Another day Another mile

Well the final long run of my marathon training plan has come to an end, it actually came to an end a couple of days ago but a little thing called life got in the way. I must say, I might actually miss running 20-21 miles a time. There's just something very therapeutic about being outside for 2 1/2 hours and the only thing you hear is the pounding of your feet on the pavement or the shuffling of rocks under every step along a gravel path; and how can I forget the sounds of the Broad Ripple homeless people yelling at one another or 2 Butler girls speed-walking with their Chanel sunglasses and talking about the upcoming Sigma Chi party. I finally got my Chicago Marathon Confirmation Ticket in the mail yesterday and thats when it all kinda hit me, my race is less than 3 weeks away! I'm feeling damn good about it though. While I didn't follow the plan to a "T" nor did I get in the number of long runs that I should've, after Sundays run, I'm more confident than ever that I will hit my goal in Chicago.

Lauren and I were both supposed to get 20 miles in so we figured we'd do it together and get it over with. The first 10 miles felt great for both of us, we were doing 7:30 splits and were feeling good. Although at the halfway point Lauren said she still hadn't found her "groove". For the 2nd half of the run we slowed the pace to about an 8:15 mile. Althought I would prefer to do the oppsite, go slow then pick up the pace, I wanted to simply get in the miles and feel great afterwards. It certainly did work though, around mile 18 I realized I felt as good as I did at mile 5. Although we did take several quick walking breaks, I feel like I would've felt great regardless, especially after what I was feeling the past few days. The days leading up to the race, my legs were completely shot. Between running a 6:40 split for 9 miles on Friday afternoon, followed by the Jason Mraz concert, standing up at work all day on Saturday then going to the Indy Jazz Fest afterwards, my feet were killing me. I thought the run would've been brutal. But for whatever reason it wasn't. After my 20 mile run last week, I was shot. I got home and wanted to do nothing more than lay my sweaty, salty ass on the floor. This time, I had no problem hopping in the shower to head to my friends for the Colts game.

Although I could probably say that I do love running now, I'm still not 100% convinced that the marathon is for me. I'm obviously still going to do Chicago and most likely other marathons in the future, but every ounce of me missed juggling swimming, biking and running. True, getting up at 4:45 to go swim is one of the worst thing in the world but getting to work at 8 am and knowing that you're already done with your morning workout is an awesome feeling. I like to look at it as squeezing 25 hours into a day because it's so frecking early that once you're done swimming, THEN you can start your day. It probably doesn't make sense but training for triathlons doesn't make sense either. I won't get into why I do triathlon too much though, I'll save that for another day.

Until now, I'm hanging up the hat on this entry...running 20 miles was easier than writing this damn thing. Maybe I'll come back and write some more...probably not though.

PRs, rain and sand... lots and lots of sand

Lauren's PR
So when I started this blog I didn't ever want to write two posts within the same day because I didn't want the readers to get used to reading something new every day or so then quit reading when I would skip a few days...but I had quite the fun filled weekend that I wanted to share.

It all started on Saturday morning at 5:30 am. Lauren decided 24 hours earlier that she wanted to run the Indianapolis Womens half-marathon as a training race for the Marine Corps Marathon she has in October. Well 4 months prior she ran about a 1:55 half marry and is in much better shape so she was aiming for about 1:45. If she could do that then she would be in the top-10 in her AG and top-50 OA. Well she was feeling great that morning and really had high hopes for the race. The race started and since I really don't spectate these days, I didn't really know what to do. So I walked around, drove the car to a better parking spot and walked to the race finish.

The winner passed by and finished in about 1:16, a very respectable time. 1:30 rolled around so I started to keep my eyes peeled for her. I have much more respect for the friends and family who come watch me race, its quite boring I must say. At 1:38 I spotted her, 6 minutes above goal pace! She passed by and finished in 1:39! To go from a finishing time of 1:55 to 1:39 in a matter of months is remarkable. I was blown away, but at the same time, I wasn't too surprised. She is incredibly dedicated to her running and has slowly been getting faster every week. I must say, its quite sexy when girls are dedicated to fitness and running, it shows a lot about their character.

Lauren looking strong with 100m to go 

Dukes of Hazzard

So my training plan also called for a 13 mile run on Sunday morning. After a shitty night of sleep due to whatever reasons, I slept in until about 9:30 and then saw that the forecast called for rain all day, 70% chance until noonish then 95% chance after that. As much as I wanted to run on Monday when the conditions are better, I kept reminding myself that if I waited for the conditions to be better for everything else in my life, I wouldn't get anything done (write that down). 

So I filled up some water bottles, loaded up the bike for Lauren to once again play sherpa and off I went for the run. Throughout the entire run, as much as I wanted to push a little harder to beat Laurens time, I knew I just had to go at an easy 8 minute/mile pace. I also never got into my running "groove". I usually start to feel really good at about mile 3 but that never kicked in. My legs felt heavy and I was just all-around struggling. Around mile 10 is when Hurricane Issac let loose on my run. It was pouring but I had no choice but to keep running. Well I was on the home stretch, mile 12, and I was running right in front of a McDonalds in Broad Ripple (for all my Indy readers). I saw a car was pulling out and kept my guard up but they stopped so I figured they saw me. Well I was about 5 feet away from the car  and I was going at about a 7:15 pace. But the damn car started to pull out! I knew that with the wet roads and my tired legs that I couldn't stop on a dime so I did what I've always wanted to do. I leapt up, and slid across the hood of the car on my ass, just like Bo Duke woulda done. I miraculously landed on my feet and kept running... like a boss. I probably scared the crap out of the driver as they probably thought they drilled me. I've always wanted to do that, and finally made it happen. 

I was wearing much less clothing and probably less graceful though.

Warren Dunes State Park

September 3rd was my 27th birthday and it just happened to fall on Labor day this year so Lauren had the idea to travel up to Warren Dunes Michigan for the day. We left early on Monday morning and made the 2.5 hour trek north. We didn't have much on the agenda except for laying by the beach and climbing some sand dunes. After stopping at an awesome "mom and pop" type of store for some lunch, we continued on and made it to the dunes. The moment you turn the corner you realize how massive it is. When you're standing on the bottom, you realize how daunting it is. The first thing I wanted to do was to climb to the top. 

After the 1/4 mile trek to the top, we took some great pictures, I climbed a tree like an idiot and we had a long-jump competition where we both looked like idiots. Neither of us cared because we were having so much fun. We then sprinted down the mini-mountain and then spent the next several hours simply laying on the beach and swimming a bit. If you didn't know better, you could swear you were in South Carolina or Florida somewhere. It was simply a beautiful area. 

After exploring a bit more, climbing the hardest "hill" I've ever been up (probably a 30% grade for 1/4 mile in the sand) and me stubbing my toe while texting and walking we decided to call it a day. While on the way home, we were watching/listening to YouTube videos of people making absolute fools of themselves (although not on purpose). While we know its mean and we really shouldn't laugh at other peoples expense, we couldn't help but die laughing. Amongst the laughter, I somehow lost track of where we were and ended up about 30 minutes out of the way, despite letting know that us Feldman's have a keen sense of direction. "That John Denver's full of shit man"-Dumb & Dumber. After smoke blew out of my ears out of frustration I finally calmed down. Although it sucked having to drive an extra 30 minutes, we did pass an Amish family walking down the side of the road at 10:00 at night, so it turned out to be worth it. To top off an already frustrating/long trip back, we tried to stop by 2 different McDonalds to grab a soft-serve ice cream cone but of course both of the ice cream machines were broken. Just our luck. Finally after searching for a McDonalds for almost 2 hours, we finally got out ice cream and it was the most glorious ice cream you could ever imagine.

This past birthday weekend was truly possibly the best I've ever had, and I have Lauren to thank for all of it. Oh... and she got me 2 amazing water bottles as my gift. They are insulated and don't leak at all. I've wanted them forever, yeah...I'm a dork like that.

Sorry this is a little random and choppy, I wanted to get everything in without making it obnoxiously long. There were many smaller parts that I wanted to include but that woulda just been boring for anybody that wasn't there. Signing off now, I gotta run 8 miles at 5:15 tomorrow morning with my friend who's going to the 70.3 World Championships in Las Vegas this upcoming weekend. I'll toe the line with her someday... but until then, I'm just a simple spectator.

WIN...NEVER TIE

So today is the day after my 27th birthday, and even though it has passed, I still think I owe it to myself to give myself a present. Now normal people might go to Dairy Queen for a Blizzard, or the mall to get a new outfit and they would say that that is their birthday present to themselves. Well being the triathlete nerd that I am and keeping to a promise to myself...I decided that my birthday present to myself would be to seek out my first sponsor, so thats what I did today. The first sponsor I'm seeking out is LockLaces.

I first wanted to seek them out for one reason and one reason only...their customer service and dedication to constantly pleasing each and every customer. If you're not familiar with LockLaces, they're a replacement to traditional shoe-strings. They're elastic laces that in order to tighten them, you simply have to pull on a sort-of draw-string. They are ideal for triathletes, kids and the physically handicapped. 

Triathletes love them because when they're in T2, they don't have to take the time to tie each shoe; they simply slip their feet in, pull the lock and off they go. Putting their shoes on literally takes 5 seconds, valuable time in triathlon. Kids and the physically handicapped love them because the simplicity of putting on shoes and also they will never become untied.

I decided to seek them out because I've been wearing them for years, but I really took notice a week before my half-ironman in Racine, WI. I had purchased a new pair of New Balance 1400's for my race and knew that I had to get some matching LockLaces to go with. I was supposed to leave on Friday for my race, and on the previous Monday I called customer service and asked them if I had ordered some laces that day, would they get to me in time for my race? The guy on the other end said “yes, certainly”. So I eagerly ordered the orange laces. On Thursday, they STILL hadn’t arrived at my door so I called C.S. again and spoke with Louisa. She explained to me that my order hadn’t been shipped at all due to some sort of mix-up/error. I told her I could go to my local retailer and settle for some boring black or white ones. She then explained how sorry she was and she assured me that she was shipping my order overnight to me in time for me to leave for my race. I put a lot of trust in Louisa…and she came through! I spoke with her at 5pm on Thursday and they arrived at my doorstep at noon the next day, just in time for me to leave for my race! On top of getting to me on time, she also included 8 other pairs of laces for me to share with my friends. Well I met my goal and completed my race, it was an amazing experience. What really stood out to me though was that Louisa knew that I could’ve just “settled” for the off color laces, but she also knew how much I wanted the orange laces and she went out of her way to make me satisfied. That service right there is what makes companies great. I’ve shared that story with many of my friends and family because it was possibly the best customer service I’ve ever received. I want to represent a company that has C.S. at the top of their priority list and LockLaces went above and beyond what I expected. Louisa knew that a small investment would keep me a satisfied and loyal customer.  I want to represent a company that not only has a great product, but they also have the service that backs up their product.

If you haven't checked out them out yet, I would highly suggest ordering some online (www.locklaces.com) or visiting your local running/triathlon/sporting goods store. I purchase a new pair for every single new running shoe I buy and haven't been dissatisfied with their product once. I promist the $10 investment will be well worth it. If you don't believe me, check out any pro triathletes shoe, you won't see a single one with a traditional shoelace.  

Well I turned in my application and explained all the reasons why we should partner together, but I realize I won't know anything for several more months, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed. I know I won't be getting huge paychecks from them, or be flown around the world on their G-6, but this is just one step to taking my passion for the sport to the next level.

"WIN...NEVER TIE"