That elusive Marathon.... by Res

Some of you might think how come a marathon is elusive, you either sign up to do it or you don't. Well, here is a little story of my first full marathon on fresh legs (thats for another entry) that when I think is going to happen it doesn't.

It all started last year, we had finished our Austin 70.3 Ironman on October 28th, and after talking to our coach on the weeks prior to it (even prior to our crash) we had decided we were going to do the Dallas Marathon. What I didn't count with was that I was going to return from Austin with somewhat of an injury. My foot got swollen and really hurt, but after x-rays, dye CT-Scans and doctors nothing was wrong with it. By the it was already almost thanksgiving so there was no way for me to do that since the marathon was on early December. Felipe had thought of doing it but we had decided to wait to do it together as we always try to do things together. Even though we start together and 90% of the time don't finish together, just the fact of knowing he is around on the same course makes me feel like he is closer than if we was home or simply somewhere at the finish line waiting for me (it happens to him too). So we decided we weren't going to race after all.

Dallas Marathon Registration

A few months go by and we do our first ironman, yes it included a 26.2 mile run but since we seem to be doing things backwards, as we did a 70.3 half ironman before we did just the 13.1 run by itself, it seemed appropriate that we would do the 26.2 mile run after we did the 140.6 full ironman. We then signed up back in June or July (can't remember when) and we were all ready for our "running" season to start and be only running for a while. We started the training and I was called to serve our country with the Public Health Service in December. Guess what... The weekend of the marathon!!!. I love to serve our country don't get me wrong but thanks to our lovely shutdown a few weeks ago, they pushed my trip to December since November was out of the question. We were training, and to keep Felipe company on his long runs I continued training however was a bit bummed that I wasn't going to run it. Felipe will be running it while I keep track of him online and wait for him to tell me he finished his first full marathon. :(. It is a bittersweet feeling, while I'm proud of him for pushing his limits and wanting to do it alone, I am still sad I won't be able to do it with him, on top of losing the $100 registration fee.

Anyways... That's the story of my elusive marathon, not sure now when I will do it, next year we have to be smart with our training and racing since we are officially signed up for 2x140.6 distances, IronMan Arizona and Challenge USA (Atlantic City), don't want to be putting more than we need to as we know running a marathon will probably set us back on our progress since recovery probably take from our already busy training schedule.

Bourbon, running, and more running

Looks like its been a while since our last post. Life has been really busy lately. Besides work and normal life seems like we've been doing a whole lot of running lately. Just to share a bit of what we've bee up to here it goes.

Us and Marker's Mark Distillery

My legs... 

Two weeks ago we did the Bourbon Chase relay run, Res actually did a recap of the weekend on her brand new blog and you can read a bit about here. It was our anniversary weekend so we had a blast. Prior to that, we had been just keeping a low profile focusing on work stuff, house projects before the holidays and also trying to put our running miles for the Dallas Marathon coming up in December.

@ the races... breakfast of
champions

Peace - Love and Bourbon

Well, at the Bourbon Chase we put in 23 and 24 miles respectively, and it was a ton of fun. Her recap covers all the weekend highlights. Definitely something to do again, maybe once a year or every other year, planning takes a toll and the traveling it's pretty tough on your body too. Those start and go every couple of hours get you stiff.

Res smiling to the finish line

Morning shot

Anyways, a couple of months ago, not sure what I was thinking, maybe wasn't thinking, I had signed us up for the No Limits Half. The idea was to do a half marathon in the middle of marathon training. Well the idea sounded great at first, maybe no such much as we got back from Kentucky. We still got some massages done and put in some runs during the week, one was an actual race the Friends of the River party on the plaza 6k. They actually helped get the legs going from that stiffness. We got ready for our half marathon on Saturday October 26th. Funny to say now that in reality it didn't get much prepping, get out race belts and bibs, shoes, hydration , a couple gels and called it good, off to another training run. Didn't have many goals, we knew pulling a goal to beat our PRs was a long shot, we were still sore. Morning was cold, but perfect to run. I set off to do a 1:45 potentially, but wouldn't be disappointed if I had a 1:50 or something like that. I was doing great with a girl who pretty much kept me on pace for the 1:45 but at mile 8 or so my hamstrings and hip flexors were starting to bug me, not cramps just a little pain from the soreness, I had to pull back from the 1:45 pace and ended up right behind the 1:50 pacer, happy with my 1:51 (still a PR). Res came in at the 2:07, she looked so strong coming in that we could hardly see pain, but there was some. Not a PR on her end but still she did pretty good. Like we said, considering that we put in 45 miles in the lapse of a week it was a good day. Surprisingly enough, we weren't that tired after that... I even came back to mow the yard :) didn't let the lactic acid build up.

not a bad day afterall

Sunday there was a local Tri here by the house and we had some teammates doing it so we went and cheered with JayJay, was actually fun to cheer! it's our way of giving back to our great Tri friends and Tri community.  

A little of what I've been up to at work... yes OSU's Bullet

Last week we took it easy, legs needed a break from running and it was time to catch up on work stuff.  Not much running until we hit the weekend. We had 16 miles (2:20) on the schedule and I ended up with 14.7... Thought doing a route that seems to be easy on the bike was a good idea...errrrr not so much. All I can say is the out and back was boring but at least I knew what I was getting into. Needles to say I was done after that. I'll add that painting, moving furniture and doing house work the day before wasn't the best idea to prepare for a long run but life goes on and we have a life after all. That's something we've always had clear, we don't let our Tri/running life get in the way of our normal life. We still have to do home projects, work to pay the bills (and races) and really it's the balance to our life. That's the trick, managing that balance of doing it all without going too crazy on the workouts. 

Now we have only 5 weeks til Dallas marathon and training is going well, plan to recover! get the legs stronger and hope for the best! the sub 4:00 goal might still be reacheable I have to be smart about it and plan it well, but sticking to that plan and not get too excited on that day. 

Til then... Take care and be safe!