Holiday wrap-up and sickness

And we're back! After what felt like a 2 week tour of central IL to Northeast Ohio and countless hours in the car with a crying cat I'm finally back home in Chicago for a few days. You know how I get to spend my taper and time off from work? SICK... It all started with a tickle in the throat the night after Christmas and has moved into a full blown horrendously painful cold. So yet another rest day for me when I really need to be getting the legs moving. Right now the focus is to feel better fast by loading up on my vitamins and cold medicine and try to get more than 1 hour of sleep at a time. A few missed workouts during taper shouldn't be the end of me come Goofy in 2 weeks.

The trip home to Ohio was a whirlwind and I definitely didn't get a lot of miles on my legs. Instead I decided to try and enjoy my limited time at home rather than stress about when I could fit in a run around our busy schedule. I did get in a few walks with this guy. He's not too good at walking so it was more of strength workout trying to hold him back.

Mostly my time was spent catching up with my family and a few friends, cooking up some delicious dinners, and having a few cocktails. Exactly what the holidays should be about!

I hope Santa was good to you all this year. I know he was to me! I was spoiled yet again.

am I ready? I'm not so sure...

I ended up not running the mileage I needed for my last week before taper. All weekend I went back and forth on if I would really confess about my mileage. I'm feeling overly guilty and a lot worried at this point. Oh and slightly embarrassed. There is nothing left for me to do and honestly I took training too lax thanks to a multitude of excuses. On my vacation I relaxed too much, I didn't take training seriously when I should have, my work travel schedule, the holidays, my ankle is hurts worse thank when I broke a bone in my foot, I had 1 or 2 too many drinks... I can go on but I won't. I didn't put the miles in and I extremely worried I'm going to pay race weekend. But I have about 3 weeks to worry about that. Hopefully, I'll find some fabulous runners to pull me through race day or dig down deep and find something in this 30 years old body to get me through to the finish line and not feel like death. We shall see ;)

Enough of my depressing race ready talk. This weekend happened to be Christmas #1 at the in-laws in central Illinois. Luckily I did pretty good on all the nieces and nephews gifts - yea me! And it was fun seeing the extended family Saturday night. Sunday was fun with the immediate family Christmas. Again I think I scored even though I felt rushed to find the perfect gift.

Before we left for Christmas #1 on Friday I ran 19 miles in 14 degree F weather. It should have been 20 miles but at 18.5 I was done mentally and headed home. Because of the ice around here much of my path is closed so I ended up running a 3.6 mile loop. I had to pass the path to my home about 4 times before I just turned to go home. Besides the layers of clothes annoying me and weighing me down I thought I had lost my chin due to frostbite so I was ready to go home and get some lunch before hitting the road. It was a weird run and I never found my cadence partly because of the loop and partly because I felt rushed. Gah! I returned home not happy with myself and seriously doubting how I'll finish come January... I really hope I'm only being too hard on myself right now. Now it's time for taper just in time for Christmas!

goofy training and donations!

Goofy training is trucking right along ridiculously cold temps and all. This week is my last big week before the taper. I am trying to find a creative way to fit 30+ miles in before leaving for Christmas #1 this weekend at the in-laws. And fit in another 20+ miles while traveling and going into the office (ugh says the home based employee) to file (double ugh). It's getting interesting and mostly involves a mixture of treadmill and outside running. I may be breaking up another 20 miler on Friday between the outside and treadmill before getting in the car but it will work out. At the end of the day I truly hope miles are miles no matter how they get done! Unfortunately the treadmill just doesn't feel the same as outside running physically and mentally. So while I may not have any time goals with Goofy I do want to complete the 39.3 mile weekend and not be completely destroyed. I have Disney World to enjoy post race!

Also for the Goofy challenge I have made the sort of last minute decision to raise money for The American Cancer Society. If you have followed me for awhile you may recall my step mother was diagnosed with breast cancer about 2 1/2 years ago now. After a double mastectomy and several months of chemo the cancer is gone. As soon as my step mom was done with chemo my dad was diagnosed with Non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma. A disease that will return but right now he has been in remission for about 6 months! In addition to the immediate family there have been countless friends and extended family who have had cancer in their life or lost loved ones to cancer. I hope someday we will see a cure! But for this reason I chose not to raise money for 1 specific cancer as there are too many and all need our help. This is where I ask for your help to meet my goal! Please consider donating to raise awareness and funds! I haven't decided how it will all work out but I hope to have a giveaway for those that help out. Of course something running related ;) And if you re-post/facebook/tweet let me know and I'll throw an extra entry in the giveaway your way.

If you can donate to my effort go ahead and click here

I appreciate any help in meeting (and beating!) my goal!

more of the same

I still haven't found any motivation to hit up the roads so far this winter. Nearly every run last week happened on the treadmill. 36 miles on a treadmill... I never thought I would say that! The only miles I managed outside were the first 11 of 19 miles on Sunday. I had every intention of running the full distance in the 15 degree windchill but I didn't take into account how much ice there would be after Saturday's snow. There was too many patches and as the sun started to go down I got nervous and started seeing myself breaking bones seeing as I'm a huge klutz so I turned around. I came home, changed, and headed to the gym to finish up. I typically don't like to break up super long runs but it was necessary on Sunday. Safety first!

This week has started out much the same because it hurts to be outside too long right now. Needless to say the treadmill next to the emergency exit at the World Gym and I are becoming intimately close. The temps should be making their way back into the 30's so I hope to get back outside sometime this week. I need to get back outside for my sanity and the fact that I'm running out of TV shows to watch on my phone! Commercial free helps when in the middle of a 10+ mile treadmill run. I caught up on the cheesetastic but equally addicting Vampire Diaries and I'm nearly done with the 2nd season of Fringe and there are few shows left on my phone I haven't watched after I get caught up on season 3 :)

Is your winter running off to a good start? Are you BFF's with your treadmill or braving the cold?

cold and snow = treadmill

Today was one of those days I started to question my sanity. Why did I think it wouldn't be too big of a deal to run high mileage needed for the Goofy training during winter in Chicago? The real feel temperature was in the teens, there were snow flurries, and I couldn't get warm even sitting next to my office space heater wrapped in a blanket. I could not fathom running outside for 10 miles. The treadmill didn't sound much better but at least I could wear shorts and a t-shirt. Treadmill it was. Though because I got to my gym much later than planned thanks to taking my sweet time walking around the house I cut the run down to 8 miles. I could have banged out those last 2 but I still needed to buy groceries for dinner and cook. The run itself was uneventful. My legs actually felt fresh even though I have been a bit sore the past couple of days. I zoned out to some cheesy TV shows on my phone and tried not to breathe in too deeply because I'm pretty sure the guy 2 treadmills over was letting them rip.

I'm slightly concerned about the next couple weeks of running. My will to run in cold weather has left the building. In the past I have gotten out there and gotten it done. It's taking a lot to work myself up to even getting dressed for cold weather running. I may need to start finding ways to love... err... tolerate the mill at least for a few weeks.