solar squirrel

Woke up to a blizzard as I’m sure everyone already is aware of.  One of the great things about not having a job is that you don’t have to worry about driving to work!  Hopefully I’ll find a job soon, but in the mean time I’m keeping myself busy with school-related things.  (Yesterday interviewed someone from E4S and worked on business plan).

Today is Todd’s birthday, so I drove down to Akron to see him.  We were going to go ice skating, but they closed the park and didn’t clear off the ice pond so we opted for X-Country skiing!

My first try at xcountry skiing

We were the first people to make tracks on the towpath.  It was so quiet and beautiful.

Self-portraits in the snow

It was Todd’s 3rd time that day playing in the snow.  When he found out Akron was closed he went snow-shoeing, shoveled his entire driveway, and then went skiing for the first time!  No wonder he’s so fit!

We're not wearing fake eyelashes people...it's ICE!

As planned, I ran with the South East Runners Club this morning in Solon.  My car said the temp. was 4F so I was preparing for a blustery run.  I wore 2 thick technical shirts (the purple one I’m wearing in the photo has built in mittens and a hood) and a pair of medium thickness running pants.  Of course as always thick smart-wool socks.  Really the only thing that was cold was my face and my butt.  The face makes sense, but the butt doesn’t.  I thought fat was an INSULATOR!  My butt was so cold that I couldn’t feel it!  I ran with Mr. Skin for a while and then Daisy caught us (she was running 2 min late and they leave at 8 am SHARP!) and I started talking and running with her - accidentally leaving Mr. Skin.  (Sorry!!).  Daisy was running too fast for my out of shape self so I slowed it down a bit and was running by myself till the 6 mile mark.  Then I caught them at the ‘water’ stop (no water today) and finished the last half with them.  I did the 12 mile loop minus the parking lot so it was more like 11.5.  I’m fine with that, though.  I need to make sure I don’t over do it since I’m just now ramping up my mileage for Boston.  I was supposed to do 20 today, but I’m just not ready for 20 yet.  I’ll try for closer to 18 next weekend.

It was really weird having all that ice on my eyelashes - it made it hard to see - it was like I was looking through some type of filter.  I wiped it off at the half way point, but it just built up again.  I didn’t realize my eyes and hair could develop so much moisture!  We looked like 3 old ladies running!

When I got home I took a really long hot shower and then headed to Todd’s.  We went to lunch and then went to this pet store called ‘One of a Kind’.  It’s awesome - they have about 20 cats just hanging out and puppies out in the open for you to pet.  They are all rescued animals and they are all so LOVABLE and FRIENDLY!  Here is a pic. of Todd testing out a cat toy he was planning on buying for his cats.

Game plan is to try to run w/ SERC every Sunday until Boston.  We’ll see how it goes!

The DREADmill

So I’m getting over a cold which I am sure would have turned into pneumonia or worse if I would have done the 50k.  I am so so so happy that I listened to my body and rested.  Nevertheless - there is still this small matter of TRAINING FOR BOSTON that I seem to have been avoiding lately.  Yesterday I decided to try the treadmill again since I don’t think I’m quite ready to run outside.  (I don’t want to risk getting too cold and subjecting myself to getting sick again).

I went to the Severance Bally’s since I was already in the area (had a meeting at Case for school).  That place is really nice!  I’ve only been there a few times, but it’s really clean and the locker room is HUGE and has high ceilings and tons of lockers and bathrooms and even seperate changing stalls.  They have TVs hanging from the ceiling and it’s really open and big.  The other nice thing is that they have like 20 treadmills…maybe more, so you never have to worry about not getting on one even during the super busy times.

This time I brought my MP3 player in hopes that it would make running more enjoyable - it actually did help a lot!  (But still wasn’t the best running experience).  I did a 1 mile warmup at 1.5 incline and a speed of 9:03 min miles.  That felt really easy so for mile 2 I increased the speed to 8:12 pace.  That felt pretty good but soon into the 3rd mile I was already getting side stitches!  ARgh!  So I changed the speed to 8:19 and did miles 4 and 5 and then decided I had enough and did the last mile at 9:03 again.  So I did a little over 6 miles.  The music definitely helps A LOT.  Still, I have a hard time knowing how to move my arms because I’m scared they’ll hit something and I also can’t seem to get into a good rhythm.  At least I did it - I was thinking that I was just not capable of running on the treadmill after my last try.  I couldn’t run for more than 4 or 5 min without having to stop and walk.  Must have just been a bad day.

I’m definitely not planning on making a routine out of this - but it’s good to know it’s an option when I’m getting over being sick or when there is freezing rain, 10 ft. of snow, etc.

I’ll be in Solon Sunday morning - hopefully I’ll be able to run with someone!

ZzzzzzzzzZzzzZZZ -Photo taken by Will King

Well - SolarSquirrel hasn’t quite gone into winter hibernation (I don’t even think squirrels hibernate…) but she’s pretty darn close!  I haven’t managed to work out more than 3 days per week this year and my running is pretty much non-existent at this point.  To top it off I have a miserable cold that caused me to wimp out on the Winter Buckeye 50k.

My days have consisted of working a TON on school projects (my independent study and my project for the Cleveland Clinic) and looking for a job.  I have only had 2 interviews, but I have a follow up interview with a company on the 26th.  This company’s industry is right where I want to be and they are doing VERY well financially and are projected to continue to do well - especially with the new administration.  (Go Obama!)  I’m not holding my breath, though.

Exercise has been so tough because of this weather, so I was trying get my running in on the treadmill which just doesn’t seem to work for me.  I get tired doing 9 min miles.  What is up with that?  I have been managing to do some sweet workout classes at Bally’s, though.  I can go to any Bally in Ohio with my current membership so I have been going to whichever one that has a good class that day.  I also swam for the first time this past Tue. with Brian R. and K.  It was fun seeing my old work friends and gossiping about Philips.  I guess they got an email from the North American CEO stating that there wouldn’t be any raises this year…at least they aren’t laying anymore people off…we’ll see how the 2nd quarter goes.

So ignoring the fact that I probably can only run about 10 miles withoug dying at this point - I need to start training for BOSTON!  I’ll probably use the same training schedule that I used for the towpath marathon.  If I start training tomorrow I have 13 weeks.  YIKES!  Luckily my goal for Boston is to just experience it, so I should be ok.  AHAHAHAHAHAA - I just looked at week 13 from the schedule I used for TowPath and I’m supposed to do a 20-miler this weekend!  Yea, right!  Ugh…I guess I’ll just have to play it by ear what I end up doing this weekend.

I think I’ll plan on at least running w/ the SERC group on Sunday’s (I’m probably the slowest member of SERC at this point…) and hopefully figure out a plan that will work out so that I can at least run Boston and enjoy it at the same time.

Congrats to everyone who braved the snow and ran the Winter Buckeye 50k today.  Daisy Duc did an awesome job and so did Todd.  Congrats to Bridget and Steve who did the half even though they just did a marathon the week before!

Yesterday was SERC’s annual New Year’s Eve run in Bedford Reservation.  Since I missed the Christmas Eve run I was definitely not going to miss this one.  (Missed it because of my 5 day flight delay).  When I went to bed the night before it was cold, but there wasn’t any snow on the ground.  Overnight the wind was howling and when I looked out the window at 5 am it was white powder wonderland!  The wind was insane and blowing the snow everywhere!  After my near death freezing experience a few weeks ago I intentionally over-dressed myself with a long-sleeve technical shirt, long-sleeve turtleneck fleece, and a wind breaker jacket.  I wore tights, wicking socks (didn’t have any clean smartwool) and my road shoes because I left my new trail shoes at Todd’s.  I figured there would be NO WAY I could POSSIBLY be cold.  Boy was I wrong - I forgot about the fact that my FACE would be exposed!

Starting off the run was fine - it was slushy and hard to grip the ground, but I was warm and even ended up taking off the jacket.  As we continued running the conditions got worse and worse!  I was running with a small group of people and when we got to the 5.25 mark (turnaround is ~6.5) we decided to turn back early.  I AM SO GLAD THAT WE DID!  The conditions were out of control!  I couldn’t see because the wind and snow were so hard and the right side of my face was so cold it was numb and beginning to collect ice and snow!  My eyebrows and eye lashes were ice shelves and when I turned to look at Barb she looked like she had aged 50 years due to the collecting snow!  At this point I was getting a little worried that cars wouldn’t see us because it was that difficult to see due to the blowing snow.  We were running REALLY slow and in single-file most of the time.  I was lucky to be short so I could hide behind the taller guys and try to get them to block the wind, but it didn’t really help much since the wind was coming at me from my right side.  It was definitely a tough run, and I felt like I had ran more like 18 miles rather than the 10.5 that we did.  We all looked so funny afterwords with all of the snow stuck to our faces.  Frank and Elizabeth got some pictures so I’ll add or link to them when I see them.

I love the fact that I run with such a crazy group of hard-core people!  SERC rocks!

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE!