Last run of 2011 and first training fail of 2012

The Wolverine resolution run went surprisingly well for me. But it was definitely every bit as painful as I remember it. Who knew that four stinking miles could feel like an eternity?

This was my second year competing in the race and once again I got lucky with the weather. Temps were in the low 40's and it was dry out! Hip hip hooray!!! The race didn't start until 3:30 p.m. so my coach had me spin for an hour in the morning. After that I spent a lot of unproductive time surfing blogs and stalking friends facebook pages. And starving and dehydrating myself. I need to learn how to eat/drink before running races. Not sure what the difference is but I can eat almost anything before hopping on a bike but it's a whole different story when running. I basically had to start the race on empty!

Anyways, back to the race. I met up with my friend Hannah at registration and we did a few warm-up laps around the track. This was Hannah's first race but she can hammer. During our first lap around the track I realized that I couldn't talk and when I looked down at my Garmin I realized that we were running at a 5:30/min mile pace. It definitely shocked my lungs into action.

With 10 minutes to go we lined up at the start area. This is a pretty big race and had 780 finishers. The really cool thing about it is that there were almost as many females (359) competing as men (421).
The promoter said "go" and we were off. Once again I started way too hard and once again I felt like I was going to pass out within the first minute. I need to thank Andy again for having me to do steady state intervals because I was definitely able to push the pace harder this year. I think steady state intervals help everything...even running. But I need to reiterate that IT WAS NOT PRETTY. At times I felt like I was going to puke and at one point I felt like the sidewalk was coming up at me. Meaning that I was so oxygen deprived it's surprising I didn't faint.

My goal for the race was to beat last year's time of 27:58 and my plan was to race at a 7-minute mile pace for the first 3 miles and then sprint the last mile. However, I went out so hard that I could barely hold up my Garmin to see my pace...my eyes were blurry. And forget about sprinting the last mile. I'll have to save that for next year :-)

I was really, really, really happy to see the finish line and crossed the finish line with a chip time of 26:59.
The promoter had the race results up really quick, and I was happy to see that I got 1st place in my age group (out of 68), 14th (out of 359 females) and 76th overall (out of 780 racers). The overall female winner was a little 15 year old who's legs were the size of my arms. Sheesh.

The rest of my New Year's Eve was really low-key. I'm just going to say it. I watched Pride and Prejudice with my mom while Scott and my dad went to a hockey game. And I wore pajamas...don't judge. To tell you the truth I really can't think of anything else that would have been more fun. Trust me when I say that I went out enough before I started racing to last a lifetime!

When I finally got home I had a glass of wine with Scott and was in bed before the ball dropped. Like most people I planned to start 2012 on the right foot and instead I started it out all wrong. While most people were rushing out on rides and rushing to the gym I overslept, and woke up feeling like I got hit by a truck.The fact that it was raining, sleeting, snowing and windy did not do much to motivate me either.

So how did I start out 2012? Instead of doing the 5 hour ride Andy had scheduled for me I took a huge nap, and then ate homemade brownies, pasta, and now I'm going back to bed. Talk about bombing a workout-not quite sure how to explain that one to the coach :-) I spent the day looking and feeling like I had the world's worst hangover but I think I just got really dehydrated yesterday.

Tomorrow it's back to work for me and back to working out. I was supposed to have a rest day but since I took an impromptu rest day today I'm sure I'll have a workout scheduled for me tomorrow...

Happy 2012!