This Croom place

Several of the trail races that I have done over the past year have taken place at Croom, an area near Brooksville, FL that includes the Withlacoochee State Forest and other areas.  There is an immense amount of forest, which is why it is so popular for trail runs around there parts.  This is where I did my 50k, my half-marathon where I was first in my age group last year, and that horrid race where I was recovering from the flu and couldn't really breathe.  But you know why you still go, even when you can barely breathe?

All of these were taken this morning during the Long Play run.  This race is put on by Tampa Races, and features a 33 1/3 mile race, as well as a half-marathon and a 5-mile run.  I did it last year, when it was my introduction to Croom and I was pretty much instantly hooked (plus I finished first in my age group.  Of two.  So yeah, legit).  Today, I did the half-marathon and I took my time, enjoying the scenery and taking photos and such.  I don't even know what my time was, actually, because my Garmin was not charged.  I feel like I ran the course more strategically this year, in terms of strategic walking of hills and maintaining a slow-yet-steady pace for most of it.  This year was a little warmer than last year (although last year started at 39F, so there you go), but not enough to be an hindrance.  I enjoyed myself so much that I was a little disappointed when I realized I was almost done with the forest part.  That's right: I wanted to run longer.  That basically never happens to me and I see that as a real achievement in my development as a runner.

I also realized that every race that I have done this year with Tampa Races has put me last out of everyone.  First there was the 50k, where I am fine with my lastness.  Then there was the Flatwoods Ramble, where my lastness was a bit more embarrassing.  But today, I was not last.  I was at least second-last.  Victory.

Incidentally, when you do Long Play, you also get to see goats:

It's like they're posing

An even better bonus?  No alligators!

What a difference decent weather and a packet of caffeinated jellybeans makes

I can tell you exactly what a difference these two things make: a full 30 seconds off of my personal record (PR) mile split for a half-marathon!  That's a whole 6 minutes faster!  I think that actually it's closer to 7 minutes faster!

Really!

That happened!

The scenario: the first half-marathon in the Florida Halfathon series was today.  I was, to say the least, concerned, particularly after the last long run that I did where I was awful.  I decided to try being better about fueling: generally I don't eat much before a race, so I decided to change that.  I had one of my packets of caffeinated jellybeans prior to the race.  That apparently did the trick.  I don't think that I've ever felt so focused at the beginning of a long run.  This idea is staying.

Then, I was very fortunate in that the weather was MUCH better than anticipated.  It was 58F with a dew point of 50F.  Now admittedly, this is actually in the 70% humidity range, but it felt considerably better than normal.  And there was a pretty hefty breeze--actually, I could have done without the hefty breeze from a running standpoint, but it was fantastic from a not-overheating standpoint.  Also great: it was overcast throughout the run, so Mr. Florida Sun was not even a factor.

And I did not even come close to overheating!  I did have to walk a bit around mile 11 because I got going too fast for a while.  But I was back on track soon enough and polished off the last mile and finished in a much faster time than anticipated.  Considering that I was worried about being taken off the course for slowness, this was, to say the least, an unexpected surprise.

This was my benchmark race for the series.  I need to work on staying steady and getting faster so that I can power through that 11-mile slump next time.  On the other hand, who cares because I got a half-marathon PR!

WHOOOOOOOOOOO!

Apparently, it's the year of weird running surprises.  I got the age award for the 5k in April, even though I didn't run all that fast.  Then, I got my half-marathon PR on a race that I really didn't expect.  Considerably better than last year, which was the year of the cruddy race weather.

Ha!

Last night I sat down and plotted out the training for the first of the four (eek!) half-marathons that I plan to run.  No biggie, right?  Just like doing two marathons in six months?  Actually, I am feeling remarkably good about this whole thing, so BRING IT ON!

I chose a half-marathon plan from about.com, which is a first.  It's called an advanced beginner plan, although I am not sure what that means...still looks considerably easier than the 'beginner' plan that I did for my last one.  I'm having to start with the week where you do the 10M run to be ready in time, but that's okay.  I'm still in decent shape from the last one, even though I took some time off in between.  In fact, that might prove to be a blessing in disguise since it gave me a break.

Things are going to get hectic this week due to travel, so I opted to try the 'speed' training tonight.  You run one mile as a warm-up, then do 2.5 at race pace, and finish with a mile cool down.  This was going really well except that I ran the 2.5 much, much too fast to start.  I think that this kind of training will require some practice for me since I've never tried to sustain my race pace for any amount of time before.  It's a great exercise and one that I'm looking forward to improving.  But today I didn't quite have it. I did meet my goal overall, but my pace was all over the place.

The weather felt great to start, a beautiful, Florida fall day.  What I mean by a Florida fall day is that it was still in the 80s when I started (90s with the heat index), but that the humidity was a mere 70%-ish and the dew point only in the lower 70s.  As I was running, the dew point went up to the mid-70s and the humidity increased because of  storms in the area, meaning that the end of my run was above the threshold of ick--which might also account for why my pace dropped.  And yet, it still felt about 100x better than the horribleness that was this summer.  Right now, for instance, I don't feel as though I am going to die by melting into a smelly ball of sweat.  Neat.

I may have lost my mind

There is a Florida halfathon series in which you run 4 half-marathons over the course of about 5 months (late October to mid-March).

I signed up for it today.

Yes, I realize that this could signal the fact that I have lost my mind.

However, I am very excited about this suddenly, which is great since I'll need all of the enthusiasm that I can muster to get through it.  Over the next few days, I plan to map out a training schedule, probably one that has me running 3-4 times a week, since that worked well when I did the marathon.  I'll have to improvise a bit since I'm pretty sure that I'll be coming into a training plan midway, but I think that I should be okay since I did just train for a 1/2 marathon and wasn't running into any injury problems.  Also, I'll have to figure out what to do between races as a modified plan.  But this is okay.

One of them has 'hills,' by which I mean the Clearwater Beach Causeway.  It's legit.  And very sunny.  I will get photos soon.  Fortunately, this is the race in January, so we can all cross our fingers that it won't be complete torture.

It is on.

Getting caught up

Well, I have definitely not written in a while and, if you're curious, I haven't been running as much lately either.  But it's not as grim as the lack of blog posts might infer.  Here's a quick summary:

• Ran 2 miles in Pittsburgh on the Saturday before the half-marathon.  I thought that I was going to a part that wasn't too hilly.  And for Pittsburgh, probably it wasn't.  But by normal standards, there were plenty of hills.  No need to walk any of them though.
• Unfortunately, for the half-marathon in Geneseo, NY, there was A WHOLE TON OF HILLS.  Several super nasty ones too.  There were rolling ones around 4-5 miles and one super killer one right before the 12-mile marker.  Because that is what you want to see at Mile 12: a huge hill.  Also, it was somewhat humid.  Humid and hilly, my two favorite conditions.  But we did it (I ran this with another person).  We persevered.  Even if we had to walk some of the hills.  The part that I found hilarious was when we looked ahead at the killer hill near Mile 12 and saw everyone still out on the course walking.  It was very pretty, though, and the race was well-organized.  Its only major flaw was that it was ridiculously hilly for a Floridian.
• There was one advantage to having walked parts of the half-marathon: I ran the last mile.  Really ran it.  And was rewarded with a finish-line picture where I am actually running instead of gasping for my last breath of air before I die.  I liked the picture so much, I ordered a super-huge copy of it.
• Last weekend I did 2 miles on a treadmill and 5 miles outside.  I called it 'a treadmill' because it was in a different gym, which doesn't believe in air conditioning with the same fervor as my normal gym.  So that was why it was only 2 miles: I got too hot.  The outdoor run went pretty well, except that I wound up in the direct sun for ~20 minutes of the run (10 out and 10 back).  This was a mistake and I did some walk-running to finish up.  On the plus side, the weather is not nearly as horrid as it was in August.

Anyway, as this summary clearly indicates, at some point I transitioned from being a runner to being a walker-runner.  I'm hoping to get my runner mojo back soon.  And to do some more running, although I have been enjoying the opportunity to take more challenging yoga classes than normal.

For once, I'm not sure what my next goal is.  I was thinking to do a 10K turkey trot, but travel plans changed and that now won't work.  So I need to think about what I want to do.  Some long-term thoughts:

1) I don't know why, but I want to run the NY marathon.  So I will put in for the lottery and see what happens.
2) I feel like I still haven't had a good shot at a half-marathon with a respectable time.  This summer was brutal and then there were hills; the other halfs I have run were in Florida and humid, all too humid.  So one thought it to think about Philly if I don't get in for NY.  Philly is mostly flat and that race is in November, when it shouldn't be too hot and humid.....right?

But those are for next fall.  I need to find something for between then and now.  With a bit more digging around, I'm sure that I will.

Fall half-marathon

Over Christmas, my stepmother and I got talking about running a half-marathon.  She used to run wicked fast and has done a marathon.  I, on the other hand, have never and will never run wicked fast, but have also done a marathon.  She wants to get back into running longer distances, so we thought about doing a half.

The plan was to do a half-marathon in Oakville, Ontario over Labor Day (or as the Canadians would call it, 'Labour Day, eh.  Sorry').  However, they have moved the Oakville 1/2 from Labor Day to later in September, which seems silly since it is called the Labour Day Half-Marathon.  But okay.

So now we need to find a new venue.  I am suggesting the Oak Tree Half-Marathon in Genesco, NY.  It would be over Labor Day, the temperature would probably be awesome, it doesn't start at some godawful hour of morning, we could get there on Saturday, then run Sunday, and the pictures make me want to run, like, right now.  I'm pulling for this one.  It seems to simultaneously solve many problems all at once.

Today I did not get out for a run, and we all know what that means: push-ups.  Boo.  Okay, off to finish them, then to bed.