solar squirrel

I’ve been trying to post on Sundays since it seems like the day that I have time and don’t mind sitting down in front of the computer.  I just realized that I don’t have anything really exciting to write about - but here’s a recap of the high’s (and low’s) of the week:

• Thursday:  Went to see Dr. Keyes and he told me that my knee was feeling really good and that I should go ahead and start increasing my running / training.  This was news that was skeptically received by me since I’m going on a full year of being injured, but it was exciting nonetheless! 
• Friday:  Went out with Brittany for dinner and drinks sort of as a ‘last single girls night out’ since she’s getting married in 2 weeks.  Had a great time - went to Lola’s for the first time (for dinner - I”ve been there for drinks before) and had an AWESOME meal.  We finished the evening at this Chocolate Bar where we both ordered ice cream concoctions larger than our heads, justifying it by stating that we would just burn it off during our personal training session the next day.
• Saturday:  At 9 am I had my weekly hour-long personal training session with Larry - a.k.a. my personal torturer.  He decided to have us do a pyramid of sprints with arm exercises in between. (Among some other fun torture exercises).  I thought my heart was going to explode out of my chest and Brittany sort of turned white and almost barfed.  We were both DRENCHED with sweat when we were done, but of course that didn’t stop us from going to get breakfast!  The rest of the day Saturday I hung out with my mom and sisters and we made dinner and watched The Brave Little Toaster and sung along with the songs and argued about which appliance was who.  It was fun.  For the record I am not the freakin’ vacuum cleaner!  And Gretchen is DEFINITELY the blankey.
• Sunday:  Today Todd and I met Steve and Bridget at Boston Store for an easy 9 mile run.  They brought Addy in the Bob stroller and we took turns pushing her while we ran.  I found that for some strange reason my IT band didn’t act up as much while I was pushing the stroller and the only thing I can think is that it has to do with me not flailing my arm as much.  (Since I was holding onto the stroller it kept that side of my body more stable).  So - open invitation for anyone who has a running stroller:  I’ll run with you and push!  (Disclaimer:  must be flat terrain).  It was a good time and we managed to maintain a pace a lot faster than 10-min miles, which was the goal (I think we were at 9:40??)When Todd and I got home we were welcomed with a super nice surprise! (Not!!!)  Our 110 Gallon Reef Tank had decided to start leaking again (Todd sealed the leak when we first got the tank…) and Todd ended up spending about 6 hours (he’s still working right now) removing ALL of the fragile corals, live rock, snails, invertabrates, and fish to other temporary storage locations as well as draining the tank.  It is seriously my worst nightmare.  At least it was a slow leak and it happened on a Sunday when we were both home and had the time to figure out several temporary storage spots and get everyone moved safely.  I would say we had about 45-50 different animals total in that tank, possibly more.  Worth several thousands of dollars, by the way.  (No, that is NOT an exaggeration.)  Not a great end to a weekend, but it could have been so much worse.  I just feel terrible - it is going to be SO MUCH work to get things back to where they were with the tank.  I am pretty sure we will sell the leaky one, which we bought for $800.  (Obviously, we will sell it to someone who doesn’t want to use it for water).  If you know anyone who wants a really pretty tank and stand for super cheap let me know! 

Here’s a quick recap of the workouts this week:

Monday - Bike 20 miles
Tuesday - Rest
Wednesday - Bike 1 hour (Lifetime Spin Class)
Thursday - Rest
Friday - Run 4 miles (7:49 pace)
Saturday - 1 hour personal training
Sunday - 9 miles easy run (9:40 pace I think)

I’m planning on swimming tomorrow pm.  BRIAN IF YOU ARE READING THIS LET ME KNOW IF YOU ARE GOING!!  WE’RE GONNA DO A MARATHON LADDER IF SO!

Well another week has gone by…nothing really new to report.  I’ve been continuing to work on getting more workouts in and working on getting my fitness level back.  Yesterday was the Blossom Time Run…2 years ago I ran it in 35:55 (6:50 pace) and I don’t think I can run 1 mile that fast now.  Obviously I didn’t do it, but instead opted to meet Bridget for an easy 8 miles on the towpath.  It was nice and I think I’m really going to enjoy getting back in shape with her!  Of course the IT band was super tight afterwords, but I think the run was good - we had a 10 min pace, which was perfect for loosening everything up and getting the kinks worked out.  I am going to attempt a slow run at least once per week moving forward.

Today I was planning on riding in Peninsula w/ CTC but there was a crazy storm right when they were scheduled to start so Todd and me opted to just stay home and work on cleaning.  We might go later tonight but I think it’s supposed to storm again.  Boo.  (Riding in the rain and in storms is not safe…as it is I’m clumsy on the bike and I don’t need to risk hurting or killing myself).

Here’s a quick recap of the week:

Mon:  swim - super lame…probably only managed to do 1000 yards (Brian let’s do a ladder next time!)
Tue: Rest
Wed: 1 hour spin class
Thurs: 5 mile run in am (8:18 pace)
Fri: rest
Sat: 1 hour personal training
Sun: 8 miles easy (10 min pace)

The run on Thursday felt really good.  I decided not to look at my pace but instead just run a pace that felt like I was just bordering on getting out of my comfort zone (anaerobic threshold).  This is good because I’m not that far off from where I used to be (8-min pace used to be right where discomfort started).  I know that in order to get my running fitness back I have to - duh - run - but it’s SO FRUSTRATING when after every run my IT band is so stiff!  I’m gonna just go with it, though.  I see Dr. Keyes again on Friday, so we’ll see how things go until then.

I was totally planning on doing the Twinsburg Duathlon - but I just went to register and realized that it’s $60!!  (I need to purchase the USAT 1-day membership).  I don’t know if I can pay that much…not because I don’t have $60, but because it’s just the principal of paying $60 for such a short race. (2 mile run, 10 mile bike, 2 mile run).  Bridget mentioned this yesterday while we were running and I didn’t realize it was so $$.

We’ll see.

Another week has gone by and things are starting off well for 2010.  I managed to run twice last week which is more than I’ve done in several months.  Both times were really slow on the treadmill - but I was running a very controlled gait and concentrating on not allowing my left leg to invert.  (The cause of my IT band problems stems from a crooked left leg).  I applied for individual health insurance and I’m considered ‘high-risk’ because of my IT band problems.  I wanted to just strangle the woman on the phone when she was telling me about why the rate that I received was more than $100 more than I was quoted.  Basically it’s because I am considered a high risk to them all because of my IT band.  Are you kidding me?!  I asked her - well if I”m the highest risk category, then what the heck is someone with cancer, AIDS, heart disease, etc?  She laughed and told me that they would just have denied someone like that.  Nice.  Gotta love health insurance.  Anthem can bite me.  The only way you can fight the system is to just try as best you can to stay healthy and take car of yourself.  Once you are sick there is nothing that you can do and the system won’t go out of their way to assist you in any way.

Here’s my weekly breakdown:

Mon:  Ran 3 miles on treadmill (9:17 pace for first 1/2 mile, then 8:27 pace for the rest).  Foam roller.

Tue:  I can’t remember what I did…I think I did the elliptical for 35 min and then did foam roller.
Wed: Netflix streaming workout videos w/ Katy and Gret.  Bootcamp then abs, thighs, glutes, and torture.  Aprox. 1:20 min total.

Thurs: Ran 3 miles on Treadmill.  9:07 pace for first 1/2 mile then 8:23 pace for the rest.  Foam roller.  Wore IT band brace thing - felt really good.  I think I’ll wear this more often whenever I increase the miles or speed.

Fri:  Slacked
Sat: Trainer ride (50 min).  Foam roller.
Sun:  Not sure if I’m going to get motivated to do anything…we’ll see.

This week I’m going to shoot for 3 days of running.  I’m going to up the mileage to 4 miles for one of the days and keep it at 3 miles the other 2.  That sounds SO LAME but I am determined to take it slow.  Also - these miles are probably going to be on the treadmill, so they sort of don’t even count…but I need a controlled environment.

In other news we bought a salt-water reef tank yesterday.  We took both Todd’s car and mine to the guy’s house who was selling it.  In my car we filled up buckets and garbage bins with the salt water that we siphoned from the tank.  In Todd’s we put the tank inside and the tank base on his roof.  The reason we brought the water is because we could then re-use it for the live rock and the fish (blue tang) that came with the tank.  It took most of the day yesterday.  Here are a few shots of the process:

Containers for the water in my trunk

It was really weird - we had a hose running from inside the guys house (inside of the tank) sucking the water into buckets / containers in my car.

Todd's car w/ the tank base on top

Tank inside Todd's car

Todd putting the live rock and the blue tang in temporary bucket

I’m really excited to get it up and running.  It’s about 150 gallons, so not quite as large as our freshwater tank.  We plan on making it a reef tank - so it’s going to take a lot of $$ to get it going.  (Live rock is EXPENSIVE!!!) I can’t wait to get some really cool shrimp and clown fish and neat corals.  We’re probably going to have to be selective when it comes to the animals that we get (i.e. purchasing tank-bread) since a lot of the fishing/harvesting practices are bad for the environment.  I’m hoping to learn how to breed / grow the coral.  The pieces are called ‘frags’.  It’s SUCH A NEAT HOBBY!!!  I’m also going to have to figure out how to offset the electricity that we’re going to be using since this will require more lighting and unfortunately there aren’t any really good energy efficient (LED) versions of the lights that we need.  If you’re interested in following the process with us I’ve put together tags and categories under ‘reef tank’.

Quick post to say that the new year is already off to a good start as far as training.  The IT band continues to be troublesome, but I’ve been doing cycling on the trainer, elliptical and spinning class at Bally’s and instant streaming Netflix workout DVD’s.  The week ended nicely with a ~2 hour indoor training ride with CTC at Twinsburg Rec. center yesterday am.  GREAT time indeed!

Mon: attempted to run on treadmill - got in .4 miles then knee pain.  Continued to get in 3 miles - pain never went above a 5 on a pain scale from 0-10.  Then did stretching and foam roller.

Tue: Trainer ride; foam roller

Wed: 30 min elliptical; foam roller in afternoon.  In pm went to Katy’s for our weekly Netflix streaming DVD workout sessions.  Did 10 min abs; 10 min thighs; 10 min glutes; 10 min stretch.  Then did hip exercises for IT band.

Thurs: Trainer ride; foam roller

Fri: Rest

Sat: Trainer ride

Sun:  Gonna do 45 min Netflix DVD later today.  (Awesome for total body).

I think I”m going to join the FF and BA triathlon group this year.  I was already checking out potential races, but I don’t want to get ahead of myself…we’ll keep things moving along w/ the knee and hopefully get it healed once and for all.  Stay tuned!

Yesterday am I got up early (5:30 am!!) to volunteer for the towpath marathon.  I figured the least I could do was go out and cheer on some peeps who were doing it since I couldn’t run it.

We had a BLAST!  Our aid station was about 1.5 miles from Boston store so we all met in the parking lot and walked on the towpath to get to our spot.  There were tables, water, heed, and pretty much nothing else.  It was hillarious because we were contemplating how to mix the heed - which seriously was NOT going well.  The guys decided to pour it back and forth into the buckets and then Frank went looking for a stick in the woods to use (we didn’t use it - Janet did a sprint back to Boston store on a bike to get items we needed).

The real fun started when the runners started coming through.  Frank was CRACKING ME UP!!!  He kept telling the runners these detailed descriptions of heed: ‘this is Heed, it’s a sports drink, but it’s not gatorade…’ and going on and on about it.  Like they care!!  I told him to just tell them it was gatorade!!!  hahahaaa.  OMG and Athena was telling people they were tigers, grrrr!  Then I had an idea to tell people they were hot and to some of the (hotter) guys I would say ‘let’s go hott stuff!!’  ahahahaaa.  Just the silly banter back and forth was way entertaining.  It made up for the fact that we were seriously in the middle of nowhere on the towpath and we were freezing to death!

Now the breakthrough.  I ran 4 miles last week, so I figured I would try 6 yesterday.  I would run whatever pace was comfortable - this is typically around 8:30 lately.  Last week I got pain at 2.9 miles, but I’ve been working on my stride and form.  I notice that if I shorten and quicken my stride it seems to help, so that’s what I did.

8:29 - no pain
8:29 - no pain
8:09 - no pain
8:04 - still no pain!
8:03 - no pain still!!!
8:19 - got nervous - but there wasn’t ANY pain at all!!!!!!!!

I am SO excited about this.  Part of this was mental, too, since I knew I was getting a massage afterwords so I didn’t care if I did experience pain - since it would get massaged and loosened up.  (I have a new hookup for massages - since Maryellen is in massage school!!!)

I’m not sure what to do for Columbus.  I’m thinking walk / run?  I don’t want to run the whole thing for fear that I will overdo it.  At the same time I want it to be a good day of training - so maybe run the first 8 and then speed walk the last 5?  Advice from my professional running friends?

I started my new job on Monday, April 6th.   It’s been an exciting handful of weeks so far, and I can’t wait to keep learning about our technologies and customers.

We moved to our new office in Solon a couple weeks ago, and wouldn’t you know it there is a gym right across the street!  A co-worker and I got memberships the day we moved to the new office.  They have classes during lunch which works out perfectly for me.  It also works out well because S. Chagrin Res. is just down the street, so I can run there at lunch and then shower.  Equally as convenient is the Solon high-school track where I’m planning on doing my track workouts on Tue. evenings.  So I would have to say that I still have a perfect workout setup!  I didn’t think I could get any better than having a gym AT my work, but this ends up working out even BETTER!  They have a towel service so I don’t have to worry about hauling dirty towels back and forth and they have tons of different aerobics classes that are 50 min. during lunch.  They also have a pool, but I don’t think I’m going to use it since I still have the sweet hookup from Mr. Royle. 

Now that I’m in a position to actually begin working out more seriously again, I have started to think about what races I’m going to do this summer.  Daisy showed me a list of what she’s planning on doing, and a lot of it looks similar to what I would like to do - including XTERRA, Akron Marathon Relay, Portage Lakes Tri, SweetCorn, Sunday in June, and Towpath marathon.  I believe the next race on my schedule is a sprint triathlon at Monroe Falls park (Planet X).  This should be fun and easy and a good intro triathlon for the season.  I have to see what other local triathlons there are…it’s getting a little ridiculous with the amt. they are charging for them, though.

I’ll update the blog with a new 2009 race page ASAP.  For now here’s a recap from this past week’s training:

5/18 - 5/24

Mon:  Abs class; body sculpting class @ lunch.  Swam ~1200 meters in pm.
Tue:  Track workout.  Tough.

5 laps warmup easy (9:15 pace)
1 mile warmup w/ group (~7:30 pace)
4×200 with 200 jogging r.i. (200’s varied in speed from 42 sec. to 45 sec.)
1×800 (3:11)
4×200 with 200 jogging r.i.
1×800 (3:09)
Glen wanted us to do another set of 4×200 and then an 800 but I was ready to fall over so he said I could do a mile at a good pace.
1 mile cooldown (7:36 pace)

Wed: Ran 6 miles after work w/ Bridget on Towpath.  (8:40 pace??) Wasn’t feeling very good…
Thurs: 45 min spin class at lunch - med. difficulty.
Fri:  REST
Sat: Mowed grass - don’t laugh - this is hard core w/ a reel mower.
Sun: ~11 mile trail run with optional hill (1st time I’ve ever done the optional hill - it was TOUGH!)

Totals:
Run - 22 miles
Bike - 12 miles
Swim - 1200 meters
Other - 2.5 hours.

First my training:

Monday:  Swam w/ Brian (we talked a lot but managed to do a ladder)
Tuesday:  Track workout - 2 * 800 and 4 * 400 with ~2:30 rest.
Wednesday:  7 mile trail run.  Fell hard and scraped up my knee and leg.
Thursday:  Rested after falling
Friday:  Swam w/ Kristin and Sharon
Saturday:  No working out - worked on school stuff basically all day
Sunday:  ~17 miles w/ SERC at 8:20-ish pace.  Laid tile in Todd’s basement.  Exhausted.

I need to get on the bike ASAP if I think I’m going to be doing any triathlons this year!  I am so excited about spring and outdoor cycling (road and mountain).

Now a super awesome update:
Last Sunday I got an email from the HR director at Aclara RF telling me she was in the process of putting together an offer letter for me!  This is precisely the type of job I wanted AND in the industry I wanted!  (Product Marketing Manager in the AMI - advanced metering infrastructure - industry).  I of course accepted the offer and I am scheduled to start on April 6th.  If you were wondering, no, I was not working with a recruiter to find this job.  That’s because recruiters told me that I wouldn’t be able to make a career shift into marketing.  Well, I refused to work for an industry I didn’t believe in doing work that I’m not excited about, so I went off on my own and found a growing company in an exciting industry.  I can’t wait to learn all about their products and help them become more successful.  After I ‘officially’ start I will provide more details and updates.

So I made a promise that I would keep track of my workouts…not sure what happened but I didn’t stick with it.  Here’s a recap of the past week:

Monday:  Rest
Tuesday:  Ran 4 miles w/ Bridgette
Wednesday:  Swam ~1600 meters
Thursday:  3.5 mile tempo run
Friday: Elliptical and bike (30 min); swam ~1600 meters
Saturday: Rest
Sunday: Ran 8 (pine lane) + 4 on towpath. 12 mi total.

When running yesterday I tripped on a root, fell hard and hurt my shoulder.  The trails are seriously dangerous in the winter.  I am really looking forward to some spring and summer weather!  Pine Lane was so bumpy my ankles were sore after only 8 miles!  Thank goodness Bridgette ‘forced’ me to run 4 more.  Brian wimped out after only 8.

I know I haven’t been great about posting my workouts, mostly because I’ve been lazy, but also partly because I’m embarrassed about how lame and sparse they’ve been. I have been going to the gym and swimming, along with the tons of fun things like cross country skiing and ice skating that I forget can be counted as exercise. I’m going to start keeping better track of my weekly workouts and I’ll create a new category so I can trace them back when I wonder why the heck I’m out of shape and weigh 300 lbs.

So here we go:
Week of 2/2 - 2/8
Monday: 1 hour bootcamp @ Bally’s - this class is HARD CORE.
Tuesday: 4 miles on deathmill; swam ~ 1000 meters.
Wednesday:  1 hour bootcamp @ Bally’s - this is a different instructor…not as hard core but still good.
Thursday:  I was lame and didn’t workout - mostly because I was depressed from career fair.
Friday:  No exercise. No excuses.  I suck.
Saturday:  Played outside on the river by Todd’s house…fun and tiring.
Sunday:  Ran ~14 miles in Solon w/ hard-core SERC girls.  Did some relaxing yoga after. (OMG - Elizabeth - you have to show me those pictures!!!)

I realized after running yesterday that I really need to start doing Yoga - wow - I totally LOVE it!!!  I think it could really help out with running tightness/soreness, plus it’s so relaxing.  Now there’s just that small problem of not having an income…