Saturday, May 29, 2010

Triton Run with Irene!

This morning was the last long training run with the SDTC for the Rock n' Roll Marathon and 1/2 next weekend.

Side note: OMG! It is next weekend!

This week, instead of running from Hospitality Point, we trekked to La Jolla and the UCSD campus to do our run. To be honest, I love this run. UCSD is full of interesting things to look at. To be honest, the run is quite hilly, but none of the hills are exceptionally long, so every uphill is followed by a down (and of course vice verse).

Even though there are about 700 people in the track club, and probably a good 300 who turned up this morning, I thought I'd end up running pretty much on my own since none of the rest of the herd could make it. Where were Mik and Kat? (running at Mission Bay) Where was Betty? (on a vay-kay) Where was Elsie? (I have no clue. I'm guessing with the BF). Where was BBJ? (????)

Then as we were stretching, I spotted Michael, Irene's DH...and then I ran into Irene. We decided to run together. I figured that Irene could pace me, and since she's coming off an 8 week foot-injury hiatus, I thought we'd do just a leisurely run for about 1.5 hours.

Boy was I wrong.

I'm not really sure who was pushing who, but we did manage around an 11:02 pace for a little over 7.5 miles
This is something I need to work on next weekend so that I can finish the race without a major meltdown at mile 10 or 11 (such as what happened at Surf City or Las Vegas). I tend to go out pretty slowly (which is a smart thing), then about mile 4 or 5, I start to feel warmed up and pretty good, and then I speed up.

Speeding up to an 11:15 or even an 11:10 pace is one thing. Speeding up to a 10:35 pace (see Mile 6) is a recipe for disaster come mile 9 or 10. You'd think I'd know that by now, but you'd be wrong.

Anyway, it was a lot of fun running with Irene. We chatted about families, races, running, remodeling. We both laughed when the sun came out noting how we both think of Penny (and how much she'd hate it) whenever the sun comes out...and this morning it did.

Which brings up another issue for next weekend, the sun. It's been a relatively cool late winter and spring in So.Cal. Typically by now, we've had a couple of opportunities to run in the heat. Not this year, this was the first long run that I've done this spring where I actually noticed that it was getting warm and I started actively looking for the shady side of the street to run on, which during the RnR next weekend, won't matter so much because by the time the sun comes out, if the weather is like this morning, by 7:55am, I'll be in an area that pretty much has very little shade anyway.

((sigh))

After the run, Irene, Michael, and I sat with the rest of the club  to take the RnR oath (I, state your name, ...) in which a good number of people say, "I, state your name..." and then we promise to have fun, run our race, and know that we are already winners. It's corny, but it's not a bad thing to do before a race.

Irene and I baking in the sun
The club listening to Coach Paul. We also had a guest speaker who gave us some last minute "hints" before the race next weekend. Also, in the background is some college or high school soccer tournament...which was quite the distraction to Michael and me...The best part was when Michael audibly appreciated a Goal Shot by uttering, "NICE." Luckily, I think the comment also fit whatever the speaker was talking about at the time. I, of course, giggled. I'm pretty sure Irene was mortified.
So...training is over. I'll do some really light running this week and I'll have another 1/2 Mary  under my belt. This will be my 9th half marathon, which I guess qualifies me as an "experienced" in the event.

Hope everyone has a fabulous weekend. I'm going to go have a margarita (I fresh squeezed lemons and limes from our tree for the mix) by the pool...like I said, it finally warmed up around here.

YUM!

11 comments:

  1. You are so ready to rock San Diego! I can;t wait for your report. I know you are going for a PR so I won't expect tons of pics, but I ma excited nonetheless! Very cool that you had a running buddy today, suffering is so much better with company. :)

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  2. Woo! Good stuff. Enjoy your taper week! Can't wait to hear how it all goes.

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  3. Sounds like a fantastic run. Good luck next weekend! I am sure it will be a lot of fun!!!

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  4. It was good for me to run with you because I don't think I would have pushed myself, otherwise. We even had some splits in the 10s! I'm no worse for the ware, either.

    I like your stats way better than mine, but it took me a while to shut off the tracker on my cell phone. Based on your stats we should be able to do OK at the half, have a decent finish time, and live to tell about it!

    Last year Michael completely missed whatever the speaker was saying because he was so caught up in the soccer game on the field. LOL.

    I'm hoping by next week it will be back to June gloom. ;)

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  5. LOVE THE RNR OATH - need that whole thing written out for me sometime. And that margarita looks delicious and well-earned - think of all that vitamin C!

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  6. I can't wait for it to be margarita weather up here. Instead it is *still* red wine weather. Not that there is anything wrong with red wine, but I would just like a little sun and warm weather please!

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  7. cathy and i were in iowa visiting friends. ran 9 miles in iowa with plenty of allergens in the air (achooo). do you know anyone that would like an extra ticket to the pasta dinner? i will be at the staff party/doug's party on friday night.

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  8. Sounds like it was the perfect way to end the training program. I won't see you on Sunday since I'm working the final marathon aid station, which you'll bypass, but I'm sure you'll listen to your body and pace yourself well.

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  9. Have a great race this weekend! I will be thinking about all of you guys!

    Will you be doing the half training this summer? I am coming back from my long hiatus. Hope to see you there.

    Good luck!

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