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| Baldface Circle Trail |
I've been really afraid to up the mileage much since I'm not 100% with the tendon thing. I had some major soreness a few days and had to back off a bit. I've been doing a lot of short, fast stuff, but I still see zero improvement in speed. It's just getting worse for the most part. I can't believe I'm running this slow right now. I might actually be done forever when it comes to speed. I did end up backing out of the Mansfield Double Up and the Ragged 75. I feel very happy with both decisions since it's the right thing to do. I could have finished Mansfield, but it wouldn't have been enjoyable at all. I'm in no shape whatsoever for Ragged, not even "just" the 50K. I'm really hoping I can start to pick up the mileage soon or else I might have to consider dropping from Hartford and Baystate Marathons. I really, really, really don't want to do that. I'm a mess, basically...in running...more so in just life in general...everything. I can't even keep the one person in my life I'm closest to (other than John) without nearly fucking that up often. It's almost like I purposely try to sabotage any close friendship for some reason my crazy brain can't explain to me. I don't know. I guess I feel I don't deserve to have this person in my life a lot of the time since, like I said, I'm a mess. But at the same time I can't imagine this person NOT being in my life since this is such a deep friendship for me so I don't know why I fuck it up like I do or why he even puts up with it over and over. I would have dropped me as a friend a long time ago.
These two weeks were all over the spectrum emotion-wise. Mostly good days, though, with some moodiness mixed in there. The financial stress has been getting to me a lot lately. I just wish I could be one of those people that didn't have to worry so much about money all the time. Living paycheck to paycheck is no way to live; I never thought I'd be one of those people who would have to. I went to a private high school. I got a Bachelor's Degree. I was supposed to be all set in life, right? It's ALL my own fault, but I just don't know how to fix it. I feel so stuck that I don't even bother trying to change my situation anymore. Looking at job openings just depresses me because it all just screams, "Impossible!" at me. I've definitely hit that point where I no longer see possibilities. I've kind of given up. I still think about the future, and I believe I will make it better for myself, but it's hard to see through my current fog. I didn't mean for this to turn into my sob story again when I really have nothing to sob about. I'm just being a cry baby wallowing in self pity.
Even though it's not the most fun topic, I should update my intestinal issue...with nothing to update. Hahaha. It's still the same although I haven't had any problems during races since June. After getting down to 116lbs, I realized I needed to do something about the sudden weight loss so I just upped my caloric intake. I wasn't sure if this would do anything, but it seemed to have worked. I'm back up to around 118-119 which is good. But really nothing has changed as far as this goes. I'm just used to it now. It started out of the blue on February 22 and has been the same ever since. I don't know what caused it. Ibuprofen could actually have done it since it is suggested as a known cause, and with my injury, I had been taking way more Ibuprofen than I should have for about a year prior to it. But I don't have anyway of knowing if it was or not, just pure speculation on my part. Haha. So that's that.
Now that I've gotten all the bull crap out of the way, I can move on to the day-by-day, which I will attempt to keep brief since I don't even remember most of it anyway. Haha.
Monday, July 16, 2018- Got myself up early for a 30 minute spin on my new bike. This would be the only Monday since that I've gotten up to ride. I'm just too lazy on Mondays. 5.5 miles according the cheap thing attached to the fly wheel. I have no idea if it's accurate. I'm still working on finding good spinning videos on YouTube. I've tried a few more than once, and I'm definitely NOT into the Global Cycling Network's videos. They are more geared toward using a trainer vs a spin bike, and I find they just don't give me a great workout. My favorites so far are from The Gym Box channel. Once I got past one instructor's irritating high-pitched voice, I found I really liked her workout.
Got our asses handed to us at work big time this week. So little sleep tonight. Definitely the most gruesome call I've ever been on, but it was so gruesome that it almost looked fake.
Tuesday, July 17, 2018- Drove down to the Trout Pond trailhead in Freedom right after work to run the Jackman Ridge Trail/Mary's Mt loop that I've done a few times over the years. I was pretty sore from Beaver race so it took a good mile to loosen up. The air was disgustingly humid. It's been basically disgustingly humid since then. Haha. 6 miles in 49:41. 840ft of elevation gain. A decent run. Not my fastest, not my slowest.
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| Mary's Mt |
John and I went to his school around noon to help paint signs for the road telling people to slow down. Another kid joined us, but he wouldn't listen to me when it came to doing the paint right so his ended up a do-over for another day. Haha. It was fun, though. John painted the background on his sign, and I did the lettering. Not sure it was a good idea to have my 4 year old art skills in charge of painting signs. Haha. After that, we fed the pigs apples then took Phoenix and Liebling on a short walk to Jackman Pond before a thunderstorm blew in.
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| Our sign |
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| The other kid's sign. Haha. |
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| Jackman Pond |
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| Phoenix doesn't care for Liebling. Haha. |
Wednesday, July 18, 2018- Got in another 30 minute spin on my bike to start the day. I'm really liking having this option!
The day time at work was actually pretty quiet with only a few calls, but ugh, we went out twice overnight which just kills me every time. Got in 2 miles of walking and ab work.
Thursday, July 19, 2018- As soon as I got home from work, I decided to take Phoenix on a walk up Heavenly Hill before I left for my run.
My run plans had me driving down to Mass again to work on the same trail I've been working on since December. With only about 10 miles to go until we completed it, I figured 10 miles total out and back this week and the next would have us completing the trail. That did not go as planned. Hahaha. First off, I left early enough to get there 20 minutes early, but a bad accident in Wakefield, Ma made me about 20 minutes late. Ugh. The description of the trail made it seem obvious, and we had a goal to take the Strava CR for this section. But once we started looking for the trail, we didn't see it. Wtf. It was SO overgrown so we followed what we thought was the trail for far too long before calling it quits and going back. We couldn't even run this part since there was so much brush. Once we got back, we actually found the trail! It was right there!! With trail markers. What dopes. Yay! So this time we could run until about .1 miles when we hit more overgrown stuff. My running companion really LOVES ticks so he also loves this section through the brush. Haha. Ok. So he actually said he was turning around. I told him he couldn't be a quitter, but he stopped just shy of major boggy area. To prove it was fine and that we could get through it, I went on ahead...about 5 yards. All of a sudden this fucking grass shit was stuck to my legs like tape. As I tried to move through it, I was pretty sure it was ripping my skin off. OMG. Annnnnd...that's when I called it quits, too. Haha. We gave it a good .7 mile try. At this point we had been either walking, bushwhacking or running for about an hour and just said fuck it and went to a bar in Attleboro instead. Haha. We could have just crossed Rt 1 to run in Gilbert, but I was over it. We also could have paid more attention to the map to see that we could have skipped this whole bog section by taking the road around to where it connected to the Wrentham Town Forest, but whatever. By the time we were back to the car, my legs felt like someone had poured gasoline on them and lit a match. I still have no idea what this grass was, but it fucked up my legs big time. Haha.
The bar was way more fun than running. I can run any day. Sitting at the bar having adult conversations happens very little despite what I'm sure most people think about me and my beer guzzling habit.
On the way home, I had this need to get off Rt 1 and head over to Revere Beach. I was starving for Kelly's Roast Beef, and I wanted to see the beach. I don't know why, but I hadn't stepped foot on Revere Beach since I lived in Revere in 1999. I've been driving by it for almost 19 years now and never stopped. Tonight was the night. It was so beautiful out and I just needed to smell the ocean. So I made the detour. Found a place to park then walked to Kelly's. Got my sandwich and walked out to the beach. It was perfect evening....and then some motherfucking seagull swooped in and ripped half of my sandwich out of my hand! Hahaha. The rest of it ended up in the sand. I was NOT wasting that sandwich so I wiped off the sand as best I could and finished it off my crunchy sandwich. Fortunately, the seagull only took one half of the bun and not the beef. He brought all of his friends with him, though, so I had an audience as I finished my dinner. Haha.
It was weird walking back and remembering my 22-23 year old self running this strip every day I was home there. I lived in Point of Pines (the north end of the beach) and ran all the way to the south end. I could only measure the distance with my car then, and it came out to 5 miles round trip. I loved living in Revere. It was my first home in New England. I reluctantly left to move in with Bryan in Brant Rock in Marshfield because he wasn't willing to move in with me in Revere. This was the beginning of my life of following Bryan and letting him dictate everything I did. It made my life more difficult. I now had to commute to Logan airport from the South Shore, and all of my flight attendant friends were left behind on the North Shore. Most of our friends in Marshfield were coke heads. Why I allowed myself to always be the one to give up the things I wanted and make all of the effort, I'll never understand. But it's what has led me to my current trapped situation. Who knew I'd spend 16 years following someone else's life only to wind up in my current dead end? I can't believe that was me. I think that's one of the reasons I waited almost 19 years to revisit Revere Beach. Coming back brought out all of these thoughts and emotions. I want to stop that girl as she's running and tell her to do what SHE wants in life and to never settle.
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| In my innocence before the thievery. |
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| The guilty party |
Friday, July 20, 2018- My indecision on where to run today was made easy when I got the dreaded "You've lost your CR" on Strava. Oh haaaiiiillll no. And it was only by 12 seconds! It was the Baldface Circle Trail full loop. Although I run the Baldface's once every summer, I had only taken the Baldface Circle Trail up once in 2013. I remembered it being steep. I had all 3 dogs with me, and Chill freaked out so bad on the ledges that I pretty much had to drag him up them. Since then, I've always taken the Slippery Brook Trail up. Well, today was the day to revisit the Baldface Trail Loop and take my CR back. Haha.
I decided not to bring Phoenix since she had gotten so hot on our Baldface loop last summer, but just as I was walking out the door and looked back, I saw the tears in her eyes and couldn't not bring her. This would be a mistake because once again, she got too hot. It was so hot out and the sun was beating on the granite. With her being so low to the ground, she was in the worst of the heat. I felt so bad and ended up taking extra long breaks with her along the way up. I brought her water and she drank quite a bit of it. Once we made the summit of South Baldface, she was much better for the rest of the run.
The ledges were steeper than I remembered. No wonder Chill freaked out! This shit was scary! And no wonder I said I'd never take this route up again. And I WILL never take this route up again. Haha. Yikes.
I'll admit that this run totally destroyed me. Between the heat and being out of shape, I was stumbling big time. I knew before I was done that I had to back out of Mansfield and Ragged. If I couldn't do this 9.4 mile run without struggling, there was no way I was doing those races. This run is what sealed that deal for me. I still took back my CR, but not by as much as I thought (And I'm sure it will be taken back from me in no time. And funny enough, right after I wrote that, I got the notification that it was taken...and by my arch enemy, too. Hahaha. She can have it, though. I have no plan to ever go up those ledges again.) With the extra long stops along the way for Phoenix, I ended up putting on an extra 25 minutes onto the run. I always stop on this loop anyway, but usually not that much. But nonetheless, I beat her time by 22 minutes. 2:30:24 moving time for me. 3,480ft of elevation gain. I was trashed. So was Phoenix. It laid me out for the rest of the day. Haha.
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| Poor baby. :( |
Saturday, July 21, 2018- Since Lovell is only a 35 minute drive away, John was able to stay home for this one. Although I knew about this race, I'd never done it. This particular weekend in July has been a traditional race-free weekend for me for years, but I really wanted to get out and do a 5K. And it was cheap! $15! And I still got a shirt. There were donuts and watermelon and AMAZING awards. Go figure! Low entry fee- you get more. Price gouging fee- you get less. Hmmm. Haha.
Anyway, I got to sleep in until 7am which was nice and then leisurely make my way over there. I was surprised and happy to find a group of women here from the Valley! We had a whole White Mountain Milers team. I was glad I had chosen my WMMs singlet for this one. Terry Ballou was there and had won this race numerous times. I knew she would give me a run for my money today. Kim Proulx, Suz Laughlin and Michelle Henley were also there. Even though I've known them for years, I'm still not a part of their group. They often train together and hang out together so I was still somewhat of an outsider which was rubbed in my face when we boarded the bus to the start line. It was like the kid being picked last in P.E.(even though I wasn't that kid; I was always picked 1st or 2nd haha) NO ONE would sit next to me. One woman even walked towards my seat, looked at me then turned around and went back to a different one. I finally got a seat mate when it was the very last seat left on the bus. Wow. I sure felt awesome after that. :( It's not like I smelled or looked unapproachable. I was looking at everyone as they got on the bus wondering if they might sit next to me. Maybe it was the desperate eyes. It certainly couldn't have been the knife across the throat motion I was doing to them all. Haha. Kidding. I swear I had on my best "I'm nice and not competitive at all" face. Oh well. But funny, all I could think was that this was the story of my life. Always the outsider but just on the edge. One foot in the circle.
Once at the start, I lined up in front since I could see some little kids getting on the line. This older but fast looking guy asked me what I planned to run. I said I didn't know (and I really didn't; my legs were JUNK). He said he only asked because all the other women looked afraid of me. Hahaha. This made me laugh. Terry moved up to the line with me and finally Silas Eastman and another fast guy jumped in. We were off! I found myself immediately 3rd in a pack of 3, Silas and the other guy. At first I was worried since I should never be running anywhere near Silas, but I could feel I was running a good, conservative pace. He looked like he was putting in no effort at all. And I would be right. As soon as we hit mile 1 at the base of the one big hill, he took off! 1st mile was 6:15. Actually slower than I'd hoped. Mile 2 climbed a hill and then had a nice bit of downhill as it came though the town square. I got passed by a young kid just as we climbed back up a short hill. We passed his coach who told him to slow down so I passed him back just as we hit the mile 2 marker and the dirt road. 6:12. The last 1.1 miles were all gravel road starting with an ever so slight downhill to a turn around and then an ever so slight uphill before turning back into the park for the finish. I DIED in this mile. 6:35. It seems this is becoming way too common for me lately. A part of it is probably because I was purposely going out fast in the beginning while the tendons weren't bothering me. Plus, like I've said, I've lost all sense of feel in my pacing since this injury so it's really fucked me up. Fortunately, I was still able to pull off the 1st female win. I did end up getting passed in the last mile by the older guy from the start so I came in 4th overall. And once again running pretty much the same damn awful time I've been running 5ks for over a year now. Ugh.19:41. In fairness to myself, I'd trashed myself the day before. My legs were not in top shape. I probably could have run a 19:30 had I had fresh legs. No matter what, I will never be good at 5Ks. I have to look at it as strictly speedwork and just be happy with the effort.
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| Coming into the finish |
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| Terry (2nd), Kim (3rd) and me. |
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| Us with Bernie and Eileen Livingston |
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| I still can't figure out why I had that face. Haha. |
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| Looks like a giant blueberry. Too bad some people can't appreciate wild blueberries. |
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| Did I say sweet? Haha. |
Sunday, July 22, 2018- Slept in pretty late. Woke up to pouring rain. It would rain almost all day so we never really left the house. It was just a good day to stay in and do nothing....well, almost nothing. I was REALLY sore from Baldface run and the race so I decided to skip running and do an hour on the spin bike. I have to admit that it was really nice doing it by the open window listening to the pouring rain. I made John pancakes as he had been requesting for weeks now.
Don Fredrikson stopped by to drop off a portrait of Spot that his boss had experimented with on wood. It came out really neat. I still miss my Spot dog.
Super lazy day. I really can't remember the rest. Haha.
Monday, July 23, 2018- Another zero day for me. And a quiet day at work! This would be two quiet days at work this week with sleep overnight! Yay! I walked 2 miles at work. I got in two ab exercises before getting a 911 call and never went back to finish the workout. Oh well. I'm kind of in a lull with that again anyway. Not sure why I've lost the motivation for that. I'll still do something about 3 days a week, but it's not the usual stuff. I even cancelled my Zuzka Light membership since I wasn't using it, and I can put that $10/month to other things. I know most of her workouts by heart now, so I'm still doing a lot of the exercises, just not the full workouts.
Tuesday, July 24, 2018- I really wanted to get some road miles in and do a "long" run...which sadly is 10 miles. Haha. I felt ok surprisingly, but I also ran at an slow-ish pace. I feel like a broken record when I say I wasn't paying attention to pace, just trying to get in the miles. Between being sick last fall and now, I feel like this is 3rd or 4th time I'm starting back from scratch, although this time is much, much worse. Ran out and back on Ossipee Lake Rd and part of Pequawket. 1:16:35. 7:39/mi pace so not bad, but not good either.
I took John to play mini golf at Pirate's Cove. He had won 4 free games last fall at the 100 Acre Challenge, and we both totally forgot about them, so I figured today would be fun to do that. It actually ended up being really fun. It wasn't crazy crowded. We had to wait a bit between holes, but it wasn't enough to be annoying. I had a really good game going under par with one hole-in-one. Haha. I smoked John, but he still got two hole-in-ones and said that he should technically be the winner because of that. Hahaha. I don't think so. :)
It was pretty hot out so John wanted to go to the lake and swim after so we did. It was actually really nice out there with some clouds and the usual breeze that blows through there.
I went to the Whitaker Woods race even though I had no desire to run. I was actually a little sore and stiff from the morning run by this point and it was SO humid, so I planned to just run a very easy "jog" tonight. Fortunately, Terry Ballou had the same plan so we ended up running it together and just chatting the whole way. It was crazy just how hard the effort seemed at that slow pace. We crossed the line together in 26:08. My first time not being 1st woman, but I was perfectly ok with that. I usually try to sneak away to that I can get back home, but I ended up chatting with a few people for awhile after.
Wednesday, July 24, 2018- Up again for 30 minutes on the spin bike. Definitely liking this routine over the treadmill. Not helping my weekly mileage at all, but I'm fine with that. Not a crazy busy day. Had a few calls in the afternoon while I was working with my supervisor as a partner. His driving scared the crap out of me; I'm surprised he hasn't gotten into an accident with the ambulance yet. Just terrible and unnecessary. We each teched a call and had a fire alarm. When my regular partner got back, we had no more calls and slept all night.
I got in a shorter than usual walk and did ab work so the day wasn't totally just sitting on my ass.
Thursday, July 25, 2018- For some reason, I wake up at work on Tuesdays and Thursdays very groggy and puffy. My eyes were so puffy that I was actually having trouble seeing. It was crazy. I already had a run planned for the afternoon, but when I got home, I actually went out for a slow 3 miles around my neighborhood just to sweat out some of the water retention. I don't normally like doing neighborhood loops, but I had no desire this morning to get out on the busy road to run. Since the run is hilly and I knew I'd be running hills in the afternoon, I just ran easy. 3 miles. 24:58. 8:17/mi avg pace. 260ft of elevation gain (only adding this so you can see how much gain you get in such a short distance). This definitely worked in sweating out the water, and I felt so much better.
Drove back down to Mass, without hitting traffic this time. Plan was to attempt the section of trail that was aborted the week before, but from the opposite direction and just skipping the overgrown section. The original plan for 10 miles was just going to be too much so I studied the map of the Wrentham Town Forest and found a way to hit the section of the trail we wanted and then take a shorter route back. And for once.....it all went according to plan!! I think this was the first time we didn't go the wrong way nor had trouble following the trail...even though parts of it were a tad overgrown. The best part was the blueberries which only I ate. WTF. So many blueberries to be eaten and then wasted on wild animals and birds instead! Sacrilege! Hahaha. This section of trail had 3 rocky summits with the final one having a decent view north. It was hazy, but you could just make out the Pru and the Hancock in the Boston skyline. You can't see them at all in my photos, though. Best selfie ever....
It was pretty hot and humid so the run was at an easy pace. I'm usually the one dragging behind so it was nice to run a pace where I could keep up and still talk at the same time. Haha. 5.2 miles total in just over an hour. Then it was off to the bar for a few drinks before I headed back home.
No stops this time since I wanted to get home at a decent hour. Had to work the track the next morning, and I knew I was walking into a fiasco for that. I should never have asked my manager which truck to use. Should have just grabbed the only extra truck in service when I got home and brought it down the next day. But don't listen to me. I don't know what I'm talking about...EYEROLL. I was asked to come in early by driving completely out of my way to the North Conway Base to pick up A3 to bring down to Tamworth for the track detail. I pulled A3 out of service on July 4th for smoking, burning brakes that was most likely a seized caliper. It was supposedly fixed until this afternoon when someone brought it back to North Conway from the track and it all of a sudden had the same brake issue. It was so bad, she actually thought it was going to catch fire. OOS. My manager knows about this, but again, tells me to drive it down to Tamworth the next morning. I refused. I said the only truck I'm going out of my way for is A7, the only extra truck in service. HE refused. So I basically wrote back I wasn't picking up any truck. Not my problem. I was showing up at the Tamworth base in my personal vehicle at my scheduled time just as I'm supposed to...more to the story.
Friday, July 26, 2018- Woke up early to get in a run before the track. This is one of the reasons I actually like working the track on Fridays instead of Thursdays. I get a day off in between the shifts and time to run in the morning. I had the 1500m race the next day so I didn't need to do anything crazy this morning so I just ran a loop from home through Conway Village and back via Cranmore Shores. 4.6 miles in 35:13. 7:38 avg pace. It would have actually been faster, buuuuuutttt, I had "issues" in the last 1.6 miles. Haha.
Showered then headed off to Tamworth knowing full well I was about to walk into a shit show. We had no truck for the track. The perfectly good truck was still sitting in North Conway. In an effort to keep me from grabbing it, our manager was trying to put a broken one back in service on Thursday night. The best part? He actually ended up in said truck on an early 911 call this morning since he happened to be there. Truck basically died and couldn't get up the hill to the patient's home. Conway Ambulance ended up having to take the patient instead. Now there was no truck. I love it when I'm right. So I asked him why I couldn't bring down A7. His reason? Because he wanted to keep a back up truck in North Conway so as not to have Conway Ambulance cover us if we needed a second truck. He didn't want to give them the satisfaction of having to take a call for us. Well, didn't that just fucking happen this morning? Duh. Plus, we don't even have a back up crew unless someone just happens to be available and hears the tone. And, also, he just risked the $2000/day the company gets by doing the track detail just to save face. So Ernie and I ended up taking his personal truck up to the track which does not cover the contract at all. Ugh. So embarrassing, but fortunately Mike knows us and that it's not us who are the problem. I told him flat out that we did have a truck that we could have used but that we weren't allowed to bring it. I wasn't going to be a part of that lie. One of our 911 trucks did show up an hour or so later to sit with us until a truck from our southern NH base was brought up for us to use. But wtf. How incompetent can you be? And oh my god, just as I'm writing this, my Monday partner texts me and says to look at today's Conway Daily Sun....
Area Towns Concerned About Ambulance Service
Some of this has to be taken with a grain of salt, though. Mike Dow has a conflict of interest because he WANTS Tamworth to use their own ambulance and will put our trucks in service even when we've done nothing wrong. Plus, he treats with us with disrespect on every scene I've ever been on with him. That being said, the complaints about contract violations are 100% truth. They all happened. They're constantly happening, but they're just not getting caught most of the time. At least I can say that I personally am NOT guilty of any violations. I do my job. I'm out the door immediately for 911s. I show up for work. Jeff and I were the only employees on last Wednesday who completed a monthly truck check (and PROPERLY). It took us 3 hours. 3 other crews (6 people) failed to do their job with no repercussions. I'm not one of the incompetent employees here, but unfortunately, that doesn't matter. I'm lumped in with it all, and I hate that. When I started here, Will Riley ran a tight ship. I was trained properly and you didn't have the option to slack off. That was 7 years ago. I don't think we have any downhill left to fall at this point. The one good thing is that I work one 24 in North Conway where we rarely have issues with Fire and Rescue, and I've known most of those guys for years. But damn, I hate being associated with this shit. Oh well.
Anyway, sorry about that added blabbity blah, but it had to be addressed since it literally came up just as I was complaining about the company. My only issue with the article is that it fails to address the conflict of interest with those Tamworth Rescue members and how they treat us with disrespect on scene in front of patients. Oh the small town politics are definitely exciting, though. Haha.
Ok. So the day at the track was very uneventful. The truck we got from Careplus South had over 447,000 miles on it, but it was actually a much better truck than some of the ones we have. It drove great and the A/C worked really well on high idle. So I spent half the day in the back in the A/C after it got too hot outside under my umbrella.
We actually got out 3 hours early which was awesome. I could have run more or gone to the Friday Night Vertical Race, but with the 1500m the next day, I decided to just do an ab workout...or at least I attempted to. Something thwarted my initial attempt.
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| Sorry for the degrading to women shirt. Haha. |
Since I had backed out of the Mansfield Double Up, I decided to go back to Holy Cross in Worcester for another go at the 1500m. I knew I could run it faster than 3 weeks prior and really needed to prove that to myself. Unfortunately, I forgot to factor in the difference in weather between the two races that would play a role in today's race.
John didn't seem to mind going to this one since we didn't have to leave super early. He slept the whole way anyway. When we got there, I made sure to snag one of the shady spots on the side so that John and Phoenix would be good to hang out in there. Emer O'Donoghue brought John another bag of clothes for John. I love her!
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| On the drive down |
After a warm-up with Barb McManus, I headed over to the track with my race gear and found everyone. We moved to the shade to wait until we were called.
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| Me, Barb, Jim Pawlicki and Kim Gordon |
The beautiful cool, dry weather from 3 weeks prior had been replaced with a hot, humid day. The heat radiating off the track was insane. I realized then that the time I hoped for (sub-5:10) might not happen today. I just hoped that the faster women in front of me would pull me along to something better than the 5:15.69 I had run at the first race. When it was finally time to start, we exited the shade and lined up. The heat was pretty atrocious so I just hoped for the best.
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| Nancy, Emer, Barb, Kim, Sharon, Jennifer, me, Apryl and the one person on the line I didn't know. |
It's funny looking at this photo since only 2 people on the line actually look like they run track. Haha. As soon as the gun went off, we fell right in line with the seeding. I could tell the first girl was going pretty easy so I wasn't too worried that I was hanging with her and Apryl.
I immediately noticed the effort today was much harder than 3 weeks ago. I felt like I was trying twice as hard, but I vowed to hang with the first two for as long as I could. We hung together for the first 2 full laps before the 1st girl made her move. Apryl started to follow, and I just hung on to the pace I was running as best I could. By the last lap, the first girl had gaped us by a lot, and Apryl had fallen back just a bit. I would still finish 4 seconds off of her despite my best effort to close the gap. I was psyched to see I'd run faster as planned. It wasn't the time I wanted, but I couldn't complain at all. 5:13.65. Just over 2 seconds faster. My 3rd place was helpful since it meant more points for the ATR scoring, but unfortunately, with so few participants, I only got 88 points. Grr. Oh well. Full Results
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| We were all pouring in sweat post race. |
After a 3.8 mile cool down with Jim and Barb, I decided to take John to lunch at the Brew City Grill in Worcester. We can't eat out as often as we used to, but he was starving so I decided today was the day. This place was pretty good. A good beer menu and food. I think they thought we were crazy to ask to sit outside, but under the umbrellas it was nice. I didn't really want to sit in freezing cold A/C inside. I hate that. There are times I love A/C, but if I can sit outside comfortably, I'll choose that instead. John was super happy, and we had a great time.
We went home from there with only a stop at Trader Joe's on the way. Since I had dragged John to a race, the rest of the day was his to do what he wanted. I took the dogs over to the Albany Town Forest for a short walk before a thunderstorm rolled in.
Sunday, July 29, 2018- Slept in since I could. Haha. I really wanted to get in some miles today, but I had no desire to do it on the road so I put together a trail run from home that would take me on some trails I hadn't run on in a couple of years. These aren't actual official trails but something that someone else discovered and told me about in 2014. I'd done them all many times but never from home and never all of what I did today at once. I guessed it would be 11-12 miles. The first part would be mostly on dirt road through the Coleman's pit again then up onto the trails to B&M Ledge first. It was so humid that I was dripping sweat when I got up to the ledge. I didn't stay long before I moved on over to Whitton Ledge.
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| B&M Ledge view |
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| View from the ledge of Whitton Pond and Mt Chocorua |
From here I backtracked on the long downhill back to the Coleman Pit before taking Ledge Pond Rd out to another "secret" trail that would take me to Boulder Rd in Madison. This trail does see snowmobiles in the winter, even though it's not an official snowmobile trail. I popped out on Boulder Rd right at the Madison Boulder parking and ran down to and around the boulder. It never ceases to amaze me.
I ran back to Coleman's from here and then took a shoot off from the road to Rt 16 for a very brief run on the road just to cross the bridge to the storage units which are right behind my house. I needed .2 miles to make it 11 so I ran my own trails for a loop to finish at 11.1 miles. 1:43:08. 1,271ft of elevation gain. I was most curious as to what the elevation gain would be since I had never put this whole run together before, and of course, Garmin decided to do an update that wouldn't let the Forerunner 220 sync runs. I had to wait until the following day when I got tech support to show me how to force the computer to recognize my watch since the update also messed up its syncing with Garmin Express on the computer. Grr. But anyway, it was an awesome run and one I would do again for sure. It was gross out, but it would have been way worse on the pavement.
After I showered, I took John to Conway Lake to swim. I think we spent close to 3 hours there! He never got out of the water. This 5 year old kid was out there swimming and wanted to hang out with John. I was thinking John might play with him for 5 minutes or so then move on, but no, he played with this kid for over an hour. It was so sweet. I think most 12 year olds would have been annoyed fast, but John seemed to enjoy it. Maybe it's because he doesn't have siblings that it kind of gave him a chance to act like a big brother or something. I don't know, but it was cool to watch his patience with this kid and keep him entertained while his parents got to enjoy a little down time.
So this was supposed to just be a brief catch up post. Sorry! Hahaha. And now, I'm still not caught up! But I'll get last week's post up before this week is over. I will be home a lot this week. Such a rarity. Haha.
I've tweaked my race calendar quite a bit lately. I took a lot of stuff off I had planned, and until the NH 10-Miler, everything except Run 4 Kerri has question marks around it. I might do a local 3-mile race. I've already decided not to do Cigna Elliot, Bobby Doyle or Saunders. I just don't feel like driving or paying for them. There is a trail race in Maine that I'm leaning towards, but I'm not sure whether I'll be able to afford the entry fee yet or not. It's not a high fee, but I'd have to pay for it with my paycheck where most of it goes to my mortgage, and I already have two bills to pay with that check, as well. The hole I'm digging just keeps getting deeper. Fortunately, the 10-Miler is paid for by the team. I only have to pay for maybe 4 more races this year with low entry fees and the 100 Acre Challenge that John and I are going to do together, so that's good. The other 5 I have planned are taken care of by the team or are free entries for me. Thank goodness. Of course the Boston Marathon registration is coming up and since I chose to use my reimbursement check for the spin bike, it doesn't look like I'll be able to afford 2019 Boston after all. I've never really caught up from the brake repairs on the car. I definitely could have chosen Boston over the spin bike, but I feel like the bike was a better decision. Oh well. I'll run it again some day. Qualifying should never a problem for me. Plenty of years left to run it...I hope. Haha.
I just like this song for the "I'm a Mess" part. I'm not in therapy or a user. Hahaha.
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