This has GOT to be one of the funniest pictures ever. And it’s not because Greg has a completely surprised look on his face. And it’s not because my thighs look like big turkey drum sticks.

But doode, check out all those crazy ass watermarks! LOL I guess Photo Crazy does live up to its name, eh? =)

That’s right!

I’m not exactly on my 3 day a week running regime yet (FIRST), but I’m getting there… slowly but surely. Last week, I ran TWICE (!!!), the Firecracker 5k + a 6.66 mi run that I’ll write about in another post. This week, I put in a solid 7 miler yesterday and plan on doing a 4 mile tempo tomorrow (6 mi total).

Twice a week, that’s good, right? =)

So a little about my run yesterday. Both Greg and the Firecracker have given me a little food for thought. I honestly didn’t think I’d do as well as I did (well for me at least!), so I’ve decided to try and push myself a bit to see where my body’s at physically, instead of assuming I’m in the same ole place (aka Sucksville) because of poor training.

Here are just some of the things I’ve changed:

1. I’ve thrown in some steeper, longer hills in my runs so that I can start prepping for the mountains we’ll have to run over in the SF half . I’m seriously scurred of the SF half.

2. I switched up one of the data windows on my Garmin. I usually have 4 data windows set at total time, heart rate, pace, and distance. But I recently read a tweet from someone (and I really wish I could remember who it was so I can thank them) about how they started using Average Pace instead of Current Pace. I decided to give that a shot with my two most recent runs and I really LOVE it!  It keeps me more consistent with my pacing throughout a run. Check out my run yesterday (goal 12:30 pace): 12:15, 12:30, 12:44, 12:06, 12:33, 12:13, 13:04. There was some variation because of the ills, but my average pace was 12:30 ;) Average HR was 159, which is 4bpm higher than my Zone 3, but I’ll take it!

3. I’ve decided to throw out intervals. That’s right.. no more walk intervals for me! Don’t get me wrong, if I need to walk, I’ll walk. But for now, I’m going try to how far I can go with just running and how well I can do with fighting that urge to walk.

4. And the biggest thing! I’ve changed my target half marathon pace. I was aiming for a solid 12:30 min pace for my next half, but I’ve decided to go with 12:00, flat. I think I’m totally capable of hitting that, and it would take me into a PR ;) and hopefully closer to my goal of hitting a sub 2:30 half.

So, that’s it on my front!  What have you guys been up to? Hope everyone’s been having a good running week! =)

1. I’ve been trying to get back on the healthy eating bandwagon by cutting down on eating out, by cooking at home more, by eating more veggies, and by cutting out most processed foods. I’ve been feeling a lot better and healthier and I’ve already lost 5lbs! Yipee! Only 15 more to go ;)

2. Tonight I cooked up a batch of turkey chili. I used ground turkey, kidney beans, black beans, garlic, onions, fire roasted tomatoes, stewed tomatoes with jalapenos, some chicken broth, and a bunch of spices. It’s been filling up my house with delicious smells for 2 hours now and it’s got another 2 hours to go, but I want nothing more than to dish out a cup right now! I’ll let you guys know how it turns out. I hope it’s delish!

3. I’ll be meeting up with some of my fave gals (Raciel and Jo) this weekend to watch Alice in Wonderland. I’m so excited! Anyone else watching it?

What do you guys have planned for the weekend? =)

P.S. Look out for some exciting new product reviews AND my very first giveaway! =)

I’m currently entered into the San Francisco Marathon’s February Challenge which called for runners to write about how they fell in love with running. I submitted the story I wrote for my “About the Girl” page =) and I’m 1 out of 20 other entries.

I’ve sadly had to drop a race (Ave of Giants) due to some exorbitant and unexpected car expenses, and winning a free race registration to the San Francisco half marathon would really help me out! It’s the last race I HAVE to do to complete the California Dreamin’ series. So, I’d truly appreciate your help! There are two ways you can vote:

1) You can tweet out to THESFMARATHON “@THESFMARATHON I vote for #13!”

Or

2) You can visit their Facebook page, become a fan and write on their wall that you vote for #13 =)

Many thanks in advance! =)

Update: Thanks to everyone who voted for me! I am so super, super appreciative for your guys’ support. It really meant a lot to me =) It was a close race with #11 but unfortunately he won by only a handful of votes =(

When I had initially entered the contest, I didn’t know that it would be a voting type of thing. I thought that the winner would be chosen a panel that would pick the story they liked best. I didn’t find out until late this afternoon that it would be a voting contest. So I apologize for the late notice and I’m so grateful for everyone who scrambled to get their votes in. Thanks again, everyone! =)

Pre-Race
I woke up at 6 this morning and made it to the race site at around 7:15. Even though I wasn’t intending to race the Firecracker, I was feeling nervous. There were a TON of people there, and I was all by my lonesome because Christine got sick and had to sit it out and I wasn’t able to hook up with Greg before the race.

I picked up my bib and jogged back to my car to drop it off. I made it back in time for their opening ceremonies which included

The Race

The race totally didn’t play out like this for me. It looks deceptively flat in the beginning, but it really felt like a soft incline (verified by Maggie) that built up to that crazy ass hill that was every bit as painful as it looked. I tried running as much as I could up that hill, but eventually had to stop to walk for a bit when the burning sensation on my calves started to be too much. That’s when I got a chance to snap these pics.

This is the view in front of me. You can see that 99.9% of the people are walking up that bad boy. I walked for about a minute and then started jogging up again.

Toward the upper portion of the hill, I saw Greg on his way down and I yelled out to him. He joined me for the final trek up, which was pure torture.

I can honestly say that if Greg hadn’t been running with me, I probably would have walked a lot more but he really pushed me to keep going. As we rounded the turn around and were on our way down the hill, I told Greg that I needed to walk a bit, but he told me to keep on trucking! We slowed down the pace a bit, and I was able to build it back up after a min or two.

Here are my stats, and I’m damn proud of them! I did negative splits for the very first time and I finished strong. Ran the last quarter mile of the race at a 9:34 min pace =D (totally blows my 400m time target out the water by 2 mins!)

Split 1: 13:14
Split 2: 11:17
Split 3: 10:18
Split 4: 0:24

Total Time: 35:37 (chip time)
Average Pace: 11:29
Average HR: 168
Max HR: 179
Calories Burned: 371

Age Group 30-34: 90 out of 218
Overall Finish: 1132 out of 2336

Right smack in the middle of the pack! =)

Greg thinks I could have run a lot faster than I was running because I was still talking fairly easily and he could hardly hear me breathing. But physically, I felt like I was pushing myself pretty hard. But it’s really got me thinking about redoing my time goals and aiming for something better. Maybe I can do better next time during my next 5k (the Deena Kastor 5k) =) I’m still chasing after my 5k PR set in 2008 (32:35). Maybe this’ll be the year!

Post-Race
As we were chowing down on our post-race goodies and catching up, we randomly ran into Tony (and his girl :), who we worked with at Aesop. What are the odds! We had a good time catching up and then bid each other adieu.

After the race, Greg and I went to walked over to Sam Woo and had some goodies!

We chowed down as we talked about some of our fave shows (Modern Family) and I told Greg about some of my other fave shows (Biggest Loser & I Survived…), and of course there was talk of running, diet, and running books.

Thanks for joining me at Firecracker and for a fantastic brunch, Greg! =) As always, good times!