Last year I wrote about thunderstorms/tornadoes in Oklahoma and how we lost our home to the May 3rd ’99 tornado: see blog
There’s a lot more detail I could share about what happened, including being separated from family! My brother was with a friend at the mall, and we didn’t get to see him for 2 days! Talk about separation anxiety! [Read more...]
About a month ago, I saw my Family Physician for a yearly checkup. He’s a triathlete and marathoner, so he understands where I’m coming from as an athlete. I decided to do full bloodwork (I normally only get my ferritin checked), as I haven’t had it checked since Fall 2011 (~when I was at the Olympic Training Center, which you can read about my experience here). Since I decided to do full bloodwork, it was best to go through seeing a Physician, as our health insurance covered everything– this is what I recommend if you have health insurance and want a lot of different things tested. However, when I want to do a single test like Ferritin, it’s cheap and convenient to bypass seeing a Physician and going through ~www.healthcheckusa.com (or a similar site).
Here’s the tests we did and the results (plus normal ranges): [Read more...]
This past weekend I won my 10th marathon and 7th state to win in at the Lincoln Marathon, with a nail-biting 6 second win in 2:44:06! This was definitely one of the most satisfying wins of my career, despite coming up short of the course record. There is nothing like coming across the finish line feeling like mentally and physically you gave it everything you had. Doing marathons on back-to-back weekends was one of the hardest challenges of my career– a true test of speed, endurance, guts, and heart! [Read more...]
On Saturday I won my 9th marathon and 6th State to win in at the Illinois Marathon, crossing in 2:45:48. I had eyed this race for a few years when we lived in Indiana, but I always raced the Indy Mini Marathon. I finally got to do it this year! Now the challenge is bouncing back to race the Lincoln Marathon next weekend.
Thank you to everyone in Champaign for all the hospitality and support! Everyone was incredibly nice and helpful. The whole community of Champaign rallied around the event as well– lots of support on the course, aid stations were well marked (Gatorade and water), course was well marked/coned/signs, and I had a cyclist to guide me. I liked the course, as it reminded me a lot of Fargo, being fairly flat and lots of turns and course variety. I would definitely recommend the Illinois Marathon to others! [Read more...]
Excited to announce that I’m doing not one but TWO upcoming marathons: the Illinois Marathon next Sat. (April 27th) and the Lincoln Marathon the Sun. after (May 5th)! I couldn’t decide which one to do, so I’m doing both of them! My recovery been very fast for the past 3 races, so I’m ready to take on the challenge of marathons on back-to-back weekends (plus, check off two new States). I will make it back to make an appearance at the OKC Memorial Marathon on Sunday, although I’m not racing it this year.
My training has been very low-key since Two Oceans. I’ve mostly been in recovery mode and running lower mileage, which feels great. My legs have felt snappier with the lower mileage. With the two upcoming marathons, my priority will be on keeping the legs fresh and recovering.
I’m currently getting A-STYM treatments twice a week up in Tulsa, which is definitely (and FINALLY!) helping to break up the hard scar tissue knot on my heel (getting soft and crunchy, a good thing!). It’s like the PT version of Graston. They said it usually takes 6-8 treatments to resolve the problem. We’ll see how the next few weeks goes with the foot and racing.
Also, I got new shoes from Inov-8 that I’ve been wearing all week– Road XTreme 118s and 188s! I’ve been rotating both of them and trying to decide which pair to wear for the marathons.
I’ve been chronicling the treatment of my plantar fasciitis– I badly tore it in a freak accident with bees last August. Making the switch back to more minimalist shoes has probably been the single most helpful thing I’ve done so far to functionally get my foot back to normal. However, I’ve also been seeking out medical treatments to alleviate the pain and scar tissue, namely acupuncture and ART (in combination) with my Chiropractor, Kevin Jones at Chiroplus, and then also dry needling with my PT/runner friend in Tulsa, Terri Cassel. I’m thankful to have these two wonderful healthcare professionals in our area, and I highly recommend them to others! I thought it would be helpful to write a blog about my experience with both, as I’m sure there’s others out there considering these treatment methods and wondering how they compare and contrast. [Read more...]
Even Spiderwoman uses Roll Recovery!
Just before I left for my trip to Ireland/South Africa, I received the Roll Recovery in the mail from my good friends Adriana and Jeremy Nelson. The timing couldn’t be more perfect, cause guess what… sitting on a plane for a gazillion hours does bad things to your butt and hamstrings! [Read more...]
I’ve had a few people write to me asking about developing stress fractures post-pregnancy, wondering why, and how much Calcium and Vitamin D they needed to consume while breastfeeding. I figured I might as well blog about it, since people must be searching for information on this topic! [Read more...]
At my first ultra this past weekend at Two Oceans 56K, sponsored by the Nedbank Team and additional support from Inov-8, I finished 11th in 3:53. I’ve had some odd racing experiences, and this was definitely one of them. Not to worry– I trust I’m getting fitter, foot is improving, and I’ll keep moving forward.
This performance brought out a lot of emotions, reminiscent to almost every ‘new venture’ in my athletic career– I tend to be overly conservative on the first try. As with the 4th place in my first track race in the 7th grade (only the top 3 got medals), and coming from behind to finish 11th in my 2nd XC race in high school (only the top 10 got their name in the Daily Oklahoman)… I felt left out. I swore that never again would that happen. As my high school coach said after that 11th place performance, “I think you can run faster.” I went on to win that race 3 times, setting my high school record that still stands. Indeed, I will come back to run a lot faster at Two Oceans! [Read more...]
Our nephew, Alex, who’s 7 and quite the dancer and character– he’s the “strong man” in his class and beat me at arm wrestling!
I’ve been in Ireland over a week now and enjoying visiting family, eating lots of GREAT food, chocolate, numerous cups of coffee/tea with milk and sugar every day, and drinking Guinness like it’s water. Once I got here I realized my electrical converter wasn’t 3-pronged, so I haven’t been able to charge up my computer. No worries– I’ve traded my computer for the TV. RTE over here is AWESOME, and we even got to watch World XC Champs live!
The weather here has been a sharp contrast to the heat we left in Oklahoma… AND the heat I’ll encounter in Cape Town, Africa! It’s been much colder, wetter, and windier than I remember from my previous visits to Dublin. It’s like Oregon in the winter… except colder and windier! Fortunately, I brought lots of rain gear, and warm clothes (even for lounging around the house), but I probably should have brought running shoes with better grip. [Read more...]
