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.

Tues track practice Hills 7-14-09

We started again today with laps, we did 4 and than some sprinting and recovery, about another 4 doing that. Coach than had us doing ladders which is a hill that she wants us to do in segments. So coach gives a few different turn around points and we head up the hill to the first point and turn around and come back down, than she we go up to the second point passing the first point and turn around and come back down. It really is like doing steps on a latter, you walk up to the first step than back down than to step 2 and down, and you keep doing that until you get to the top.Coach had us doing this at Blue Ball Park and boy let me tell you it was a huge steep hill.
We finished the ladder than sprinted to the fence and back and called it a night. Well of course after we stretched and did are ground exercises, than we really called it a night.
I really felt it in my butt and my calves, and boy ice was my best friend for a few days.

Saturday Henry Cowell The Bench

Today is a Buddy training on your own so I decided to grab my Friend Susan again and head out to Henry Cowell Park.
We have this short little hike uphill to the bench that we really enjoy doing (not) We mostly do it to get a good cardio workout and to try to get back in to shape.
This particular hike is pretty brutal, it has a steady incline that really kicks your butt, and than you get to the hill and thats always so much fun to walk up.
The best part of the hill is when you get to the top there is a bench with a view that is awesome. You can see all the way to the Boardwalk and on a really clear quit day you can actually hear people on the rides screaming. So Susan and I made it to the bench, got a few sips of water and a little fuel for the body and headed back down. I think the total hike is a little over 7 miles.
I felt a little sore after but all and all it was all good.

Tues track practice 7-7-09 (stairs)

Today we started off doing laps, and it was one of those days when I felt like they were lucky I was there. Coach had us do 4 laps and than wanted us to sprint a certain distance than recover , and alternate the sprinting and recover for another 4 laps. Next she had us start practicing on stairs and small uphills. We are learning the technique of how to walk uphill and keep the same steady pace and also how to walk downhill and not get injured. I was very gratefull to learn the downhill technique as I always have a lot of pain in my knees after I have done a downhill hike. We practiced the rest of the hour with the stairs and hills, up and down, it was a great workout and seemed to go by pretty quickly.
Not to bad ;-)

Firecracker Race

4th of July
Saturday we alternate, one Sat. with the team and coaches and the next is buddy training or you train on your own.
I decided to enter the 4th of July Firecracker 10k Race in Santa Cruz with my Friend Susan.
This was very exciting for me because it was my first official 10k race, however I had no idea what I was getting my self in to.
The Race started at Harvey West Park and looped around the park and led us down River street, than turning onto a side street that led us up in to Pogonip area. This started the incline uphill which steadily increased to a steeper incline, for what seemed like forever. As we are making are way up the hill (at this point I was thinking we were doing the thrill of the Hill, WRONGO) they had these really great motivational signs posted saying, "Are you Ready to Embrass the Challenge Of the Hill", and I'm pretty sure one also said, "Are you Ready To Meet Your Maker. So we Finally get to the Water Stop and the Nice lady that hands us water informs us that the best it yet to come oh, and she also says in her cute little english accent, " It is rather tricky, that hill it is", I'm thinking bring it on. Well It definatley was a Thrill alright, it turned out to be one of the steepest hills I have done. By the time I finished the Ginormous Hill my legs were pretty shacky, and at this point we still were no where near finished.
The view was great at the top of the hill and the trail was awesome, I was really happy that we were in the woods shaded by trees and done with the Thrill of the hill.
We passed through the woodsy area pretty quickly and this let us back on to the streets, and looping around the urban area. On every block of the streets we had people rooting us on and giving us water, it really was nice to see so many nice people out there that really cared.
Now we got to the down hill part and we started to go a lot faster especially knowing that the finish was very close YEA.
Susan and I must of got a second wind so we decided to start jogging, this really didn't feel to bad so we kept it up and came in jogging.
It felt so great completing my first 10k race, It really made my day to see my good friend Emilee waiting for me to finish at the finish line..
I have to say that it sure seemed alot easier having my friend with me, it really went by faster just having her there.. Thanx Susan

Tues track practice

Today we met at Soquel High School Track, and if you haven't noticed yet, every
Tues we meet at the same track with the coaches. Today we mostly focused on are walk technique.
We did some lunges( I know I'm going to feel the lunges for the next few days) lunge hold, lunge hold, lunge hold, that was fun. The coaches have us doing some sprinting and recovery time and a lot of exercises to help with the walking technique. There are two that are especially fun to do, one is the girlie walk and that is where we are walking kind of like Charlie Chaplin with our hand in front of us swaying them back and forth, I know I look too funny. And the other is with are arms in straight out in front palms facing up in a cup position, looks like we are walking holding an egg, that is where we all are cracking up, and so is everyone in the bleachers that is watching us.
At the end of every workout the coaches will have us do stretches along with some leg, arm and stomach exercises.
It's all about the walking technique and stretches this week....
Practice, practice and more practice.

Saturday 6/27/09 8 miles

Training started @ 730 am at Dominican Hospital, we started in back of the Hospital and followed a chalk marked route down Soquel turning by Harbour High School, making are way up to DeLaveaga Park, and let me tell you it was UP!

The uphill was a lot more than I ever expected and there were times when I thought what the heck am I doing, this is crazy!! there is now way I'm going to make it up there. but I just kept treaking a long and kept thinking that I can do this, no sweat.... ha ha ha and boy was I sweating.

The uphill finally came to an end and we started back down and that eventually came to the paved streets and headed back towards the start, I kept telling myself, Almost there, it's just around the bend.

I was really lucky to be walking with one of my coaches Haley, who is soooo Awsome. She really helped me to keep up the pace and than some. She would make me pick a focal point way a head of us and then we would sprint to that point, we did this all along the trail on our way back and before I knew it we were sprinting back to the start and I Finished !!!
My time for the day was a little over 2 hours.
I felt pretty good right after i finished, it was probably the addrenalin still kicking in.
That all changed when I drove home and it hit me like a ton of bricks!! Felt like a Mack truck hit me and I could barely keep my eyes open, Nappy time for me. I was pretty useless for the rest of the day and pretty crabby. But come Sunday I felt more human, I have to tell you I had some pretty achy muscles though but not still feel lively and ready for more!!!!
So ready for Tuesdays uphill training. GO TEAM