Wine and Dine Half Marathon Training Begins!

Well we are officially one week into runDisney's Wine and Dine Half Marathon Training!  Only 16 and a half weeks to go!  runDisney provides training guides for runners based on the Jeff Galloway training methods.  You can find them here! They update them every year and you can import them into your calendars for some gentle, or not so gentle reminders.

First Run of the 2014 Wine and Dine Half Marathon Training Guide!

I am notorious for not training.  I mean well, but then I just don't do it.  It seems like every race post starts out with some version of how it's another race that I haven't trained for.

Which there's no reason for that nonsense.  Jeff Galloway has 2 - 30 minute runs a week followed by a long run on Saturdays.  Like I can't find 30 minutes on Tuesdays and Thursdays to run, and I'm certainly not doing much on Saturdays. (except in the fall....we'll see how this works with football season!)

Running in the 90 degree heat along with at least 60% humidity should have me ready for Florida in November, right?

I'm combining the Couch to 5K intervals with the runDisney guide.  So last week, I did 2 - 30 minute runs, at 1 minute running and 90 seconds brisk walking, and then a 2 mile run on Saturday with the same intervals.  This week it's 2 - 30 minute runs with 90 seconds running and 2 minutes brisk walking with a 3 mile run on Saturday.

I'm hoping a combination of both increasing my intervals and mileage slowly will help me build my endurance, along with letting my knee and ankle heal from...whatever it is that's ailing them.

A very welcome unseasonably cool run!

I'm planning on heading to good old FleetFeet this weekend to get fitted for some new shoes.  My bargain bin Nike Outlet shoes aren't cutting it.  I plan on getting some new SuperFeet insoles as well. I L-O-V-E those.

What helps you to stick to your training for races?

July 4th Music City 10K/5K

How on earth is it already July?!?!  I feel like this year is absolutely flying by!  But here we are again, for the July 4th 10K.  We ran this race last year.  You can read about that here.  It was a soggy mess.  As all of 2013 was.

Not this year!  This year was absolutely beautiful.  We left the house around 6:30 and headed downtown.  It was around 65 degrees outside and no humidity.  Yes, you read that correctly!  July in Nashville and there was no humidity.  To the point I contemplated for a minute running back inside and grabbing a long sleeved shirt to wear.  It was chilly believe it or not!

I've been working with a personal trainer for about a month and have tried to get my running back on pace.  I've probably been pushing a little too hard too soon after the great ankle injury of Warrior Dash - Ohio.  So a combination of running too hard too soon, running too soon with an ankle injury and getting used to actually working my muscles again I've developed some knee pain.  This race is 2 loops.  You stop the first time for the 5K, or repeat it and complete the 10K.  Usually I hate that, but this year it was awesome.  I figured I'd test the old knee/ankle and see how it was going, if it was going well I'd complete the 10K that I signed up for, if not, I'd stop at the 5K.

Before the race - Jason and Ben

Jenn and Betsy

Ben, Hopper, and Jenn

We got downtown and got our packets in record time.  Of course we got there right after 7:00.  Then we found some friends and hung out until it was time to go.

We got in the shoot and stretched a little, the National Anthem was sung, and we're off.  I took roughly 50 steps and realized it'd be the 5K for me.  It was a beautiful morning for a run.  Across the bridge, by the stadium, and back down town and we're done.  Or at least I was, everyone else ran the 10K and had to see everything for a second time.

Ben approaching the finish line

I stood at the finish line and took pictures of everyone as they finished - everyone except Jason who passed me with half a mile left....yes...he finished a 10K before I finished a 5K. Then we rallied up and headed to Puckett's for brunch.

And he's done!

Unfortunately, Puckett's had a 45 minute wait.  Fortunately though, Frothy Monkey is right down the block.  I decided it was WAY passed time for us to try Frothy Monkey.  Some friends of mine from high school own it and I've said we need to try it for forever, but locations in comparison to Murfreesboro are difficult to get to. We have been missing out.  BIG TIME.  We had a couple beers and I had the Royale sandwich, and Ben had an omelet with anything his heart desired.

Happy Independence Day!

What did you do for the 4th?  Did you run in any Independence Day Races?

Tough Mudder Weekend - 2014 - Nashville

I am excited to write this blog since I couldn't find much information on volunteering for Tough Mudder when we were thinking about doing it.  Hopefully this helps some of you out who are looking for this.

Tough Mudder - Probably the Toughest Event on the Planet.  They FINALLY came to Nashville.  So of course we jumped at the chance to run it.  What?  We can volunteer one day and run the next for a discounted race?  Where do we sign up???

That's exactly what we did.  We are Volunteers, right?  These spots "sell" out quickly.  We all signed up via their MVP (Mudder Volunteer Portal) months ago.  They had 12 hour shifts - 7:00am-7:00pm, BUT we receive like a $100 credit towards a future race!  After discussing this with a friend and trying to encourage him to volunteer with us, he pointed out that we were working 12 hours for $100 or $8.30/hour.  But don't think of it like that....I mean we need to pay it forward, right?  How many races have I done, and I've never volunteered for one.

The week leading up to the race we received a couple emails, a waiver and an information packet briefing us on some of the general information we'd need to know along with

The 5 of us bright and early Saturday morning

 Saturday morning we got up at 5:00, got ready and headed out to Spring Hill.  About a 40 minute drive from our house.  We got checked in, they provided a light breakfast but encouraged us to bring snacks.  We packed backpacks with water, snacks, asprin, a change of clothes and flip flops, sunscreen, hat, and sunglasses.  Basically anything we thought we'd need during the day since we didn't know what they would provide us.

2 of us were assigned the "course" and were given a water station to man.  The other 3 were "Mudder Experience".  We took that to mean "whatever's left".  At first I was jealous, I mean, they were going to be working with the runners while, in my mind, I carried ice.  I'm not sure why I thought that's what I'd be doing, but it was.

We met up with Dave, the Tough Mudder Volunteer Coordinator.  Super awesome and nice guy.  Genuinely cared about us having a good time, being safe, and being helpful.  He picked the three of us who weren't assigned to the course and told us to head over to the Mudder Legion tent.  We headed over there, and we were in charge of checking in all the people who have run the race before.  TM has started the Legion this year, if you complete more than one race, you get a different color headband.  1x - orange, 2x - green, 3x - blue, 4-6x - yellow, 7-9x - pink, 10+x black.  Talk about a great marketing scheme.  Who wants an orange one when you could have the BLACK one?!?!?

We worked the Legion tent until 2.  The last wave started at 2 so there were no more people to check in, so they asked us to head over to either the finish line, or rewards to relieve some of those people.  We of course headed to the finish line where we were able to give out the coveted orange headbands.  I could have easily done this all day.  Watching the expression on the Mudders' faces as they crossed that finish line and we put the headbands on them, it was amazing.  And muddy.  VERY muddy.  Ankle deep mud.  So be prepared for that if you decide to Volunteer.  You will be muddy.  They suggested we wear "boots or rain boots if there's a chance of rain".  That sounded terrible in my opinion.  So I opted for my obstacle/mud run  shoes where I didn't mind if they got muddy.

Me and Cara on our lunch break

They eventually started trading people around so everyone could put headbands on people if they wanted to.  I switched back and gave out rubber bracelets to people to trade in for their Finisher's T-shirt, Ben of course headed straight to the beer tent to hand out beer, and Cara I think opened 1,000 bananas.  I didn't know she was doing that.  How many times have you been handed a banana at the end of the race as you are covered in mud and cannot get it open.  I thought that was awesome of her for opening them for the runners. 

A great "official" picture of me handing out the coveted head bands

Meanwhile, Adam and Lizzy who were stationed at the water tent did that and only that.  They handed out water, handed out gummies and granola bars and that was it.  They said while it was fun to watch the runners, it certainly wasn't exciting.

After our shift ended we checked out, got our information on how to register with our discount for Sunday, got our chip for a free beer, and got our information for 20% off merch we headed to the hose pipes to spray off as much mud as we could as quickly as we could since a bad thunderstorm was rolling in.  We grabbed our free beers and headed off back to Murfreesboro.  We grabbed a quick supper and headed home to get ready for the race the next day.

After weeks of trying to decide, even Saturday I couldn't decide if I was going to run.  There were people in really...actually ridiculous shape, then people in way worse shape than me coming across that finish line.  But when it came down to it, I realized between the great ankle injury of Warrior Dash Ohio and my lack of training, I didn't think I'd be able to do the race justice so I decided to sit this one out. 

I bet you can't tell which two of us were at the water station instead of the "Mudder Experience"

We got to bed around 11:00 Saturday night with 8:00 alarms set for the next morning since the first wave that they wanted to run started at 10:00.  Adam came and tapped on our door at about 7:30 to inform us that they had cancelled Tough Mudder for Sunday.  Initially we of course thought it was a joke, but apparently those storms that we ran from after our volunteer shift tore apart the course.  It made the pathways for the medic vehicles impassable, we heard a creek rose so high it flooded parts of the course, and tore apart Mudder Village.  Parking was a nightmare on Saturday due to the several days of rain we had leading up to the weekend, I cannot imagine if they had tried to park cars on Sunday after flooding Saturday night.

All the people who had registered for Sunday can now have their registration moved to any other race.  They didn't offer a refund, but I'm going to bet if you had registered for the race, you'll probably do another one anyway so a refund didn't matter.  Also, another perk for being a Volunteer is a race is never sold out for a Volunteer.  So if you see one you want to do, you can sign up no matter if it says it's sold out.  Of course we were disappointed, but that just means we'll have to put together a road trip!  Looks like we'll be heading up to Pittsburgh this August!  68 days!  I'm going to kick my ass for the next 68 days and get ready so I can run with everyone.  #toughmuddertraining

In the end, I'd volunteer again in a heartbeat.  I'd just choose one of the half day shifts instead of the full day.  12 hours is just too long.  They provided us with a light breakfast and a really late (in my world at least, it was around 2:00) lunch.  You don't get as much of a discount if you do a half day, but I'd rather pay more than work for 12 hours.  That just makes for a long day.

Have you volunteered for a race?  What was your experience like?

Warrior Dash II - Ohio

Apparently we couldn't get enough of Warrior Dash with only one race this year so we decided on two.  We ran Warrior Dash in Georgia back in April - you can read about that race here - and decided to run it again in Ohio with Ben's sister and brother in law, and a couple friends.  Well unfortunately work schedules didn't work out for a few of the people, so Ben, me, and some friends from Virginia headed over to Columbus for the race.

We met at our hotel, the downtown Hyatt Regency, and headed out to get "an amazing burger better that Litton's" at a place called The Thurman Cafe.  While the burgers were delicious and GIANT, they were no Litton's.

From there we headed back to the hotel, we had some race prep to attend to.  So I busted out my sewing machine. Bet you didn't see that coming, I mean who pack a sewing machine to take to an obstacle run?  I get to work on the ridiculous costume we are wearing the next day.  Doug who came in town to run with us is a band director and had some old uniforms laying around.  After pulling some strings he was able to get us some to wear on the race.  Well these fit high schoolers...we are SEVERAL years removed from high school, so some seams had to be let out, some sleeves cut off.  And of course after finishing 1.5 of the jackets my needle broke.  I may have brought a sewing machine, but I sure didn't bring extra needles!  Thankfully the nice people at the Hyatt Regency didn't ask too many questions when we called down to ask for 3 sewing kits.

Doug Ben and Jenn trying on our overlays

Me and Susan began feverishly hand sewing these overlays as we played Cards Against Humanity.  If you haven't played this game you need to, it's hysterical!  Now don't play this with grandma at Christmas...one of you will be very embarrassed.  For the 4 of us in that hotel room, it was absolutely hilarious.

Ben's Flat Warrior Ready to Go!

We finally finished up for the night and laid out our flat warriors and passed out.  The next morning, we got up early and started making the hour drive to the race site in Millfield, OH.  We parked the car - note it's our brand new (to us) Honda Element - on this giant hill stacked in with all these other cars.

Susan all set up to watch our bags while we run!

This is where Warrior Dash dropped the ball...MAJORLY!  We got in line to get our bibs/hats/shirt, it took almost 45 minutes, we couldn't believe it.  Usually there's NO ONE there that early, then we finally made it to the front of the line and were told all 3 of us were on the "master list" and we had to check with information.  We walked over to the information tent, where we found a line 2 times as long, and only 2 people working it.  After waiting there for another 45 minutes we finally had our gear to go run.  We got all suited up and headed off.

Conquering the Mud Mounds!

Conquering the Mud Mounds

The first basically mile had 1 Warrior Dash obstacle, and the rest was God's obstacle.  I'm not kidding when I say it was hilly.  They have it listed as "slightly hilly", I don't ever want to know what anything about slightly is.  There were parts where no one would have blamed you for getting on all fours it was that steep.

The Great Warrior Roast!

We had Stormin Normandy, the only obstacle where Ben uses his knee pads.  I didn't wear any, and now have cut up knees. The Mud Mounds, which absolutely destroyed me.  After running/walking those hills at the beginning I was already getting exhausted.  We had the trenches, which I've never done before, so that was awesome.  Apparently I was the only one to crawl through them, Ben and Doug just walked then ducked under the slats. Dead Man's Drop, where I was able to complete it this time (with a little help from Ben).  It wasn't slanted back like it was in Georgia so it was much more manageable.  Then we had the Warrior Wall, which I chickened out on, we were so muddy from the trenches and mounds that I didn't think I was strong enough to hold me on the slick ropes.  I did however conquer the Warrior Peak (A-frame) and I didn't use the wussy 2x4s they had nailed into one side!  We had the shock top obstacle, the barn, , and those horrible cargo tubes to climb through.  Those, as Ben said, are deceivingly difficult!  Goliath - which didn't have the GIGANTIC line like in Georgia so I completed it all, the Warrior Roast, and the Muddy Mayhem.

Goliath!

 I'm not sure exactly what happened at the end, Ben started playing and rolling all over me, I couldn't get my balance, somehow I twisted the holy crap out of my ankle.  Again!  I did the same thing in 2012.  So I limped probably the last .01 miles to the finish line.

At the Finish Line!

Warriors!

It was a great race course, if they could figure out the new system for registration it would have been perfect!

One thing I'm not sure if I mentioned in the other Warrior Dash post from Georgia in April, Warrior Dash has decided to offer FREE, yes FREE professional pictures of the race!  So far, we've had tremendous pictures, of course I keep an eye out for the photogs so I ham it up for them.  But this is another reason to run this race, most races set you up with marathonfoto.com which is NOT cheap!

We headed back to the hotel, cleaned up, and headed out to Schmitz for some German food with Ben's parents, sister and brother and law, and Doug and Susan.  After that, we were wiped out.  We've gotten to be so boring in our old age.........

Schmidt's!

Ben's Parents!

The whole crew for the sausage fest!

We headed back to Tennessee on Sunday morning, but not without stopping to fill up the car with various beers that aren't sold in Tennessee due to the ridiculous tax laws.  Hello Fat Head Bumbleberry!

The next day I begin the great task of cleaning out the warrior clothes.  Everyone has their own technique.  I prefer to let them stay in a garbage bag until I get home.  Keeping them wet if possible.  Some people prefer to dry them out then shake out the extra mud.  I bring all that sweet sweet mud home and lay everything out on the lawn chairs and spray it with the hose pipe.  Once I get as much as I can out, I wash it in the washing machine twice then dry it and usually that gets everything out. Most of the time the mud comes out of everything except whites.

It don't matter if you're black or white

Country Music Half Marathon!

For some reason I'm competitive with Ben. Entirely too competitive.  Regardless of what we're playing he gets called a cheater, whether he's cheating or not. (let's be honest thought, he had to cheat if he was beating me. right?)  I've broken Xbox controllers, thrown golf clubs, and signed up for races that I am no where near ready for.

Ben wanted to run the Country Music Half Marathon.  He asked if I wanted to.  The answer was a big fat no.  But then I realized that he'd have yet another medal than I would.  So, being the medal whore that I am, I said yes.

He registered us for it maybe 2 months ago, not enough time for me to complete the usual ~12-15 week training schedule of most half marathon training guides but enough time for me to be in decent shape...

It was official, I was running the Country Music Half Marathon with no training

Then March happened, where we had something going on every single weekend in March, then April...where we had a race every single weekend in April. And in the 2 months leading up to the Country Music Half Marathon I had run a grand total of 11 miles.  That's right...11.

Flat Runner is Ready!

So we get all our items ready for the race and set alarms at 4:00am to head downtown to get parked then to the starting line.  Race started at 7:00.  We were in corral 24 so we got to the starting line around 7:40ish where I proceeded to have a complete breakdown.  I'm talking tears and everything.  I was so nervous about this race as soon as we hit that starting line that I thought I was going to have to wait for the next corral.

Waiting for what seemed like forever for them to call on corral 24

They counted down and we started running, immediately I felt better, I guess that anxiety of it all just caught up to me. From then on I ran/walked for the next 13.1 miles.  Met some people along the way, talked to several people with runDisney shirts on about races.  Heard that our upcoming Wine and Dine Half Marathon is the best one at Disney.

I hope this is us in 40 years

I've lived in Nashville for 22 of my 31 years on this Earth...how is it possible that I still don't know where I am in the city?  We ran around the naked statues, Demonbreun, 12 South, Belmont area and I was lost the whole time.  I do know at some point people were giving out free tequila shots.  I definitely took part in their generosity.

Ben's goal was to finish this is 2:30, my goal was to finish this.......that same day.  Around the 2:30 mark I sent Ben a text saying that I thought he'd be finishing soon, but if he hadn't he's still awesome in my book.  He said he had bonked around the 10 mile mark.  It started off cool, in the low 40s, but it heated up quickly. Everyone back with me were starting to feel the effects of the hot air.

Photo: Jamie Richardson Hurt

I got back to Grumpy's and had one final bridge to traverse and I'd be finished.  I called Ben to let him know I had less than a mile left so he could take pictures of me and meet up at the finish line.  As soon as I crossed the finish line I got a text from him: "Sitting in a chair next to gate 5 at the finish line med tent. I'm fine but trying not to vom banana and Gatorade."

I grabbed all the post race stuff they handed me - Gatorades, water, cold towels, bananas, cookies and most importantly chocolate milk, my favorite post run drink - and headed to find Ben.

Ben had committed the great mistake that Tim committed after the Disneyland Half Marathon including the blue banana vomit story.  Ben was one minute under pace when he got to the 10 mile mark, then bonked. The last 3.1 miles of his half took him 48 minutes and crossing the finish line he chugged anything they handed him.  Which included a 24 oz bottle of Gatorade, 2 bottles of water, and a banana.  Way too much right after running for 2 hours and 45ish minutes.

I found him and we headed to the car where he asked if I'd drive.  That's my key as to when he's not feeling good.  I never drive.  Ever.  So when he asks me to I know he's either really tired or really sick.

I got in and headed back to Murfreesboro.  I told him if he needed me to stop to let me know.  He did, as we barely got out of town.  Under the overpass of Harding, Ben unleashed hell, or at least 24 ounces of Gatorade, 2 bottles of water and a banana.  And felt like a new man.

Voiding

Somebody cue up: "Don't you forget about me"

We got home, took ice baths, ate something and rested for a little while and headed to Franklin for the Main Street Festival where we logged anther 4 miles looking at the booths.  We went to get supper where I almost fell asleep at the booth and I was in bed and passed out by 7:30.

ahhhhh!

It was a great race, live bands and entertainment throughout the race.  Friendly volunteers and great people to run with.  Highly recommend this race, if you are looking for a nice, hilly, potentially hot half marathon this is a great option.

Warrior Dash - Georiga - 2014

Finally Finally FINALLY, my favorite race and race weekend of the year.  Warrior Dash.  This is the 3rd year we've run as a group (hubs and John went in  2011).  You can read about last year's here!  If you are looking into running an obstacle race or mud run, hands down this is the one to do.  They are by far the most organized race we've done.  (I'm not including Spartan in this since our experience with that race was less than the "norm" as far as races go.  Read about it here)  Last year they had some...snafus to be nice.  Parking was a nightmare, buses to get to parking was a nightmare.  They owned up to it in a big way.  They apologized and offered all runners from that race I think at least a 50% off discount for this years race if not more.  And this race was DEFINITELY above par.  Minus a back-up at Goliath (their big and new obstacle this year) there we had zero issues.

2014 Warrior Dash - Mountain City, GA

We've had everything planned out for AT LEAST a month, probably 2 months.  Of course, the curse of the new runner hits.  I've probably talked about this before, we have a theory that if someone comes and runs with us who has never run with us before, something bad happens.  See my post on the Spartan Race where we had several new people running with us and it almost killed us!  The Tuesday before the race, so 3 days before we were heading to Mountain City, GA our cabin rental place called Ben.  They had a pipe burst 2 weeks before and "thought it would be fixed by now" so we had to cancel our reservations there and find somewhere new.  Back to the Murder Cabin!  We stayed here in 2012, it is seriously a set of a scary movie.  You know how I know it's the set of a scary movie?  It has a book case...no real hotels have book cases, if you still question it, the copy of Deliverance that we left in 2012 was still on the bookcase.

We arrived Friday evening and proceeded to get ready to properly fuel our bodies for a race, with a shrimp boil and beer. It was delicious.  After we devoured it, we chilled for a little while and went to bed.

Pre Race Crew

The next morning we got up early and headed to the race site.  It was awesome.  Completely different than the previous year as the course was basically completely reversed.  It was uphill both ways, seriously you began and ended the race going uphill.  Jerks. We had to swim through a lake that was absolutely freezing, climb over cars, jump fire, (successfully) traverse A frame walls.  It was a great race.

Warrior Roast

Goliath

Goliath

After Ben almost killed a photographer on Goliath we headed to the post race party.  Beer and Turkey Legs.  You really can't ask for a better combination.  We hung out there then decided to head back to the cabin and drink the beer we had already purchased.  Apparently we thought we were in college still because 5 of us drank nearly 40 beers...excluding the ones we threw like grenades when someone didn't describe something well enough during our game of Charades (phone app....where you put the phone to your head and you have to guess what the word is based on the other person's description).  We grilled out entirely too much steak, then of course at it all, complete with baked potatoes, watched Boondock Saints at senior citizen audio level and crashed.

Post Race!

Turkey Legs!

Post-Race Party!

2 years ago we followed up Warrior Dash with white water rafting on the Ocoee.  Why not do it again this year?  It was awesome last time.  What we didn't realize was that Warrior Dash was a month earlier this year as compared to 2012.  When I say the water was cold, that's a severe understatement, if I were to say it was freezing, also a severe understatement.  Was it awesome?  Of course.  There were only 2 boats of people, then they had about 4 or 5 boats of trainees.  It was crazy to see them in their training.  That's a tough job.  Hats off to anyone who does it.

It was an awesome weekend with amazing friends.  I get to run another Warrior Dash in Ohio this year, it's going to have some GIANT shoes to fill if it's even going to come close to the race weekend we just had.