Safety #1 Running buddies

 

These girls are my rock... love running with them!

I did my first presentation for our Fleet Feet 10K training program this morning on runner safety. Its been a long time since I've presented material in front of people (other than the workout that Ed let me lead last Wednesday which went really well other than the group cussing me out in their heads being so excited over making them do one mile repeats). Due some extenuating circumstances in our area it was just a good time to remind everyone of some safety issues anyhow. Here's a little run down of how I keep safe on runs. Today I'm going to talk about running buddies.

I schedule a run with friends, especially in a new area to me. Running with my friends is one of my favorite ways to connect and socialize with my besties. I found this amazing group of friends through running and we keep that going by exercising together... and of course they are kind of a captive audience once we're out on the trail a few miles... I do love to sing and tell jokes 10 miles into a 20 mile run... I'm sure they love that!



crazy things you do when with your running buddies



Run with new people. The best way to make new friends is to go for a hot sweaty feet pounding run with them. Every ones guard is down and the honesty seems to shine through. I can attest to the fact that I've sometimes over-shared with new running buddies but I've also listened to many stories that we wouldn't normally share in any other circumstances from child birth to bathroom habits, while out on the trail. I build emotional walls, that's just how I deal with life... but they crumble easily on the trail or road. That seems to be when I'm to the most ME.



out on a run with my best running buddy



I run with my dog. She loves to run with me. She deters strangers and other dogs from approaching me and its just great to spend time with her. I rescued her from the pound and she is just so happy to be out and about with me that I can't help but love that time. I also hope that keeps other big scary animals away while on trail runs. My dog even has a best friend...Laila that she loves to run with. That is how amazing running is. :)



me and Koz on our 50K relay

Running buddies stop you from running into the street when you shouldn't. They remind you of which side of the road to run on (facing traffic), have extra eyes and ears to watch out for dangerous situations, keep you from getting lost alone, pull you through a hard run, carry extra GU or chomps in case you run out, deter strangers (or big animals) from approaching. They are your sounding board, youre theirs. Running may be cheaper than therapy, but its also a lot more fun. I do love my running buddies!.





Do you have a running buddy... or two or three or more? Do you run with your dog?









Heights, Water and Catwalks, Oh My

Lots of fun stuff going on here! Coaching is going well. I'm not getting as many miles in as I would like and my hip was a lot more tender after hill repeats with the 10k group Wednesday night than I would have liked. I did a couple short runs this week but other than that I've been off the wagon. My brain AND my body needed the long run release. When Linda in Paradise offered up a chance to run the flumes above DeSabla reservoir this morning I jumped at the chance.

My grandparents, aunt and cousin lived just down the fire road from the PG&E lake when I was little. We spent countless hours walking along the trails, riding sleds down the embankment in the snow by the lake and riding my cousins horses along the paths. Although it has been many years since I've spent time up there in ways it will always be a part of me and some of my best memories.

I met Linda at 6:30 in order to get 10 miles in. She ran this same trail for 10 miles yesterday with a bunch of people from Paradise that make the track down the hill in the Spring and Fall for the marathon programs. They all took the Summer off and taking to the trails up in the foothills. Today we headed off along the trail and chatted about lots of fun stuff. We run along the flume with the water running the opposite direction. There are several places where you have to walk along "cat walks" sometimes just two boards side by side and sometimes grates with a hand rail... sometimes without a hand rail...

If you know me in real life you know I'm a chicken sh*t. I don't like water... I don't like heights and I'm not particularly fond of bridges. OK I LIKE bridges a lot but I do NOT like to walk across them. Heights+water= no thank you. I just sucked it up and walked. The views were probably amazing but I wasn't going to look around and see. It was just one foot in front of the other. I'm sure that Linda was annoyed but she didn't show it. We got to one point where the catwalk didn't have a handrail. It was half of a metal tube cut in half and help up next to the cliff side of a mountain with water GUSHING flowing against the direction we were running. it was hard to keep moving forward without feeling dizzy so i took my time.

We turned around and headed back and crossed back across the same catwalks. It was a lot easier to get across then. Water flowing the same direction and better to focus on getting home that way! Linda even offered to take a picture on the long catwalk to prove i got across all by myself! The run was beautiful and I forgot that I love the sound of the water moving. There were still a lot of wild flowers in bloom and the temperatures were in the high 60's the entire time. I am definitely putting this run on my list.

Into the Wind



North end of the levy where we shouldn't have been

 There is a crazy storm headed our way. Some people in other parts of the country think its beaches and sunshine all over California. Well here in Chico we don't have a real beach but we have lots of creeks with wonderful watering holes to jump in. We have lakes all around us to go explore too. But this week we are expecting snow all the way to the valley floor! SNOW! You know because all the people who already shouldn't be out there driving will be F-L-I-P-P-I-N-G out! I'm excited though. I love running in the rain and I'm sure I'd love running in the snow although I do not like running in the wind. The whole run today felt like it was running right into the wind. So I haven't even looked at my splits but I'm sure they aren't good.



I swear she found every mud puddle

I took the kids to school and came back and ate breakfast. Gotta love Cheerios with strawberries and blue berries. I know they aren't in season yet but I couldn't resist them on my Trader Joe's trip. They did not disappoint. I love me some blueberries. They are most definitely my favorite fruit. Strawberries are yummy but just can't compare. I can't wait for summer fruits and veggies.

I didn't get out the door until 9:30 but the wind had already picked up and the clouds were threatening rain. I grabbed the leash and Cindi went crazy. She was so ready to go. I knew that she was going to either drag me or that I was going to spend the first few miles correcting her. Off we went and we hit our first hurdle when we crossed the first major street with two puppies that Cindi assumed were there to play with us. I had to drag her away from them but they all did look pretty cute playing together. Off we went to the walking path behind a local subdivision that leads to the levy. Its just over a mile to get there and Cindi was so happy to be off leash for a bit. There are houses to our right but all open fields to the left so she felt very free and I had to keep calling her back so she wouldn't run off. When we hit the levy we decided to add some mileage by turning left instead of right and seeing where it lead. I probably should have told someone I was going there since I doubt enough people go out there that if something bad happened it would be days before anyone found me! So no more going back there by myself but we will be heading back there with friends for sure. It was pretty though.

Just past the ball fields along the levy

We turned back into the wind and ran to Wildwood park along the levy but the wind was so bad and my hip was hurting a little I had to stop and stretch a few times along with the "snot rockets" and coughing along the way. The wind took my hat 3 times along that mile stretch alone. We turned the corner and checked the water fountains that are apparently still off due to this freeze and decided to take a leashed loop around the path that is just over half a mile long then over the road to the other side of the levy. Cindi was pretty tired by then and our run was starting to warm up. We ran along Centenial then turned around at the 5 mile mark and headed back with a water stop for us both at 5 mile, me at the fountain and her in the creek then ran back along the levy and home. Those last 3 were almost effortless. Finally found my happy place and even the parts where Cindi was on leash she was behaved. At the point to turn off the path behind the houses we did run into a German shepherd who was loose. We ended up leashing up and heading into the neighborhood to avoid a confrontation. This ended up adding more than a half mile to my projected route but we didn't even care! Well I didn't care and I didn't hear Cindi complaining so when we slowed down in front of the house and noticed the hubby wasn't home yet I almost headed back out for a few more miles. Instead I did dishes and laundry and stretched.


Chico Creek by 5Mile



We do have a few miles to make up for since i didn't run yesterday. I'm thinking of heading to Paradise and running in the snow because I'm so jealous of you mid-westerners who have been battling it for months. ;) We got in with 8.81 miles in but I'm not telling you how long it took us with all that head wind.

Do you take your dogs on your runs? How far do you run with them? Cindi has run anywhere from 3 and up to 12miles with me.

I totally Rocked this Weekend

I suffered from a terrible ear infection all week (and refused to see the dr.). I lived on ibuprofen for a few days I think. But I felt better on Saturday and met the marathon training group at 1mile for our 16 mile run. The great thing about meeting here is that the city turned the creek into a pool perfect for post run "ice baths".

Since the 10mile and Half Marry programs are over we got Ramon back to help coach! We took off and I got to chit chat with the girls at the back of the group since I'm to slow to keep up with the faster runners.  We headed up the park, took the levy around, then headed up Upper Park road all the way to B trail. 8 miles! It was pretty slow going since it was a decent climb all the way to our turn around on a rocky unsurfaced fire road. We did take an extra long rest at the top, ate some GU chomps and i really needed to stretch my hip flexors (ouchy!!!) and headed back down the trail. We chatted away and the miles seemed fly by. When we got to the aid station with 5 to go with picked up the effort to marathon pace then the last mile was supposed to be 10k effort to simulate the "race to the finish kick" we should all have at the end of the Marathon in 8 weeks. We finished strong. I still felt good enough to bring home a 9:08 the last mile! I'm starting to feel my legs, brain and lungs falling back into sync. Not as fast as I have gone in the past but definitely seeing improvements. You can see my Garmin Connect info
Got back to 1mile and stretched good before literally jumping into the creek for the "ice bath". This is so much easier than going home, filling up the bath tub with cold water, getting in then adding ice. 15 minute soak then got out and dried off as Ramon was talking to Tara about ultra running. Now this has been sitting in the back of my mind for a long time. I even gave a little hint a few months ago on FB about wanting to try my hand at an Ultra some day. We talked ourselves into doing the Sunsweet 50k next Spring. HOLY CRAPPOLA I'm even more crazy than I thought.!

bib for 1/4 marry and cute long sleeve tech shirt!

Good Neighbor and I had our Bunco for Boobies night last night so I was on my feet getting stuff done all day then headed to packet pick up to sign up last minute for the HOT Half in the quarter marathon. Got my bib, my shirt and I was off to convince a bunch of ladies to spend a bunch of $ for a good cause... and it worked! We raised $915 last night!!!

I got up this morning and handed the kids to the sitter and headed to Hooker Oak park for the Hot Half and quarter marathon. I met up with a friend TD and we headed out on a warm up run. She was treating this run like her last long run before Nike Womens next week and needed to get 9 in total. Since we were both doing the 1/4 we headed out a mile and a quarter and back to get the difference and did some planning for next weekends race in the city. We shared some GU chomps drank some water and lined up.


 I'm not much of a trail runner but I was excited to try something new and work into more trail runs since I got my cool nifty trail shoes too! I also wore the cutest outfit possible to distract other runners and hopefully disorient them long enough to let me pass and then they can't catch up. That was the plan anyway.

TD and I post race

Me and Shannon post race

The race started and immediately hit some tough terrain. It was fun though. I can't believe I actually enjoyed crashing through brush, up embankments, around boulders, through creek beds, along rocky or very narrow paths and sometimes down steep lose graveled trails. Many of these trails are ones we run on every week... and some were definitely harder and less run paths. But it was fun and I didn't fall and hurt myself or anyone else even once. We had water/electrolyte stations at mile 2 and 4.5. I walked through those but none of the hills or especially technical areas. I'm pretty darn happy with myself. I ran most of the first 5 miles with Shannon who was in our training group last year and we did some catching up when the path was a little wider and we didn't have to concentrate too much. When we hit the fire road I took off and caught up to TD who had been ahead of us all along and we just tried to keep her in our sights. We worked hard to keep the pace up that last mile and a half (.83 is more like it). I crossed the line in about 1h10min. That brought my grand total today to 9.23 miles with our warm up. Here's my GC for the race sans warm-up.

I met up with Shannon, TD and Jed from our training group was there too. It was a pretty awesome day. Chico Running Club did a pretty good job of organizing and getting us out there today. Instead of a medal we got pint glasses! Aren't these cute!


I did need a nap today but over all I felt great for the whole race. Came home and did some laundry (fun fun fun I know!) and re-organized bunco stuff for future games. I finally settled down tonight and tried out the new glass... with my favorite beer of course!

I do need to give a special shout out to SBS who ran Portland Marathon today and brought home a BQ coming in at under the 4 hour mark. I hear it was a soggy race!! And also to Anthony Villasana and Holly Nevarez who both ran a very hot Chicago Marathon today. You guys rocked it in spite of the weather. I'm not sure I could have said the same. All of our local runners doing the Healdsburg Half (my hats off to you!) but especially to Ed Hudson who ran an amazing 50mile race yesterday. You are truly an inspiration.You are all my heroes!!!  I think 10-10-10 will go down in history as a day of extremes.

I'll raise my pint glass to those extreme runners!!! Cheers!