I give up!

Seriously, wasn’t it supposed to get easier once football season and the holidays and the race were all over?

Sure, but then I forgot about it being a new year and so there’s preparing for taxes, and that rugby thing 17 decided to try out and then that whole college admission thing and oh maybe I might want to keep up with being in such good shape and look around for other races & fitness challenges.

And then, the rebound illness hit (as properly identified by my high school friend Stacey). You know, that thing that happens after some sort of either positive or negative Big Deal is done? The one when your body says “Hold up now! It’s time to REST!” Yeah – that hit me last week.

Perfectly timed of course – both boys were out of town so I had the house to myself. We had done the big holiday decoration clean up already and about all I had planned for the time was a run with Audrey to catch up with her and maybe some preliminary tax paperwork sorting and the annual side closet clean out (how does that one closet manage to multiply its contents every damn year?)

Thankfully, all that hit me was a head cold and not the dreaded flu so I actually did get some of the sorting and clean up done, but I did have to stay home the whole time and forgo running. Which may have been my body’s whole goal anyway eh?

In the meantime – those of you who followed my race prep and final results would enjoy reading this race report written by my most excellent (Best Ever) pacer – here’s an excerpt:

As our legs warmed up, I inched us up to around a 10:30 min/mile pace. This is what I was shooting for initially. But as the miles ticked away, our speed kept creeping up. We were consistently running closer to 10 minute pace, sometimes even faster.

Christina didn’t know how fast we were going, but she looked completely comfortable. She was working hard, but it didn’t appear to be stressing her too badly. I was pretty sure she could keep it up so I decided to go with it. 10 min/mile, here we come!

I told you I suspected she had some nefarious schemes up her sleeve! Read the rest HERE.

I do have plans for more events in 2014. I’m signing up for an event on 2/16 that is a local 10 mile run complete with 20 bands along the route! That sounds pretty awesome. Then there’s a series of trail races that start with a 5k and build up to a 1/2 marathon. Those *really* appeal to me since I do love trail running, and a friend from work wants to do that set so I think I’ll do those too. I’m pretty sure I will sign up for the 2nd annual Holiday Half in December 2014 as well – maybe see if I can improve that time 🙂

Somehow I have managed to keep up with one challenge I found on Tribe Sports called the 30 Day Squat Challenge. I started it on Jan 1 as Day 1 and even with the attack of the killer head cold, I managed to keep it up. I thought this would be a good one to tackle since I know that I need to improve my hill climbing strength if I want to keep running *anywhere* in San Diego, but especially on trails.

I can tell you that Days 1-3 are the WORST. I could barely even get through them, and that was with splitting up the squats into sets of 20 each. I literally fell on my ass after the very first twenty! I walked around, did some quick stretches and then went to start the next set of 20, and my quads quivered and then GAVE OUT. *Splat!* On the floor. OK then….I waited about an hour and managed to eke out 20 more and then finally the last 10. And then the next 3 days I was in agony with every step! Forget how much those 55 and then 60 squats each day hurt – simple use of my legs in any capacity was brutal!

But – after that blissful day of rest (which also happened to be the day we took down all the holiday decorations so, rest was not entirely accurate!) I was amazed to be feeling completely fine. Not only fine, but measurably stronger. The runs I had done before I got the cold were easier and faster than ever even with hills. At this point the biggest problem I will have getting the challenge done is simply time and boredom. I do them in sets of 50 now, and I might feel a little tight at the end, but proper stretching and walking it off and I back to normal.

That’s it from here – the rest of the week will be all about rugby – a mid-week game tomorrow and then a trip up to UCLA on Saturday to play two games against high school teams from Northern California – college scouts are expected there. Not sure what impact that could have on 17’s prospects given his relative newbie player status and that he is a senior already and college apps are supposed to be done, but…one never knows I guess! He’s willing to talk to anyone at this point to have as many options as possible before he truly has to make a decision. I know if he has a chance to play a sport, ANY sport, while in college that he will leap at the chance.