Monday, August 15, 2011

REDEMPTION!!!!!!

Yup, that's 20 miles on the Garmin! Woo Hoo! (& isn't it pretty?)

I prepped, planned and fretted over it....I was determined that I would get through it no matter what....AND I DID!  Yay me! Went out last thursday while up at the lake (sorry! no computer access til now) and despite the fact that it is rolling hills all around, the weather was perfect (high 60's) and I was psyched to get out there in those cooler temperatures.  I knew the constant hills would be hard so I borrowed some ultrarunner advice from 'Born to Run' (an excellent book, btw) and decided that 'if you can't see the top of the hill, walk it' was the way to go....and that's what I did.  Gave myself permission to walk those big hills and it worked!  This run actually felt better than the 18 I did in the heat.  I did not collapse on the floor in exhaustion when I got home & I don't feel that it overly impacted my time.  The goal anyway being to just FINISH today.  The big challenge though, was figuring out how I was going to fuel and hydrate out in rural Ontario for 20 miles with NOTHING but hills and trees around.  I caved and bought some GU (which gave me pep, but my gut did not fully appreciate them....yes, lots of trees, thank goodness!), and as I was running and out and back route, brought and dropped  2 bottles along the way for the return trip...and good 'ol Mum made a gatorade drop on the way to the golf course with Thing 1 & Thing 2 ;-D......so I was set!  It was a bit of a hassle carrying the extra water/gatorade but no option there. 

Oh, and SO cool bonus!!! Love that garmin tracks 'moving time' (which was 3:58 in case anyone cares)!

I starting to think that I will be able to do this marathon after all!

See...still upright & able to take pictures after 20 ;D
Oh, and I have been using the HR monitor (thanks, Nelly!)....how cool is that????? Already I have found that I feel best around the 149 range & want to die when I hit 170......no 170's on this run.  But for those of you who use the HR monitor, that strap is ok, but not super comfortable after a couple hours....any suggestions?

AND a HUGE shout out to my husband who KILLED his first Olympic Distance TRI on August 7th in 2:46 to take 83rd overall!!!!

8 comments:

A Prelude To... said...

Way To Go!!! on a great long run!!
My first 20 miler was way better than my first 18 miler, too! It's the heat that gets me.

Congrats to your hubby!

Michael said...

Wow Congrats! That's awesome. I have issues with the HR monitor rubbing...I guess some bodyglide would help. Congrats to the hubs too. That's a great time. I have an Oly in a few weeks and I'm just hoping to keep it under 4 hours :)

Jose said...

Congrats on your run!!

The Green Girl said...

Whoo hoo! ::high fives:: Congratulations, girl! That number looks very nice on that Garmin!

I found putting BodyGlide under the HR strap helped when I was fatter but now that I've lost weight, I can't seem to make it comfortable so I've stopped using it.

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Nelly said...

Awesome job, congrats on the run! You will definitely be fine on your marathon!

Great to hear that the heart rate monitor is going well! Yea, I think having the monitor for runs is a real benefit - it keeps you from going too fast on runs - because if you see a HR number over XXX, you are going too fast, and need to back off.

For the HRM strap, it does take a bit of getting used to, generally just wetting it down before I put it on makes it fine for me. Sometimes figuring out how tight to make it is hard, because it comes loose occasionally during runs. Maybe from water loss or simple vibration? I don't know.

Nelly said...

Thanks for the comment about water running, your comment sums up my feelings when I felt pain after doing it, I was like - what am I doing wrong? It could just be too much too soon, I guess I'll see if it gets better not doing it for a bit.

Penny said...

Thank you so much for stopping by and becoming a follower. Boy reading your last post hit home for me. I real want to do another marathon but my running partner is out,because she is working full time now. So I would have to run it solo. That scares me to death. I know how hard the last 4 miles can be mentally and physically for me. I'm sign up for the Half marathon, but would really like to do the marathon. I'm afraid to commit to this marathon in oct, because I'm afraid I will fail by myself. I have only done 16 miles solo so far.

You are doing awesome on your training. 20 miles is not easy and you did great. I hope mine go that great.

Looking forward to following your journey.