I am SPARTACUS

I wish I was a more consistent blogger because I feel like everytime I do post I have a million things to recap!

Last week I felt like I was battling something so I didn't do a whole lot, I did run one glorious midweek run at a 10:XX pace on hills, which for me, is fabulous!

Saturday Mr. Pi and I went with JM and her man to the Field of Screams haunted corn maze on Sauvie Island, which despite the mile long line, was really fun. I used to be a summer ONLY kind of girl but there is something about the crisp fall air, pretty fall leaves, hot cider and scarfs that is growing on me. (That's not to say I don't miss my flipflops, hehe.)

Saturday Mr. Pi and I also introduced a new member into our family. World, meet Spartacus! (Thanks Tara for the awesome name suggestion. I have a feeling Spartacus and Fabio will be great friends.)
Isn't he handsome? He's my new Specialized Allez road bike. I'm nervous about the clipless pedals and skinny tires but I'm sure I'll get used to it with time. Jen said something funny to me the other day about getting used to a new bike and improving on the bike in general. I guess there is a saying called TITS (time in the saddle), hahaha! I can't wait to get in a good ride, sadly, the weather has been less than ideal for bike riding. I'm hoping for one clear day this weekend.

Sunday Mr. Pi, Jen and I went out the Banks Vernonia trail for a run. It was drizzly but not pouring. So crazy that I'm running in that kind of weather. It doesn't really even phase me too much anymore. Jen was running 17 miles, Mr. Pi and I were both doing 10-12ish. I ended up with 10.5 and I think Mr. Pi did 12 (he still beat me back to the car!). The fall leaves were amazing on the trail, I tried to snap a few pics while running, sorry for the blurryness!

Mr. Pi

Pretty trail, I think Mr. Pi is a little dot in the background.Jen over the bridge as we started out.Jen's in this one too but it's super blurry. Look for the pink/orange dot.
Me!Pretty trail!
Me, with my hot cider, dry clothes and Harry Potter waiting for Jen to finish her 17. (Yes, I am just now jumping on the Harry Potter train. Already through book 1 and well into book 2.)

I had a good run last night. 3 easy miles @ 11:04 pace. I didn't go the super hilly way but I still have at least 1 mile of hills (which was my slowest mile clocking in at 11:15). After the run I did a weights circuit with lots of abs at while catching up on TV online. I am feeling my arms, back and abs today--ouch!

I'm really trying to hit 1000 miles for the year. I'm pretty close, currently, 807.07. This means I pretty much need two months of 100 miles. Lately, my miles per week has varied a LOT. I had one week of 31 miles, then the next was only 15. I'm really trying to stay consistent and hit the 20-25 range.

D10 sent me her tri maintenance plan and I've been looking at new plans for myself as well. I have a goal half in a few weeks that I'm currently training for with a new plan I created last week. It's a modified version of a Runner's World plan. I know tempo runs (or Pfitz users, LT runs) are great at building speed but I have such a hard time fitting them in since it's really hard for me to do a tempo run on hills and every route by my house is hilly. I'm thinking I may need to do these runs on the tready or the track. I'm going to stick to my plan as closely as possible but try not to stress out too much about pace. All I really want to do is beat my current PR, I don't have any other goals.

Happy Wednesday!

P.S. I'm thinking of hosting a virtual race a la RunningLaur style. Is there an interest in that fellow virtual friends?

Nike Women's Marathon 2009 Race Report and Weekend Recap

BEST.WEEKEND.EVER! I know I’m going to miss a lot of fun details and probably give too many details anyway. Really, the first line sums it up!

Friday morning started with a road trip to Cali. Car was full this time with Zoey, Mr. Pi, me, Sarah and the co-worker. There were fun stories told and lots of great music shared (clearly, I wasn’t the DJ since no one likes my hippty hop). We dropped Mr. Pi off somewhere along the 5, where he spent a few days with his family. The girls and I continued on to the Bay. We dropped the co-worker in Alameda then, Sarah and I were on a quest for ZACHARY’s!!!! YUM! Sarah has pictures!

Friday night we crashed with the lovely Julianne at her A-MAZ-ING house. We were pretty delirious by the time we got there but we so appreciated being hosted by her and her great hubby @donutfan (for all your tweeters). In the morning, we woke to glorious views of SF and breakfast prepared by the Donut Man. (No, it wasn’t donuts!)

Saturday was an amazing day. The weather was perfect, everything went smooth with packet pickup. Sarah and I met up with Aron and Tara and chatted for a little while. Sarah’s friend who helps put on the NWM hooked us up like royalty! SERIOUSLY! The rest of the day Sarah and I gallivanted around SF. We shopped, we ate, we walked up an infamous SF hill and we enjoyed the beautiful warm weather. We had one interesting adventure ending with a $12 cab ride to REI and $5 bucks worth of Gu. The day was pretty awesome! I don't have any pictures from our glorious day of sightseeing but Sarah does (now she has to write a race report and post lots of pictures!)

Kristen met up with us about dinner time and had made us reservations at an Italian place. Post dinner we all crashed after carefully laying out our race outfits. Kristen being our city expert had us in the BEST hotel ever, we were literally two blocks from the start line. No worrying about cabs to the start, we were going to walk right out the door to the start line.

Sunday morning was another early wake-up call. I did my pre-race coffee and tried to shove down a banana. Not too much to say about the morning other than us laughing about Sarah’s big butt (see below) and that comment making me have “I like big butt’s” go through my head for about an hour. At the start line we found Tara and Aron. It was a little interesting getting into the corral but we made it and before we knew it the gun went off. Kristen and I had decided to run the whole race together, have fun, take pictures, walk, stretch and just enjoy ourselves. My Garmin crapped out within the first mile, it would auto pause and auto resume, then tell me I was running a 5 min mile. I eventually just turned it off and really decided to have fun!

With Sarah and Kristen pre-race! I look wayyy too excited about being up before the sun!

Sarah's "big butt" stuffed with Gu, kleenex and her phone.

Staying warm in the VIP tent. Sarah, Tara, Aron, Me and Kristen.

Start line!

Mile 6ish?

In GGP, I think.

The course was hard, I won’t lie. Every time I saw another hill I thought “poor Sarah” since she was doing the full. The downhill portions were nice but it’s not like they were gentle downhills, they were steep too. Good thing we were running for fun! I cannot stress how fun and how fast the miles went by (despite them actually being slow for both Kristen and I). Running with a friend was amazing.

Another really cool thing was leap frogging with Audrey and her cousin. They were taking their time too and we kept leap frogging with them. Crazy thing is, Kristen got her bib from Audrey who had earned an extra one through a Nike running club but they had never met! Awesome! Seriously, Kristen and I chatted through the whole race as the miles flew by. Right before mile 11, I started looking for Roadbunner, right away I spotted her bright yellow hat with a bunny on it. She was a great spectator. We saw her again at the finish and then we hung out with her for awhile after too. She took lots of pictures!

Finish Line!!!

Half marathon finishers!

Kristen and I with Roadbunner, she's a great spectator!

Post-race I also ran into Mel which was so totally random and so totally great! Also, saw Aron, Tara, Shelly and Solorunner. This makes me seem like I know EVERYONE, I really don’t.

Mel, from 2ndChances, totally random blogger meetup!

I will for sure be signing up for the half marathon lottery again next year, it was a great race! I won't lie the Tiffany's bling was pretty nice too. Check out Aron's blog for pics! I won’t ever go for a PR, holy hills, but everything else was great. I’d post my finish time but I honestly don’t know it. The website is difficult to maneuver and my Garmin was off. My guess is 2:3X, which really isn’t all that far off from my current half PR so there is hope for me to PR at the HM distance.

What made this race so great, aside from all the things I have already mentioned, is that I got to see Sarah finish her first full marathon! I, along with Amy and the other PB&J’s, have been training together on Sunday’s for over a year. I was nervous, excited, happy and proud as Kristen and I waited to see her come through the marathon chute. She’ll have all the details from her perspective on her blog at some point but it was so awesome for me to be there when she finished! Sadly, the dumb guy next to me had his arm in the way of the picture I took, but I did get a couple of her as she passed by (Sarah, you'll have to post those too.).

WAY TO GO SARAH! You are a MARATHONER! You did great and I’m so happy that I got to be there to share the weekend with you!

Finishers!

Post-race we hoped in the car, well, hobbled is probably more accurate and headed to Mr. Pi’s parents place for a feast. Though, since it took a LOT longer to find the shuttle and get back to the hotel than we originally thought, we made a pit stop at a CA staple. (In n Out anyone? Best. Milkshake. Ever.)

The car ride home was relatively uneventful however; more fun times were had between the Dunlap’s and Sarah. I LOVE that girl!

All in all, Nike Women’s Marathon was a COMPLETE SUCCESS!!!!!!

Vacation Re-Cap!

Where do I begin…

The wedding in Napa was gorgeous. The bride was beautiful, the wine was tasty, the scenery was amazing! Here’s a pic of Mr. Pi and I in the car before we went to the ceremony. Sadly, that’s the only picture I have from the wedding.
After a long night, we arrived back to Sac from Napa pretty late that evening and we were up at 4:XX the next morning to get on the plane to HAWAII. It was a bit brutal but no complaining, we were off to HAWAII! Being so tired, I actually did a lot of sleeping on the plane which normally I can’t do. When we arrived in Maui it was a balmy 85 + 90% humidity. Glorious! Perfect beach weather.

Running to Lahina and back to the condo on Maui. Running to the top of Diamondhead (well running from Waikiki to the trailhead, I walked up to the top and most of the way down, too many tourists and too steep for me to run the whole way.)Top of Diamondhead.Mr. Pi waited for me at the start of Waikiki so we could run the rest of the way back together. What a guy!

Totally out of order photos, here is the view from our condo on Maui.Ocean swimming!

The wedding we went to on Wednesday was kind of odd. My grandpa now has a stepson who is only 6 months older than me. My new step grandma seemed nice enough and her family was pleasant. My thought on the whole thing is “if he’s happy, I’m happy.” He now has someone to explore new adventures and travel the world with, which makes me happy.

Before the wedding.My Mom and I on the beach after the wedding.

Mr. Pi and I post wedding, beach at sunset.

We’re now back in the NW, where it’s cloudy, windy and rainy, not everywhere can be Hawaii. I leave again on Friday for SF to run the Nike Women’s Half Marathon. I’m super excited to hang out with some new bloggers/tweeters and see some old friends (ROHO’s, RoadBunner, Audrey, Kristen, all my Cali friends). I don’t have any goals for the race other than to support my awesome friend Sarah (her first marathon) and enjoy the route. I’m ready to have some fun!

While I was away sooooo many people ran awesome races, congrats to you all! Most special congrats to my PB&J/R (depending on who you ask) marathoners Emily (who BQ’d) and Amy (who kicked her first marathon in the ass)—way to go ladies!

What were you doing this morning?

While many of you were probably sleeping I was running my long run. I kept telling myself if Aron can get up at 4:XX to run 18 miles before work, I can get up at 5:15 to run 10. I also knew I wouldn't be running in the dark alone since my co-worker was also going to be running. Today was also her birthday so I totally stole the idea of making birthday bib's from Emily, who did bib's and timing "chips" for Jen on her birthday. Here are the bib's I made, laminated with packing tape--I'm so resourceful!

It was a very dark 3.5 miles but my co-worker had her head light and I had Mr. Pi's flashy bike light so we were fine. We also saw a surprising number of runners braving the streets at o'dark thirty.

I leave tomorrow with Mr. Pi for a wedding in Napa and on Sunday we fly out to Hawaii (for another wedding on Wednesday). I normally get nervous about traveling and pack wayyyyy in advance but this time, I haven't thought much about the trip at all (except to check the weather in Hawaii). As I rolled into work almost 2 hours after I normally get there, it hit me, I'm going on vacation! Yay! I have a birthday dinner to attend tonight and nothing to wear since I flaked on the lovely Grippo yesterday morning where a dress exchange was supposed to happen. Oh well, I'll find something decent in my closest (hopefully).

As for the news that I've alluded to for a couple of weeks. Well, it's really not that exciting but I've decided to sign up for another half marathon this fall (besides Nike) and try for a PR. I'm setting any time goals other than a new PR. Since I almost PR'd on a training run last weekend, I am fairly confident I can beat my old time. On November 21st I'll be running in tracktown on a flat course along the Mackenzie river...I just hope it's not raining, but it is what it is. Another friend from work will be running her first 10k and Mr. Pi is likely to run the half, it'll be a fun carpool down to Eugene.

I'm taking Netty the netbook to Hawaii so hopefully I'll be able to upload some pictures to make you all jealous of the sunshine and beaches!

Last but not least special shout out to some very awesome peeps running marathons/half marathoners this weekend (I hope I didn't leave anyone out):

Aron and Tara at Cowtown (I'll be ringing my invisible cowbell for you both!)

Emily , Kristen and Michelle in Portland (I wish I was going to be here to cheer for you both. Jen said she'd shout a little extra for me! Rock it ladies!)

RoadBunner running the SJ half! You got this girl! Sub-2 is YOURS!

Gazelle in Milwaukee for marathon #1 (savor it!)