Catfish Aquathlon race report

Posted by Rachel

PART I: Catfish

Last year we signed up for an open water swim race called "Catfish". It was a 2.4 mile swim that was appropriately timed for Ironman training, and we tacked on a 90+ mile, >8000 ft climbing, hot-as-balls bike ride afterward, barely making it back before dark.

This year, I opted for the 1.2 mile swim + 3.5 mile run version. Sounded a hell of a lot better than last year! A week before the event, the venue was changed from Livermore (not close to my house) to Berkeley (way closer to my house, but colder/saltier/more questionable water). Due to partially to the temperature but mostly to the questionableness, I switch my race category from non-wetsuit to wetsuit, though it didn't matter because the aquathlons were combined.

Pre-race
This was a pretty small race (maybe a couple hundred participants over all of the race categories?), so check-in was really chill. I never even waited in line for a bathroom! I had a secret goal I set earlier in the week of running sub-7:00 miles for the run, so I did a bit of run warm up. Then I got in the water about 10 minutes before our wave started. One fun thing was that there were a handful of people there I knew. Shout out to Minori from LMJS who won the overall female 500 yard swim-3.5 mile run division, and my Club Hot Tub masters swim team members who both won their divisions as well (1.2 mile no wetsuit over 50 age group, and aquathlon 1.2 mile swim-3.5 mile run over 50 age group).

Do I look ready? Questionable. Ready to go back to sleep, maybe.

Swim (supposedly 1.2 miles, my watch clocked ~ 1.05 though it's not always accurate in the water).

First, a warning to anyone considering swimming at the Berkeley Marina. The bottom is GROSS. It is spongy and hella slimy, and then when you look at your feet they are covered with some sort of gray matter. So I warmed up a little and we are off! As I said, it was a small race so there weren't too many issues right at the start. Two guys pushed ahead of me right before the start (which Travers noticed from the shore) so I drafted off them for about 200 to 300 yards, but then I thought I should probably to try beat them so I pulled away.

The swim was really uneventful and I felt great! Here's a photo of me during the swim, although it's really unexciting because there's not much going on!

Look, there's me!

My overall time was 25:02, which according to m Garmin was a pace of 1:22/100 yard, including the time it took me to get out and up the swim ramp. That sounds very reasonable, so I'm tending to believe my Garmin distance is close. Also, I finished first in my wave (all 1.2 mile swimmers combined, men & women)!

Very nice volunteers had to pull everyone out of the Berkeley Marina. Thanks, volunteers!

Happy after swimming :)

Transition

Why am I so slow at transition?? First, I couldn't unzip my wetsuit! Another girl in transition helped me, which might be illegal but otherwise I would have been literally stuck in it. Then I couldn't get my shirt on because I was wet, then Travers started giving me crap for putting socks in real-time. Next year I really need to work on my strategy for tri transition in general. 2:18 to strip off a wetsuit and put on shirt/shorts/shoes.

Run

I had a secret goal of running sub-7:00 minute miles, so I just started cranking the run. There was a nice spectator around 0.25 mile who shouted at me "nice pace!". I looked down at my Garmin, encouraged, until I realized that yes... I was running a nice but highly unsustainable pace. Oops. I clocked the first mile in 6:45 but was struggling. I think I had swallowed too much salt water and was feeling nauseous. There was a water station at the turnaround where I chugged some fresh water (which maybe helped?) but led to a drop in pace of 6:58 for mile 2. I was still feeling nauseous but luckily 3.5 miles isn't that far. So I kept calculating how many minutes were left and then eventually I finally made it to the finish!

This is actually a screen shot from a video Travers took, but I surprisingly looked SO much better than I felt. Maybe I was overjoyed to be almost done running!

Total distance: 3.5 miles, 6:52 pace, 1st overall finisher in the 1.2 mile swim-3.5 mile run category!

Awards ceremony, after we all cheers'ed our pint glasses!

Then I went home and took a nap. That's the end of my Catfish race report!

PART II: "Exercising with singles" (pictures are omitted for your reading pleasure)

I have the heading for this part in quotes because I must've googled that exact phrase 10 times and found nothing useful. 3 weeks ago, shingles appeared on my C2/C3 dematome (on my neck). At first I thought it was a bug bite so on day 2 of bug bite/shingles I ran about 10 miles, which didn't prove to be a problem so I thought nothing could be THAT wrong. I also thought that the worst headache I ever had for 2 days straight was just a coincidence. On day 3, when I woke up at 5 am to go swimming and everything was even worse, not better, I gave in and went to the doctor. I didn't dare ask "can I workout?" because I feared the answer would be "um... no, psycho" so I came home and googled it instead. There's relatively little information out there so I thought I'd just share my experience with the internet:

-Get on the anti-viral (you have to go to the doctor within the 1st 3 days) - there's not scientific evidence that I found regarding recovery time with vs. without the drug but a lot of speculation that it helps, and I was about 80% better after one week and 95% after 2 weeks which seems reasonable!

-Listen to your body (I know.. duh, right?). One piece of advice that I got was don't work out at all because your body is trying to fight a virus and it can make you much worse. However, I did run 3 times in the first week (albeit at reduced volume and intensity) and that was fine. The dumb thing I did was try to go swimming with shingles in the neck. I was past the point of contagious (about 6 days after it first appeared) but the nerve pain in the neck was not having it. I got out early with massive headaches and was cursing myself for being an idiot. 4 days later though I was good to go for swimming, so just be patient!

Oakland Triathlon Race Report

Posted by Rachel

Sometimes when my alarm goes off at 4:00 am on the morning of a race, my first thought is "whyyyy do I do this to myself voluntarily?" On this particular race day, however, when my alarm went off my first thought was "I get to do a tri today!" That's a pretty good start.

The Oakland tri is only about a mile and a half from our place, so Travers and I loaded all of our stuff into backpacks, put our wetsuits on, and rode down to the transition. You can imagine who might be out in Oakland at 5 am on a Sunday morning (Saturday night?), and I wonder what people think when they see us riding down the road wearing wetsuits on a bicycle. We got to transition with plenty of time to set up and get to the start. We even found a bathroom in the JLS parking structure that nobody else seemed to know about with real sinks, which was a huge win! What a great start to the day.

Swim
The swim was a straight shot from the ferry terminal east to the boathouse. During warmup I didn't feel that great, but after about 5 minutes of swimming I got into a groove. The swim was current-aided, which I don't really like because I don't bust my ass in the pool to get carried to the finish during the race :p But I can't complain too much, since it makes the swim safer than going against the current. Since there weren't any photos of the Olympic distance swim finish, here's a photo of a random person I don't know jumping in. It's a very Oaklandish picture, which makes it awesome!

Even though after I got warmed up the swim felt great, I have to say it was very confusing. While I didn't have to sight very much because it was a straight line, once we got near the final buoy I had to stop several times and look around to locate the finish. We were in the second wave and I had passed some people from the first wave, and the people who were in front of me seemed to be dispersed everywhere. Luckily stopping to sight helped and I found the swim exit.

Swim result: The website seems to have subtracted 2 minutes from everyone's time, so I don't really know what my time was. 17:56 according to the official results and ~19:56 according to my watch. 2nd AG/2nd overall female, got completely smoked by a pro (the eventual AG and overall F winner).  

T1

There was a 0.8+ mile run from the swim exit to T1 including 3 flights of stairs up and down, so the race took our shoes to the swim exit for us. I'm usually a really slow transitioner, but I think adding a long-ish run helped my time look not-so-bad compared to everyone else. 10:18.

Bike

This was probably the best bike ride I have ever had! First of all, in every Olympic tri I've ever done my leg muscles felt like they were going to detach from my hips by the end of the bike ride. It took me until June of this year to realize that it's because I don't train in aero ever but then I try to hammer the race in it (duh, Rachel). So over the past 5 weeks I trained as much as I could in aero, and it really paid off! The ride felt great, I negative split the two loops, and was having FUN riding a bike!

I'm not really smiling in the photo, probably because it was taken during a turn. I'm not great at turning my bike, and there were a lot of turns in this course. Still tons of room for improvement, but my fastest ride ever.

Travers passed me really early on in the race, around mile 8. Last time we raced Oakland I held him off until mile 19, but not this time! I knew he was having an awesome race and he did... 21 mph! I should be pushing myself harder on the bike so I can get closer to that speed!

Bike result: Course was short (~23.6 miles), time was 1:15:11 for a speed of 18.8 mph. 4th AG.

T2

A regular transition. While I was putting on my running shoes I saw a fellow LMJS team member and we chatted briefly. I probably shouldn't be chatting since as I mentioned, I'm a very slow transitioner. 2:15.

Run

This run was on "home turf" and I just knew it was going to be way better than the Pleasanton run. I tried to hold back the first couple of miles because I was worried I was going to crash, but I was clocking ~ 7:15 miles and feeling good! I think my face says it all here:

I try not to worry too much about racing other people, but I did notice that around mile 2 I was passing back the girl in my AG that I saw pass me on the bike. After a loop around the lake, which is the place I know better than any other for running, we headed back into Jack London Square. The 3 flights of stairs up and down added about a minute to my 10k time (and everyone else's), but after that the finish was in sight!

Run result: 45:34, 2nd AG. 7:20 pace, but if you subtract the overpass it's ~ 7:10/mile.

Due to the cooler weather and nicer course, I was much happier heading into the finish line at Oakland than I was at CIT!

Overall result: There's still that 2 minute discrepancy from the swim... my final time was either a 2:31 (race results) or 2:33 (my Garmin). I got 2nd in my age group so we stayed for the awards. 

The winner only beat me by 22 minutes! 

So what's next? I signed up for the Catfish swim/run (my favorite 2-sport combination) at the end of August. After that I'm not quite sure what to do. Last winter I didn't bike at all to focus on running, but I feel like I'm starting to get into biking and will kind of miss it. I also haven't figured out how hard I want to train for Healdsburg, if I want to run Boston, etc. I probably ran too much last winter since I ended up with a torn groin, but I guess we'll see how it goes when I start planning my fall/winter/spring racing.

California International Triathlon: race report

Posted by Rachel

So this is the race I signed up for two weeks beforehand after watching a bunch of super fit people do the Escape from Alcatraz Tri. What can I say... it was really inspiring!

Two weeks later I'm scrambling around the night before the race trying to organize all of my things. Having not done a triathlon since the Ironman last July, I forgot the ridiculous amount of stuff you need for this sport. I shoved an entire gym bag full of tri crap and I still had to carry some of it separately. It's actually mind boggling to think that a crew of us drove 16 hours with cars full of full IM gear just last summer. Not sure how we all pulled it off. Travers had decided not to race CIT so I actually had some help with my stuff there anyway :)

I work right near the race venue, so I had no issues getting there. I was pretty much on autopilot and actually almost drove to work. Luckily the only other cars on the road all had bikes attached to them and I realized I should be following them. The lake was calm, e coli levels had come way down since the previous weekend's unacceptable levels (whew) and I had plenty of time to set up in transition.

 Right before the race start

Of the things I hadn't done in a year, putting on that wetsuit and open water swimming were on the list, so I decided I should probably warm up. Luckily everything felt good and I got ready to start.

Swim
The men and women ages 30-39 started together. My last 2 tri starts were miserable, washing machine-like experiences, so I decided to start to the outside this time. After about 300 m I realized I was seriously on the outside, but at least I had clear water. I adjusted so that I was actually swimming toward the first buoy, and other than that the swim went really great. I felt good and came out with a PR of about a minute for this distance (not including current-aided swims). After uploading the data, I was able to notice that my stroke rate has increased 2-3 right armstrokes/min since last year, which is probably how I dropped the time. Good to see that swimming 3x/week vs. 2x is actually doing something!
Official time: 22:35, 1st AG

I swear I was really happy about my swim, even though I look miserable in these photos

T1
Being disoriented after getting out of the water (as usual), I first turned the wrong way. I realized I was running away from transition, so I turned around, got in, and found my bike. I had decided not to wear my shirt under my wetsuit, and my first mistake was to put my helmet on before putting on my shirt. My second mistake was thinking that I could put on a shirt easily while wet. Needless to say, T1 took me FOREVER.
Official time: 2:38 (slower than pretty much everyone else)

Bike
I have been training really hard on the bike but didn't put my aero bars on until 6 days before the race. Lesson learned - if you want to race in a position, it would be a good idea to train in it. The first 12 miles or so felt fine. There was a little bit of a climb (maybe 300 ft over 3 miles) and I was able to push fairly hard up it. After the downhill was where I started getting a bit uncomfortable. First of all, my inner thigh muscles on both legs were KILLING me. I kept shifting positions because I was almost worried that I might be injuring myself, although I might be mentally hypersensitive to that coming off a groin pull earlier this year. Then there were times when there was nobody around and I was wondering if I was still on the course at all. Even though I work in the same town as the tri, there were point in the race when I had NO IDEA where I was. Miles 19-25 seemed to take FOREVER, but finally I made it back to T2 without permanently injuring anything. Don't worry, I've been training in aero ever since! The other disappointing thing about cycling is that I rode my fastest speed ever- 18.6 mph, which is really fast for me, versus 17.9 mph last year- and it only equates to about a 1.5 minute drop in total time. That means if I want to drop a several minutes I have to improve by a few miles per hour. I have a long way to go on the bike :p
Official time: 1:20:28 (18.6 mph), 10th AG

In both of these photos not only am I not aero, but I'm smiling like I'm on a Sunday ride. I do NOT remember the bike part being that fun!

T2

Another horrible transition. When I got back, someone had put their bike in my spot and the rack was somehow full (or at least the bikes were spaced such that it seemed full). So I kept trying to inch this person's bike over, inch by inch, and each time mine still didn't fit. I finally got sick of that and shoved their bike over and managed to rack mine and everything was fine. Why didn't I do that in the first place?

Official time: 2:26 (really slow again, but at least I remembered my run number belt this year)

Run

I forgot to mention above that the CIT triathlon was my first ever tri in 2011, making this my 5th anniversary of my first tri! In addition to that, one thing I remembered about my first tri was that this run course was brutal - it was hot, with several short steep hills and mostly on gravel. I also remember cheering for people on this course one year with Chen and her trying to tell everyone "you're on the best sport!", and everyone looking at her like they wished someone would tape her mouth shut. Anyway, it wasn't long before I was reminded that this IS a pretty tough run. The course itself isn't what you'd call fast and the heat only makes it worse. I felt terrible after about mile 2 but my running has been solid lately, so I somehow just kept chugging along. 

Not smiling

Finally, as it always does, the run ended. Once I got back onto the pavement I pushed it into the finish where I was rewarded with a washcloth soaked in freezing cold water - the best.

Official run time: 46:12, 2nd AG

Can't tell if I'm happy, miserable, relieved, about to fall over, or what's going on here. 

Total official time: 2:34:20, 2nd AG (F 30-34)

This was my first triathlon podium, so I made Travers wait around with me for the awards ceremony :p  USAP gives pint glasses as their awards, which is an excellent prize. 

Kudos to USA Productions for having free race photos - very cool. I would definitely recommend this race, although if you're going to be serious about competing or going for a PR you should probably check out a loop of the run course beforehand so you know what to expect.

For me, next up is the Oakland tri. I'm not sure how much time I have to make improvements to my cycling, and the OakTri bike course is a little bit abnormal in that it has TONS of turns and the pavement quality is really sub-par. I'll just have to hit the trainer hard, actually practice in aero, check out the course a few times since it's in my backyard, and see what I can do!

[PS - You know you work with data too much when the first draft of your race report says "error bars" instead of "aero bars".]

Well, it has been a while!

Posted by Rachel

I logged in here intending to write about last weekend's century ride, but looking back at my last post I feel like I've missed a lot! Here's a brief summary of things that have happened since March:

Groin injury - totally recovered (woohoo!). Recovery stayed on the up after the Oakland half and by April I was back into running hard, even track workouts.
Pacific Master's Short Course swim meet - beat my times from last year in everything, so I'd consider that a success! 
Trainer Road - started doing a lot more TR workouts and it has been going well! After just a few weeks of starting biking again I re-tested my FTP and it was 2 W higher than last year in the middle of training. Have been working off my new FTP since then and I think I have been getting stronger on the bike!

Now the event I came here to write about - the America's Most Beautiful Bike Ride century in Lake Tahoe! I only signed up for this because my aunt was riding with Team In Training to celebrate her birthday + being 20 years cancer-free. I figured that being out there on the course doing the ride too was an additional way to support her efforts. Several members of our family also came out to watch and the weekend was tons of fun. I am so so impressed with what she did - a relatively new cyclist with no endurance sports background, and she finished 100 miles with a smile, raising a ton of money for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society in the process!

Much less impressive was my day, but it was slightly comical and I figured worth writing about. First of all, I totally meant to train for this century. Seriously. But then I went on vacation in Mexico, then the following week got sick, then the following week got a finger infection (from the gym, don't ask), and so on. 

I'll put a photo of Mexico here because it's by far the nicest image of the 3 options above

So I ended up doing a grand total of 3 rides over 35 miles , and only 1 ride over 50 miles since last July (a 62er). I had no idea if that was enough. When we got to Tahoe, Travers and I chose to run and hike on Saturday instead of bike. My aunt went for a 10 mile bike ride to make sure everything was working ok which I thought was crazy, thinking 'I'll save the pain for the century, thanks'. 

Views from the hike - pretty awesome. I do love Tahoe in the summer.

Sunday was the ride. They had a rolling start and I decided I would go toward the end the avoid congestion. My aunt's group started at 5:30 am before the mass start at 6, since they were the self-proclaimed "slow" group. It was about 6:15 when I decided to fill up my tires, and one minutes later we just hear "hisssssss". My front tire had a tiny slit in it and the air was rushing out. No WONDER my aunt went for that ride to check out her bike...good thinking but too late for me! I just started laughing (I was really tired and found it hilarious) and Travers was annoyed: "You think this is funny? Now we only have 1 tube between the 2 of us!" He insisted I take the tube and he went without one; my tire was maybe compromised so he said I was more likely to get a flat. So we changed it and I made it to the start in time for the very last wave at 6:45 am.

The ride was going ok except it was really congested. The road being closed for the uphill switchback portion near the beginning made it a lot safer. Finally at mile 35 on the way out to Truckee I caught up to my aunt. I was so excited and talked to her for about a minute when I hear "hissssssss". My tire was flat AGAIN. I changed it but bent the tube stem so I couldn't fill it more than 25 psi. Tubeless, I crossed my fingers and just rolled 8 miles into Truckee. Luckily they had a rest stop there with a normal bike pump, a tube for $5, and some much needed bathrooms. 

Top of the hill near Emerald Bay

After Truckee, I found my aunt again near mile 58 and we rode into lunch at mile 70 together. My family was there to greet us and I hung out with them for a while. I hadn't taken in calories since the last rest stop (25 miles back), which was a rookie error so I shoved my face with tons of food as per usual. After a long lunch, my aunt was planning to stick with her training group so I decided to just ride in the last 30 and get the thing over with. There was a relatively long/hot 6 - 8 mile climb at mile 80, but it wasn't terribly steep. I thought of this as the type of ride I was training for LAST summer (super hot and hilly, not hilly and freezing cold rain). 

A view partway up the climb. I can't resist stopping at anything called "scenic overlook".

It wasn't until mile 93 or so that my ass/shoulders/neck/back/toes really started bothering me. Considering my complete lack of distance biking training, I was really thankful I had made it this far but at the same time ready for the ride to be over. I saw a sign that said "South Lake Tahoe - 4 miles". It occurred to me that the ride was going to be short and it was - 98 miles. I saw some fools riding in circles around the parking lot after the finish to reach 100 miles (that was SO me last year), but not me this time. I rode back to the hotel, showered, watched my aunt finish the ride, then watched the Warriors destroy CLE. The worst part of the weekend was the 3.5 hour commute to work from Tahoe the next morning.

So that was last weekend. This morning, we went to watch the Escape from Alcatraz triathlon. That was so cool. We saw multiple future Rio Olympians and tons of other amazing athletes. I'm already signed up for the Oakland Tri, but now I'm one click away from signing up for one more this summer, just because tri is awesome and how can you watch one and not want to do it???

Oakland Half Marathon: race report (sort of)

Posted by Rachel

This is the first year since 2010 that I haven't run the Oakland Marathon. As disappointing as it was to change my registration from the full to half thanks to a groin injury that I ran the LA Marathon on (oops), it was definitely the right decision.

Not running the marathon is less stressful in many ways than running the marathon. First, my aunt invited me on a bike ride the day before the Oakland race. She is training for her first 100 mile bike ride with Team in Training, and because I didn't have a full marathon looming I was able to accept! We rode Paradise Loop together, and despite the less than ideal weather it was a great ride!

Later that night after stopping by the expo, Chen and I conquered about a bottle and a half of wine between the two of us (even though she was running the full... but let's face it she's a champ) while watching the movie Bridesmaids. A pretty solid Saturday night if you ask me.

The next morning, Travers and I went out to cheer for the marathon start at 7:10 am. There weren't many other spectators out there with cowbells at that time, but it was fun to support the full marathoners and see a lot of familiar faces. The half didn't start until 9:10, so after that we had plenty of time go back upstairs, eat breakfast, foam roll, watch TV, etc. Then about 15 min before the race, we headed down to the start.

We didn't really have any race plan, but Travers and I had decided we would run at a comfortable pace together and just have some fun with it. I felt really good and I'm always inspired by the support of the community in Oakland, and we ended up going a little bit faster than I had planned (7:43 Garmin pace average, whereas we had talked about targeting 8:00). I was pleasantly surprised at being capable of finishing a half at that pace considering I had only run about 65 miles over 5 weeks since LA. My neighbors were there to cheer us into the finish, and I looped back just in time to see Chen come in at an awesome training run time of 3:48 (where's your race report, Chen!?). Then, of course, we had mimosas and got brunch. 

Recovery from the groin injury has been very, very strange. I took some time off and got a sports massage but was still in pretty severe pain for about 1- 2 weeks following that. However, I continued to ease back into exercise and, as abruptly as the injury started out of nowhere, it just started disappearing. I was worried after the half that running faster than planned would prove to be dumb, and my leg was a little bit sore later that day, but the injury has continued to improve since then. I don't feel any pain at all now when I'm running, and only a few times in the past week did I notice any tightness or sign that I had suffered an injury. So hopefully this improvement trajectory continues.

We also signed up for a few future races:

-Pacific Masters Swimming meet - April

-LMJS 4th Sunday run in April - took a training class and going to volunteer as a guide for a visually impaired runner at this race

-AMBR century ride in Tahoe (June) 

-Oakland Triathlon (July)

-Healdsburg Half Marathon (October)

-Oakland Marathon 2017 (Haha, yup. Determined to run the full next time.)

Injury denial and a different perspective

Posted by Rachel

For a while there, I was thinking that as I got older and more experienced at running I was becoming better at making good/smart running decisions. It turns out, this is false.

So here's what really happened. About 2 weeks before the LA Marathon (while I was tapering), my inner thigh, outer thigh, and hip started hurting. Every single day when I woke up in the morning, it hurt to walk. At first, I dismissed this as one of the famous "phantom taper pains". The problem is it persisted every single day. The only good thing about it was that it would actually diminish as I ran. "It can't be a real injury," I thought. "Real injuries don't feel better after a run." Also, false.

Since I've already blogged about this, I think we all know what happened. I convinced myself this wasn't a real injury and ran the LA Marathon. In hindsight, I am lucky that the marathon didn't make this thing worse. In hindsight, I am also really lucky that compensating for this injury for several weeks didn't cause another injury.

This past Saturday, after almost a month of being in pain that would only disappear sporadically after exercise, I went to see my sports massage/bodywork guy. At first he told me I had a tight ligament in my hip (so far, this wasn't bad). Then, after working some more, he informed me that I had pulled a groin and had a bunch of muscles stuck together everywhere (causing the tight hip ligament and many other problems). At this point he was kind of looking me like I was a psychopath for running marathon on it, but saying no such thing. He fixed a bunch of the problems but told me I was to REST (walking only, no swim/bike/run) for 4 - 7 days so things could heal up. When I left his office, the first thing I thought was "Hmm, should I run the Couple's Relay tomorrow?"

The Couple's Relay is hosted every February by our local running club, where 2 people team up and run a 5k each. In mixed gender couples the girl runs first and the guy runs second. After all of my (smarter than me) running friends weighed in, it was decided that I would walk and NOT RUN the first leg. Travers was really awesome about it. I walked a 5k in 42:49 and finished behind a couple hundred people. The only person I beat was a lady carrying her dog, and Travers started his race after several teams had already finished both relay legs. But he stuck it out and supported me anyway - for better or worse, right?

Being in the back of the pack offers a different perspective. It's hard in a very different way than being "in the race". When you're in a 5k race, you're running so hard you feel like you're going to puke. When you're in back, there's nobody around. You're getting lapped, and you know those people will be enjoying the post race festivities long before you. The spectators on the course are cheering for the super fast people, but when you come by they look at you quizzically like, "hmm, is this girl really in the race?" This was a good experience for me because walking a 5k race was challenging in a completely different way than I expected.

In conclusion, this stupid injury helped me get over my post-marathon burnout real quick. Looking forward to getting back out there soon!

Combatting the Cold

I just verified that it has been 18ish months since I contributed to the blog. That is far too long…my
apologies.

Since my last post, I was diagnosed with a left femur stress fracture, moved across the country, and have  run a total of 5 races (4 in 2015 and 1 in 2016). The road to recovery has been a fickle web, woven with depression and self-doubt. While it has taken much longer to return to decent shape than it has in the past (I know, I know, I am getting older), I think I am almost there.

The intent of this post is not to review the failures of 2015 (there were many), but instead to provide
some helpful tips for combatting cold weather while you run.

As I mentioned before, my husband and I relocated from the land of perfect weather (the Bay area) to
Boston.  With the exception of the occasional east coast visits, it had been a long time since I have run regularly in cold weather. I grew up on the east coast and have vivid memories of training through the winter months. I remember early morning training runs when I could not feel or open my hands without assistance. I suffer from Reynaud’s phenomenon, something I am sure many of you are familiar with. Basically, when the temps are low and there is moisture in the air, my hands and feet lose circulation and hurt like hell. So when winter rolled around again, I feared for a very painful training cycle. However, cold weather gear has improved so much since I last lived on the east coast that I have found running in the cold to be much more enjoyable. I am sure you are all thinking LAYERS, and you are not wrong, but there are specific articles of clothing that I have found essential to combatting the cold. The key components I like to run in when the temps are lower than or hovering around freezing (from the inside outward) include the following:

The Base:
Top:  Typically I will use UA Cold Gear  or Craft Crew Neck as my base layer, the layer that comes in direct contact with my skin.

Bottoms: I use a lined pair of running tights. My current favorites include a pair of Asics Thermopolis Tights and a pair of random tights I bought from TJMax.

Socks: I highly recommend Smartwool or socks to keep your feet warm and dry.

Insulation Layer: If the temps are below freezing, then I will use an insulation layer such as a thin fleece. My favorites are actually old race swag from the Celtic Solstice 5 Miler and the Oakland Running Festival.

Outer layers: The Shell: I wear my hybrid full-zip jacket from Title 9. This jacket has been a life saver for me for sure. It is wind resistant with a plush fleece interior. It even includes thumb holes to provide extra insulation for the wrist and palms.

Gloves: Gloves are an essential component of running comfort in the cold. I love my Saucony convertible mittens. Admittedly, my hands are almost always cold, especially when the temps hover around 20 degrees or lower, but with the help of these gloves, they eventually warm up after a few miles.

Headgear: My choice in head warmth is temperature dependent. At temps above or around freezing, I
will opt for ear warmers; they typically provide enough warmth and ear protection to be comfortable.
However, when the temperatures drop below freezing I opt for a hat and an ear-warmer/headband.

Safety:
During the winter months, we get less than ideal sunlight for training. In addition inclement weather can make for some pretty awful visibility conditions. That said, I like to wear a high visibility running vest outside of my jacket. I am more comfortable knowing that a car will spot me at greater distances when I am wearing the vest. In addition, I wear my high visibility bracelet.

Sub 30 degree - running gear

What do you prefer to run in when you run in the cold? I have been considering a face mask lately for colder and windy conditions, any suggestions?


Upcoming races:
Smuttynose Palooza 5k
Hyannis Marathon