Chug-along-chica!

Well, I am overwhelmed by all the support I got for my race on Saturday.  Thanks, guys! 

I was a little sore this morning from the race--mostly in my quads and my obliques.  Hopefully I will be able to keep up with Christine tomorrow!   32:30 for a 5K with splits of 10:33, 10:44, 10:19, and :58.  Rather poky, but it was a pretty good effort for me.

So about my experiment last week--going without sucrose and white flour...  I was able to survive fairly well.  Every once in a while I would end up skipping a snack just because I couldn't find anything to eat, but for the most part, I felt fine and not really deprived or anything.  (Thank goodness I could still eat cheese--my one dietary consolation!) I was successful on all the days except Saturday at sticking to the food plan.  Saturday I drank a whole bottle of gatorade after the race, then succumbed to the temptation of pizza later that day.   I'm still not sure if I will be able to do this permanently, but I am going to try another week of it.   The scale showed a 4 pound difference after one week(!) although I'm sure a lot of it is just a difference in water retention.

1.2 miles later with the double jogging stroller. 

5K with Christine.  Splits of 10:19, 9:57, 10:04, and :52.  I slowed us down on the last mile with a side stitch.  Probably because Christine was making me laugh.  Fun times. 

What a difference an hour of sleep makes!  This past week I've been going to bed around 9:30 and waking up feeling really refreshed and ready to go.  Then last night I just went to bed at 10:30.   This morning was death!  How ridiculous.  I still got 7 hours, and I never used to even get that much.  But I think I'm a little more in tune with my body, and 7 hours just does not feel good.

2 more miles with Holly in the PM.

You guys are not going to believe it!  This morning is was feeling a little bit frisky.  Well, that's not quite true...more like I was feeling quite grumpy when I got up.  So I decided to do just one mile at 5K pace in the middle of my run.  My legs really liked the feel of the tempo mile.  Very smooth.  I didn't really start feeling the pace until about a third of a mile in.  Anyway, at the end of the mile I was hoping to see 8:15 or below.  (I was a little skeptical because I was afraid the lack of "race day magic" would slow me down.)  Anyway, it was 7:46!!!  That is the first time I've run below 8:00 since I was 17 years old!!!   I'm so happy...no more grumps today! Then I finished the rest of the 5K nice and slow with Sparky.

A funny thing about running that tempo mile...I reminded myself of this guy at the race on Saturday.  He was breathing REALLY hard and letting his air out with a loud "CHoooooo  CHoooooo" like a train or something.  I had a really hard time not turning around and telling him to Be Quiet!  ...tryin' to concentrate here.  But I guessed that if he was pushing that hard, he was going to drop behind soon, and he did.   But today I probably could've woke up the neighbors with my breathing...but at least I wasn't chewing on the air and sending spit flying everywhere with each breath.

2.2  just below 10:00 pace with Christine and then she had to go. (I didn't exactly complain that it was shorter, though, I was GLAD to stop today.)   My tummy was complaining about the half a bucket of movie theatre popcorn I ate last night.  *Blush*  It's funny, greasy popcorn doesn't usually bother me.   But since I've been eating really well these last couple weeks (from a nutritional standpoint, anyway) I've noticed my tummy is starting to have more of an opinion about the less healthy stuff.  Jeez, give it an inch and it takes a mile!

1.5 With my boys--pushing the jogging stroller.

Driving to St. George.  A little bit of cross-training?  I did the rock wall at the expo with Callzee.  She is a brave little chica.  It scared the heck out of me, but I did it.

Early morning run with Michelle and Mik'l.  This was one of the highlights of the whole St. George experience for me.  They are so fun to talk to, and the pace was just right.  Made me wish we could run together more often. 

The first half was all gradual uphill, which I was not used to, but then when we came back down, I felt like I was flying.  Nice. 

It was so amazing to watch the marathon and see all the amazing PRs!  I had never really understood how exceptional the runners on the blog are!  Almost everybody who came in within 20-30 minutes of the winner was a blogger or a good friend of a blogger I met a the dinner (like Brett).  I was really proud of James for taking 43 minutes off his time after only about 6 months of base-building.