Our 60's crashed to the 30's.

Post as you wish.

I woke up quite early- will catch up with personals.

Judy, nice you had a little spring weather in Jan. Too bad it didn't last.

Julie, on your BS...just a thought...have you tried to take cheese, peanut butter or another protein  along with a hard candy/glucose when your BS drops?  We used to encourage our diabetic patients to do that. Otherwise, the BS drop, climbs quickly then because it's digested quickly, they'd have a rebound drop and feel awful. The protein helps even it out since it digests more slowly.  Even having a little before you run might help.

Lisa, sorry about the prob with DH.  I usually only traveled 1-2x/ year for work, but we'd try to add vacation days and make a trip out of the opportunity (and I think you'd be crazy not to).  Amateur psych here (so feel free to ignore), but I wonder ifhe feels threatened in his husband role with your earning more and having a more successful career. Impressed with miles.

Tessa, sounds like you've found a great running partner and had a wonderful run. Nice.  So sad about the girl's father.

Ginny, I'm also a little surprised by your legs "giving out" on an 8 miler since you did 13 a month ago. Have you tried heel lifts and calf strengthening?  Easy to do anywhere and helped me a few years ago.  Quad and hamstring work might help, too, but I seldom do those. : )

Marjorie, amazed by your miles! I can't imagine a run without water. My little water bottle is my security blanket-never run without it. : )

Laura, glad you had a nice outside run.

Carolyn, 8 miles is great!  remember-even a mile or 2 is great! This is just an unusual group with our monster miles gals.

Lisa-Marie, nice job on the 10K!  Pancakes at the end-sweet!

Karen, sounds like your job future is a winner either way-more responsibility at current job or the new one.  Nice!

Carol, sounds like a good yoga tape. Funny how different yoga is-some challenging and some easy.

Gatsby, hope it was a nice trail run.

Linda, woo-hoo on the 50 mile week!  Mileage pr!  You rock!

Cindy, what a great idea to plan a race as a family!  Sounds like a lot of fun.

I did 10 in dense fog.  Now I'm at the dentist for cleaning.

Lisa Marie the plan looks good.

Camille I'm just odd but as long as the dew point is 60 or below I can go without water.

Judy sorry the weather turned.

I planned a brief race report for Houston, but it's feeling so good to sit in bed, it grew. 

I got in by the lottery last summer on my first try-a surprise. I entered mainly because I found it curious that Houston had such a popular race that it requires a lottery.  : )

Logistics-you may remember me trying to figure out hotel.  People on the marathoner's forum strongly suggested staying downtown and I'd reluctantly made a $$$ reservation.  My flight reservations were thru Orbitz and they sent a deal last week-Hobby airport Marriott AND Hertz rental for 78/night.  I couldn't pass it up and it worked out great!  Nine miles away, so a 15 min drive and the race parking was easy.

Expo-was fairly big and a little different with vendors with lots of marked down gear. I got a Hind skirt and Asics shorts for 9.99. Ryan Hall made a couple of appearances for autographs-missed him.  They didn't have speakers and I missed that.

Prerace Sat-we got an email from race director about the weather-the forecast had changed daily. They'd been predicting a rain/cold front moving thru on Sat evening, but it was now predicted to continue during early race. She encouraged jackets and hats and warned of hypothermia. To cover her bases, she also said the sun might come out at the end and hyperthermia might be an issue.    Trying to pack light, I hadn't brought a jacket and had been looking anyway. I headed back to expo hoping to find a deal-no deal, but bought one. I was early and saw part of the 5k. Lots of kids-fun!  Noted it was  77 with 95% humidity and some people had on jackets and pants. Later, I went to the Houston Space Center-very cool. Found great pasta place, Angelino's (angelos') near there.

Race-Training was pretty good until Dec, when I got a bit freaked out by my occasional arrythmia and cut way back.  I only did 2 16's and an 18 miler ( a slog) and weekly miles were low. I know I can finish if I take it easy, so decided to walk the water stops and not obsess about a strategy or time.

Race morning was ugly-rain,wind, 50 at 4:30 and dropping.  Am I picky or what? Don't like 75 or 40's with wind/rain!  . We were blessed-the waiting was inside the huge expo center. First time I've seen porta-potties inside and they had lots of them.   Everyone was reluctant to go out in the rain,so at 6:50 the announcer gave us a verbal shove..."The race starts in 10 mins!! Time to line up."  The corrals were crowded and not really by pace..least of worries.  It took 20 min to cross. I had on sleeves, ls shirt, jacket, thin poncho, and capris and every stitch was soaked by half mile including shoes. Rain was coming in gusts.  (Tessa-thanks for the poncho tip. You mentioned it months ago and I've kept one in carry on since. Nicer than garbage bags.) They had flashing signs on course about weather-code white for hypothermia risks. "Dress in layers..cover skin. "    By then, people had what they had, but prob good to keep people aware.

The course was really crowded until mi 9 when half split-so crowded it was hard not to bump into other runners. Those were my slowest miles-going out too fast was not a problem!  : )  It was so crowded,  I was wondering why it was  popular.  However, after mi 9, it became a very nice race thru universities and pretty neighborhoods. The rain also stopped about then which helped a lot! Wind continued. The spectators also started coming out and were great. Water stops were plentiful- during the pouring  rain, they were a little short handed...not a surprise... but the later ones were great. They had orange slices and pretzels fairly often-prefer those to gu, also available.

I felt pretty good walking thru water stops till the last 3 miles when I was just tired and walked more. I prob should have fueled more though more training would have helped even more.  Finished in 4:54:48 for 7 of 35 AG.

Post race: Again, everything was set up inside the huge expo center and was very organized. Quick gear pickup. Nice gender specific finisher shirt and we could pick the size there (sweet) and a finisher's mug. There was lots of food, including ice cream sandwiches, which sounded delicious (and was!) despite being cold. They even had breakfast-eggs, biscuit and sausage (passed on sausage) and hot coffee. I tried Texas Barb-b-q'd beef for dinner.  Very good!

Summary: it's a very well organized race and I'm glad I did it once, though it's not one I loved enough to repeat. I was really impressed with the dedicated volunteers who deserved double  OT pay to be out in that!

I leave today, so it's  time to get out of bed. : )

Morning!  I am back in the land of the heat and humidity (wait, I never left, I was in Orlando, doh).  Goofy Challenge went really well.  I almost PRd on the marathon, oops.  First marathon without albuterol and that in and of itself makes me very happy.  SRD for me today.

judyruns, I'm jealous of that weather.  Enjoy the track run.

camille, hope your day goes well.  Thanks for sharing the RR.  Congrats on the great performance.

Lisa-Marie, hope DD feels better soon.

Marjorie, nice 10. Sorry about the dentist.  That's as much fun as nothing at all.  Looking forward to our dinner Thursday.

Crazysue, hope you're not in trouble for arriving late.  Nice workout.

I wrote an RR and it's thesis-long.  It's in my blog, so if you want something that would make you fall asleep, click on my siggie and read it before bed.  Might work as a children's bedtime story too.

Have a nice day!

Tessa--Yes, you would think I could knit a yellow lab sweater with all the hair he sheds.  You just look at him and fur falls off.  I hope your sister appreciated your help!

Great job Camille!

Quick check in as I'm trying to get some stuff down and out of the office early so I can get my 6 miles in before taking Jake to the vet to hopefully get his stitches out. Although I don't think it looks that good and he may need more surgery. My wallet and Jake's patience with the cone will both be quite unhappy if that is the case.

Anyway, I took a shot at removing the asphalt background (sob) on Karnel's event graphic. What do you think? Photoshop is not my strong suit, so if anyone else is better than me I'd be happy to send the psd file for manipulating.

Hmm, if that doesn't show up, click here and you should be able to see it. For some reason, it's not showing up as a pic for me here. I also posted in the RW over 40 group on facebook.

Great report camille! Will read yours tonight Damaris. Hi to everyone!

karen

Well, correct the language as you read because there is cursing.  So, maybe PG-13?

It's 30s here too. 25 yesterday morning. 25. In southern California and at an elevation of about 1300. That's unbelievable.

 

The local news was filming in the bank parking lot, thermometer prominently on camera.

 

8 miles yesterday afternoon. I was not running yesterday morning! And none this morning, since the mattress magnet won and I had to take my sister to the airport, but planning on the gym at lunch. Not overly thrilled with my sister either.  Dropped her off at the airport at 6 AM. Drove back to Santa Clarita to park at the bus stop. Bus was a little late so checked my phone. 8 calls from SIL. Oh crap.  Called her back. Sis left her purse in my car. With her ID, her cell phone, her meds, everything. She had got hold of SIL on her iPad which she did have. She was frantic. She had a meeting in another city and needed to get on the 8 AM flight. She couldn't get on the plane without photo ID and she needs her phone for work. Not to mention that hotels like to have a credit card presented at check in and meals have to be paid for.

 

Fortunately a) I was not on the bus yet and b) it was Burbank not LAX. I drove back down to the airport, reunited Sis and purse, and drove to the North Hollywood station rather than backtracking once more.

 

Camille, sounds like you had a good time! I did Houston in 2004, weather was better than yours, glad they are putting more potties at the start. There was a shortage of facilities nine years ago. And glad the poncho tip helped -- poncho with hood means that cold rain isn't dripping down your neck like it does if you have a garbage bag with holes for neck and arms.  And it's not the marathon that's so popular, it's the half, and so many people signed up for the full intending to drop to the half that they wound up making both half and full a lottery. I'm not surprised that it thinned out considerably after the split.

 

Damaris, will check out your Goofy report, children's bedtime story? You must not use the language I frequently do during races.

 

Susan, Deuce hair -- could you filter it out and then card/spin/knit it? I've heard of people doing that with dog hair!

 

Marjorie, with you, if it's not too humid or hot then I may not need a drink at all. I didn't drink much on Saturday even though we were doing 22, it was not warm and not exceptionally humid.

 

Judy, good luck with the Kayanos, are those stability?

 

Lisa-Marie, good for you! Hmm. I think I might add at least one more day of running in there, not sure you need two days of rest and two of XT. Also the peak mileage is 17, that's fairly low. But that's me. If you are comfortable with 17 miles a week as the peak mileage (Tuesday 3, Thursday 4, Saturday 10) go for it.

 

Work calls! Happy runs.

 

Tessa