Colfax 13.1

Have I mentioned I like running?

This past Sunday I ran the Colfax half marathon.  

5:15am!

It was great.  I got the SAME exact time as I did when I ran the half in Minneapolis back in August. 

Well, I technically ran 9 seconds slower this time.  Both races I ran 8:33 min/miles, and ran them in 1:51:50 and 1:51:59 respectively.  I felt like I trained better this time...so I'm gunna chalk that 9 seconds up to the altitude.  I feel like that's fair.  And I followed all of my pre-determined race Do's and Don'ts that you can read here, if you really want to.

I will say, though, that the 13.1 in Minneapolis was waaaayyyy prettier.  We ran along the Mississippi for the majority of that race.  This time? About 6 miles were along Colfax Ave.  I counted 8 Marijuana Dispensaries, and 4 strip clubs in the 6 miles we were on it.  There were probably more, but I was distracted by the spectators' signs along the side of the road.  My favorite, "Morgue Ahead, Look Alive!!!".  

After we finished running on Colfax Ave, we got to run THROUGH a fire station.  Best part was that it was lined with firefighters who gave us all high-fives.  I kinda felt like a celebrity.  Or like a runner in the Colfax half marathon.  

Then on the way back we ran down 17th ave which is lined with beautiful houses, mature trees, and beautiful yards.  We also started and ended at City Park, which is a huge park with a little lake and a sweet fountain close to downtown Denver. 

I honestly felt good the whole time, all things considered.  

Mile 1: No thoughts really, just focusing really hard on not tripping on other runners. 

Mile 2-3: I should have warmed up and stretched better before.  

Mile 4-5: I found and ran next to two guys also wearing Team World Vision shirts.  We small talked, but not too much.  Just enough for me to tell them I was a WV staff here in Denver, and for them to tell me to stop by the World Vision tent after the race. Which I did.  

Mile 6: Thankful I didn't drink too much water before the race, port-a-potty lines were about 6 runners deep. See ya, over-drinkers!

Mile 7: This was when I realized I had trained well and was running at a good pace. Lots of people around me started walking a bit and I began passing more people than were passing me.  

Mile 8: Took my second GU Energy Gel (ate a pack of the GU gummies before the race).  

Mile 9: The GU hit me, and I picked my pace up a notch.  As my high school cross country coach would always say, it was time to start picking people off.  This meant looking at the person directly in front of you, and slowly passing them, one by one.  Obviously people were passing me too, but this method worked for helping me pick up my pace a bit.

Mile 10: Okay,  only a 5K left.  People run 5K's all the time. 

Mile 11: Just keep running. 

Mile 12-13.1: Ok, I'm dying.  The whole last mile, I was just praying.  "Lord, I've pushed it as hard as I could and I'm literally running out of energy here, you're gunna hafta fully take it from here".  Yanno how on trains, the wheels are turned by those arm things?  Well, I was just imagining God being those arm things moving my legs for me.  Okay, that was a really hard mental image to explain, but I hope you get it. In other words, I was just praying for my legs to not just collapse beneath me.  Because they sure felt like they were about to.  But God showed up, and helped me to actually manage taking it up a notch further, and ran as hard as I literally could for the last half mile, and then sprinted (as best I could) through the finish line...with no injuries, yay! 

The absolute WORST part of a half marathon, in my opinion, isn't the run itself, and it isn't even mile 12.  It's after you cross the finish line.  You're forced to immediately stop because of the bottleneck of runners who are being handed medals, water bottles, bananas, bagels, Pepsi (yeah...seriously), sample sports beans, and reusable bags.  I felt like I was back in a Guatemala market, where everyone is invading your personal bubble while trying to sell you things. Except this time they were just shoving them at you.  All the while, the lactic acid in my muscles instantly descended and made it feel like my legs were being filled with cement.  Ouch. People, seriously, grab your bagel and keep moving.  (But to be fair, I was very appreciative of my free water, food, and goody bag at the end.)

And you gotta love that post-race high.  

Once I finally got out of that chaos, I wandered towards the World Vision tent, talked to them for a bit, then decided to go get my free BBQ Pulled pork sandwich.  Keep in mind I got to this stand probably ten minutes after I crossed the finish line, when my brain wasn't fully functioning yet, and food still sounded good.  I ate the whole thing, pickle and all.  Once I found my friend Alex (who blew her last 13.1 time out of the water!!!),  I was deeply regretting eating that whole sandwich.  

My stomach kept cramping up, I never got sick but I was pretty miserable for the next few hours.  BBQ Pork at 8am after a 13.1 mile run.  Great idea.

Well, we hung around for awhile, then walked back to my car.  When we got back to the car, I had texts from my mom, some friends, and even one from Josh that he had sent around 4:30am his time knowing that it was 5:30am here and I would be almost ready to start the race :)  So although I didn't see them until after the race, I loved seeing all the encouragements! 

Post 13.1

So Alex and I really wanted to go to church, but realized we didn't have time to go all the way back to our apartments to shower and change...so what did we do? We went right to church.  God looks at the heart, right? Well, we actually went to a coffee shop first, and I got some water and some more food (I felt so sick, but SO hungry at the same time...bizarre phenomenon).  We got a lot of strange looks at church, but we were courteous and made sure to sit in the back by ourselves.  Sitting down and standing up during the service was brutal.  Everytime we did we looked at each other with that pain-filled/half laugh "Owwwww" look. We could hardly walk back down the stairs afterwards.  Is this what getting old is going to be like? 

It's now day three, and I still wince when I have to go up or down my apartment stairs.  But its such a good sore.  Addicting.  Now...I want to attempt the full 26.2. 

I mean, I don't.  

But I do.  

Train picture from: edward-weston.com

Tomorrow's Half Marathon Game Plan

I wrote most of this earlier this week, but here is my list of what I am and am NOT planning on doing before/during tomorrow's half marathon:

I AM planning on...
-Running with my ipod again.  Zoning out is an art. 
-Attempting a PR.  Even though I'm running a mile higher in altitude.  I've trained in it. Last time I was training around 9:30-10:00 min/miles.  This time I tried to stay around 9:00-9:30.  Crossing my fingers for a sub 8:30 min/mile average this race. 
-Using GU gels again.  Get at me, energy.
-Drinking water/gatorade at each station.  Even if just a little.
-Carbing up the two nights before the race.  Bring it, spaghetti. 
-Having fun and enjoying the race, regardless of how well I'm running. Live music along the way? Running through a fire station? Sounds like a party to me. 
-Scope out a parking spot the night before...which I just did.  Might be a lil tricky, but hopefully if I get there early enough I'll be fine. 

I am NOT going to...
-Get mad if I don't set a PR.  There's always next time.
-Stay with a pace setter.  I'll go on how I'm feeling...not try to stay at a certain pace the whole time.
-Use my own GPS/pace tracker...I'd rather not know how my pace is...otherwise I might get overconfident or discouraged.  I trust I can pay attention to how I feel and know how much I can push myself without burning out too soon. 
-Drink so much water the morning of.  Last time I had to make a bathroom stop at mile 2. 
-Wear shorts.  They bugged me the whole race last time.  Running capris it is. 
-Run faster than my target pace when I'm feeling good.  Save it, Kirsten. 
-Walk.  I made it last time without walking at all.  It's not even an option. 
-Force it if my hip hurts too badly.  Again, there's always next time.  Don't play tough girl.  Not worth it.

So, we'll see how it goes :) 

Visitors: A cousin, a [new] boy, a dad, and a roomie.

So, I just made pasta with crushed up Sunchips in it because before I added the chips it was super blah pasta.  And it became awesome.  Just one adventure after another over here, I tell ya. 

Alright, so I'm now in a season where there are so many exciting things going on and things are changing really fast.  However, I'm starting to get used to the everyday newness that until I decided to blog about it I hadn't really realized how much has happened in such a short time!

As my last post talked about, I had just recently gone on a work trip to Boston and then home for Easter to MN.  Then we had a church youth group from WA here in CO working on the World Vision warehouse--more on that in a bit :)  So the week after the group left, my cousin Rebekka and her boyfriend Peter came out to visit the beautiful-ness that is, Colorado.  So much fun to have them here!! We walked around Garden of the gods in Colorado Springs, we toured the Coors brewery and walked all around Golden (which is super pretty, by the way) and enjoyed watching people in kayaks practice tipping over in the river.  Cheap entertainment at its finest. We hit up a Rockies game and just overall enjoyed some good cousin bonding and laughs! I'm hoping someday to turn her into my first Colorado roommate ;)

Cousins are the best.

So I've also been in the heart of some good ol' half marathon training, race is in 9 days!  I love training.  Oh, big news: I'm becoming a morning person.  I LOVE the days I get up early and run before work.  Ok, I don't love the first 10 minutes after I wake up and see that my alarm clock reads 5:30am, but running that early makes my whole day...awesome.  Well, until 7pm that night when I crash hardcore.  But Colorado is amazing because of the whole "300 days of sunshine!" thing.  Which means I'm not confined to running in the rain or...the dreaded treadmill. And it's helped me get to know my new neighborhood and discover some pretty awesome trails around here! One is full of prairie dogs.  Have you ever heard one of those guys? They sound EXACTLY like a squeaky dog toy.  Imagine that times like, 30 around you at all times.  How's that for a cheer squad. 

My new thing is I want to run a half marathon in a different state every time.  Not that I need to move each time, but I love a good mini-vacation.  Even if the vacation includes running a race that makes me feel like every leg muscle has been ripped out the next day.  Don't worry, it's a good pain.  And its addicting.  Isn't that what people say about tattoos? Which is why I'll probably never get one.  I'd be that person that ends up getting my whole body covered.  Ok, no I wouldn't.  Which is why I'll stick to running instead. 

Even bigger news: I have a boyfriend :)
I feel like a 13 year old again saying that with a smiley face...but I'm excited! He's great. Really, I promise.  He was here as a leader with the mission team that came from WA to work on the warehouse.  And he just came back this last weekend to hang out with me which was a blast. We did some hiking up in Evergreen, we cooked some good food, hung out downtown and people-watched from one of the rooftops during Cinco de Mayo, we also made it to a Rockies game (and got hooked up with some SWEET free seats!!), went to church and he even ran with me!!  If you want to hear the whole story...and I promise, it's a pretty great story...just ask and I'll tell ya :)

...he's good looking, too ;)

In family news, I got to have dinner with my dad last night!! He got asked last minute to do a charter bus run from SD to Denver.  It was so much fun to see him.  We were both pretty hyped up that we got to see each other.  Lots of laughs!!! I'm SO blessed with the amazing parents that I have.  Seriously.  I know everyone says that...but I think I win. 

Yep, we really were as happy as we look.

AND....guess what? Nicole is coming to visit in exactly TWO WEEKS!!! Also, it's her birthday today.  If you know her, you better wish her a happy birthday.  Seriously, go do it, now!

On a more serious note, (not that wishing her a happy birthday wasn't serious, cuz it is, did you say happy birthday yet??) I can tell that as a person I've grown so much since moving here, even in just the short 5 months.  I've had to quickly become a lot more confident and outgoing.  People that I meet now honestly have a hard time believing me if I tell them how shy I was in high school.  But I suppose it makes sense that this big of a life change is going to have some affect on me!  I like it. I like that I'm not afraid to go hang out with new people.  I like that so many other people here have the same adventurous spirit that I have.  I like that everyday I wake up to sunshine and am just happy and consistently content.  God is so faithful!!! 

Life is good in Colorado.