Packed my bags last night, pre-flight!



Looking good ladies! See you soon!



We're getting close.

Like, really, REALLY close.

Last night was our last running clinic with the Running Room(which ended with an excellent potluck, which in retrospect was something we really should have done every week!) Most of our run buddies will be doing their half this weekend, but we still have a bit further to go.  Two weeks from tonight we'll be packing our bags and checking in for our flight since we'll be leaving Thursday night! I'm already looking forward to choosing which three 100ml bottles of liquids I can't travel without. And which shirts to pack. And which bag to pack them in. And how many pairs of shoes is too many for a 4 night stay again?

On one hand, it feels like we've been training forever and we'd never make it Florida, and on the other hand, it's starting to feel like this race is coming up way too fast...I mean, we have to run 20K on Saturday and won't even get a medal at the end of it!   Unless pannenkoeks count as a medal (I'd take them over metal anytime, since they come with a side of sour cream!) And while I've pinpointed the nearest cupcake store to our hotel (BabyCakes in Downtown Disney, yum!), I have no idea where the closest premium outlet is.

And we need to watch our princess movies to get us all prepped for race day. I mean, what if at Mile 7 I realize I can't remember ALL the lyrics to Little Town or Something There or just how many eggs Gaston ate every morning to help him get large? This kind of training is important too, we have to be prepared!

Well as we get closer and closer to our goal it seems pretty important that we keep to our training schedule. As of late this has been more and more apparent in the ways we’ve been making these runs happen. One of the things we’ve been doing is running before work instead of after.. one big reason is that the wind seems to be less at this time of day, there are people who can join you PLUS you are finished for the day and don’t have to worry about the next run until tomorrow.

Run #1 - Princess Crys and I decided a couple of weeks ago to do our weekly 8km run in the morning and invited a fellow WestJetter and runner Alex to come join us. As per usual before the run, our running attire was discussed (ignored) and we were on our way.

Thank goodness for my new running gloves as no sooner than 10m into our run I hit an ice patch and went down in a surprisingly smooth fashion but with enough of a yelp to literally awaken a mouse from hibernation and create a few yelps from my fellow runners when it ran out on the sidewalk beside us. So now we have 3 heart attacks in 3seconds into our run and we must continue.

The temperature was great for running but as mentioned we dressed for the wind chill and all ended up being more than a little warm. Our route took us from Campus up to the Barlow running path I had used for my 18km to work, so I knew it was clear-ish. The problem was that the wind the night before had caused some pretty high snowdrifts on the path and with our best efforts we made our way knee deep through them and on occasion off the path until our turn around point then made our way back the same route to campus.

Run #2 – Let’s call this run, the ‘wet’ one. Princess Crys had worked the night before so Alex and I wrangled up Jason with jabs of him not getting up early enough to join .. and we all know how boys are when they are told they can’t do something. So Jason met us at the back doors.. and by meeting us, I mean he got there first, then when Alex arrived we started out.

Same 8km route but the weather was a balmy +7 with the wind being half of what it was the week before. Now this turned out to be a blessing and a curse.

Good times though.. we had just gotten to the intersection when a car came up behind us and honked, besides scaring the .. well you know out of us, I made a few ‘gestures’, no not those ones, just letting the car know there was plenty of room to pass us. Well we soon found out the car had honked to try to get our attention to find the Canadian North Hangar.. stunned silence. No idea, we replied and continued our run.

The path was a little slick in parts but mostly just wet in general. Luckily we had the headlights from cars coming up from behind us to let us know what was a puddle and what was just black asphalt. The new traffic circle was a little harder to maneuver with construction ongoing, puddles, and curbs but we managed to get to the turn around post (which I almost took out with our usual grab the post and do the gravity weeeee squeal)

Now the real problem was the return route .. with the headlights now incoming and the path not really that easy to see we managed to run close enough to each other that we all ended up dropping deep into the first puddle thus starting the sopping run back. This pattern continued through the traffic circle with sounds of running shoes being dumped into puddles and then the voice close behind it yelling “noooooo”!!

Make it back in good time considering it felt like an off trail run that we had just completed.

Run #3 – With Princess Crys on the injured reserve, Jason not wanting to mess up his workout regime and Alex willing, our third 8km in 3 weeks started and finished with little trouble. I had worn the coveted headlamp from Princess Felic and my Sight Night run and this turned out to be a fantastic help while trying to maneuver the puddles and construction. We finished the run 3miuntes faster than the last one and I’m sure our shoes were much appreciative of the lack of water intake compared to the last run!

Three weeks to go!

23 more sleeps, Mickey!!!

It seems like only yesterday we were 200 days away from our race, but this time three weeks from now, we'll be arriving in Florida!   We still have one more week of running clinic, we have a 20K to get through in training, and I need to find some sweatproof mascara and eyeliner, but I've been compusively checking our flights, the weather, where the cupcake shops are and even had my first "Disneymare" last night...I dreamt we went for lunch in Toronto during our layover and missed our connecting flight.  Yes, I woke up in a sweaty panic today, but I guess if I'm still not too worried about the run itself, then we're doing OK!

Damsel in Distress...again.

OK, there was no Snidely Whiplash,
I brought this on myself...

Hey, remember when I got lost in Central Park? Well, apparently this feat isn't limited to other countries, but can just as easily be done in my hometown! For my 8K run last week, I was trying to figure out where I could fit it in. Since we were going to the Flames game and the weather had been fantastic, I joked I should just run to the Dome, but checking the route, I saw our house to the nearby Glencoe (where Bryan was going to be anyways) was 8.2k...PERFECT!

Thinking ahead, I packed a change of clothes (including jersey, of course) in Bryan's car the night before and planned to meet him around 7:15 so I could freshen up and we could get to the game for 8pm puck drop. At home, I packed my cash, ID (and yes, I DID get carded for beer later, HURRAY!), phone and keys into my Coach wristlet, put that into a plastic ziplock (am not going to get lovely bag all stinky, thank you!) and then tucked it into my pocket. My first run with a Coach bag, am so fashionable! I headed off and since the whole way is a gentle incline, the kilometers flew by as gravity helped me on my way.

I was wearing my headlamp, so no fears of slipping on the last remaining bits of ice.  I learned the hard way that sometimes I couldn't tell the difference between "ice" and "6 inches of icy water" so my feet were soaked by the time I got to 14th st. Undaunted, I pressed on, I was nearly there and I knew exactly where I was! I was so proud of myself for being all organized and fun for doing this, and had even added a new song to my running playlist. (Turns out, I REALLY liked running to this song, and maybe ended up listening to it 9 times in a row?) Anyways, I get to the traffic circle as expected right around the 7.5K mark and sped up a bit, excited at how smoothly the run had gone and how very on time I was going to be.

A few minutes later I came to a steep hill with no sidewalk. Hmm...I don't remember a hill around here?  Fearful of being smushed by a car, I sprinted up the hill and turned left into what I thought (and was now really hoping) was the Glencoe...no such luck. I was in a cul-de-sac overlooking...something. Maybe Elbow? I'm not sure. I fire off a quick "I'm not lost" text and backtrack, confident I was only slightly off course. I run another half kilometer and still no Glencoe. I stop to squint at street signs that don't help me.  I run another half kilometer and realize I'm not sure if I should be running to bigger street numbers or smaller. Looking around, I realize I no longer know which direction downtown is, let alone East or West.  I'm so lost, I don't even know which direction to head to figure out where to go. Defeated, I call Bryan. He asks where I am. I walk to the nearest street sign and read them out. He starts laughing and says not to move and he'll be there in 5 minutes.

I take the opportunity to do some post run stretches and feel sheepish...when Bryan does pull up, he is still laughing. He continues laughing as he drives for nearly 5 minutes to get back near the Glencoe, at which point I'm laughing pretty hard myself. Apparently at the traffic circle, instead of going straight, I had made a hard left and been heading due South for over a kilometer...

In case you're wondering, Bryan =2, Felicity =0 and I will always carry a phone on any run I go on by myself from now on. Also, because of this lengthy delay, I had to change in the car on a side street before hoofing it to the Dome. I felt sorry for the people sitting in front of me who had to smell my stinky feet the whole game. But I tell you what, the hot dog and pint of beer I had at the game were great!

Two very different 18Ks...

Part 1: 18 kilometer run



Sunday I woke up feeling lousy. My stomach hurt and I was kind of stuffed up. And really tired, in spite of a solid 10 hours of sleep. I didn't want to run 18K, I wanted to go back to sleep and then eat chicken noodle soup (laced with, um, Imodium). The great (and terrible) thing about training as a trio meant I couldn't do that, I had to get up and go. Still feeling lousy, I drove over to the Running Room to join the group and we set out on what I grudgingly acknowledge was a lovely sunny and warm (for January) morning run. We started out running towards the mountains, which was straight into a brisk Chinook wind, which means I was in trouble immediately. I find running INTO the wind means it sucks the air right out of me so the first 2K which are usually a treat before I get all tired were tough as I wheezed my way West. We wound our way into some pretty posh neighbourhoods and I eyed their 4 car garages nervously, daydreaming of what would happen if I knocked on their door and asked to use their servants bathroom should it be required. Running was NOT improving my tummy, but we kept on trucking. Crystal had brought her awesome marathoner buddy for the run and was wearing one headphone, so she stayed slightly ahead with the lead runners and entertained us with her random karaoke (run-eoke?) Christi was foolish enough to lag behind and both keep me company and force me to keep up with the group so I wouldn't get lost. This meant she had 123 minutes of me whining to look forward to!

Like the Evil Witch, this only looks good on the outside

 After a few KILLER hills, I was actually whimpering out loud. I didn't sign up for this!---wait, yes I did. After running up a dirt road hill, we reached what I can only assume was City limits, so we mercifully paused for a photo op. I made the mistake at this point of checking our distance, and was crushed to see we weren't even half way. We still had a few kms before we were even halfway. At that point, if a taxi had pulled up, I would have quit and gone home. I was tired, I wasn't feeling good, and at no point so far had I hit a running groove: basically every minute was feeling like torture and I was not having fun. But, no taxi (or bus, or rickshaw or donkey) came to save me, so on we went.

I'd like to say things got better at the halfway point, but they didn't. I whined for the next hour or so as we worked our way around Signal Hill and Richmond. Sorry Christi, and thanks for putting up with me! At one point, I got a stabby pain in my foot so sudden and severe I shrieked and dead stopped. I limped along for a few minutes until the pain subsided, and it hasn't come back since. We finally made it back to the Running Room only to realize we were still a quarter of a km off the finish, so we had to run over to the Best Buy and back, twice passing the others doing their cool downs. I was so relieved we were done, I wanted to lie face down on the icy pavement for the rest of the day. But then I would have missed what happened next...

Part 2: 18k....that's 18000 calories consumed, people

Now, the only reason I pushed through the run was under the promise of Pannenkoeks. We peeled over to the restaurant to get on the waiting list, stopping only to grab a jug of chocolate milk to fight off the post-run DTs. Noticing the "No Outside Food or Drink" sign on the door but not wanting to wait in the cold, we huddled around the curio cabinet, surreptitiously swigging and passing the jug around like bad high school kids at the mall with a mickey swiped from their parent's stash. When we were sat, we apologized to our server about the milk (we're not bad kids, we totally felt guilty!) and instead of being mad, she brought us sample sizes of their own chocolate milk which she claimed was the best in the city. After trying it, we couldn't argue. She also brought us extra cookies with our tea because "we looked like we needed them". HOOORAY!

Things only got better from there. We decided since 18k was so much more than 16k, we needed to split 4 between the 3 of us---2 savory and 2 sweet. We opted for their feature: grilled chicken, Anjou pear, maple glazed pecans and Gruyere, along with a repeat of the awesome one from last week: potato, bacon and cheese. Then we sat there unable to concentrate on a subject for more than 10 seconds until the sweet, sweet nosh arrived on our table. After some hasty pannenkoek math, we dived in to what can only be described as heaven on a plate. Not only was it excellent, but we were seriously tapping into empty carb tanks at that point. I could almost feel life and happiness flowing back into me as I alternated bites of each, pausing only to slather the potato one in sour cream.

No, I can't believe Crystal left a cookie either!

Before we knew it, we were staring at empty plates...but not for long. Moments later, our dessert pannenkoeks arrived. One was banana Nutella with ice cream AND whipped cream, the other was the cinnamon bun one (sugar and cream cheese frosting) with added baked apples and maple pecans. At this point, I was so excited, I had to put my head in my lap to avoid passing out, so Crystal and Christi divvied up the goods. Again, sweet sugary joy coursed through ourveins as we mainlined our dessert.

That's what I call a money shot!

Eventually we flatlined, so full we actually left traces of Nutella on the table. All we could do at that point was rush home for showers and serious couch time, both of which were well earned.

 

This folks, is what running is all about...through perseverance comes great rewards!

Note the crazy looks in our eyes...