The Sandy Marathon Dilemma

Since I got word that I snagged a lottery spot in this year’s NYC Marathon, I’ve been counting down the days til the race. I’ve trained for months, changed my eating and sleeping habits, and scheduled my life around my running. Aside from the physical efforts, I’ve also sunk a big chunk of money into transportation and accommodations for the big day. It’s pretty much all I can talk or think about. Just ask my friends– I’m sure they’re sick of hearing about it. Now Hurricane Sandy is putting a big wrench into the race and many are calling for a complete cancellation.

McGuire Mud Run Race Recap: The Beast of the East

Now that my bruises and scrapes are (mostly) healed, it’s finally time to sit down and do my recap of the 2012 McGuire Mud Run. This annual 10k was held at the Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst on September 8. Matt has run it for the past five years, and when he asked me to join his team for this year’s race, I didn’t hesitate. I figured I’d be in solid racing shape since it would be marathon training season, and it would be fun to do a mud race. I knew there were some obstacles, but I had no idea what I was in for.

In late summer, we started to get emails regarding the obstacles. There were 23 to be exact. This is about the time where I started to second guess my decision. I was joining an all-male team and would be scaling walls and climbing hills and crawling under and over various obstacles in the mud. I was pretty concerned I’d slow everyone down, and knew I would be extremely discouraged if I let that happen. So as I usually do with races I’m not really excited about, I avoided thinking of it until race weekend. I packed up old sneakers, cruddy running clothes, a change of clothes for after, and my waterproof camera, and we headed out to the base. The race was surprisingly well-organized. The bus ride over from the parking lot was pretty quick, and bib pick-up was a breeze. There were changing tents with an area for you to leave your post-race clean clothes. We had selected a wave time when we signed up, but since we were there early, we just hopped in with the next group starting. It didn’t feel overly crowded in the starting corral, which was a nice change of pace for most races I do. The website for the event said approximately 2,500 runners participated this year.

Results are in: Summer Bootcamp

It’s been a long 10 weeks of waking up early for workouts, but I’m kind of sad that my summer bootcamp at Fusion Cross-Training is over. For the summer boot camp series, participants received 10 weeks of unlimited sessions at the studio, one weekly outdoor bootcamp workout, a weekly nutrition tip and food challenge, and a pre/post fitness assessment. For the first 6 weeks, I was going to classes religiously, almost every morning. I could feel myself getting stronger and faster. I noticed the classes are much easier for me now as opposed to when I started and felt like I was going to pass out. For the latter half of the bootcamp, my marathon training schedule started and it was harder for me to squeeze in the classes. I still went at least two times a week, and I was running enough on other days that I was getting plenty of exercise.

Midnight Madness Run Recap

Like most runs I sign up for these days, I was both looking forward to and dreading the 20in24 Midnight Madness Run as the race date approached.

The 20in24 is a series of race events run along the Kelly Drive/River Drive loop in Philly every summer, benefitting Back on My Feet. The events include the Lone Ranger (50 and 100 mile ultra marathons), a Relay event, Pajama Loop, and the Midnight Madness Run.

The midnight run consisted of one loop around the 8.4 mile course, starting at midnight as the name suggests. Runners are required to wear reflective gear and encouraged to wear glowing items, with a prize for Most Illuminated at stake. I bought a string of battery-powered lights from Walgreens and threw on a few glow sticks for the occasion.

Here We Go Again

Monday marks the start of my official training for the NYC Marathon. This time around, I’m going with the Runner’s World 16-week plan, found in the June issue. It’s pretty similar to what I planned out for myself last year for Philly. But it integrates more hills and more intervals, both things I’ll need to work on for New York. My goal is sub 4:30. Ideally I’d like to run under 10 minute miles, which comes in at 4:22. It’s totally doable if I stick to the plan and don’t burn myself out before race day.