#RWrunstreak 2017 & Danville Braves 5K

Last year between Memorial Day and the 4th of July, I had completed the Runner's World Run Streak (or the #RWrunstreak), which was just a little challenge set out by Runner's World to encourage runners to run at least 1 mile every day between the two major summer holidays. This was meant to help runners keep running through the summer. It is so hard to get motivated when spring racing is over and fall training hasn't quite started. So I needed this kick in the rear to get me into gear! Last year, Mr. Marathon did not join me due to a busy schedule. This year, we both completed the 37 days in the challenge, and then some! We both have officially (as of today) made it 70 days!!!!!!!! Let's look at the mileage:

HIM: 335.5

HER: 249.65

Danville Braves 5K

Mr. Marathon also completed a 5K during his run streak. This race was on July 15 in Danville where he works and goes to school. This race was hosted in conjunction with Danville's local minor league baseball team on a Saturday morning before the Braves played that night. Mr. Marathon has been working on speed training so he was very excited to see what he was capable of at this point. He went out racing and hit the road. His biggest competition were 2 teenage guys who were leading for most of the race. He hadn't been feeling that great, so he was having a hard time breathing, which is kind of important for running. DUH. He ended up pulling away in the last mile and one of the 2 guys was still right by his side. The course finished unfortunately on an uphill, which he was thinking that would be where he would lose the race. However, the other guy apparently had the same thought. Halfway through the hill, he wanted to slow down, but just as he was thinking that, the other guy stopped because he got light-headed (Mr. Marathon looked back to make sure he was ok!), and a course volunteer went over to help him. This gave Mr. Marathon the lead and the extra motivation to kick it and finish strong. He took 1st place overall with a time of 18:50! A great time! Even better, the overall male and female winners were given the privilege of throwing the first pitch at the Danville Braves game that night! So that was a fun experience! And he got a cool bat trophy as his award. All of this, just to find out 2 days later that he had BRONCHITIS..... for the past FOUR WEEKS. 

Back to the Run Streak

This all being said, we made it past the 37 day mark, then I wanted to go further than last year (42 days), and then we decided to just keep going until the end of my summer before I start teaching again this school year. This is the end of our intentional, official #RWrunstreak. If we keep on streaking from this point on, it will be unofficial and unintentional. We made this conscious decision because today is a very important day for me. It is Day 1 of my MARATHON TRAINING PLAN! I am now IN TRAINING for a fall marathon! I am still undecided which one. I am torn between the Richmond Marathon and the Outer Banks Marathon. They are on November 11 and 12 respectively, so my 14 week training plan kicks off today regardless. 

Pictures! 

Last year, I took a picture and posted it on Instagram every single day. This year, I tried to take a picture most days, but some days I was just not feeling it. Sometimes I took a billion pictures and hated them all at the time so I didn't post them. So here you go, you can get some inside scoop, never before seen photos of my #RWrunstreak! A picture for every day!

Days 1-25

Days 26-50

Days 51-70

Super Run 8K

Yesterday was a big day for me! I had set a goal at the beginning of this year to update some of my current personal records, the 8K being one of them. I haven't really run many 8Ks, so I hadn't set a PR in that distance since 2012 when I ran the HCVa 8K in 51:54. I really wanted to run another to see how much I'd improved since then.

So I decided to run the Super Run 8K in my little hometown. This race is just wonderful! It's the celebration event for the end of the spring season of the Girls on the Run and STRIDE running teams from local elementary and middle schools, and since I am a Girls on the Run coach this race was extra special to me. I had 4 girls running the 5K, and spoiler alert: they totally rocked it!!!!!!!!!!

Girls on the Run coaches: my friend Mary and me

After we all gathered and took some pictures first thing in the morning, we all made our way to the start line. I took off a little bit too fast (I got excited sorry!) and I finished the first mile about 30 seconds too fast for my goal pace. My goal was to just PR, but of course I wanted to see just how fast I could go. I found my groove for the next couple of miles, despite some hills. I have run this course a few times before so I knew about these hills, so it was no surprise. However, the last time I had run this course, I got a stomach cramp around mile 3.5. I blamed it on my nutrition that day, so I was hoping on race day if I ate my usual breakfast I wouldn't experience any cramping. Unfortunately, I began cramping around that same time. I ran through it and kept pushing because as I approached the turnaround I got to see all the other runners coming back. I noticed the first several men, then I saw one woman, then I got to the turnaround, and I hadn't seen any other women. Granted, there was a small turnout for the 8K as the 5K is the main distance for this event, but still, I was 2nd place female! I saw another woman a little bit behind me, so I knew despite my cramping, I had to keep pushing to maintain my spot!

"THE FUTURE IS FEMALE" Love it!

I pushed through to mile 4, then I made my way back to the last road before the final turn toward the finish. My cramp was coming and going, but the woman who was behind me still hadn't caught up. I kicked it up at the end around the last turn. I ran the last straightaway to the finish line without even looking down at my watch. I was expecting a PR at this point, however I was not prepared for what I saw: a time of 46:29! It was a PR of 5 minutes and 25 seconds!!!!!!! I would have been thrilled just with this time, but it made it even better that I managed to place 2nd overall female.

Mildly unflattering finish line photo....
I expect nothing less from myself!

The only picture of me on the podium....
we were about to get down haha!

Now, it's time to get sappy. I haven't raced short distance in a while, but I am just so happy with my time and the effort I was able to put forth during this race. If you recall, I got sick back in November with pneumonia that put me down and out for quite a few weeks. Then I got sick again in February after just coming back to running after the pneumonia and I was out for a few more weeks. I was so nervous that I had lost all my fitness, endurance, and speed. But I ran so much during March and April training for my half marathons (RnR Ral and BRM), and luckily for me, it brought my speed back to where it was (and then some)!  As for what's next, I have a few more goals that I would like to accomplish coming up here soon, including a goal for a 5K and a 10 miler!!!

Two of my coach friends and me!

Had to get a picture of the race shirt with my bib!

.... and my kitty Fat Harry had to be part of the photo shoot!

Rock n Roll Raleigh Marathon and Half Marathon

Last weekend we traveled south to Raleigh, NC for the Rock n Roll Raleigh Marathon (for him) and Half Marathon (for me). This has been my goal race for the past several months. I was trained up to go for a personal record (PR) since I haven't PRd a half since the Myrtle Beach Mini Marathon in 2014! I desperately wanted to beat my time of 2:19:55. For Mr. Marathon on the other hand, this was simply a training run. On his personal training plan that he designed to prepare him to run the Boston Marathon and then the Blue Ridge Marathon in the same week, his long run was 22 miles. Because I so desperately wanted to do the half, he figured why not just go ahead and go the extra mile (ok the extra 4.2 miles) and have fun at a marathon? So that's exactly what he did.

                 

We both hit up the expo, got dinner, and settled in fairly early at our hotel that was less than 5 minutes from the start line. We woke up pretty early to make it back downtown for the 7:00 AM start the next morning. It was a chilly morning, but we knew it was going to warm up to mid-50s, possibly even low 60s so we were dressed in tanks and shorts... without any throwaway gear (oops forgot to pack it!). But nevertheless we were ok! We took off, Mr. Marathon at 7:00 AM on the dot with corral 1, and me at 7:12 AM with corral 10 (even though I was supposed to be with corral 9, but apparently I was a little too far back...). We were off and we ran all around downtown Raleigh!


I really enjoyed the course for the half. It definitely had some rolling hills, which I expected, but the course had a good variety of scenery. I got to see downtown, a lovely park, NC State University's campus, and ... other ... neighborhoods (?? I was delirious at this point sorry I don't recall, but it was awesome). During the beginning of my race, I managed to maintain 9:50-10:10 minute miles for the first 6 miles, and I was shocked when I got to the halfway point. I was on target for about a 2 hour 14 minute half marathon! I was feeling good- strong and consistent. I had a couple of "off" miles, at 10:30-10:40 minutes/mile, but overall I was able to keep my pace low 10 min/mile. As I made my way back through downtown Raleigh, I was still feeling good and I was able to finish up strong with a time of 2:13:11!!!! I was so happy to finish with a 6 minute 44 second PR!

Mr. Marathon took off around downtown Raleigh with the goal of getting his last long run before the Boston Marathon. He planned on enjoying this run and having a great time while getting his miles in. He spent most of his time joking around with other runners, talking to the other runners, laughing up the hills, and oh- of course running too. His boss was running the full marathon as well and caught up to him at mile 7, and they ran together until mile 18. Mr. Marathon was planning to slow down his pace, but having someone else running with him just made him stay at a steady pace. There were plenty of rolling hills along the course from beginning to end, which made it a little challenging to maintain a steady pace throughout. After mile 18, he was running solo again, but still in good spirits and joking with everyone around him, except the runners around him that were NOT in the mood for his shenanigans at this point in the race. It takes a very special kind of person to tolerate being around him at this point, believe me! Humor in the last part of a marathon is not always well received. And by no means does this mean that he is not putting in effort, but him cracking jokes and using his sense of humor was just his way of staying motivated and positive. At mile 19, something else happened that helped him stay motivated and positive. At a water stop, there were volunteers giving out Hawaiian leis, and they were in competition with each other to see who could give the most leis out. So Mr. Marathon decided to help them out. They were offering him one, but he decided to take all of the leis... from 2 different people! As they laughed, that was the seal of approval and the little bit of extra gas in the tank to get him to the finish line. People from then on were very confused. How is he running with all of those leis????? Regardless of how many leis he had on, he finished feeling pretty good in a time of 3:10:38! And of course he looked good doing it!

Here's a little game- guess how many leis he's wearing!
If you guess correctly you'll win a chance to run with Mr. Marathon!

We really enjoyed our time in Raleigh, and now we are looking ahead at what is coming up. Boston is in just 9 short days, and the Blue Ridge Marathon (for him) and Half Marathon (for her) is in 14 days. Can't wait! Until then, here's some more pictures of our race weekend!

Fun at the expo!

I'm kind of obsessed with this picture.
I was telling everyone I HIT A 6 MINUTE PR!!!!!!

Finishing strong with all those leis on

Cheesin

With his awesome boss!

Aw aren't we cute?!

They wouldn't let me back into the finisher's area...
so this is how we had to have our picture taken.

Post race posin'!

2016 Year in Review / 2017 Preview

Last year, we had a fun time reminiscing about our 2015 and making our plans for 2016 around this time. So we decided to do it again!

2016 was a tough year for plenty of people, that's no secret. It seems like there are infinite memes on the Facebook about how much 2016 sucked.

Since we are fans of MMA...
Mr. Marathon's brother is an MMA fighter!

For all the fans of Grey's, Scandal, etc. HAH!

But for us, we actually had a pretty decent year. Let's review, shall we??

Just a collage of some of our fun run-ventures of 2016!

In the winter, we traveled to Charleston in January for the Charleston Marathon (and both hit personal records!), he ran 105 miles in one week for the the What's Your Wall? challenge again, he nailed the rail and I ran it, and we got to do the Martinsville Half Marathon again. Then in spring, participated in the Blue Ridge Marathon & Star K 10K then hopped a plane to BOSTON! Then we had a really busy month of May! In the summer, I did the Runner's World Summer Run Streak (and then some!) and we got to do a new 4th of July race! Fall rolled around and he did some running and Spartan-ing, and I did some running. In November, we did our second marathon of the year and I achieved my marathon goal (!!!!!!!!!!!!!!), I got pneumonia that sidelined me for several weeks, and he completed his second 24-hour ultramarathon! My pneumonia also derailed my 100+ miles a month goal, but I made it November 2015-October 2016 (12 consecutive months) before I had to cut back in November and December due to doctor's orders.

Here are my monthly totals during my 100+ mile/month streak!

And now for our total running mileage from this calendar year:
HIS: 1,762.56 total miles in 2016

Hubby's "Best Nine" (most liked) pictures from Instagram in 2016

HERS: 1,122.68 total miles in 2016

My "Best Nine" from Instagram

PHEW! I'm exhausted just recapping all of this! As this year comes to a close, we realize just how much we have accomplished this year, in running as well as other aspects of our lives. Mr. Marathon is halfway through his Bachelor's degree, and I got a job teaching at a new school this past August!

We are so proud of all that we have done in 2016! In 2017, we have a few plans already in place. We will be traveling back to Boston for mister to run the Boston Marathon (4/17/17) again, and he plans to do the Blue Ridge Marathon (4/22/17). We also have plans to stay active, have fun, run a lot, exercise as much as we can, and take on other challenges/races as they come.

We wish you all a very happy new year and many happy miles in 2017!

Marshall University Marathon

We are so excited to share this recap with you! We traveled to Huntington, West Virginia this past Saturday for the Marshall University Marathon (MUM). On Saturday, we left our house late morning and took the beautiful 4 and a half hour drive through southwestern VA and all the way through to WV. Mister and I both really enjoyed the fall foliage on the drive and saw beautiful scenery in the mountains. We also loved going through tunnels that went THROUGH MOUNTAINS!! Um, cool!

Going through a mountain tunnel!

Inside the mountain tunnel

There were lots of cool bridges in WV

Anyway, we arrived at the expo that afternoon and picked up our packets and all of our SwAg! This was one of the deciding factors in choosing this race, y'all. As full marathoners who signed up before September 1, we got an awesome jacket and a duffel bag! We also paid a little extra to get the tech shirt as well (and I got a women's fit! Yes!). The shirts are adorable. The jackets are SO FLY. And the duffel bags are so neat and a great extra touch! Also at the expo, there was a pasta dinner for runners, and that was so awesome! After we picked up everything and ate pasta, we checked into our hotel and took a surprise nap (my favorite kind!) until it was time to eat some more. We picked up an order of spaghetti from the local Olive Garden and ate it, prepared our stuff for Sunday morning, and went back to sleep for the night.

Swag-tastic!

Humongous salad trough at the pasta dinner!

On Sunday morning, we woke up very confused since the time changed overnight. But we got ourselves in order, got ready and headed to the Marshall University Stadium for the race start! We got parked and lined up pretty quick for a 7:00 AM start. The cannon went off very suddenly and away we went!

It's amazing how all the runners in a particular event can have such different experiences. For example, hubbs and I ran the exact same course, but we had totally different races. Stay with me, k?

HIS EXPERIENCE
This run was a little tough for Mr. Marathon. He felt ok at the start but quickly started cramping at mile 3. He had a huge mental struggle at this point. Should he stop and walk? Should he wait on his beautiful yet slower than him wife? Should he just give up and DNF? After walking for a brief little bit and refueling, he decided that he was going to finish. So that left him with two options- run with me or run it out on his own. There was one key word in both of these options: RUN. He knew he was going to have to run the rest of this race that was still ahead of him. So he decided that he was going to pull himself together and try to take control of the race and keep on keeping on! And that he did. Despite this early setback, he managed to turn out 7ish minute miles for the remainder of the race even though he couldn't get rid of the cramps officially until mile 18! He was so glad that he didn't just give up. He managed to get himself back on track for a 3:04:09 finish! This is still a Boston Qualifier and still an amazing finish time!


HER EXPERIENCE
I started out feeling ok, but also completely and utterly terrified. I had been training for 20 weeks officially, but since last November with my 100+ miles a month. I had built a really great base for myself. Since running Charleston in January of this year, I knew that I wanted a personal record really badly, but I also wanted to get my time under 5 hours. Um, that's ridiculous though right? Cutting off over half an hour is crazy far-fetched. Right? I was going to go for it, though. So I knew my paces and I had the confidence of my training with me. I managed to start on pace, and continue on pace all the way through the end of the first loop (this race was a half- 1 loop and full- 2 loops of the course) and I was still on pace and feeling awesome. I managed to keep up with my pace, and I was starting to get confused by miles 18-20. Um, am I doing this right now? Is this for real? Is my Garmin working? Or is it broken? Am I really STILL on pace to meet my crazy far-fetched dream-big goal? So I just kept going. At mile 20, I had the realization. If I could keep this up for just 10K more, I would get my marathon under 5 hours. I looked at the volunteers guiding us to the next water stop and I said "Hey guess what?? I'm going to get my first sub 5 marathon today!" and they clapped and cheered for me and I rode that high all the way to the finish line. In under 5 hours. In 4:56:51 to be exact! It definitely helped that my loving amazing supportive husband came back for me despite the fact that he was tired from running this course and giving it all that he had. He came back for me and met me at mile 24 to help me run it in. And I did it. I met my goal of breaking 5 hours in the marathon.

I have talked about this before as well. So many runners and even non-runners may think this is "slow". But I'm not about to compare myself to others in this regard. If you look at the fact that I have come from a 6:19 marathon all the way down to a 4:56 marathon with some intense training and commitment, I hope you can celebrate the accomplishment in that with me. I also hope you can be happy for me that I cut off 37 minutes and 10 seconds from my marathon time in January. I have not stopped training since Charleston, and I am so happy to say that it paid off. I cried crossing the finish line at the MUM, not because I was in pain or sad that it was over (lol), but because I accomplished something so huge for me. I thought this goal of mine was far-fetched, crazy, and impossible. And it was.... until it wasn't. As I said recently on a post on Instagram channeling my good friend Walt Disney-- "Do the impossible. It's fun."

Ok so this is what the internet says Walt said

And of course, more photos from marathon weekend!

Hittin up the EXPO

Running through the park along the Ohio River

I don't know about you! But I'm feelin (mile) 22!
Channeling T-SWIFT

Finishing in Marshall Stadium!

He came back for me!

The majestic buffalo statue

My finish line photo! I'm holding the football like an idiot
BUT I'M A HAPPY IDIOT!

We finished!!!!!!