Tues track practice 8/11/9

So I am back to training today after being off my feet per the Dr's orders for a week and 2 days.
I had Football feet for a couple days than went to the Dr. well he was not happy with me ;-O,
He said to stay off my feet for a week and keep them elevated or I would not be able to do my marathon. So I have not walked in a week and I was a little concerned about keeping up and getting back in the game, but I got out and started doing laps around the track, at first I was a little out of breath but after my 5th lap or so I felt ok. I did about 9 laps than Coach had us do some grab bag drills, she has a different drill on several strips of paper and she gives us a strip and we would go and do that drill and after completing that one we would come back and get another one. My first drill was doing the egg walk for 1/4 lap than changing fartlicks (don't ask, but yes it is) than girlie walk and hands behind back, than a sprint and recover lap, my second drill was bleachers and wow I am feeling it today. I finished 2 other drills and on the last drill I had to sprint 2 laps and amazingly I did it, I did'nt even stop half way to recover, I just kept going, and OMG did it feel good!!!!
We had aone of the little honoree's visit training practice and he decided he wanted to do a lap with us, boy did he just take of and run the whole lap. After he was done with the first lap we asked him if he was ready for another lap and he said " oh I think I'm done" he is so cut. I posted a picture of him with the team, and another one of me after sprinting laps ;-)
Saturday is the 12 mile Dress rehearsal for the Kaua'i half marathon and I feel good.

Harvey West/Pogonip 10 miles 8/1/9

Started the 10 mile trek right in front of Harvey West Park, headed straight down towards Costco and right towards the back of Harvey West. This was almost the same trail as the firecracker race I did on 4th of July but in reverse and a whole lot more!! For the next 2 miles they had us doing uphill and it was brutal, I kept thinking come on, lets get real here, you have us start off @ 7:30 in the morning on a Sat. and than first thing we do is a brutal 2miles UP HILL! Give me a break. Well that was just the beginning of it and the worse was yet to come....oh Joy Joy.
We now are heading into Pogonip, and I would say for a good 2 miles we did flat land on dirt trails, I loved this part of it, it is so beautiful along these trails, lots of trees and with plenty of shade to keep us out of the hot sun. That was about when all the site seeing and fun ended and I entered Hell. We now are headed to the top of Hell Hill (not really the name, I felt it fit this name) and we kept going up and up and I was hoping it had a end somewhere, thats when we got to the switchbacks but they still kept us going up, all though it seemed a lot .asier doing the swithbacks than the straight up hill.
The Team in Training Capt's put pictures of our honoree's on posters and posted them all along the uphill trails, so as we are painfully conquering Hell Hill and thinking "OMG I don't know if I can do this, oh my legs,my hips, my butt hurts" just whining a long and than I would look and see one of the posters, WOW now I remember why I am doing this, yes it is hard but it is so worth it. It sure made it much easier for me to finish after seeing the posters, what a awesome idea.
We finally made it to the top and stopped to fuel up and stretch a bit and than turn around and head back down to the finish, we did the same trail back down. When we got down to the streets again I knew we were so close to the end and got my second wind and just picked it up and raced back to the end. Ahh and there at the end the coaches and runners were there cheering us in, what a great way to bring it home!!
As I was driving home I kept thnking that I was beat but really not as sore as I had been before after finishing 10 miles, but kept thinking that it will hit me later or tomorrow I'm sure.. It hit me the next day and for about a week I was a little sore and my feet were swollen like a footballs.

Wharf to Wharf ----- Jacob's Birthday

Today is my son's 14th Birthday---Happy Birthday Jacob----
and it is also The Wharf to Wharf Race, which I have entered.
I am so glad that Jacob is being such a trooper about this, I mean what 14 year old do you know that wants to spend his birthday at his ol mom's racing event. But we will make it up to him after the race.

Opps I did it again, but this time I was official, first time I have done W2W with a official bib #.
The race started at 8:30 and I was really excited, I knew the gun was going to go any minute now to start the race and I still jumped, and than we were off. It was so hard getting going because there were thousands of people running in the race and everyone wants to beat the next person. I have to say that most people were really nice in the race, but there were a few people that just shoved me out of the way a couple times.
All along the way people are cheering you on and there are all kinds of bands and singing groups, dancers, and you name it they did had all kinds of entertainment, it was awesome. I really love the route that we do, all along you have a great view of the ocean, what more could I ask for? I had to make one stop during the whole race, one of the runners accidentely stepped on the back of my shoe just as I was about to step forward, causing my shoe to fall off my foot and go flying up the street. That was my first and only pit stop to put the tread back on my foot. All and All the race went really well and I felt totally great through the whole thing. although I really can't believe that at the end of the race they expect you to trudge all the way down the beach, through the sand, to collect you race package and shirt, right after you just finished the race, I mean really people get real ;-)
The race was 6 miles and it really was a pretty good race, I think I will make it a yearly event for me.
I started at 8:30 and came through the finish line at exactly 10:00, that is 30 minutes faster than last year, I'm stoked!!!

Friday Bocci's Cellar 7-24-09

Today we started in front of Bocci's cellar in Santa Cruz.
I was not able to run with the pack that evening so I decided to do a hike through Fall Creek.
I again grabbed my friend Susan and we headed up to Fall Creek to do a nice little 2.5 mile trail.
We decided to walk up to the kilns, which is a nice slow incline uphill. It really is not a brutal uphill hike so it is one of my favorite trails to do, it keeps your heart pumping and gives you a nice slow workout. So we got to the kilns and although we had done this trail a few times before, I never really got a chance to look around the kilns, so I decided I wanted to explore. So Susan and I are exploring the kilns and she see's a different trail off to the left that looked like a trail we had never been on, and looked to be a nice trail, so what do we do?...hmmm we decide to try this new trail going up and up and up and still more up it went, until we wound ourselfs all the way to the top of the flippin hill. Now that was a little more than I anticipated and not what we planned. So now here we are at the top of this hill on a paved road, so we decide we are going to walk down the road back to the entrace of the park where we parked my car. It turned out to be a very bad Idea for a few reasons, the first and most important reason was this read happened to have no sidewalks and kind of a steep hill going down, and very narrow, and all the cars coming down the road were flying way over the speed limit and we pretty much had nowhere to move to, seeing as there was nowhere to go, except over the edge of the hill. We decided are best bet would be to run fast down the hill and hope to god we don't plowed over by a speed demon coming down the hill.
Well I am writing this so you probably figured it out, we made it back to my car and agreed we would never do that trail ever again.
I'm not really to sure how far we went, but I'm guessing it was well over 3 miles.

Wharf to Barf starts today 7/23/09

Today is the first day of Wharf to Barf and it is also the Birthday of a good friend(Paul)
Happy birthday Paul! ;-)
I belong to another running group called the Surf City Hash House Harriers, and every year we do a event called Wharf to Barf. This event is always the same weekend of Wharf to Wharf, and it is a 4 day running event that Starts on Thursday and ends on Sunday.
Thursday we started at the County offices off of Emiline, and did a nice trek around Santa Cruz, along the city streets and ending at the Medical offices on Water. The total trail was around 3 miles with not to much uphill :-)
A perfect start for my 4 day adventure.
Thanx PG and Cl.

Tues track practice 7-21-09 sprint and recovery

Today we are working on sprinting and recovering.
This is one of the toughest for me because I am not a very fast walker, Robin I know if you are reading this you probably don't agree with me because you always say I walk fast, and you have to jog to keep up with me. But really I suck at speed and I have to say at first my speed really bothered me! I would see all these other girls just flash around the track and here comes Michelle doing turbo turtle. So I had this thing about going faster and getting a better time, or being very unrealistic about my goal time. That reality has come and gone and I think Coach Terri and Haley will be very happy to hear that.
So now we will work on how to keep up a fast steady pace, and recovery after, I love the recovery ;-).
We did 4 laps regular speed (medium)than coach had us do 2 minute sprint and 8 minute recovery. Ok so picture the School track and we would sprint down the straight part and recover going around the round part, we did that for a few laps, than it was, do a lap of sprinting and one of recovering, that was for another few laps, ending with a recovery lap. Workout today went very well, and I feel like every time we meet for track I get some really great advise from my coaches!

Natural Bridges Westt Cliff Dr.

7:15 Saturday Morning.
We all met a few blocks from Natural Bridges, and this morning I will be doing 10 miles.
I especially enjoyed the first part of the walk because we are all refreshed and ready to go, and mostly we are not so tired to enjoy the great view of the ocean for the first 3 miles or so.
We made to mile 5 and I felt pretty good, we than had a very little uphill to do and than back to the flat streets. I prefer the trails through the woods or the scenic beach verses the boring city streets. It seems to go by so slowly when you are on the boring streets and it is a pretty hot day to boot, seems like it took so much longer to walk the long straight away up Bay st. Wow and thats when I felt it. My body started to ache and out of no where I felt all my energy drain out of me, I was so glad that my walking buddy for the day (Sandie) was one of the teams mentors, so she suggested I take one of the packets of Goo. All I know is that within 5-10 minutes I felt way better and got a huge charge of energy, all better bring it on.
We turned around at that point and headed back to West Cliff Dr. Yea back to the beach. I felt pretty good most of the way back until about mile 9, thats when my body was screaming at me ( hey you what are you doing to me? here, you feel this? no, ok how about this!) ok ok I hear you but I still have just one more mile to go and than I will stop. We came up to the entrance of Natural Bridges and thats when I got my last gust of energy and gave it all I had to just finish, I was just so excited to know the the end was so near. I ended up coming in with Erin and the rest of the team was there waiting for us, it felt great hearing them cheering us on as we finished.
That was the day when I learned that time is not always the most important, finishing is.
Thanx to Coach Terri I learned a hard lesson that day.