100 Days Left!

There are 100 days left until October 8 (it’s actually 99 days now – I should have written this blog this morning!  Lol).  I vacillate between thinking that’s a lot of time and that’s way too little time.  🙂  The one constant thing about time is that it really doesn’t care what you do – it just keeps moving along.  Today I ran three miles; Sunday I will run 16.  That seems mind-boggling to me.  The other day I told Lloyd that I’m feeling intimidated by this race.  He told me if I wasn’t feeling scared, then he’d be worried.  No coddling there. Lol.

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Hair Woes

You can find some really stupid advice on the internet.  Lol.  I sweat in my head when I run.  Profusely.   My hair can be soaked when I’m done – especially after long runs, and especially now that it’s summer and hot.  Why is this a problem?  I have a relaxer in my hair.  To keep it healthy, I minimize the heat that I put in it – this includes blow dryers and curling irons.  This doesn’t work out so well if I’m running four times a week, and have to leave my house before noon for work.  Lol.  

Long Run Sunday – Simple Math

Image courtesy Komodomath.com

The other day I had to schedule a conference call: I was going to be in MD, one coworker was in Cali, the customer was in Hawaii, and one other coworker in Germany. It was crazy trying to keep all the time zones straight. After lots of counting, I sent out the invite. And immediately realized that it was the wrong time! I’d subtracted three hours for Cali, instead of adding. Sigh. Lol. 

What does this have to do with my marathon?   I made a similar math miscalculation. After I finished my half on May 7, I was done. I had to cross the road to walk back to my car and I couldn’t even run across the road as the sign turned to “Don’t Walk”. I couldn’t imagine running anywhere else that day. But for some reason, it never clicked to me that in order to run any distance longer than 13 miles, I’d have to run 13 miles first. Lol. Duh Melissa!The realization that I’m gonna be running several half marathons (I’d never thought of it that way) between now and October was a bit intimidating. 

So I went back to simple math. This morning I ran 13 miles. +1. 

June 18 long run. Check. 

Why I’m running Chicago

Speed workout #1 – the recap

I. Am. Dead. 

Somebody come get me. The track at PG. 

The world record for the 400m for women is 47.60 seconds. Marita Koch. I insist this is false news and alternate truth.  No way anyone is running once around that track in LESS THAN A MINUTE.

Hahaha. First one down. And I’m not dead.  Sunday might kill me though. Lol.  Stay tuned for details. 

113 days and counting. 

Why I’m running Chicago. 

On Your Mark…Get Set…Go!

Image courtesy img.spokeo.com

I grew up watching Carl Lewis and Edwin Moses run track.  My dad ran track while he was in high school, and he loved watching track and field, and so we watched too.  He’s actually where I get my love of sports from – we grew up watching basketball (Lakers, of course!!), tennis, swimming…fun stuff.

At every Olympics, I imagined myself a world class sprinter.  I have a great imagination!  Lol.  Evelyn Ashford (first woman to run the 100m under 11 seconds at an Olympic games) was my girl!  I was never a Flo Jo fan though (not gonna make any comments about steroids).

I am talking about track and field because tomorrow I do my first speedwork run in my marathon training.  I am supposed to go to the track and run 400m as fast as I can, rest one minute, then repeat that sequence four times.  

Why I’m Running the Chicago Marathon

Image courtesy trbimg.com

Running this marathon is probably one of the hardest things I’ll do in my life.  I am not a runner.  So why am I doing it?

At the beginning of Spike Lee’s movie, Chi-raq, the following numbers are shared:

2001 – 2015
–2,349 American deaths in the Afghanistan war

2003 – 2011
–4,424 American deaths in the Iraqi war

As I watched this, I nodded my head and thought, “Yeah, lots of people die in war; it’s pretty awful.” But then he hits you with this stat:

2001 – 2015
–7,356 murders in Chicago

I looked at that number in shock.   There were more murders in an American city than deaths of soldiers (people expected to die) in two wars. Did people know this?  I hadn’t known.