Miscellaneous musings on January 31

My dad died a year ago today. It's been the toughest year of my life. I think about him and his life and his death every day. I miss him a lot. Thanks again to you all who are supporting me in this marathon quest. I'm really only doing it for him. And to raise money to fund research to find a cure for leukemia and other blood cancers. I. Hate. Cancer.

Today I returned to my beloved treadmill for my three miles. Our weather was a bit iffy this morning and I didn't know what condition the streets were in. Also, I thought a 'kinder, gentler' surface would be better for my shins. They were better today. Still some discomfort. I'm getting them checked out tomorrow. I'm hoping the problem will be solved with some new shoes. A little more ice and some advil after my run and now I'm good to go.

And then there was one! GO TIGERS! Kansas got beat last night, so we are the only unbeaten team in the country. Tigers looked GREAT last night against those scrappy Houston Cougars. GO TIGERS GO!!!

Less than ideal

Boy was it cold out there this morning. Twenty-five degrees. I dodged remnants of last night's wind storm - garbage cans, basketball goals, shingles...

Today was a tough one. My shins were really giving me some fits. I walked quite a bit, but still put in the 3 miles. I was accompanied this morning with some nice musical selections from Lenny Kravitz, The Foo Fighters, and Prince. I iced my shins when I got back inside and that has helped a lot. From what I've read, shin splints are common among beginning runners. I have been researching some stretches that I hope will help me out. I need to get some help from somebody down in PT today. In the meantime, Advil and ice are my friends.

I'm just disappointed with today's effort. But I guess that happens sometimes...

In the fundraising arena, my total is now $775. I'm excited about that. I'm so appreciative of the support that everyone has given me. Was particularly touched by a gift from a friend of my dad's cousin (who I've never even met) and also a gift from a friend of my parents who lost her husband to leukemia just a few weeks ago.

Progress made:
Doing well with my fundraising.

Lessons learned:
Not every run can be perfect.
Do not try to run on treadmill during sporadic power outage. Did that last night while I was working on my iPod. Not smart.

Need to work on:
Getting this shin pain under control
Nike+iPod was a bit better, but needs a bit more attention in the callibration department

My cheering section

I do not think it's an accident that I start this official training almost a year to the day that my dad died, which was January 31, 2007. All of that is, obviously, on my mind this week. But I am blessed with family and friends who have been very supportive. They have gotten me through my dad's illness, his death, and my grief. They are so super supportive of my attempts at this marathon. I have a huge cheering section - and we're not even at the race yet! Y'all are SUPER!

I received a donation from a friend yesterday along with a note that I really think sums all those feelings up.

I've thought for a while about a way for me to remember your Dad this week. I never met him, but I know him -- you know? His life and death really affected me. I still can't really understand all of the dynamics around that, but it did. I just know that I needed to find a way to honor his life.
Anyway, I decided the best way for me to remember him this week is to support something I know he would be your #1 cheerleader for. In my heart, it's my way of honoring him -- and supporting you in your desire to run in memory of him and for a cure.
I just wish that I wasn't such a baby about running and was running with you. I'll be cheering you on and will be one of your faithful blog fans! But no one will be cheering louder than your Dad.
Thanks for letting me be a part of the "1st annual Angie Whitfield runs a marathon" by giving to help find a cure -- and for letting me remember your Dad with you this week.

New running stuff for me!

Today is my birthday! Connie gave me a gift certificate to Breakaway and Mom gave me a gift certificate to Dick's. Looks like more cool running stuff in my future! The kids gave me a gift certificate for a massage and spa pedi. I know I'll be needing that soon!

Jodi gave me this neato Nike+iPod thing that goes with my Nano. It's a sensor that goes on my shoe which communicates with a receiver plugged into my Nano. It tracks distance, pace, calories, time, etc. and shows it all on a red display screen. And there's a voiceover that tells how far you've gone. You can also download all the data to your computer and keep up with your history.

So I tried it out this morning during my three mile run. What I did not do, however, was to calibrate it before I used it. Mistake number two was that I had it set in kilometers not miles. I figured out rather quickly that it wasn't calibrated. At one point, when my little voice man friend said 1.75 kilometers, I said out loud "It HAS to be farther". Then I decided to just focus on the time, rather than the distance and then callibrate it tonight or tomorrow. I ran for one hour and it showed that I put in 2.1 kilometers which is about 1.3 miles. Now, I'm not fast. But I'm faster than that. I may have put in a bit over three miles actually.

It felt pretty good. Had a little discomfort in my shins. Need to find some good stretches and get that taken care of.

Progress made:
Stepped out of my comfort zone a bit with some fundraising yesterday.
Have secured $525 in donations - yea!!
Ran this morning in 'freezing fog'- whatever that is.

Need to work on:
Callibrate my new Nike toy and figure out what else it does.

Lessons learned:
I'm in America. I should always focus on miles, not kilometers.

The week ahead

Realized late yesterday that I've got to do the whole long run thing again this Saturday. And the next, and the next, and the next.....

On the training schedule for this week:

• Sunday - cross train (I worked with Polly Pilates this morning before church. Felt good to stretch.)
• Monday - 3 miles
• Tuesday - rest
• Wednesday - 3 miles
• Thursday - 3 miles
• Friday - rest
• Saturday - 4 miles - group run

Am trying to figure out how I will manage the long weekly runs since my time frame is very limited. I don't mind getting up at 4am, but once the miles start getting larger, I can't be getting up at 2am...... Maybe my pace will be a bit faster by then and it won't take as long. I'm sure it will all work out.

Progress made:
Got out of bed and was able to walk.

Need to work on:
Develop a 3-5 mile route that will keep me in my neighborhood since I'll be doing this at 4am. Just need to be safety conscious. I'm not fast enough to outrun anybody yet. Then again, who is out at 4am....

We're Number ONE!

GO TIGERS!!!!!

I did it!!

First group training long run - DONE!!!! I'm totally psyched right now. This is how it all played out.....

5:00am - Got up. No paper (don't get me started) so I checked news and email online.
6:15am - Took a shower. Not sure why I did this. Struggled with what to put on and how much to put on. Finally decided that the worse thing that would happen would be I would just freeze my tail off and then know better next time. Slather on chapstick. Apparently advised to do in cold weather running. So this is NOT my OCD kicking in here....Decide also to wear my 'relentless' leukemia awareness bracelet that I had worn while my dad was fighting his leukemia. I think I'll do that every run. Will need that motivation down the road I'm sure.
7:00am - Check weather online. I had asked my friend and personal weatherman, Ron Childers, yesterday what the temp would be today at 8am. He said 32 to 34 degrees. Current temp at 7am= 31. One thousand bonus points for him. I'm thinking I will need to get a personal forecast every Friday.
7:15am - Jordan's volleyball coach calls to say today's games have been cancelled because of inclement weather and icy conditions. WHAT!?!?!
7:16am - Turn on TV. Sure enough. Inclement weather policy in effect. Oh dear.

7:30am - Leave. No ice on road. More chapstick. (OCD kicking in HERE)

7:40am - George, my coach, flies by me on Walnut Grove in his little sports car. Weather can't be too bad or he wouldn't be driving his little sports car.
7:45am - Sit in warm car as long as I can.
8:00am - Group gets together in parking lot. More chapstick. Leader tells us to "watch out for black ice on the path". ICE ON THE PATH!?!? Oh my - do I really want to do this? I signed up for some running, not an Olympic luge event. She says we will run 3 minutes and walk 2 minutes. I'm cool with this. Well really I'm just COLD period. The longer we stood there, the colder I got.
8:10am approx - Off we go. I meet Nicole & Jessica. They are also training for San Diego. We all kind of stay in a group.
At this point, I'm very unsure of the time. Passed a marker that said 1 mile. Is that all? I'm wondering if a zero had been rubbed off that sign.... Parts of the trail are covered in ice. I run in the grass part of the time. I'm alternating between walking and running. Nicole & Jessica are gone. Fine with me. Bye. George is sticking with me. I feel like I'm slowing him down. I told him he could go ahead and I'd catch up (or he could come back). He says no, he was fine. More chapstick. I trudge along. My nose was running faster than I was. But I was running. Then walking. Now it's raining or sleeting or something. But then I see it - a marker that says 2.25. Could we be approaching the end? I realize at some point that the run today will be the equivalent of a 5k. How about that?! Then, there we were back at the parking lot. There were about 20 people milling around and George says something like "And the crowd goes wild" -- so they all cheered for me and that felt nice.

There were a few people who came up that must be farther in this training process. One girl asked her coach if she "should put in a few more miles" (what a nut). She also had ICE on her forehead. I'm not kidding.

I DID IT! And on top of that, found out that it was a bit faster than I would have estimated. It was about 40 minutes total. Not bad. I'm not fast anyway. I don't want to be fast. I just want to have continuous movement.

I was back home at 9:00am. Dripping with sweat. Felt like I had been playing in the snow. Like when your body is cold, but hot - at the same time. I was really excited and anxious to share my saga with Jodi and the kids. Jodi looked the trail up on the Shelby Farms website. It looked as long as it felt.

Took a HOT HOT HOT shower. Yum. Then Jodi took us to Sonic for breakfast. I had a sausage burrito. Maybe not the healthiest option. But I was starving. And celebrating.

Progress made:
Did first group run. Three miles. Outside. In less than perfect conditions.
Have sent out many fundraising letters and received some money. Yea!

Lessons learned:
Need to stretch more before (and after!) I run.
Time and distance definitely go faster when you've got somebody to talk to.

My newest obsession

I love this stuff.

Breaking up with my treadmill

Since tomorrow is our 'long run', I thought I would just walk this morning. On my treadmill. I love my treadmill. I'm afraid I'm going to have to break it off with my treadmill. I must start branching out in my running relationships. I will still have to run my treadmill sometimes because some of those runs during the week will be challenging with schedules and kids, etc. So some of the runs will have to be on the treadmill. But I'm thinking most of them need to be in the great outdoors. OUTSIDE. Oh my. I hate to break up with my treadmill. I love him.

I finished up the movie Glory Road this morning. It's a good one. Got a little teary at the end. At one point, I hit some button on the remote and they all started talking in French. Un grande probleme! I was about to settle for English subtitles, but then hit some button that corrected the whole thing and enjoyed the rest of the movie. Good movie. You should watch it.

I'm excited!

Went to the TNT kick-off tonight. Sadly, didn't meet Nicole. Didn't meet anybody else on the San Diego team, although George said the count is now up to EIGHT! Good to hear. I can kind of get lost in a crowd eight maybe.... I did meet our mentor Julie. Not sure what that means really. But I think she is running San Diego too. Or at least going. Probably running.

There were some people there who had done marathons before. And there were some people just like me. Some 'jogger-walker' people.

We picked up our training schedule. This Saturday says "3". I was hopeful that this was THREE MINUTES, but George quickly said it was MILES. Too bad. The training schedule is two pages. The last run at the bottom of page one is April 5 and is 15 miles. I was scared to turn to page two...

I left there very excited. Tonight this whole marathon thing seems very doable.

And then there were two....

Tonight is the kick-off party for our Team in Training. George said there is one other person who is training for San Diego. Nicole. She sounds thin and fast. Guess I'll meet her tonight. We also get our training schedule. Scared about that.

He said on Saturday we will run (or "continuously move") for 45 minutes. I can do that.

Maybe not my cup of Pi-la-TEA

I am supposed to "cross-train" on the off days of non-running. I can barely acknowledge that I am training, much less cross-training. Anyway, the list of suggested activities included swimming, eliptical, Pilates, etc. How hard could the Pilates be? Some stretching, some leg lifts. Plus, it would be easy to just go buy a DVD at Target. Which is just what I did.

It was just a little odd. First of all, the women were laying in this meadow by a little stream in the Swiss Alps or something. I was waiting for Julie Andrews to show up and start singing. I was supposed to find my 'powerhouse' - which I'm not sure what or where that is - and then 'engage it'. Something about my abdomen, pelvic floor and buttocks......

Well, I made it through the DVD. Thirty minutes of stretching and lifting and rolling around on the floor. "inhale...flex....two...up....release.....exhale....three". WHAT??!?!! There were a few minutes where the threat of hyperventilating became very real. I got real messed up on the inhales and exhales. At one point, she said to "push through the thick molasses". I laughed out loud at that one.

I'll try it again. Maybe I'll get better and get the hang of it. In the meantime, I have to find my powerhouse........

Progress made:
Tried new activity.
Starting to send out fundraising letters and email.

Shouldn't he have been able to outrun this?

Read that a Kenyan marathon runner was killed by an arrow during some political unrest. Shouldn't he have been able to outrun that? Here's the whole story.

Just one more excuse that I can add to my list: Can't run because I don't want to be shot with an arrow.

Small Victory

Finally did it. I ran outside this morning! Small victory for me! I wisely did NOT check the temperature before I went out.

I had laid all my clothes out last night - Under Armour tights, shorts, mock turtle Under Armour shirt, thin long sleeve tshirt, sweatshirt, gloves and hat. So I put everything on this morning - felt like I was a kid getting ready to go play in the snow - grabbed my iPod and headed out.

It really wasn't that bad. My face got a bit cold. I could feel myself quickly warming up. Maybe with time I will be able to appropriately layer. Guess you eventually figure that out. Parts of me got hot, but parts of me were cold. Gloves and hat were key.

Found out when I got back inside that it was 28.

And actually, it was a very good run. I had worked on a good cardio mix for my iPod (thanks for the great Christmas gift Jodi!) so that helped a lot. Me and Gwen Stefani at 4:15am....

I feel real good about today's accomplishment.

Progress made:
Ran outside - woo hoo!
Printed all my fundraising letters. Actually have given out two....

Need to work on:
Appropriate layering
Keeping steady pace running outside. Treadmill makes that easy.

Lessons learned:
Get iPod set before I put gloves on.

Still Inside

I'm still a chicken to go run outside. I ALMOST did it this morning. But when I got up, it was 21 degrees. So I went upstairs and ran on the treadmill. However, since we don't keep our heat turned up too high up there, it was pretty cold up there too. And I did most of my run with my hands tucked in my sleeves. I almost put on my gloves. So, maybe that's a start to my cold weather training. Baby steps.

The forecast for this Saturday's first Group Training is rain. Hmmmmmm. I haven't decided if that's worse than cold.

Kind of scared to get this started. Maybe just anxious because it's unknown. What if I'm the only person out there on Saturday who is a non-runner?!

George (my coach) said today that I may be the only person on the Team who has signed up for San Diego. One is the loneliest number.....

I've signed up

Well, it's official. I have signed up and am now a member of the Team in Training for the Leukemia Society. I'm training to run a marathon - that's 26.2 miles folks. The funny thing about all this is that I don't even run. Well, I've been trying to run since September (building my 'base miles' as my Coach George says).... I'm waiting for it to get easy and fun. That has not happened yet. Even wearing cute little running clothes from Dick's doesn't transform one into a runner.

I'm going to run in the Rock 'N Roll Marathon in San Diego on June 1.

My official Group Training (GT) starts next Saturday. I guess that's my rude awakening. I've been doing all my running so far (except maybe three mornings) inside on my beloved treadmill. I love my treadmill. It's INSIDE. With my TV and my ESPN Sports Center and all the other indoor comforts. Sister here will have some issues next Saturday when I'm outside and it's 30 degrees. And I have to run on ground that doesn't move. And there is no cable or dvd player.

Why am I doing this? Am I crazy? Yes, probably so. Several reasons I guess. But mainly for my dad. Funny how the training for this starts a year almost to the day of the first anniversary of his death. And when I gave George a donation in 2004 when he did TNT, leukemia wasn't even an issue in my life. Fast forward 3 years..... So, I was really thinking about whether to do this or not. And was really leaning toward doing it. Maybe I just needed that last little nudge to say YES. One night, I was looking at the race route and found that the finish line is on a Marine Corps base. Daddy was a Marine. Enough said.

But at the same time, I'm raising money for the Leukemia Society. My goal is $4000. Check out my fundraising page at: www.active.com/donate/tntmds/AWhitfi1 I hope you will consider making a donation to support my efforts. Your gift will help find a cure for blood cancers. Or maybe just make a donation because you think I'm nuts for doing this and need to seek professional help. Whatever your reason is, I'm grateful for your support.

So I thought I'd set up this blog. As a new person to running, I wanted to share my thoughts as I hit each milestone and roadblock.

I am committed to crossing the finish line. Vertically - on my feet - not on a gurney or in the poop out van.

Anyway, it all officially starts now. I'm TRAINING FOR A MARATHON. yikes.