Preparing For My Next Race: A 3K!

 My next race is a 3K.

Now if you're a die-hard running enthusiasts, you're laughing at me right now. You're preparing for a 3K?  Really?

Even if you're a casual runner you're probably still laughing at me right now.  And if you're like so many people and you don't like to run at all, you're probably pretty impressed.  You're probably also wondering how far a 3K is.  

Well, don't get too impressed. A 3K is just under two miles or about 1.86 miles. Now, why am I preparing for this race? Well, I haven't run a race in a year now and a year is a really long time to be out of the running game. At least that's what I think so I need to get both my mind and my body ready to race again. 

Before we go any farther, I should be clear that I really only race against myself. I'm not fast enough to ever place. Maybe when I'm 70 and the field has thinned out a bit.

Back to what I am doing to prepare myself for this race.  Well, running is obvious but here are a few others:

• Strength Training:  I'm keeping this really simple.  Typically, my strength training involves doing lunges and squats during our daily walks around the neighborhood.  To work on my arms I'll do push ups against the stairs or tricep dips on the back of the couch.  I'll also use our weight machine downstairs to work my hamstrings (boy, do they need it) or quads.
• Foam Roll:  This has been so helpful for my back!  In the past, I've mostly focused on my legs, specifically my shins and calves, but I'm finding the more I work my lower back, the better my feet and calves feel.  I'm also working on loosening up my hips to help my Achilles which was tight during my last run.  
• Working on my Form:  I wrote a blog post about that HERE.  While I run I'm really concentrating on keeping my shoulders down, my arms low and my foot strike and less on how fast I am running or how fatigued I feel.  

Is this all helping?  I ran 2 miles recently, the longest I've run in about a year, and I felt great the next day.  Even my feet feel fine.  

I can genuinely say that I am excited for my first race of the year on October 28!

When is your race?  Tell me in the comments below!  I want to hear about it.  

A Chip Off the Old Block

My 5 year old daughter is just like me.

But yet she's not.

Alright, so when it comes to running, she is just like I was when I was a kid - she hates it and she's going to let everybody around her know about it and make them miserable in the process. 

I asked her if she wanted to run the Lil' Pumpkins race with me again and she happily agreed.  I warned her that because she's older now she's going to have to run longer.  This year she'll be running 0.3 miles versus 100 yards.  She still wanted to do it so I registered her.  I promised her I'd take her out for a training run. 

After begging me all week to take her running, we finally made it out today, a day when Daddy could watch the baby. 

In the beginning, she was more than happy to get outside and run.

After a few short, warmups, really we are only running 0.3 of a mile, we headed to the road to run.

Reality set in at that point.

I don't think we ran 100 yards before she started complaining that she was itchy, she didn't want to run, that it was too hot.  She kept asking to stop. 

I told her we'd slow down but that we really needed to keep moving so she doesn't get knocked down by the other kids on race day.

With lots of encouraging, she finally made it to the "finish" line. 

She immediately asked if we could walk back and not run.

I compromised with her and we did intervals.  I told her we'd run to the stop sign and then walk and then run to the mailboxes and then walk.

By the time we made it home, she was running to the door to get away from mommy's crazy race training.

I'm MORE than HAPPY that a 12 mm was a comfortable, easy pace for me!

Now, my daughter has more energy than the Energizer bunny.  She's very active in dance and Girl Scouts.  Her favorite activity at school?  Playing outside.  She will run... when she wants to. 

But she's still a chip off the old block and hates running.  I wasn't nearly as active as she is at her age and now I'm paying for it. (I even wrote a blog post about it HERE.)  I'm fine with running not being her thing because she is so active.

What physical activities do you enjoy with your kids?  Leave me a comment below.  I want to know.  

2016 CHaD Trick or Treat 3K and Little Pumpkin Dash Recap

Let me just start by saying I really didn't want to run this race.  I signed up last minute because I thought it would be fun for my daughter to participate in the kids' run and frankly, I knew I would need something to motivate me to get my butt moving again after my second half marathon.  But I woke up exhausted from Trick or Treating the night before and staying up way too late watching scary movies.  Can we talking about The Conjuring?  OMG.  I must have jumped 50 times!

How I wanted to spend my day!

It didn't help that the race was held during The Pats game and if you don't know already football is an institution in this house.

Opening game at Gillete for the 2015 season. 

But after I ran a barefoot mile on my treadmill, I schlepped my butt to Manchester with my costumed family in tow.  

I'm glad I did.

They have a little Halloween "festival" set up for the kids before the races.  Scarlett loved the bounce houses and the bunnies in the petting zoo.  One of her friends from her class was running the race too so she was overjoyed to run around with him.

After a quick warm up led by a man in an apple costume, the girls' ages 4 and under race started.  I ran behind Scarlett so we wouldn't lose her in the crowd.  She sort of stopped towards the finish line so I grabbed her hand and pulled her along.  She loved the medal they gave out but unfortunately it went missing somewhere along the way.

Luckily, she hasn't realized the medal is missing... yet. 

Then it was time for my 3K, the shortest race I've ever run by the way.  I was looking forward to being done in a decent amount of time.  Mentally I couldn't handle another half marathon not with the amount of pain I've been in since my last one.  

This race also had a first for me:  I lined up in the corral WITHOUT MY BIB ON.  What was I thinking?  I was so distracted by helping Scarlett with her race that I completely neglected to put mine on.

I realized this 30 seconds before it started.

Luckily, my family was standing not too far away so I mouthed to my husband that I forgot my bib and we got to work grabbing it out of the bag.  Thank GOD I always pack extra safety pins for just in case.  This was definitely a "just in case" moment.

It probably took me less than a minute to fix my mistake, but I was stuck behind the walkers and strollers by the time I was ready.  In a way this helped me because I took off at an 8 MM pace!  I quickly slowed once I hit the first of 2 decent sized hills.  It didn't help that I was dodging a lot of people who were walking or running intervals.

The second hill helped because I was able to zoom by a lot of people.

OMG, I zoomed up a hill!

Since this was just a 1.86 mile race, it was a nice out and back so you could see the leaders at one point.  It made me feel better to know I wasn't that far behind the pack not that I'll ever be in the front.

Overall, I felt great!  My lungs were a little full but I've been battling colds lately and I changed up my allergy medicine.  My feet were a non issue and it was so nice to run down hills without wincing. 

As I approached the finish line I tried to really kick it. My arms were swinging hard as they did most of the race, but I looked on helplessly as a flood of people passed me.  The last kick has been an issue for me lately and I really don't know what it going on.  I just can't seem to sprint anymore.

My final time was 19:23 and my pace was 10:23/mile.  Not too shabby all things considered.

Next, I'll keep rowing, running barefoot on the treadmill and strength training.  I've got to work on strengthening my hamstrings.  They are so weak!