i’ve been back for an hour, and i still can’t feel my fingers.
weather is funny. yesterday’s run was 82 degrees, a little on the chilly side, but ok as long as you keep moving. but that was before the Great Arctic Assault of 2019.
i suspected things would be bad when i looked out this morning and saw the wind, indicating the beast had roared into town. but icy weather can’t stop me. i’m a runner, dammit.
stepping outside, my worst fears were realized. a jarring 75. and with the wi
I guess I’ll try writing a race report. This will be the first race report since I wrote about my first marathon a little over a year ago.
Yep - Marshall was my first and I did a second at the end of March this year. It was the Carmel Marathon and it didn’t go as well as Marshall. I went a little more aggressive and blew up around 20 miles like so many do. Enough about that.
So not long after Carmel, I decided that I wanted to do a 50K trail race. For years, I’ve been far more into tra
The Short:
It's no secret that I went to Indy with the goal of running 2:45:00 or better. I truly felt like my fitness was there, whereas before my past OTQ attempts I've always felt more comfortable with 6:20ish but tried anyway since that is so close to the 6:17 average needed. My pace plan was 6:20 for the first 10K, then 6:15 from there on, dropping lower towards the end if I was up for it - and although I never looked at my watch I averaged 6:19 for the first 10K and 6:14 from there
Delayed write-up and post due to crappy life in the beginning of October. (Subject of another post for another day.)
I love running this 5K every year. The start is less than a quarter mile from my house, it’s a certified course, there’s a lot of runners around the same speed as I am, and it supports a scholarship for a student at the local high school. I was nervous about the race, more nervous than I should have been, but I was training well for the AC marathon, and thought a PR (and po
I hate that saying by the way. “It is what it is” is what people say when they wNt to give a smart answer to something that really doesn’t have an answer.
I sprained my ankle a few months ago while I was playing chase with my 4 year old. I jumped on the bed and barrel rolled off and slapped my ankle on the tile floor it hurt for a bit, but I didn’t give it much thought until a few days later when it started aching on my runs. That’s what it’s been ever since, an ache. I keep tell
I'm also here because the garbanzo'd one told me to.
My year has been going pretty well. I finished my masters degree! I ran 8 half marathons this year. I paced 3 of them, and successfully paced 1 of them. I am now up to 68 lifetime pikermis! I haven't run a full marathon since 2016, but I am currently signed up for 2 (Illinois Marathon and Grandma's Marathon) and am in the lottery for Chicago and New York, where I will win -$500ish in entry fees if I get both. Ouch.
Is anyone else si
I had a few good years. Lots of age-group awards. I qualified for and ran both NYCM and BOS. Running has pretty much sucked ever since. The last five years have looked like this:
Illnesses: pneumonia, bronchitis, arthritis in the big toe
Injuries: ITBS, stress fracture near the arthritic big toe joint
Surgeries: toe nail removed (because there was a bit of mold growing under the nail!), nasal septum surgery (which did NOT help with my snoring)
But the really weird thing is th
I’ve been meaning to do this for a while. I just get distracted easily these days.
I’m still doing the thing. I still wake at 4 and run until I don’t want to. I still train for races, though maybe 1 or 2 a year instead of 5 or 10. I still love the woods more than the roads and still love the dawn more than dusk. I still consider the loop the reason I’ll always run. It’s the same old me.
Now, where’s my pie?
-me
Garbo said, "GO WRITE", so here I am. There was a promise of pie. *Looks hopefully in Dave's direction*
I just noticed the thingie is called "Blog Entry". How dare it. This is a bloop.
Anyway, I have not much to report. A few years ago I blew out my ITB and that was not fun. Then I got kicked off my first 50K for being too slow and that was not fun. I kept trying to run but it was just a cascade of injury, and that was not fun.
I did run a bit when we lived in Canada and that *w
Dear diary: I have a confession.
Emily Sisson is a runner. A runner who just finished 10th at the 10K world championships. A runner who ran a 2:23:08 marathon debut at London this year, finishing sixth and ahead of her training partner, Molly Huddle. A runner who was the 2015 5k national champion. A runner that we in the Running World refer to as "Fast."
And I broke her.
It started out innocently enough. The day is October 25. It's a glorious morning at the track. Just a few peo
This is my story of pregnancy loss. For any women who have experienced this, I want to give you a heads up in case this brings up unexpected emotions.
Total miles: 16 Number of races: 1
Number of pregnancy losses: 1
September 18th We hadn't expected any of this. We figured it would take a good 6 months to get pregnant, but it happened after only two. I don't think I'll ever forget the morning I first took a pregnancy test, and then took another one because I couldn't believe my eye
After my trail marathon I did the usual rest and recovery - five days of no running and then some easy runs for a few weeks. Then just as I started my first tempo run in an attempt to get back to training, I hurt my foot. I don't remember turning my ankle, but suddenly my foot hurt just below the ankle bone. It was sore but I could run on it, so I kept going and figured it would go away. It did not. I managed four miles before deciding to cut my run short and limp home.
I iced it and took
I started keeping a journal when I was 19. I wrote almost every day for the two years of my LDS mission, and about every week or so for several years after that. Sort of like my running, there were some pretty significant gaps from then until ten years ago when I started this marathon thing and found the Loop. Since then I substituted my bloops for most of what I would have written in the journal. The vast majority of that writing is about running, and not so much about the rest of my life. But
October 2019 in Review
Total mileage for the month: 376.4 - a monthly mileage PR, barely!
Sep. 30-Oct. 6: 88
Oct. 7-13: 91.7 - but on the Sunday through Saturday week of Oct. 6-12 I ran 100 for the first time ever!
Oct. 14-20: 92.1
Oct. 21-27: 80.4
Oct. 28-Nov. 3: projected at 60
It was too cold for this!
Races:
Oct. 5 - Panther Run 5K as a "bonus" race that my coach added at the last
After NH, I planned to hold my base and gear up for a 5K on the 9th next month.
Then Connor got a job. It's with a small, non-profit in Tacoma, WA. This gives us two children in the PNW, so my secret plan to retire out that way is slowly coming together. Anyway, he starts on the 18th, and dear old Dad is helping to get him and his stuff out there, which involves me being in Louisville on the 9th.
So, there went my plans for a fast 5K on the back of all that hard fought for summer tra
The short version – I thought I put in enough training, but “the wall” hit me good, and the marathon humbled me… as it should! Not super disappointed because it was my best effort for the day, and I have a lot more respect for the distance again. BQs are not easy and that's why they are magical! I will be trying again!
The Atlantic City marathon is my 17th marathon, but only the 3rd that I have raced, and the first that I have raced in 10 years. I followed a Garmin-provided training plan
This past summer I really, really wanted to start building up a good base again. The idea of the 3 x 13 Trailfest series scared me. The problem was that I really had no idea how to train for the back to back days plus add in the fact that my body was still being a jerk on some days.
I managed to be super consistent with some form of exercise. Biking became my go to if I thought I'd do more harm than good by running. And some of my results this summer were excellent -- PR on my summer 5k tra
I ran my first ever 100 mile week! Ironically, it wasn't exactly planned. My coach schedules my mileage Monday through Sunday, which is how I prefer it (Strava also tracks weekly mileage that way), so it was only by luck, or maybe fatigue, that it happened on a Sunday through Saturday week. You'll have to read the rest for the full explanation! You'll also notice that the little extra 0.1-0.3 I have on almost every run was an important part of accidentally hitting this milestone.
In June of 2012 I began my life changing journey of running. I was drawn into it after going cheer on my daughter as she was running her first half marathon. I did not get to see her train as she lived some 45 miles away and did not get to discuss running with her as she is somewhat of a person who keeps things to herself.
Somehow she and her mother talked me into signing up for a 2013 January half marathon at Walt Disney World in Florida. I just think they wanted a winter vacation. With my
It's been 3 months since I've posted on here. Since then I trained for a marathon. And I didn't get hurt. But it was summer (so, a little warmer than usual around here). And I wasn't really motivated. Because you see, it was a trail marathon. So when I didn't really get enough miles in, I shrugged and said, eh, no matter. It's just a fun run in the woods. Time will be ridiculously slow anyway, so, whatever.
So I enjoyed running and didn't push it when it got hard, and (not coincidentally) s
I finally ran a 5K time starting in 17!
Everyone won & PRed!
This local race was a last-minute addition to my schedule. Back in July, I noted all of the races I was interested in on my training calendar and told my coach to choose which ones she thought were the best fit for my biggest season goal, the Indy Monumental Marathon (this truly shows how much I trust her!). I wrote the Panther Run 5K/10K/15K on there as a fun local event
Total mileage: 76.0Not as high as I had hoped it would be. Had a few days where I just wasn't feeling great, and I'm a firm believer in quality over quantity, so some days became easy days or running for time days, which always means I lose some mileage. The silver lining is I hit a beautifully round number without even trying!I'm putting a hold on marathon training. Still planning on doing a half marathon that I signed up for in mid-October, but there's enough flux in life right now that being
My friend Cathy and I have been talking about doing the Grand Circle Trailfest for almost 2.5 years. The Grand Circle Trailfest is 3 days of racing roughly a half marathon each day. Each day you run just outside of a National Park -- Bryce Canyon, Zion National Park and the Grand Canyon (Horseshoe Bend).
Three years ago I sent Cathy the promo video for this race and she was excited as I was! We were all set to sign up and then I had the whole hamstring tear. Fast forward 2 years and I told
