Hills for breakfast, hold the gnats

Royal Victoria Marathon

Previous MonthRecent EntriesHomeJoin Fast Running Blog Community!PredictorHealthy RecipesSnoqualmie's RacesFind BlogsMileage BoardTop Ten Excuses for Missing a RunTop Ten Training MistakesDiscussion ForumRace Reports Send A Private MessageWeek ViewYear View
Graph View
Next Month
JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
200820092010
15% off for Fast Running Blog members at St. George Running Center!

Location:

Snoqualmie,WA,

Member Since:

Jan 31, 2008

Gender:

Female

Goal Type:

Boston Qualifier

Running Accomplishments:

Marathon PR: 4:17 at Portland Marathon, Oct. 2007

5K PR 24:37 2009

10K PR 52:58 2010

Have run 22 marathons to date.

No injuries, ever.   :)

Short-Term Running Goals:

Qualify for Boston (4:05 for my age/gender) - or, perhaps, to use my desire for a BQ as a way to get in the hated speed work so I don't just get slower and slower over the years.  This goal is "under (re)construction" right now, until I figure out whether it is truly what I want. :) 


Long-Term Running Goals:

To continue learning about myself and about running, and to enjoy being a fit, happy runner for life.   To always know why I am running and the best way to get the most (both mentally and physically) out of my runs.  To keep a sense of humor and remain optimistic about myself as a runner.  To enjoy running more and more with every passing year. 

Personal:

Baby boomer generation.  Jogged a little in my 20's and 30's.  Started running seriously in 2002.  Low-carb runner since January 2010. 

I love long runs and cold, cloudy weather.  I don't believe in "junk miles."  I am an optimist.  I adore dark chocolate, fog, my family, and knitting -- not necessarily in that order.  

"As every runner knows, running is about more than just putting one foot in front of the other; it is about our lifestyle and who we are."  -- Joan Benoit Samuelson 


Favorite Blogs:

Click to donate
to Ukraine's Armed Forces
Miles:This week: 0.00 Month: 0.00 Year: 0.00
Brooks ST3 Lifetime Miles: 891.35
Vibram Five Fingers KSO Lifetime Miles: 23.77
Brooks ST3 II Lifetime Miles: 965.17
Lunaracers II Lifetime Miles: 198.23
Mizuno Wave Universe 3 Lifetime Miles: 104.14
Asics Piranha Lifetime Miles: 536.83
RunAmocs (Softstar) Lifetime Miles: 16.23
Piranha II Lifetime Miles: 219.53
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
96.0430.704.000.00130.74
Brooks ST3 II Miles: 80.59Lunaracers II Miles: 9.88Brooks ST3 Miles: 33.36Triax 12 II Miles: 1.85Mizuno Wave Universe 3 Miles: 5.06
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
6.190.002.000.008.19

High 40s, cloudy w/ ~10 mph wind.  Solo: easy with 2 tempo miles (8:51, 8:36).  With SnoFlake: 2 miles run/walk.  15 min. abs & stretches. 

Ahhhh-ctober.  Love the cool air and the clouds.  Tempo miles were super hard as always, and the first one way off the target pace of 8:30.  

Brooks ST3 II Miles: 8.19
Comments(7)
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
3.580.000.000.003.58

High 40s, raining.  Easy/aerobic run.  20 min. core & stretching.

Not too bad. Dark and wet. Lots of meditating on various mental puzzles.   

Lunaracers II Miles: 3.58
Comments(6)
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
11.201.000.000.0012.20

35F, rising to high 40s after sun came up,  mostly clear.  Easy aerobic run (mostly w/ club) with mile 11 at MP on the track. 

HELLO LEGS! Man, am I glad to see you.   11:35, 11:41, 11:45, 11:17, 10:01, 10:02, 10:00, 10:01, 10:14, 10:22, 9:09 (MP on track), 11:05.

 I arrived early at Centennial Park to take a warm up run around the perimeter. On the far side, I saw this herd of elk in the adjacent meadow.  See the little dots in the mist?

IMG_0114

None of my usual pace group attended the club this morning, so I started out with some slower folks to warm up, and we parted ways at about mile 2.  One of the faster pace groups, which had run a different route, came up from behind as I ran on the Snoqualmie Valley Trail, and I had them in my sights for about a mile after that.  

I turned into North Bend to run around some neighborhoods that I like over there. By coincidence, when I returned to the SVT the faster group was returning as well. I said hello and tucked in behind them, thinking that at least I could trail them again for a while and not be totally alone on the trail.  That was mile 5. See that mile 5? See that 10:01?  I was as surprised as anyone that they didn't drop me.  Hm. I am not falling behind. Hm. I am talking to them.  I am running with them.  How curious.

Right in that section of trail, the terrain is heavily wooded and my Garmin never reads pace accurately in there. It will read 16:45 one moment and 7:15 the next, as the satellites try to find me through the trees.  Not knowing the pace I figured, "these guys are really slowing down," and enjoyed their company.  After a little while two of them ran on and one young guy stayed with me.  We ended up running the rest of our miles together, including the mile on the track. What a great running partner he turned out to be.  He has only been running for 1 year but has a great deal of enthusiasm and love for running.  We talked the whole time (except for my MP mile), which makes that pace I logged all the more wonderful to me.  (ie Plenty of oxygen!)

Very best wishes to everyone who is racing this weekend!!  

Brooks ST3 II Miles: 12.20
Comments(6)
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
4.320.000.000.004.32

Chilly, sunny morning.  Objective: Recovery run and 5K chaperone. A little over a mile of warmup jogging before having the honor of accompanying SnoFlake on her first 5K.  I'm sure she'll be posting her report shortly if she hasn't already.  I was so proud of her!  We did have some walk breaks, but FAR fewer than we do in our training runs.  Mr. Sno ran it too, in bare feet and beat us by about 10 minutes.  I never thought I'd see the day we all ran together.  What a wonderful experience!

Brooks ST3 Miles: 4.32
Comments(4)
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
2.671.500.000.004.17

42F, clear, w/ very bright moonlight.  2 miles easy, 1.5 miles MP effort, remainder = cool down.  No more resistance training for now, except for a few crunches this morning.  Stretches and Stick. 

Everything feels fine.  My "hard" mile and half were not terribly fast (mile 3 mostly downhill @ 9:48 and next half mile mostly uphill @10:00)  but I didn't really feel warmed up yet either.  I don't control this getting-old business.  ;)  I only observe, and somewhere between mile 3 and 4 I see that I usually speed up without trying.  That's when I know I'm warmed up. 

I'll try a short tempo run tomorrow, as prescribed by Sean.  Then a short run Thursday and I'm done until Sunday morning's marathon.  I might do a short, easy pool run Friday and/or Saturday.  

I can't wait to see charming Victoria again.  The last time we were there was about 11 years ago for my 40th birthday.  I was about 45 lbs overweight and had to hover over a toddler 80% of my waking life.  I remember on the boat trip over, the captain got on the speakers and announced, "we have a birthday on board....  it is... Mary so-and-so who is 30 years old today!"  Sigh.  It rained all weekend. Sigh.  And I still loved Victoria!  So, this should be a ton of fun.  Extended forecast looks dry -- and now I am only 10 lbs overweight.  For a marathoner that is.    :D

Brooks ST3 II Miles: 4.17
Comments(22)
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
3.600.002.000.005.60

45F, partly cloudy. Tempo run: ~2 mi easy;  2 x 1 mi @ tempo w/ 1 min recovery b/t ;  1.5 mi c.d.   Tempo miles: 8:37, 8:32.  (Target 8:30)

The legs whined bitterly about not being warmed up to their liking.  So I'm pleasantly surprised to see the paces on those two tempo miles.  I thought I was quite a bit slower.  The oxygen deficit felt more like a VO2 workout.  And the Garmin pace reading, as you Garminites know, varied widely. I'm sure my true pace varied a lot too, since no part of my neighborhood runs are ever flat, and there are corners to turn and curbs to navigate.  

Brooks ST3 II Miles: 5.60
Comments(7)
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
2.680.000.000.002.68

Mid 40s F, clear and starry.  Easy, short run.   

Very quiet in the neighborhood this early (4:45ish); I saw only one car.  Managed to scare myself turning my headlamp on someone's Halloween decorations.  lol 

Lunaracers II Miles: 2.68
Comments(8)
Race: Royal Victoria Marathon (26.2 Miles) 04:21:48
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
0.0026.200.000.0026.20

Sunshine and low temperatures, and LOTS of hills.  I feel really great about how I ran my race, as confirmed by the intense pain I now have in my legs. ;)   

On Friday, while cruising the expo, I chatted with a few people about the course and attended a talk given by Rod Dixon (amazing runner), during which I became less and less confident about my assessment of the hills.  The following sentence from the website, "The Royal Victoria Marathon is a beautiful, seaside course with lots of mild undulations, but with a maximum elevation change of only 74 feet.," was looking more and more like a marketing department invention, so I signed up for the bus tours.  Marathon bus tours can be depressing and I tend to avoid them.  I am SO glad I took this one.  Hills, hills, hills. Most of them really were quite gentle - though not all! - and I knew they would take a toll.  

While running I counted 5 hills that made me say a bad word, 4 of which had to be run again on the way back to the finish.  But because of the bus tour, I knew what to expect, and adjusted my goals, my effort level and my "state of mind."  I will only say this last thing about the hills - even with all the hill running I do, the hills took their toll... However!  I really could feel the strength from my training.  I passed people on every single hill, even when I slowed down at the end! 

I don't have Garmin mile splits to share, except to say that I was right on target (between 9:00 & 9:20) when I was not climbing a hill, until about mile 18 when things started to hurt. At that point I started clocking 10:00's  and 10:15's.   Before the start, I decided to hit "lap" every time I walked through a water stop (and "lap" again when I started running), and in the last few miles when I had to add some additional walks. So my mile splits will require a lot of math to figure out. But it gives me some data I will be able to use in the future. 

Sorry this is such a disjointed report.  I haven't gone to lunch yet and I keep pausing to chat w/ AuntieEm, who is here in our hotel room.  So fun to see her!  

I had a great time today! The last 5 miles were very difficult and painful (and slow), but I am extremely happy with how I ran today.   This is a gorgeous course, with nice volunteers, and good course support.  The expo was not great, but the speakers were.  I'll come back with splits later if I figure them out...  Off to get food!!  Ouch!  :D

More details about the raceā€¦


The course began on one side of the ornate, palace-like Parliament Building, and wound around through downtown Victoria and the "Inner Harbor" waterfront, eventually coming out towards the shores of the Strait of Juan de Fuca. But just before we arrived at the sea, the course made a detour into Beacon Hill Park, which was absolutely beautiful: huge trees, ponds, fountains, statues, and peacocks (though I only saw them on the bus tour).  We ran two loops in the park (picture eye glasses) and came back out to arrive at the shore of the strait around mile 5.  During this section, I did not look at the Garmin at all, a choice about which I am very pleased.  Now I know exactly what an easy, warm up pace is when I am in the excitement of a marathon race day, and running up and down hills: 9:59, 9:54, 9:45, 9:04, 9:29. 


Next, we ran along the water, downhill into a bay, uphill out of the bay onto a sort of headland, and down again into another small bay. Partway into the bay, the course turns inland to the charming town of Oak Bay.  Here we ran a series of long gradual hills, with a shorter steeper hill at the highest point on the course.  I still felt very strong through here, but I took it easy knowing I would see all these hills in reverse on the return trip.  Oak Bay is a really charming residential area with lots of interesting homes and huge oak trees lining the streets.  We came back to the seaside at about 17K; I don't remember what mile that was, but I was trying to do the conversions in my head (the course was marked in kilometers, Canadian you know) to avoid Garmin gazing.  After a while, I just started thinking in kilometers and subtracting every K marker from 42: OK, almost to the halfway point.  I had the pleasure of seeing the elites on their return, with a young Kenyan far into the lead.   I was still only walking at the water stops, and hitting "lap" before and after walking so that I could know my run paces (not all of these are full miles because of the water stops coming in the middle of miles):  9:29, 9:09, 9:26, 9:14, 9:13, 9:13, 9:17. (Not bad considering the hills!)


Emerging back onto the shoreline, we ran up another hill to a headland, and back down to the actual bay of  "Oak Bay," where the course was noticeably flat for a while! Past a lovely marina and parks. Then we ascended again and ran inland a bit, through a neighborhood of $10+ million homes, inland farther to the turnaround, and then retraced our course back towards Oak Bay.  The turnaround came right after the 23K mark; that's about 14.3, but I miscalculated and thought I was at around mile 16.  So when I glanced at the Garmin to get an idea of how I was doing, I became quite confused. About that time, I was also experiencing some dizziness (this has happened to me in marathons before), so  I pulled back just a little and walked, thinking maybe I was in some kind of trouble.  I soon realized my mistake, felt "stable" again, and kept running. I remember playing a game in this section, to see how many trees I could name. They were so beautiful and huge: oak, sycamore, blue spruce, cedar, and madrona were most common.  The non-walking splits for this section were: 9:29, 9:07, 9:20, 9:26, 9:17, 9:12. 


Eventually we had to return inland and retrace our steps back through Oak Bay village, the high point on the course.  By the time I came back out to the shoreline, I had hit mile 18 and my legs were starting to feel rubbery.  I could tell I was slowing down. Dang.  The course does not return through Beacon Hill Park, however, so the last 5K follow the waterfront around the last headland and back around to the Parliament Building and the Inner Harbor.  I am disappointed that I had to add so many short little walks through here, but at least I was still feeling positive and forcing myself not to let things fall apart too much. Keep moving forward!  My mind dwelt on how lucky I am to have discovered a sport I love and to be able to enjoy it even when I am hurting.  At around 40K I thought I might be hallucinating: there were about a dozen 70+ y.o.  ladies in poodle skirts cheering us on.  A couple of unwelcome short inclines near the finish, and I was finally seeing the finish line!  There was my family.  :)  Last eight miles (in pieces): 9:50, 9:30, 9:51, 10:00, 10:15, 10:15, 10:02, 10:22, 10:43, 10:19


I believe that my legs felt worse at the finish than any other marathon I have run, but the comparison may be biased by that trick the brain plays of not letting us remember the worst.  In any case, I was in a great deal of pain and shaking with weakness.  The volunteers were wonderful. My family was wonderful,  And there was AuntieEm - she was wonderful too!  We all sat on the grass for a few minutes; Mr. Sno had to lower and raise me. Ouch, ouch, ouch!  And I do it - for fun! LOL 


Monday morning...  I slept quite poorly last night, since my sore legs and abs screamed at me every time I moved.  Before bed, we spent some time at the hotel pool and I went back and forth between the hot tub and the relatively cold pool. Perhaps that helped a bit, I don't know. 

I feel great about how I ran and how strong I felt most of the race. I am pretty sure I could have stayed closer to (if not on) my marathon pace if the course had been flat or even less hilly.  That's all right.  I have no regrets. This has been a very happy weekend and a great race experience.  

When I think of how awful I felt before my taper, how discouraged and self-deprecating - I am overjoyed about this experience and all I have learned.  I cannot wait to start running and training again.  I am looking at Newport Marathon for June 5, but honestly - must I wait that long to have another marathon? No!  I cannot.  I'll have a look around at my late-winter, early-spring options and see what might fit.  Many, many thanks  to Sean Sundwall, for getting me stronger with that training plan; I will continue to use those workouts as I pursue my goals.   

Brooks ST3 II Miles: 26.20
Comments(22)
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
0.000.000.000.000.00

I miss running. A lot. 

However...  it is so nice to: sleep in, miss out on the downpour, see my full collection of Smartwool socks clean and ready in the drawer, not panic at 9 PM if I'm not ready for bed, dream and scheme about hard workouts instead of doing them, and just feel guilt-free about laziness.  

I am going to run again as soon as I can descend stairs with a normal step and without pain. Another 24 hours I hope.  All of you who bounce right back into running (or at least a slow jog) are amazing to me.  

Comments(7)
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
1.850.000.000.001.85

High 50sF, very windy. Clouds are moving in but there were some brilliant constellations still showing.  Objective: test the legs.   20 min. core & upper body. 

The lights are on but nobody's home...  No strength whatsoever in the legs. But no soreness either.  I had a feeling that might be the case, but I had to get out there and try it.  So I dressed for walking (warmer clothes) and just enjoyed the fresh air.  I jogged for little 1 block intervals and walked a lot. 

Triax 12 II Miles: 1.85
Comments(8)
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
5.230.000.000.005.23

53F, light showers. Slow run, walked the steep hills. Recovery continues. Gorgeous fall colors; I wish October lasted longer. 

Brooks ST3 Miles: 5.23
Comments(7)
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
4.560.000.000.004.56

43F, mostly clear; saw a shooting star.  I'm still tired and slow, but it's nice to have "permission" to run like a beginner for a little while.   Getting up early was hard -- I've been spoiled by the taper and recovery weeks.  That won't be any fun to redevelop. 

I signed up for the Napa Valley Marathon, March 7.  That will give me a tasty little "tide over" before Newport in June, and I'll have the opportunity to visit with my sisters who live in the Bay Area.  Eight months to wait for Newport felt like eight years.  I think I could use a little extra motivation during the winter months, and an opportunity to see how I'm progressing. Besides, they give out awesome stuff: in addition to the cool shirt and medal you get a great duffle bag stuffed with goodies.  Dean Karnazes will be the main speaker at the expo along with several others.  

Brooks ST3 Miles: 4.56
Comments(11)
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
3.620.000.000.003.62

54F, cloudy. A bit of wind, a few drops of rain. The predicted downpour never came.

Mentally, I am ready to get back to my usual mileage, but my legs are just not back from their holiday.   After a long, sluggish warm up, I started feeling fairly good -- but the stopwatch does not lie.  Sloooooww.  

The Cat Who Must Be Obeyed popped out of my neighbors' shrubbery and nearly tripped me.  I am sure he thought that was great fun, because when the attack did not produce the desired outcome (ie me sprawled across the sidewalk) he proceeded to wind his body around and around my feet when I tried to walk, purring his head off.   I did make it home vertical.  

Ah, there is the sound of heavy rain now.  Well, that was nicely timed for me.  

Lunaracers II Miles: 3.62
Comments(6)
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
5.000.000.000.005.00

44F, mostly clear and starry.  Easy run, last mile and a half with SnoFlake.  15 min. strength & stretching. 

All of a sudden, the legs felt very good today.  What a relief; I was beginning to wonder if they'd ever come back.   

Garmin 405 users - have you ever had a problem with the contact points for recharging the watch?  Every now and then I have had to fiddle with mine quite a bit to make it happy.  Evidently, I didn't quite get it right yesterday and was greeted by a blank watch face this morning. So I used an iPhone app called Allsport GPS this morning. Very cool program. Mr. Sno does all his runs with this app.  I loved the elevation and map features. They make my runs look a lot harder than they are. Macho points for me.  ;)  

Brooks ST3 Miles: 5.00
Comments(7)
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
4.680.000.000.004.68

42F, mostly cloudy with patchy fog.  Lots of gorgeous fall colors.  Club run.

I had a great time running with MSRC folks along the Snoqualmie Valley Trail.  It is absolutely beautiful this morning, for us cloud/fog lovers.  Such vivid colors.  We had a pretty good turnout for the club run today, so I enjoyed the larger group - good conversation and lots of variety as we constantly changed pairings along the trail.  

One of the runners today was a woman who lives near me and has started organizing some weekday group runs.  (I believe I blogged about running with them briefly a couple of weeks before my marathon.)   I am looking forward to running more often with them when my recovery is complete (they are fast).  On Sundays they do some interesting trail runs around here (Rattlesnake Lake to North Bend, Snoqualmie to Fall City via the Falls, etc.). I'd love to have some buddies to run those trails.

Brooks ST3 Miles: 4.68
Comments(7)
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
5.060.000.000.005.06

I have to be at home the next couple of mornings (long story), so it's the dreadmill for me. Ug. Do you believe me that I would really rather be out in that pouring rain, doing "real" running? lol 

Mizuno Wave Universe 3 Miles: 5.06
Comments(10)
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
5.370.000.000.005.37

Last day on TM.  :)

Brooks ST3 Miles: 5.37
Comments(7)
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
8.170.000.000.008.17

40F, raining, wind 10-15 mph.  (Smartwool alert.) Easy run.  

So great to be outside again!  I was able to leave the house a little later than usual this morning, so I even got to run in daylight the last 3 miles or so.  This was my longest run since the marathon and everything feels great.  Onward! 

Brooks ST3 II Miles: 8.17
Comments(7)
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
4.200.000.000.004.20

56F, cloudy, wind 15mph w/ gusts. Easy run. 

That's a huge jump in temperature from yesterday, so I was lucky to miss the earlier rain. (Can't wear a jacket at that temp.)   Kept it short due to a busy morning and my plans for a long run tomorrow (first real long run since the marathon). 

Brooks ST3 Miles: 4.20
Comments(5)
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
14.062.000.000.0016.06

Low 50sF, mostly cloudy, windy (10-20 mph).  Endurance run + club run.  Late for club = 2 miles at accidental-marathon-pace.  

Seeing as how I haven't been under an 11:00 min. pace since the marathon 3 weeks ago, it's pretty amazing to me that this run was so fast (pretty much 10:30 and under the whole time, except for coming up the Parkway).  

I was late for the club run because I couldn't figure out what the weather was doing and I kept changing my mind about wardrobe.  So I let myself just have 1 mile at 12:00 and then let it rip down the Parkway. Near the bottom, with 2 miles to go until the club meetup spot, I realized I still didn't have time to make it -- hence the 2 marathon pace miles.  

The whole way I was thinking it was pretty stupid of me to spend so much energy that early, but I figured I would accept the consequences happily as long as I could make it through at least 12 miles today.   

At the club run, I paired up with a lady who is much faster than I am, but wanted to run with me anyway.  I sped a little for her, and she slowed down a little for me, and we both had a fine ~6 miles together.  We stayed at about a 10:15 pace, which is faster than what I've been doing the past 3 weeks, and it felt great. 

Heading back up the Parkway (The Leg Builder, formerly known as The Spirit Crusher) is when I really paid for my somewhat reckless behavior,  and I had to walk the steepest parts. 

For all my changes of clothing, I still was not dressed quite right. But other than that it was a fantastic run.  My legs feel great and the autumnal world is very beautiful right now.  I sure do love running.  And hey, I'm having a birthday soon.  I won't say when, because I don't care to post my date of birth on the internet. But within a short time I will be 51 years old - and I'm a runner! Ha! 

Brooks ST3 II Miles: 16.06
Comments(3)
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
96.0430.704.000.00130.74
Brooks ST3 II Miles: 80.59Lunaracers II Miles: 9.88Brooks ST3 Miles: 33.36Triax 12 II Miles: 1.85Mizuno Wave Universe 3 Miles: 5.06
Debt Reduction Calculator
Featured Announcements
Recent Comments: