have to run up them on your tip toes because they are vertical with your body.
13) When those charcoal clouds hover to your right and jagged lightening zags through them while blue skies and birds remain to your left--don't get too comfortable. Here's when I wished I wasn't lost, when I wished I had paid attention to the names of the trails, to identifying marks, to anything that would help me get back to my car and FAST! The trail became dark and the thunder rumbled through Def Tones crooning "I took off your wings". I heard the crack and snap of something and I felt panic--real panic-- like I was in Minos' labyrinth and the Minotaur was laughing and waiting while I ran in serpentine circles.

I'm not sure if it's a phobia--but, while I love running in the rain, I am terrified of being lost in lightening storms--esp when I am trail running. I feel like I'm going to become a human candle, torched by some lightening fired tree nearby. I just kept running fast until I saw one of the trails that had pavement-- I ran and ran on that pavement with many choices to turn down another trail but I just kept running on the same paved trail and came out at a parking lot far away from the one where I parked my car. I didn't care--at least I could run away from the match light trees. I ran down the park's streets until I found my car--grabbed a park map on the way and lightening cracked just as I opened the wooden box to grab it-- I jumped and yes, screamed, as embarrassing as it was, and took off again for my car.

I sat in my car laughing and trembling-- looked with glee at my Garmin- 5.8 miles! Ha! and my best time???? 6 minute mile-- yeah-- I sure know when that kicked in.

Can't wait to run at Heritage again. I have memorized the map--memorized it! Next time lightening chases me I will know how to get out of the maze--even without Daedalus's wings.

I've been tagged

I was tagged by Ken

Here are the rules as explained to me.Copy the rules (or your version of them) and the set of questions onto your blog post, provide your own answers and then tag 5 new people. If tagged, you’ll find your name at the end of this post.To be sure everyone tagged knows they’ve been invited to play, go to their blogs and leave them a comment notifying and referring them to your blog for details.Lastly, once the chosen have answered the questions on their own blog, they should come back to yours to tell you.Here are my responses.

1. How would you describe your running 10 years ago?

20 minutes on the treadmill everyday for a few weeks and then not at all for a few months

2. What is your best and worst run/race experience?

Best – Running a 5K side by side with my brother--not only my best experience running because I got to bond with my brother but it was also my best time.

Worst – Fracturing my femur after the Detroit Free Press race-- but before that would definitely be running the 15K Tax Trot in 85 degree weather in April wearing my under armor and a black turtle neck--thought I was going to pass out--also got lost.

3. Why do you run?

I started with Team in Training to raise funds for blood cancer patients, and I got hooked. Now it's just become part of who I am-- I don't feel quite myself when I take too long off running, and it's such a great way to experience everything beautiful around me--esp when trail running--also nice way to bond with my dog.

4. What is the best or worst piece of advice you’ve been given about running?

Best - Don't run in those Sketchers anymore!! Buy good shoes with stabilization. Also, let gravity get you down the hills and be sure to keep your arm swing straight and your feet will follow. Lean a bit into the uphills and shorten your stride
Worst – You can't drink enough water just before a race (oh yeah you can!) and don't cross train-- one of my coaches actually said to me "You'll never see a Kenyon in the pool!! Stop cross training" and hello fractured femur, twisted ankles, injured knees, etc.

5. Tell us something surprising about yourself that not many people would know.

I was mugged twice within the first month I lived in Dublin but have never been mugged in Detroit and lived here most of my life! I still love to travel--esp. by myself because it feels more exhilarating.


These are the folks I'm tagging:

Scott Keeps Running

Dag

A Kiwi on the Run

Cycling through life

TNT ROAR

More blogging than running makes Laura a lazy girl

So, I have not run since the darned half-marathon. This is becoming a habit--run a
half-marathon take a million days off running--train again for next half-marathon just shy of three months before the race--at this rate I'll reach my goal of a two hour half-marathon in about two decades.

I started to blog to motivate myself for what was supposed to be my first full marathon--which turned out to fracture my femur and scared me off of trying for a full--burned once and don't want to get burned again. It did not help that it was after my 14 mile run that I started having leg problems--like that magical number past the half-marathon itself cracked my leg and now I seriously am scared of going anything over 13.1. Some day, though, some day.

For now, it's as many halfs as I can sign up for, take off work for, and train/be a slug after for.



My parents took my brother and I out after the race and this photo was taken right before they drove to the lake house in Manistee. The wonderful highlight of this half was that it was my brother's first full. He took my advice and we had exactly two drinks together the night before the race at the Grand Traverse Resort. It was surreal to actually give my big brother Mark advice about anything but especially something athletic--but I successfully warned him off of using his tri belt for a full marathon, talked him into putting on his entire racing outfit, socks, pinned on (yes pinned on not clipped on!) race bib, and most important shoes with timing chip already looped through the laces and then taking it all off and having a good nights sleep with it piled next to the door.

It's my method for every pre-race night: exactly two glasses of wine, try on all my race gear, take it all off, go to bed and it's completely lights out. Some people never sleep the night before a race. Me? I get my best sleep ever the night before a race and I usually have a rather hard time getting to sleep.





This was Mark just minutes after he finished the Bayshore Marathon. Some advice he didn't take-- don't stop! Don't sit down! keep walking! He walked a few steps and then did a small twirl like motion and sat/thumped down on the grass.

He also did not take my advice about the post-race ice bath and took a hot tub instead-- crazy. It's actually nice to be so numb you can't feel anything because you also can't feel the pain in your legs.

Veronica, who ran the 10K, was kind enough to tell Mark, as were having help-get-to-sleep drinks, that a full marathon was much harder than a triathlon. Nice timing Veronica. "It's true!" she insisted. "You tell me, you tell me after the race," she said to my brother, "if it isn't harder than a tri." I told her that was enough for the night before Mark's race. Veronica is a crazy fast runner and certainly has her priorities--she prefaces everything with "Two choices" As in "I had two choices: go for the bathroom or go for time." Guess what she chose?
I loved rooming with her and Lou that weekend. While her, Lou, and I suited up for the race, she talked incessantly about running in her jeans--the girl from Mexico city could not fathom 38 degrees any time of day (even 4 a.m.) in late May. She almost talked me into running the Bayshore in my jeans.


Here she is post race already in her jeans and the temp rose to nearly 60.
















Here some middle of the race photos.




































After my half I waited near and on the track for my brother to finish the full. I was so excited that I got as far out into the track as I could without being an obstacle. Though I nearly become one.













I was so absorbed taking this photo of my brother finishing that the racer behind him almost slammed into me-- I didn't even notice.

My parents, who were watching in horror, told me after I ran across the track to show them the photo of Mark finishing.

A nice 38 degree summer race

Jackie and I on the bus to the Bayshore start line-- around 5 a.m. and the sun was just coming up--that dawn with the rosy red fingers as Homer calls her--spreading across the windows of our bus--made being up so early not so bad.

Here is where it did get bad:





FREEZING!! That plastic poncho might as well have been dipped in ice--did not keep out the 38 degree wind and drizzle as we waited our nearly two hours of rotating through the bathroom lines until the start of the race.

It did warm though to a perfect 50 degrees as the race went on and the sun broke through the drizzle--turned out to be another beautiful Bayshore race--lake on one side, nice breeze, and sprawling lawns on the other side--with families sitting on their lawn chairs cheering us on and some offering water--one family had a bucket of candy for the runners.