It was the best of times, it was the worst of times... 2012 edition, the SWAG episode!!

YAY! PRIZES! (no, I'm not hosting a giveaway. calm down.)

I LOVE a good race medal! Truth is, I even like a terrible race medal. One would think that after years of equestrian life I might not be so excited over paltry prizes and merch but come on.... it never gets old to me!

I won a few things this year that made me shriek in joy. After murdering myself and running to 4th place in the 4 on the 4th I scored some sweet gift cards to Maine Running and New Balance, enough cash money to actually buy myself some fun shiny new things *dies in happiness* If I had been smart enough to check at the following races I would have won awesome age group prizes: Great Bay Half, Tri For a Cure 5K and (as we all know) MDI- where I won my AG and due to the low IQ after 26.2 didn't even think to check. And there for missed out on the chance to win the prettiest award ever. I'm still legit sad about this and might be until my dying day *insert too much drama HERE*

The award for the best Swag Bag by FAR goes to the Maine Half Marathon. SO MUCH STUFF. Sweet shirt, samples, coupons, odds and ends and (randomly) a can of baked beans which I certainly could do without. Aside from that I'm always excited to collect my sack of happiness from them and am sad that we are parting ways next year.

OK. Chit Chat over. Time to move on to my favorite (and least fav) prizes!

PS: It was tricky. I actually like ALL my merch from this year. for the most part anyways...

My Absolute favorite! The MDI Medal.
So gorgeous. So Big.
That's what she said.

The hard to photograph All Women's Half Medal.
So pretty! So heartshaped! LOVELOVE!

Quincy Half Medal.
Looks ok from here. But kinda cheezy in real life.
Take my word for it.
(Quincy also had HORRIBLE race shirts which would have been in the running for Worst Shirt had I not dropped it at Goodwill...)

Around the Lake Medal.
Well, it was my first marathon so it has meaning...?
I totally puked on it. (for real.)
But it's really really small. Itty Bitty. I wish for my prizes to be large, damnit.

Pineland 25K Cowbell.
COME ON! IT WAS 25K! Give me a freaking real bell...
It horrifies me whenever I lay my eyes on it. As you can see...

TEENY. TINY. 

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.. 2012 edition, episode TWO!

Today's edition of Best of/Worst of 2012 has to do with fashion.

EPIC FASHION. OH YES.

I seriously got 3,256 shirts this year. 3,252 have already gone to Goodwill. World, you are welcome. 

Honestly, I don't expect decent shirts at races. And at 5K's I'd kinda rather that they gave all the money to the charity and spared me the trip to the thrift shop (just sayin'...) I have come to expect the hideous, the heinous and the poorly fitting. I have made my pics, it is official!

As usual Beach To Beacon gave a solid shirt. I wear it all the time as I did with last years shirt and it is possibly my favorite part of that race (I'm a Debbie Downer about Beach To Beacon. I'm the only person in the world who doesn't love it and think it's the best thing ever, Oh well.)

Anyway. Onto my Best and Worst Race shirt fashion moments from 2012.

Photographed by my excellent exclusive dating partner, who is lucky enough to get to help with my blog. Every man's dream right there...

Would you look at THIS!
WORST RACE EVER...
Gave a damn good shirt. Figures...
I never wear this shirt running but put it on pretty much every day when I get home from work.
Actually. This outfit is almost exactly what I put on at the end of every day.
Lucky my boyfriend. 

And the oddities continue!
BEST RACE EVER (MDI) Gave out this TENT that sleeps 8.
Wow, this is a ladies XS. It goes down to my knees, no lie. IT IS THE WORST.

Seriously. WTF?
A study in why 5K races should just cease and desist with the ghastly shirts.
Furry Friends 5k, humanity wants you to never give shirts again.

My Dog is ready to climb up in this enormous shirt, from the looks of things.
But he's too scared of the fire hazard material and blinding hue.
I love it, as you can see.

I kinda love this shirt!
Thank you All Women (and one lucky guy) Half!!!
It fits! It's cute! I have actually worn it in another race!!!!
BIG SOLID WIN!!

On a side note. After being a champ and taking pictures for me and kindly loading them into the computer Eric settled down to do random Man Stuff (or so I thought.) I was over here at my computer, typing away when suddenly my computer went freaking nuts. Up on the screen popped: lerhekthve vkwehrv krvh!!! I was like "UH OH, WHAT IS THIS??" I tried to figure out if I had hit some catastrophic button to cause mass mayhem when the following words appeared "Eric is so sexy.. And he likes your boobs." Looking around I discovered that sneaky Eric had powered up a random wireless keyboard and was having a grand time effing with my head and my blog. HMMMPH! I laughed hysterically for about 10 minutes. Ahhhhhh, I'm so lucky!

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times... 2012 edition!!

2012 was quite the year.

I ran about 47 races (or so it felt. I actually have no idea, perhaps I should count...?)

Some were awesome, some were horrid and a LOT were just little blips on my radar that I no longer even remember. (because clearly I'm too cool to be bothered with OMG so many boring races, haha..)

Since we are quickly getting into the Holiday season, and thus the year's end I have a few blogs planned to chat about the highs and lows.

Today's Episode!

ALL THE RACES. Well, a couple of them anyway.. What did I love? What did I HATE??

Read on to find out...

 

Around The Lake Marathon
Wins for: NEVER EVER AGAIN!!

Actually, that is a lie. If you want to pay my entry, buy me a sweet new outfit (plus shoes!) and pay for me to get down there then I'll do it. If you require that I run fast I require quite a bit of extra moolah though. Something about running a marathon in the middle of the night in the MIDDLE of the summer promotes death like agony, so I'll pass. Thanks. This was no fault of the race organizers, clearly. They ran the whole silly shebang just fine. However, this race is not for me...

MDI: The clear winner of BEST RACE!!!!

MDI is THE BEST FUNNEST MOST AMAZING. Do it. Take my word for it.

I expect that there will be a lot more people in the "start" picture next year and I CAN NOT WAIT!

Best Lesson Learned at: Tri for a cure 5K

And what lesson is THAT? I suck at fundraising. I absolutely CAN NOT run anymore races that require me to raise a certain amount of cash- I just can't do it then I pay the whole amount. And go broke. SUCKSUCKSUCK.

 

 

Color Me Rad
Wins for: STUPIDEST RACE EVER.

Call me Buzz Killington but I thought Color Me Rad was a silly, messy, VERY EXPENSIVE waste of time. At the time, I claimed that I would never do one again and this is a FACT. Spend that money on something, anything else!!!  And it was only 2.8 miles AND was untimed to add insult to injury. It was also horribly organized and total chaos and bedlam. And it was a disgusting mess. *grouchygrouchygrouchy*




Pineland. The race I swore to never do again.
But clearly will.

Pineland was a hilly, hilly nightmare. This is also where the shin shit of 2012 started. However.... They throw a damn good party, there is beer, food, cookies, friends and it is kinda fun to run thru the woods (for 5 minutes.) This one is already on my to-do list for 2013 because I'm straight up stupid.

Great Bay Half. My least favorite race, that became my most favorite race.

I am a fickle woman. That is all.

Sadly, GBH and I will not be reunited in 20136 because of this little race I have going on called the Boston Marathon. GBH actually kinda kicks ass if you can handle the hills. And there are good medals, beer and food. Notice a trend? Beer and Food are VERY VERY important to me!!

A runner up for me on the "best" list is the Maine Marathon- I ran the Half per the norm. Great race, very organized, so much fun (terrible weather) Sadly, not on the list for 2013 because of other TBA plans!

So there you have it, my expert and very legit list of my favorite (and least fav) races from 2012. Stay tuned for the next episode of my end-of-the-year recap!

A study in my coordination.....

On December 1st I started working with my excellent kick ass coach.

On December 1st I also managed to take one stupid lousy step and pretty much turn my ankle over in the worst possible way. Yeah, I totally did. My coordination is the subject of much talk...

It took me a couple of days to realize that I needed to be more attentive to the little Achilles problem and up to that time (Friday) I continued to work out. Friday was a moderate shit show. I was legit gimpy and pretty damn unhappy....

 

 

FREEZING COLD LONG RUN. Go away winter, go away.

Thinking back, I know I had a recovery run last Saturday (the 1st) a run with fast intervals on Sunday, an 8 miler (I think?) on Monday that included a 1 mile speed trial.

Sad to say that I couldn't do better than a 6:44. Oh well..

Tuesday was a rest day and Wednesday I went to (WAIT for it) SPIN CLASS.

And the world tips on its axis.

If there is one thing I dislike and try to avoid it is group exercise classes.  90% of the time they seem to consist of "whoo girls." You know: "ARE WE HAVING FUN??" to which the response is "WHOOO!!!" This makes me vomitous as I wish to have fun after working out, after getting my ass royally kicked. If I have fun while working out I'm often dissatisfied. Bottom line, I am a righteous asshole. Who also wants to have sweaty, stinky, miserable, tormential workouts- NOT fun dancing silly get-ya-club-music-on kinda crapola.

The moral of the story is that this was NO Whoo Girl class and I got my hat handed to me. I was the worst in the class by a very considerable margin and since this is unacceptable to me I plan to work hard (in order to be THE BEST. DUH.) The good news is that I did not fall off my bike, which seemed like a very real possibility.....

My legs felt strange for the rest of the week. Not sore. But very, very strange like they belonged to someone else. I was bewildered.

I had a 6 miler the following day which was when I realized that I was more wounded than I had originally thought. Coach Kelsey wisely forbade my long run. And she is secretly glad that I'm having a wisdom tooth out this week which will prevent me from running ALL the miles. (and this is no secret, she kinda came out and said it.) Poor Coach Kelsey. I'm a pain in the ass...

Oh, and somewhere in there was a very difficult strength/core day in which I managed to find out that ALL my muscles are weak. VERY WEAK!!!!

Sexy date night! YAY!!!

You all know that my exclusive dating partner and I know how to have fun. We run miles and/or get hurt and rock out in the most impressive socks ever. With my dog Lester who is the MOST adorable!

ERMAHGRD! We CAN be normal!!! With 5 inch heels on I am still that short. WTF??

 

We spent the weekend celebrating my Aunt's birthday down in Mass. We got dressed in non running attire (but let it be known that Eric DOES have compression socks on in that picture...) We drank wine, danced VERYVERY well and sang Bon Jovi. We are the coolest.

With our buddy Evan.
Yes, we all went on a run the following day.
Yes, we DID make his Dad pick us up so we could run point to point.
YES, that is ALL his poos Dad seems to do when we visit!!

What was it I said about being normal?
This happened.
This ALWAYS happens.
We are dead sexy. Eric needs to work on his creepy face a lot to be as awesome as us...

Anyway, we did indeed have a very decent 1 hour run on Sunday. My ankle felt a lot better and we kept up a totally decent pace. I'm really hoping to keep my idiot clumsiness to a minimum. I would love to be able to get all my workouts in with zero drama... We shall see what this week brings.

Big Exciting News!

For a change my blog absence has little to do with "nothing" going on. The opposite is actually the case, I have SO much to report on that I've had a hard time putting it into coherent posts.

Luckily, coherency has rarely been important to me so why start now? (did I just make up the word coherency? awesome...)

 

Here is a quick update of my goings on, starting at the beginning. Expect some juicy details (or sweaty details, whatevs...) coming in the next days and weeks.

 

We all know Boston is looming on the relative horizon. My original goal was to stay fit and healthy and bang out a BQ there for next year, effectively making me a one hit wonder (or one marathon per year wonder but again- WHATEVS!) I changed my goal about a month ago because I have an intense desire to run Boston with "no pressure." However, my desire to BQ for 2014 nice and early is still there. How to do this logically (what?) reasonable (WHAT?) and injury free (WHAT WHAT?!?!?) presented a big problem for me.

 

 So I called in the the coolest experts around...

 

 

 

 

I really like doing everything that Eric and Andy do, so jumping on the TSA bandwagon seemed wise. And wise it is proving to be.

If nothing else I chose my own, seriously badass, zero percent body fat coach. (She is so ripped it puts me to SHAME. which is good, shame is the best motivator for me!) I really liked the coaches that the boys used but sometimes a girl needs to step out of the formidable shadows of the Ironmen and do her own thing, even if she is a copier! Coach Kelsey will be kicking my ass into the best shape ever this winter/spring/possibly the rest of my running life, UGH! (but UGH in a good way, for real.)  I'll talk a little more about my recent workouts soon but suffice it to say- there is cross training involved. OH NO!!!

And what's next on the agenda?

 

Full Marathon, Hopefully a solid BQ. February, 2013.

I'm feeling good about things. SO glad to have someone creating an amazing training plan for me so that I don't have to strugglebus thru it myself. Always nice to have an expert voice of reason to intercept my desire to over train like a complete idiot (who, me?!! yeah, me...)



I feel like this is a potential big step for me. I'm really excited to see what a little help will do for me in the fitness and injury department. (I take that back- I might need a LOT of help come to think of it.) Either way, I'm realy to work hard and see where the road takes me this time...