Friday, December 30, 2011

Yahoo!!!!!

So those of you that have followed my blog (albeit somewhat spotty of late) know that I am a serious runner. Okay not a serious runner as in "I have to qualify for Boston this year" but more like someone who is seriously committed to getting out and trying to run one longer and two shorter runs every week. I do cross training on the alternate days, but that's not what today's posting is about.

I am happy to announce that today, with one day to spare, I met a goal for myself that has been a work in progress for all of 2011. Namely that I have run 1,200 miles this year or an average of 100 miles per month! I am so proud of myself!

This started out the year as a goal to run 1,000 miles for the year. For the first part of the year this seemed like a reasonable goal for myself. But as the months rolled along, I realized that my monthly averages started bumping up closer and closer to the 100 mile mark. They never actually hit that point, but they were certainly getting closer to it. So, about September I started readjusting my goal for the year upward... barring injury, and pushing myself just a bit, 100 miles/month was within my reach. Keep in mind, I'm only tracking my running miles... not my cross training day elliptical or walking miles. I figured although those miles ultimately help my running, they aren't actually running, so I didn't want to co-mingle the two.

December has been a little nerve wracking, mileage-wise. Even at the end of November, I was only at 98+ miles for an average, so that meant that December had to be better than 100. Yikes! Since October and November had vacations, a little back tweak and a little illness, those months did nothing to help my overall miles, plus the fact that most of my long runs have gone from 12+ miles to 13+ miles in the last few weeks all combined to make me cautiously optimistic heading into this month.

It's all come down to the last couple of weeks. At the beginning of last week, I still had 43 miles to knock out. By the beginning of this week I had whittled it down to 26+. For those of you keeping track, for me, that's one 13 mile run and two 6.5 mile runs or some similar combo. Well, today, I did 8 miles and popped myself up over my mark. I officially am at 1,202.0 miles! I am so happy, I feel like I need to do something to celebrate this long-term goal, but I'm not sure what. I'll have to think on it and let you know what I come up with...

Of course, now that 2011 is nearly over it's time to move on and start looking to 2012. After all, as the saying goes, there is no rest for the weary! Okay, not really weary, just a little stiff and sore from time to time!

Today's Run
8.0 Miles
1:28:57
5.40 mph
11:07 pace

Thursday, December 15, 2011

Me: Missing in Action

Yeah, okay, I admit I haven't been keeping up on my blogging very well of late. As much as I'd like to fancy myself a fabulous multi-tasker, sometimes my days just get away from me and I crawl into bed realizing that yet another sun has set without me logging in to keep you all apprised of what's going on in my life, with my weight and with my running.

Well, I am happy to report that earlier this week, I hit the 90 lbs down mark. I'm not sure why, but to me, 90 seems so much more than 80. Yeah, 80 is pretty incredible, but I guess the 90 means that the big century mark is just around the corner (sort of) and it's seeming like it might, just maybe, one day become a reality for me. Alas, my hormones and water retention are wreaking havoc on this fabulous 90 lbs landmark here, later in the week, but that's something that all of us girls have to deal with and I'll just keep in mind that this water weight too shall pass.

As for my running, I am happy to report that I have been keeping up on my miles. Most weeks I shoot for between 25-27 miles over the course of 3 run days. I'm still doing cross-training on alternate days and I'm actually working a little on building my upper body strength... a least a little bit. I don't know if anyone else experiences this, but my arms ofter get really tired when I'm running. I can try to shake out the tension, but that only goes so far. Mostly, they're just pretty achy by the time I'm done. I'm hoping that doing a little more upper body work will help remedy this situation.

What has been sucking up a lot (most) of my time lately has been my own modest attempts to make a little additional cash via eBay. I have set up my own resale store that focuses mostly on clothes, but I have a few crafting items and DVDs there as well. My DH would like to add books & CDs to the mix eventually, but that means that he has to conquer his own mult-tasking issues... so maybe sometime after the holidays this will happen.

The cool (and hopefully relevant) part of this eBay venture for those of you out there is that one of the areas I have been trying to focus my efforts in clothing resale is to find running & athletic wear that is in fairly good shape and offer it up at reasonable prices. When I was doing a lot of shopping for resale athletic wear myself I really struggled to find items that were in good shape AND that were affordable. So, now that I'M the one doing the reselling, I get excited whenever I find a cool piece that I can offer.

Of course, even more than workout gear, I have lots of regular everyday clothes too. I try to find a selection of items, including quite a few plus sizes because I remember what its like to be frustrated because I could never find anything at the resale shops for me. Anyway, for those of you interested, you can check out my (tiny) little corner of the eBay world here. I will also put the link on my links page for future reference.

Now, the next challenge is to master the multi-tasking just long enough to get the rest of my Christmas shopping done... Wish me luck!

Today's Run
7.0 Miles
78:10
5.37 mph
11:10 pace

Tuesday's Run
7.95 Miles
90:19
5.28 mph
11:22 pace