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Mind vs. Legs

September 6, 2011 by Kristy 13 Comments

Don’t you love when you have an epiphany while running? My epiphany occurred last week after my 22-miler. You’ll recall (or maybe not) that I didn’t listen to my mind during my 22-miler, just my Garmin and my legs. I didn’t want my mind to feed me negative thoughts, tell me to slow down, etc. So, to the best of my ability, I tuned it out (it’s not easy). Then came the epiphany:

mind = subjective
legs = objective

OK, let me explain this one. We all know how powerful the mind is over the body. And we all know how important your mental game is to an endurance race. Sometimes it’s more important than your physical training.

During a race, our mind spews negative thoughts and signals our legs to slow down.
Truth: most of the time, our legs have more gas in the tank than we think.

Before a race, our mind preys on our nervousness and we pace, walk, stretch until go time to make sure our legs are ready.
Truth: our legs are ready. And we waste precious energy by pacing, walking, and stretching.

During the taper period, our mind conjures up phantom pains and we begin to think we are injured.
Truth: you are not injured (it’s the taper crazies!).

The mind seems to be very subjective, don’t you think? So why do we listen to it?

On the other hand, your legs always tell the real deal. Ever have one of those runs where you leave the house thinking this will be the run of your life, only to get slapped with a major case of brick legs? Or sluggish legs? The legs don’t lie.

Which brings up another question. How do you distinguish between the two? Are your legs really tired or is it more mind over body? During training runs, I think this is simple. If you’re not having the best run, take a look at your mindset. Are you feeling meh? Is your mind somewhere else? During races, it becomes a tad more difficult since you’re pushing the pace and your legs may be close to exhaustion. This is the point in most races when people either give up or dig deep.

Come Sunday, I’m digging deep and listening to my legs. They will be my greatest ally (along with my Garmin). And my friend Fatigue 😉

Do you agree? Do you think the mind has more control than we think? For me personally, I know it does. It’s way more mental than physical.

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Lehigh Valley Marathon: Week 14 Recap

September 6, 2011 by Kristy 8 Comments

9/5/11 (Monday)
5 miles tempo
*2 miles at marathon pace: 8:13 and 8:10. Way too fast…I blame it on the taper crazies!

Labor Day weekend was wonderful. I rested, got some stuff knocked off the ol’ to-do list, BBQ’d, and slept. I slept like a champ…9+ hours each night. More time spent sleeping = less time for the taper crazies to strike.

And the taper crazies made me order this for Hawk’s Halloween costume. Sorry, buddy.

MON: rest
TUE: 6 miles speed (my last speed work of this training cycle!)
WED: 5 miles easy
THU: 6 miles easy
FRI: 10 miles long
SAT: rest
SUN: 6 miles tempo (4 miles at MP)

A total of 33 miles for the week and 229 miles for the month of August! That’s a new mileage PR for me! Damn, I should have ran an extra mile to make it an even 230.

So what’s left? Two more easy runs…probably 4 miles on Thursday and 3 miles on Friday and lots of marathon prep. You know…lists, weather checking, and repeating of positive mantras!

Please keep voting for RTLR for CBS Philly’s Most Valuable Blogger (click here to vote). Voting ends on Friday, September 9th! Please vote every day this week!

Taper Makes Me Lazy

September 2, 2011 by Kristy 10 Comments

9/2/11
10 miles / 1:31 / 9:06 avg pace

Last week I practically jumped out of bed to run my 22-miler. Today I re-set my phone for an additional 15 minutes of sleep (something I never do) and could barely muster any enthusiasm to run my last long run. “Taper time” makes me lazy. I hate holding back, watching my pace, and cutting out miles. It seems that all that holding back demotivates me in the process. Thankfully, I only have 1 more week to go.

Of course today I decide to carry my camera with me and it’s cloudy. Right at this exact spot you can usually see the most amazing sunrise.

And what would a long run be without post-run pictures? Thumbs up for a successful training cycle!

And then a normal picture.

I hope everyone enjoys their long weekend!

Any good long runs or races this weekend?

Do you get lazy during “taper time”?

It's The Most Wonderful Time Of The Year

August 31, 2011 by Kristy 14 Comments

9/1/11
6 miles easy / no Garmin

Happy September 1st! September is my favorite month of the year (with October being a close second). I love Fall and the whole back-to-school season. I’m obviously not a teacher…or a parent 😉 I never dreaded going back to school either when I was younger. Nerd.

If you sense a list coming, you know me too well! Here’s why I love Fall…

perfect running weather (this is almost too obvious to even list)
running in shorts and a long-sleeve DRI-fit shirt
sweaters (and my beloved Uggs – I don’t care if they are no longer in style)
enjoying my coffee without sweating to death (dislike iced coffee)
on that same note, hot chocolate
pumpkins and mums
Halloween candy
dressing up Hawk in a ridiculous costume for Halloween

Fall races (I have lots of them planned)
keeping the windows open and allowing fresh air to come in
perfect sleeping weather

AND…I have a marathon in 10 days! A perfect way to ring in Fall! I got an email from the race yesterday saying “it is on as scheduled”. Apparently there were questions about whether the race would go on due to Irene. The thought of it NOT happening never crossed my mind but it does explain all the “lehigh marathon and hurricane irene” blog searches.

What’s your favorite season? Why?

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Lehigh Valley Marathon: Week 13 Recap

August 31, 2011 by Kristy 8 Comments

8/31/11
5 miles easy / 47:25 / 9:29 avg pace
*Done at the crack of dawn (5:15AM), thankfully with my neighbor. If I were alone, I would have waited for some sunlight (no worries Mom and Dad).

Week 13 can be dubbed the “lazy” week. I began my taper with respect to overall mileage but I still had a 22-miler to do. I only planned to run 44 miles with 22 of them being a long run. So I only ran 4 days and took almost as many rest days. But it’s taper time, right?

MON: rest
TUE: 7 speed
WED: 7 easy
THU: rest
FRI: 22 awesome miles!
SAT: 8 ~~tempo~~ easy (had to fit this in pre-Irene and my legs were in no shape for tempo miles)
SUN: rest (although I had fully intended to go to yoga but the studio was closed for the hurricane)

I have an unrelated question that I’d love feedback on: when you read blogs, do you prefer quality over quantity? Say a blogger were to only post 3 days per week but they were more high quality posts…would you prefer that over more “simple” posts every day? Do you like when bloggers are on a schedule (i.e., post every Mon/Wed/Fri) or it doesn’t matter?

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what we want vs. what we have

August 30, 2011 by Kristy 10 Comments

8/30/11
6 miles speed
*6 x 800m at 10K pace. It was freezing this morning! OK, that’s a slight exaggeration but it felt amazing out. I cannot wait for Fall running weather.

Don’t we always want what we don’t have? Aren’t we supposed to be grateful for what we have and make the most of it? Absolutely, but that doesn’t mean we can’t dream or ~~make a list~~. Here are some of my current “wants”.

Want: bangs
What I Have: curly hair
Yeah, there’s no mixing the two. Kinda like oil and water. I would also like to run my fingers through my hair on occasion but they would get stuck. Actually, I love my curly hair (I never straighten it) because it’s different and, most of the time, pretty low maintenance.

Want: long, lean legs
What I Have: short, muscular legs
So my legs will never look like Kara Goucher’s. But they power me through marathons and totally came through on last week’s 22-miler. This might be the worst picture ever, by the way.

Want: a career involving running (talking, writing, blogging, and most of all, coaching)
What I Have: a job
I’m fortunate enough to even have a job but that doesn’t mean I can’t complain! I’ll get to the running career someday…baby steps. At least I’m lucky enough to spend a good deal of time outside my job coaching. That’s where my passion lies and that’s what I will do someday…for a job and career.

Want: a pair of TOMS wedges
What I Have: not a pair of TOMS wedges
This isn’t the best “I want vs. I have” but I’ve been eyeing these shoes up for awhile. And then Holly had a pair on at the HLS and raved about how comfortable they are.

(via)

Want: to run the Boston Marathon in 2012
What I Have: a slim-to-none and crappy chance of even registering
So this is my biggest want, obviously. If When I qualify on 9/11/11, it won’t be by more than 5 minutes (i.e., 3:40 or sub-3:40), which is the rumored time you might need in order to get priority registration. I could worry about that now or I could put that energy into qualifying and leave the stuff that is out of my hands to fate.

Now it’s your turn. Give me a current “want” vs. “have”…or two!

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