Sunday, September 30, 2012

The beginning of Fall

Vegas with JR, Elliot and Jack was so much fun. Both of them were so funny and relaxed going into the race and very pleasant to be around (you know how athletes can be before a big race...sometimes they can be a giant pain in the behind). Not those two. Transition closes at 6? OK, so we have to be there at 5:55. That is how easy they were :-) Here are some pics from before and during the race.








Jack and I were spectating all day. Both JR and Elliot disappeared for about 1.5 hrs after the race, turns out pretty much every racer ended up in medical for dehydration and stomach issues...I checked out what the water source of Lake Las Vegas is and I have to say that a mix of run off and reclaimed water might not be the stomach friendliest lake to swim in :-) 

Since Las Vegas I have been going full power: studying, working and running. Yep, swimming is wayyyyy on the back burner right now...cycling in form of group rides still exists, but mostly running is my sport of the fall. I am taking classes in preparation for grad school and instead of taking one at a time I decided to take all of them together, get them out of the way and be completely done by December 14th. I know it means sacrificing my fall season, but when you try to combine work, school and training, nothing will work 100%, so I decided to focus on school until December. Running is easy to include because I can always squeeze in 30 min -1:30 hrs in the day.

I am excited to do a lot of running races this fall and started of with a local 5 k a month ago. A 6 mile warm up, a 5k and a 2 mile cool down made a great workout. Unfortunately it was still 105 degrees that night, so I ended up with a 18:11. SUCCESS :-)

Yesterday I competed in another local 5k and ended up running slower. Why? Not sure: mile 1@6:00, mile 2@ 6:02 and mile 3 @ snail pace? It didn't feel like I slowed down but somehow we must have ALL slowed down like crazy on that last mile. Oh well, it was still a lot of fun!!!

Next week will be the Xterra 20 k in Phoenix, which includes rocks and elevation gain/loss = Angi completely out of her comfort zone. JR and I went on a 1:40 trail run today including some serious hills with switchbacks and it kicked my butt. Thankfully the combination of Zoot trail shoes and Zoot compression socks helped me get a good grip and safed me from scratches :-)

The week after the 20 k is "race for the cure" a 5 k in downtown Phoenix, where I hope the 18 min barrier will be broken. After that the Phoenix 10 k which always draws a lot of fast people, so hopefully a sub 37 min 10 k is possible, but we will see how things go.

I had a little setback with my back that has been bothering me ever since the lady hit me with her car in January. Unfortunately sometimes it gets to the point were I just can't run. Thankfully I work at Endurance Rehab and they never let me down. After an hour of working on me and three days off of running (last week), they got me back to zero pain!!! 

Summer in Phoenix is coming to an end, unfortunately slower then I would like :-) At least the mornings are nice now and it is possible to run until 9 am - YAY!!! Anything after that is still impossible, but that will change soon too!!! I cannot wait.

1 comment:

Damie said...

Hey speedy!!! great to read about ya! what are you doing for grad school???? PT or something else? xoxoxo