Denver

I know I have been absent in the world of blogging and well that is because my hopes and dreams of running an entire half marathon were shattered with the news of my injury. I have been taking it easy and only doing small 3 mile runs lately to just test thing out and so far I have been good to go. Pain but nothing outrageous like before. I had decided that I am not built for running 5 days a week and that 3 day of running with cross training would be best for me. I have also been lacking on the blogging because I have not been working out everyday like I wanted to so I had fallen off the wagon of exercise... ish (three days a week aka not enough time in the gym). and was feeling totally bummed because my Denver trip was coming up and that was the day i was supposed to run my half marathon.


So last week on Thursday I hopped on a plane to head to the mile high city. I am not such a good flier so I always stop into the bar for a little bit of courage. Here is a picture of my courage of choice ( 20oz beer and Crown Royal on the rocks) and my drinking buddy ( no judgment there).

I got off the plane was greeted by my nephew and my sister who made the short..ish trip to the airport to come pick me up and then we headed back to their place about 25 mins outside of Denver. At this point I am just a supporter of this half marathon and I get to enjoy this much needed vacation. As I am riding in the car with my sister she begins to tell me the farthest she has gone in her training is 8 miles so I begin to start thinking if she is going to do this then I can. I mean I know I can't RUN it but who's to say I can't walk and run, walk and run the darn thing. So now she's got me thinking......

The next morning I wake up to my precious little nephews trying to get their Aunt out of bed with their silly faces of course I made them smile once too. We headed out to get a cupcake at the cupcake store and then off to the arcade and bowling I will have you know I was the big winner I bowled a 161 ( a score I will probably never duplicate or come close to again in my life). We head back to the house and wait for all the other to arrive. My mom and her two friends are also joining in on the 13.1 mile madness. I am now watching everyone printing out their release forms and talking about corral numbers and I decide well heck might as well giver
NOw that the whole crew has arrived and I have decided to take on this challenge (UNDER TRAINED) I do what all run walker do to get ready..... A hay maze with my nephews!!


Well with that complete and one cup of coffee down it is time to head into Denver and pick up packets and meet up with the last member of the team.

When the directions to packet pick are go inside the building with the big bear they were not kidding. This is where we'd be meeting up with the last member of the A squad Jamie (who by far is no rookie runner The Denver half was her 11th of the year I believe). As for most of us this was our first time doing the rock and roll half marathon so we took picture and tried to get as many free thing as possible. My sister and I made out like bandits.

Now for the pre race day tradition
It was game time and well I trapped on my shoes and went for it i walk the majority of the race because I had not run in 6 weeks but the walking was wearing on me so I did about a 4 mile running portion and then ended with a hellish mile of running. All in all it was a great event and I had fun but was not able to reach my goal but I did finish :)

tried again

Just 2 miles tonight with a 2o mins row workout after but I just wanted to see how the foot would hold up and so far so good. For you runners out there when you take time off and you come back your first run always feels great you feel like you could run forever but then the next time you go out two days later it not quite as easy as it was the first time. There are always good days and bad days with running but I am just happy to be back putting some miles on not many but still more then I have ran in the past 4 weeks. My sister has now started training too so it is fun to have a buddy. Although we can't run together because I think one of her strides is about one and a half of mine. She is making great time on her runs so we could start together then she can stretch, drive home and put dinner in the oven by the time I am wrapping up a run. It is nice to have someone that is training anyway. I think she will be happy when I can go more then 4 miles again:). Off to bed this girl has got to get her beauty rest.

-RR-