touchdown!

OK, you’d expect any post that’s a race report for the Gridiron Classic 4-miler to have some football-related title…and this wasn’t very original, but the first one I could think of 🙂

So this was my first race back since the infamous (sh)IT band injury…was just using it as a time trial/fitness check of sorts…see exactly how out of shape I had gotten in the last 3 months.  Wasn’t sure what to expect…thought breaking 32 minutes may be a stretch (based on the last injury where I was out for an extended period of time) and that I was gonna totally be embarassed by my time but who knows what will happen…

Oh yeah.  Didn’t know it was gonna be 17 degrees that morning.  This is gonna be fun!! 😛  (well at least the weathermen were wrong…no snow on Saturday, meaning no race being turned into a fun run, no slippery roads)   Woke up and had my pre-race eats…which was almost entirely courtesy of Trader Joe’s: quick-cook steel-cut oatmeal w/ PB and honey, and gingerbread coffee 🙂  I usually have a bagel before races, but wanted to experiment a little bit.  Put on the race attire…ahh DS-Trainers, how I’ve missed you!  Wanted to try my new Sugoi compression tights but actually was way too cold for that…gonna go with the SubZeros.  And on top…hmmm I’ll go with the red Nike Flyers singlet over a warm black top.  Annndddd can’t forget my “Kara Goucher necklace“!  Headband, gloves, Mr. Garmin-ready to go!!

Thank god I live about a mile from the start, I needed the warmup…and actually despite the cold, it was a nice morning and once I was moving wasn’t that bad.  And I was actually glad to be out…I think I really missed the social interaction more than anything!  Having to do all my runs solo since my mileage isn’t up is no fun!  OK, off the subject…so I get to baggage with enough time to stash my bag and get to the corrals.  Even though this looked to be a crowded race, it definitely was not stacked, as I got a red bib.  So while waiting for the start, I saw Dr. Evil in his infamous Superman blue tights…and a certain crazy bandanahead, camera in hand, came up behind us and surprised us 😛  We were all trying to stay warm waiting for the start and thankfully things went off on time…(even with all the football-related questions!  Who’s a Jets fan?  Giants fan?  Who wants the Saints to win?  Who wants the Colts to win?)

Mile 1 (7:50)-First time facing Cat Hill since before the injury.  This is gonna be…painful?  But I tried the best I could…and actually the legs didn’t feel too bad, but I was definitely out of shape…was breathing harder than I should have been, even with the hill.  Flyer JB ran by and tried to give me a “low hi-five”…ok, at least he didn’t scare me like Dr. Evil did one time 😉  Speaking of, I could still see him…hmmm maybe I’ll try and use him as my rabbit?  Mile 1 marker is coming up…hmmm not bad!!

Mile 2 (7:39)-Instead of pressing the “lap” button, I accidentally hit “stop”…damn gloved hands.  So as quickly as possible, I hit the lap and start buttons and just tried to keep in mind that this mile 2 split will be a couple seconds fast and I’ll have to figure out the real time later.  Just kept going, though my lungs did not like breathing in the icy air and even though I had my gloves on, my hands didn’t warm up til the end of this mile.  Tried to keep Dr. Evil in my sights…he wound up pulling ahead by the end of this mile…which was fine, I didn’t want to hurt myself using someone as a rabbit.

Cast your "vote"! Saints or Colts?

Mile 3 (8:04)-So a fun thing at the beginning of this mile, on the 102nd St Transverse were 2 mats that someone could run over depending on who you wanted to win the Super Bowl-the Saints or the Colts…you can bet I picked the Saints as the Colts beat my beloved Jets 😛  And apparently, 66% of the race participants agreed with me…though Moz may have a point about the results being skewed a little, as the Saints mat was in the inside running lane.  So after the transverse was my favorite west side hills (NOT)…I knew this mile was gonna be weak but just did the best I could.  During this mile, the guy who annoyed me during the first bridges run last fall pulled up and passed me…and believe me, I really wanted to beat him…but today just wasn’t the time for it.  (There will be plenty more chances for that…)  So this mile turned out to be just over 8 minutes…ok, not too too bad.

the finish is in sight...

Mile 4 (7:35)-Barring any disaster in the last mile, looked like I would get under 32 minutes easily…could I get under 31?  This mile does have a big downhill…and I tried to do some math, but keeping in mind the cumulative time was a few seconds fast…hmmm under 7:30 for this mile?  Could I do it?  I was trying to pick up the pace, but by the latter half of the mile, my out-of-shape-ness came into play and I couldn’t kick it up another gear.  BC passed by me in this mile (taking a break from the ObsceneCam™ for a race!) but I couldn’t stick with him.  I was happy to see the 72nd Street Transverse, almost home…just a little further south on the West Drive…ohhh I forgot about that uphill!!  Good to see the announcers reminding us of it as well!!  I crossed the finish line just as I heard…I think Mary Wittenberg?…congratulating those of us who got in under 32 minutes and saying what a great thing it is.

bandanahead and me 🙂

Final time was 31:08, 7:47 pace.  Not as even as I would have liked (damn West Side Hills!)  but no horribly positive splits.  I’ll tell ya, I was glad to breathe normally again and grab some water.  Saw Bandana-brain and Flyer ST around the finish area…she snapped this nice piccy of us 🙂  After that, just went to get my bag as soon as possible and get inside and get warm!!  Meaning brunch with a coupla other Flyers…mmmm chocolate chip pancakes and lotsa coffee.  OK, maybe that wasn’t the smartest thing to order considering I’d be eating lots later in the day while watching the big game…but what’s done is done 🙂  And yes I did watch the big game later…as well as the commercials 🙂

So…this was definitely a lot better than I thought I would do, given the minimal mileage the last 3 months.  The important thing was that the (sh)IT band stayed quiet for the 4 miles, which was the important thing.  I was a little concerned about it being tight given the really cold temps but it seemed fine.  The cardio system really needs work though, as my lungs seemed to be working harder than my legs…and I really didn’t feel this was an all-out effort, I really didn’t have the extra “kick” I did last year.  It will take time I guess… (though if this ridiculous winter can end sooner rather than later, I’d be everso happy.)

Next up?  xoxo, Gossip Girl.

bring on the gridiron

So against my better sanity, I actually signed up for a NYRR race for next month. I figured that 4 miles is a doable distance…and for once the Gridiron Classic is not the morning after the Flyers awards gala so why not. I’m of course expecting to be very embarassed by my time…but at least I’ll earn the right to eat on Super Bowl Sunday, right?

Oh yeah, the Gossip Girls will also be reuiniting for the Cherry Tree Relay. For me its just for fun and an excuse to wear a cute running outfit that will include a plaid running skirt (completely serious!). I just hope my 2 teammates will forgive me for slowing the team down… 🙂

And getting back to the previous football topic-once again, I still have the Jets to watch-who woulda thought this would happen so late in the game? In appreciation of that, I figure I should post a shirtless pic of Mark Sanchez… 😉

OK…maybe I should post one of him actually playing football in Jet gear too 😛

GO Jets!!!

Oh and if any of you have figured out there is still post content below the pics and are still reading, I do have to give a thumbs up to the WordPress app for the Crackberry. I just composed this entire post while on the subway, and just saved it and inserted links/posted the pics when I actually got to a computer. Big improvement from having to post to Blogger via email…

the “green team”

Guess there’s more than one green team in my life, so to say?  Let’s see, there is the “enviromnentally friendly/socially responsible” group which was formerly known as the green team and was the target of lotsa mocking from the office smartazzes, including one mock-founding the “brown team.”  Mind you, with the amount of paper our side of the office uses, we could not be less environmentally friendly if we tried…

(oh and on the topic of work, yep everyone kept their pants on last week, though I think the entire office wore jeans on Friday just because they could 🙂 )

And of course, there is the J-E-T-S, who have stayed alive long after many peeps had written them and their 2009 season off.  Same bar as the previous week to watch the game, same beer consumption, thankfully same results too.  I’m not commenting yet about what could be next week…don’t wanna jinx it!!

Could it be, that the Jets are actually doing better than I am?  Yeah I guess so.  The road to recovery is still friggin slow, and I’m getting more and more sick of having to run solo.  If there is anything I have learned in the last few months, its that if you’re injured, there is no place for you in the NYC running scene…everyone’s doing their double-digit mileage runs and training for marathons while I have to make do with 5 miles max at a time.  May do a short NYRR race in February just so I can feel human again (and because I don’t want to make the mistake I made last year and not get in 9 races.)  But besides that, I’m still not sure where to go from there, I feel like I have no motivation.  And I know what everyone is going to say, and no I do not want to train for and run a spring marathon.  Just not feeling it, and there wouldn’t be enough time anyway.  I know I need to be patient, but as someone who is craving companionship right now, the patience is slowly wearing thin…

And I guess I also have to apologize I don’t have more to write about…unfortunately injury recovery does not lead to exciting blog posts!

winter is long

So yeah, here is that “longer blog post” I referred to in yesterday’s “welcome to my new blog crib” post 🙂  And rumor has it there may be other bloggy peeps looking to make a blog software switcharoo and join me here…ahhh once again, I am a trendsetter 😉

So first off, how about those Jets?  Wasn’t sure how their chances would be yesterday, as I’m sure the Bengals gave them last Sunday’s game just so they could choose their first-round opponent, so to say.  And there was some sloppy playing yesterday, but it all came together in the end.  (And I just also have to mention that Mark Sanchez is good eye candy 😉 )  So they take on San Diego next week…can they repeat the magic?

And now that the new year has started…yeah winter really seems long…everything seems long(er).  Last week was the first 5-day week I worked in awhile and it just killed me 😛  Well not really.  Though of course, the week cannot pass by without incident…well, besides being in an all-day training session for an online reporting tool and feeling so unproductive for one day, there’s a quasi-crisis on one project (thankfully was not my fault, and did not get fingers unfairly pointed at me!) and then I had to save someone else’s ass, who doesn’t follow directions when being told “re-map yourself to the new shared drive and don’t use the old one.”  Friday couldn’t come soon enough…

And on that running thang, I got my new orthotics in and have started breaking ’em in…not sure if they are drastically different from my old ones, but they do feel good and seem to be better made.  And my PT is starting to kick my ass-literally-with squats and lunges…I think I am gonna have a chronically sore butt for the next few weeks 😛

And a topic that I’ve mentioned briefly before, but just feel like raising the question again…what is the etiquette on family members being friends/keeping in touch with ex-boyfriends?  Like do I have any reason to feel bothered by the fact that my ex-boyfriend (who I havent spoken to in forever) is Facebook friends with my brother and I see him posting comments on my brother’s status?  (I give it 2 weeks before he friends both my parents…)  Never the mind that for 2 years after I broke up, my mom still had a picture of the 2 of us in her office…and would probably still have it there today had I not seen it that one time… :-\

The weather is supposed to get into the 30s this week!!  Break out the running shorts…

welcome to bloggy version 2.0!!

So I decided to make the move to WordPress…figured a new year/decade, a new “home” 🙂  And I’m liking this format so far!  🙂  (still leaving the old blog up just in an effort to prevent any broken links from old posts)

Any comments/suggestions about the new look/feel of the blog-let me know, would love to hear!!

In the meantime…I’m off in a little bit to watch the Jets in the first round of the playoffs…if you had told me 2 weeks ago that would be happening, I never would have believed it!

A longer blog post to come soon, but for now I leave you with this…

J-E-T-S, JETS JETS JETS!

lady luck

so, la familia is fans of Gang Green. meaning lotsa heartbreak over the years. And the biggest fan of all, my dad, seeming to be bad luck when seeing a game in person. However, the ladies in my family seem to have better luck. First, my mom was in attendance with my brother (who has season tix) at the game where the Jets scored 56 points.

And I just happened to be in attendance at this past Sunday’s game, where the Jets crushed the Rams, 47-3…which was “a rout that was unlike any other in franchise history.” I got to view the biggest winning margin ever? How awesome was that?? And of course, I wasn’t alone in witnessing that…

Yep, fellow blogger Uptown Girl had scored some sweet tix from her boss (awesome seats!) so to Giants Stadium we went on Sunday and had a great time. Oh and apparently, so did this drunk guy. Yeah, couldn’t resist nabbing a picture of that…hehe. I figured I’d do you all a favor and just link to it instead of posting the picture. You’re welcome 😛
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So I’ve actually been back on track, running-wise (no pun intended.) Have been doing an easy run every other day and have felt fine…I think I’ll stay away from any hard stuff for at least another week or 2. But I am kinda feeling “now what?” Like a little bit of a let-down feeling. It’s crazy, I don’t want to do anything hard right now, yet I feel I need a goal or something right now-an actual race goal, not a “keep running so you don’t get fat during the holiday season” goal 🙂 Short races in December? I do want to be smart with regards to recovery though…

numbers are up

Giants 3, Pats 2. Those are the numbers I got in my company’s Super Bowl pool, those are the last digits that the quarterly scores need to end in in order to earn me some $$$. Honestly, this is the only reason I’d be watching, I really don’t care who wins (though it has been amusing throwing Manning and Brady at people via SuperPoke on Facebook. teehee.)

And besides, this has a strong possibility of being a dry Super Bowl for me…thanks to the Flyers Awards Gala on Saturday night!! SO excited for that!! Everyone bringing out the bling and red carpet attire, open bar, dancing til the wee hours…yep, I forsee that I will be extremely useless on Sunday.

(and I am sure Flyer attendance at the Gridiron 4-miler will be very low. I know I don’t anticipate getting out of bed before noon on Sunday…)

game on

this has been one of those weekends where i wish it were a 3-day weekend…like i need another day just to recover.

friday nite was such a beautiful nite out, that i made the impulse decision to get my “long run” in after work…mission accomplished. 9 miles. but almost found myself locked out!! i brought the correct apartment key but the wrong front door key-lucky one of my neighbors was around 🙂

saturday i did my “good deed for the month” and helped out at a volunteer event that the Flyers do quarterly with the Central Park Conservancy-we usually do a volunteer event with them in the park once every “quarter” of the year. this one was mulching and raking leaves, so we all got a little dirty 🙂 but had fun. and thank god the rain held off til the end. then last nite we celebrated a teammate’s birthday over at Fusion, a pretty cool bar/lounge over in Hell’s Kitchen. Had fun hanging out and chatting-and knocking back 3 very good mojitos while doing so 🙂 didn’t get home til 2, didn’t fall asleep til 3, couldn’t sleep in cuz…

this morning was the Gridiron Classic 4-miler…I wasn’t planning on racing the thing, I just wanted an excuse to get in 4 miles today and listen to some good music. Besides, I don’t think mojito-loading and 4 1/2 hours sleep make a good race 🙂 nice day, yet another shorts day…i’m sorta liking this global warming thing this winter (though I will not be saying the same this summer, for sure!) i wound up running it in 34:20, an 8:35 pace…miles 1-3 were 8:44 each (i kid you not), topped off with an 8:08 final mile. then right afterwards, headed to our ex-president’s place for the “transition” exec board meeting. and i was hoping to get in a nap before meeting friends to watch the Super Bowl, but somehow I don’t see that happening.

as for the Super Bowl, I’m sorta indifferent as to who wins, as long as my numbers come up 🙂

now playing: “love at first sight” ~ kylie minogue

color me crazy?

yeah, for a coupla reasons. maybe.

so this weekend and last, i’ve been/will be going out to watch football games with teams playing that are pretty much “rivals” of my team (the Jets.) Went out last Saturday nite to watch the Patriots game with some teammates, and then Sunday saw the Giants game with Phil and some other (non-running) bloggers. needless to say, i cared more about chatting with everyone than watching the actual games. and tonite, i’ll be watching the Pats game with the same teammates, same place as last week. hey, as long as my team is out of it, gotta have something to keep me occupied. right?

and today, i was debating…to run or not to run. i knew i just had to get in a few miles to make it over 20 miles for the week and the options were run today with the threat of rain (but temps in the 50s), or tomorrow with the temps in the high 20s/low 30s. i’m sure those who know me knew which option i chose. so i decided to try and get in a quick 4-mile loop during the lull in the rain. temps were perfect, shorts weather. started my clockwise loop at west 86th when it was just misting…but it had picked up by the time i got to the 102nd street transverse. i said to myself “am i crazy for being out here?” nope. i saw plenty of other people doing the same thing i was doing, including 3 of my teammates. and surprisingly, even though the weather was crappy, i was feeling good. good enough to not take the 72nd street cutoff and add another 1.1 miles to my run, and run the whole thing at an 8:50 pace. nice.

so i netted out at 23.7 miles this week, which i’m happy with, i’m trying to get my mileage back up over 20 miles a week and this is the 2nd week i’ve done it since the injury. this tuesday i am gonna try and attempt speedwork, and also have a chat with one of our coaches about a game plan for the Queens half. it’ll be good to have some real direction again.

now playing: “alright” ~ red carpet